the systematic departments of knowledge, which constitute literary or scientific instruction, can take place only when reason is sufficiently developed to enable the learner to appreciate the importance of these departments of instruction, and to feel the necessity of system in the pursuit. It is only in the third period that it can be commenced methodically. In the first two periods, the principal object of éducation should be to give to the child physical, moral, and intellectual habits, as a preparation for the time when self-education shall begin. We must then early accustom him to rely little on the assistance of others, and to seek in himself the sources of his own improvement. The conviction once acquired that progress depends on self-exertion, will be the starting-point in self-education.

Spontaneousness should be encouraged in childhood; self-will, so common among young people, should be regulated, not broken: it may become, if properly directed, noble firmness in manhood. Every tendency to a vice might, by judicious management, be turned to account for the acquisition of a virtue. By suitable training of the will, a child may be made to pursue virtue and knowledge for their own sakes, and be stimulated to accomplish, each day, something more than on the preceding. This continual endeavour to surpass oneself is a motive to improvement much purer and nobler than the desire of surpassing others, which springs from pride and vanity. The secret satisfaction attached to success in the performance of any action, or in the acquisition of any information, is one of the most powerful incentives to mental exertion in every pursuit. It is thus that will engenders patience and perseverance, the two great instruments of genius.

SECT. III.-MORAL ACQUIREMENTS.

The moral faculties are the instruments by which are acquired the qualities which constitute moral perfection. It is especially on their proper cultivation during the first three periods that the success of education depends; for the early practice of duties, virtues, affections, and inclinations which proceed from them, having once rendered them habitual, the object will be attained: morality will then be a second nature to the individual. Virtuous habits being once formed, there is little danger that he will afterwards turn to a bad purpose the power which physical and intellectual cultivation confers on him. This moral training, the surest preservative against evil tendencies, is now the more

necessary as the progress of the arts and sciences daily increases the power of man.

The moral faculties to which we have now adverted are often erroneously included in the class of moral acquirements, and the latter in that of innate powers; the virtues, duties, affections, and inclinations which constitute the moral acquirements, and which are the object of moral education, are not either, in general, clearly defined, or sufficiently distinguished the one from the other. This confusion has not a little contributed to retard the progress of educational science.

Obedience to parents, veracity, sincerity, probity, gratitude, discretion, loyalty, patriotism, are not virtues, but social duties, or obligatory acts of Justice towards others; the neglect of them is a transgression which calls for punishment. The fulfilment of duty, which it is the office of conscience to secure, merits no acknowledgment; whereas social virtues, based on self-denial, are self-imposed sacrifices which claim gratitude: the absence of a virtue, although blameable, is not, according to human justice, liable to penalty. Modesty, charity, generosity, hospitality, forgiveness, are the virtues which, with filial love, benevolence, humanity, affability, and other affections, constitute so many species of Goodness, and which spring from sympathy, as we showed in treating of that moral faculty.

These duties, virtues, and affections belong to social morality, and are practised with a view to the well-being of others; but there exists another class of moral qualities which have for their object the well-being of their possessors: these are the acquirements which form the elements of Wisdom or individual morality. They arise chiefly from well-directed self-love, as do the social qualities from sympathy. In this class may be mentioned1. Duties, such as temperance, frugality, moderation in desires, resignation, industry, self-respect, consistency. 2. Virtues, as meekness, equanimity, patience, prudence, perseverance, courage, fortitude. 3. Inclinations, as love of cleanliness, of simplicity, of order, of occupation, desire of improvement, and of esteem. All the moral qualities which constitute Justice will gain for us the esteem of our fellow-creatures; those which constitute Goodness will secure their affection, and those which constitute Wisdom will command their admiration.

It is time that a system of moral education based on the constitution of man, his duties to God, to his fellow-creatures, and to himself, be formed, whereby he may fulfil the designs for

which he was created. He who shall give a clear and complete nomenclature of the moral faculties and acquirements, will lay the first stone of this system, and will thus confer a boon on society. With regard to the numerous faculties and organs with which phrenological educationists have enriched their catalogue, we doubt whether sound philosophy will ever recognise them.

Nature is always sparing of causes, and prodigal of effects: with a few elements variously distributed and combined, she produces in the physical world an endless variety of organic and inorganic matter; so, in the moral and mental constitution of man, a few innate principles suffice to produce innumerable dispositions and characters. All human beings, with the exception of those whose cases are anomalous, are born with the same faculties, as all the lower animals of the same species, are endowed with the same instincts, and as all plants and minerals of the same kind, are formed of the same elements, and possess the same specific properties. It is contrary to the simplicity, uniformity, and universality of nature's laws to consider the numberless dispositions of men as so many primitive principles, and to suppose that faculties, the essential characteristics of the human species, would remain unmanifested in a great number of individuals, owing to supposed depressions of the cranium.

Consistency and analogy incline us to recognise only a very limited number of innate powers, physical, moral, and intellectual, as common to all individuals, but varying in quality and activity in each. With regard to the infinite diversity of human character, it is only the effect of the relative proportion of energy of these powers which, differing in all individuals, produces different combinations, that are again modified by the ever-varying circumstances under which they act. The climate, the laws, the form of government, the degree of civilisation, the social relations, the mode of life, and the kind of education, exert all a direct influence over the human character.

That which phrenologists, for example, call the faculty of tune, does not appear to us to be a simple primitive power, but the result of an exquisite delicacy of hearing and of a peculiar sensibility of the nervous system, joined to that kind of sympathy which prompts to the imitation of modulations. What they call the faculty of language seems to be a compound power resulting from an active disposition to communication and imitation-the offspring of sympathy-combined with correct hearing, flexible vocal organs, clear conception, ready recollection, and quick

analogy. The energy of this power depends on that of the perceptive and the reflective faculties which elaborate thoughts, on the social dispositions which prompt to the communication of them, on the mental operation which attaches ideas to conventional signs, and on the physical functions which produce vocal sounds and articulations. We are, consequently, inclined to suppose that this very complicated power proceeds from the simultaneous action of different portions of the brain, rather than from the narrow cerebral localisation which phrenologists assign to it with so much mathematical precision. The leading facts and principles upon which phrenology rests appear consistent with general induction and the laws of our constitution; but this science, yet in its infancy, fails by the multiplicity of the elements, as exhibited in its nomenclature. Although it must be acknowledged that its investigations have successfully aided in elucidating the connection of the brain with emotions and mental manifestations, it is doubtful that they will ever lead to a sound system of psychology.

Without pretending to establish a standard classification, we present the five faculties which we have noticed as the only moral principles which seem to be primitive and universal. We have collected in the following Table the principal qualities, or moral acquirements, which result from a proper exercise of these faculties, and which are the great object of moral education, with an indication of the approximate age at which they may be gradually acquired :