1855.] On Mental Education. 4-65 



good in respect of high things to the very highest. I am con- 

 tent to bear the reproach. Yet, even in earthly matters, I 

 believe that the invisible things of HIM from the creation of 

 the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things 

 that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead ; and I 

 have never seen anything incompatible between those things 

 of man which can be known by the spirit of man which is 

 within him, and those higher things concerning his future, 

 which he cannot know by that spirit. 



Claiming, then, the use of the ordinary faculties of the mind 

 in ordinary things, let me next endeavour to point out what 

 appears to me to be a great deficiency in the exercise of the 

 mental powers in every direction ; three words will express 

 this great want, deficiency of judgment. I do not wish to 

 make any startling assertion, but I know that in physical 

 matters multitudes are ready to draw conclusions who have 

 little or no power of judgment in the cases ; that the same is 

 true of other departments of knowledge ; and that, generally, 

 mankind is willing to leave the faculties which relate to judg- 

 ment almost entirely uneducated, and their decisions at the 

 mercy of ignorance, prepossessions, the passions, or even 

 accident. 



Do not suppose, because I stand here and speak thus, 

 making no exceptions, that I except myself. I have learned 

 to know that I fall infinitely short of that efficacious exercise 

 of the judgment which may be attained. There are exceptions 

 to my general conclusion, numerous and high ; but if we desire 

 to know how far education is required, we do not consider the 

 few who need it not, but the many who have it not ; and in 

 respect of judgment, the number of the latter is almost infinite. 

 I am moreover persuaded, that the clear and powerful minds 

 which have realized in some'degree the intellectual preparation 

 I am about to refer to, will admit its importance, and indeed 

 its necessity ; and that they will not except themselves, nor 

 think that I have made my statement too extensive. 



As I believe that a very large proportion of the errors we 

 make in judgment is a simple and direct result of our perfectly 

 unconscious state, and think that a demonstration of the 

 liabilities we are subject to would aid greatly in providing a 

 remedy, I will proceed first to a few illustrations of a physical 



