376 JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
THE PRINCIPLES ON WHICH EDUCATION 
SHOULD BE BASED. 
ABSTRACT OF MR. W. F. COLLIERS PAPER. 
(Read February 25th, 1875.) 

Tue education of the mind may be said to be the most important 
subject to which the attention of mankind can be directed. In 
considering the education of the mind, it is obvious that the mind 
itself must be our first study, for we cannot cultivate successfully 
that of which we know little or nothing. The study of the mind 
is called psychology, and in making an inquiry into the nature of 
our minds, we are conscious of its consisting of three plainly 
marked divisions—the feelings, the intellect, and the will A 
sound system of education ought, therefore, to be based on the 
cultivation of those divisions, each being cultivated with a due 
regard to the effect to be produced on the whole. In treating of 
education, we have to recognize the fact, that minds differ before 
education can begin. It is impossible to estimate the relative 
power of the original mind, and the education by which it is 
developed; but that they are two forces, and that education is a 
very influential one, we do not doubt. To educate the mind from 
infancy to manhood, the feelings, the intellect, and the will must 
be so cultivated that the whole may be in as perfect a state as 
possible for the enjoyment of the individual and the human race, 
the good of the individual being the same as that of the race ; for, 
if all individuals are taken into account, no distinction can be 
found, 
In considering first the cultivation of the feelings, it will be found 
that they consist of different kinds, and that a further analysis is 
necessary. ‘They are divided into the sensations and the emotions, 
or the peripheral and central. The sensations are known as the five 
senses—seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and touching—the result 
of impressions received from without; and also hunger, thirst, the 
