Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

devoted to these highest elements of our being, even though the lower suffer neglect in consequence? As happiness is the object of our being, and as these higher faculties confer a higher order of happiness, should you not confer on THEM the main part of your existence, and put off your worldly desires with the mere scraps of time? Which will render you happiest during life, and at its close; to have devoted several hours of each day, perhaps half of your entire time, to the cultivation of your intellect and morals, and the balance to worldly pursuits, or to have devoted all to the latter? Now is the time to make your choice between riches on the one hand, including fashionable display, or, on the other, comfort without style, and a vast range of intellectual acquisitions. Will you spend all your time in toiling for property ? Will you not rather make it a "fixed fact" of your life to spend four, five, or six hours every day, however pressing your other engagements, in study—not in dozing over books, but in real hard, vigorous, mental application? Consider some of the advantages of this course. how great the amount of knowledge you might thus acquire! Mathematics, mechanics, natural philosophy, chemistry, electricity, history, anatomy, phrenology, and physiology, might each be as familiar to you as your alphabet. Above all, what a world of material would they furnish for thought during the balance of your time!

How vast the range,

Bear in mind that your intellectual progress would not then be as slow, or mind as dull, or memory as traitorous as now, because, as action strengthens, so those energies which now go to your stomach or muscles, would be in part diverted to your head; so that your brain would perFORM much more in a given time then than now. That weakness of memory and obtuseness of mind of which you now complain, would give place to clearness, retentiveness, and power. The habitual cultivation of your mind will enable you to make more progress in a day than you now do in a month. Use your stomach and muscles as little as you now do your mind, and how soon would such indolence render them as inefficient as your brain now is. You can form no conception of the increase of intellectual capacity which would result from four hours of hard study daily. Make the trial, if it be only a month; and then judge from a little discipline what a good deal will effect.

Do not excuse yourself by urging that you cannot discipline your mind while engaged in manual labor, or any of the other common avocations of life. On the contrary, you can study BETTER by commingling study with labor, or business. No mistake can be greater than the common supposition that the improvement of the mind requires the WHOLE time to be devoted to study. No one can learn as much by studying all the time as by studying some five or six hours per day, and giving the balance of the time to business, or labor. Hence the latter become actual helps to the former. So, too, study facilitates labor and business. A young man

can actually perform more MANUAL labor, or transact more business, in a life-time, provided he will study five hours daily, than if he devoted all his time to labor or business. On the other hand, he will perform more mental labor by studying five hours per day, and giving the balance of his time to labor or business, than if he did not thus labor or do business. I will not stop here to show how and why this is so, for my other writings fully establish this point; but simply make the appeal to young men whether they will not kill both birds-the worldly and the intellectual-since they can kill both together just as easily as either separately. Though to do this they must work while they work, and study while they study; yet this is the way to do both.

In order to aid this intellectual culture, PROCURE A LIBRARY. As workmen must have tools, so those who would cultivate their minds must begin by obtaining HELPS to study. Not that I would have you mere bookworms, but I recommend reading for two reasons-first, as a means for obtaining knowledge, and, secondly, as a means of QUICKENING THOUGHT. Mind excites mind; and though you should by no means swallow unchewed what your author administers, you should nevertheless read with a mind open to conviction, canvassing inch by inch, receiving the good, but rejecting the bad. Yet never stop where he leaves you. Reflect on the subject treated. Think the whole matter in hand over, in all its ramifications and bearings. Instead of passively imbibing his conclusions, use him to aid you in forming your own—as a means of setting your own mind vigorously at work.

One word as to the selection of your library. Do not confine it to any ONE class of books, whether religious, or scientific, or amusing, or historical. Remember that EACH of your faculties requires its appropriate food. While some buy all Methodist, others all Catholic, others all Episcopalian, others all Presbyterian, others all infidel, others all scientific books, do you purchase some of ALL kinds, that you may, "try all things, and hold fast that which is good."

But of all other books, those on PHRENOLOGY AND PHYSIOLOGY will benefit you most, because they teach you the laws of your being, and the conditions of happiness, and that with all the authority of established science. Scientific books should take precedence of all others, because they teach you nature, and conduct you "through nature up to nature's God;" and phrenological and physiological science should stand first among scientific works, because these sciences relate to the highest department of nature-mainly, man and man's MIND, which is the highest department of man. Neither silver, nor gold, nor jewels, nor stock, nor houses, nor lands, nor any other species of property whatever, can at all compare with this in its intrinsic value, nor in the happiness it is capable of conferring upon you. And I submit to the practical experience of all those who possess this class of books, for the correctness of these remarks.

In conclusion, let every young man begin life with the fixed determi. nation to spend a portion of each day in the vigorous, powerful, and exclusive exercise of his intellectual faculties—in the discipline of his mind, in the acquisition of useful knowledge, in the study of nature, and in reasoning on those great moral truths taught throughout every department of her works.

For the American Phrenological Journal

ARTICLE XLIX.

DEMANDS OF THE AGE ON YOUNG MEN. BY LUCIUS HOLMES.

In pointing out the demands of the present age upon young men, it is necessary perhaps to speak of a few of its peculiarities. The present age is distinguished, then, for what may be termed its CELERITY.

We move by steam power. Our speed is rail-road speed. Enterprises are planned, taken up, and carried through, with an amazing swiftness. We think, conclude, decide quickly. We have but little patience for very abstract speculations, elaborate arguments, minute commentaries, or circuitous explanations. We have only time to hear or read what is clear, pointed, and practical. Again, we are distinguished FOR A KIND

OF IRREVERENCE FOR FREE INQUIRY FOR FIRST PRINCIPLES, AND A DETERMINATION NOT TO BE MISERABLE.

Long-believed dogmas, immemorial proverbs and political maxims, venerated usages, established customs, ancient forms and old habits, holy relics and primitive ideas, are freely discussed, and, perhaps, unqualifiedly condemned, and unsparingly ridiculed. Men speak frankly to the king, shake hands familiarly with the president, stand unabashed before the senator, joke the priest, and scold at the doctor. In arguing with men now, one who does not wish to be laughed at, must pay attention to something besides inferences and conclusions—he must be careful to have good premises. It will not do to assume or presume much, if one wishes to stand approved by modern logic. Men (speaking generally) are not looking back, or up, but glaringly right straight ahead. And they are beginning to conclude that men were not born to be miserable. Misery used to make men humble, penitent, and, in a way, pious. Now it makes them restive, rebellious, and, it may be, desperate, and to feel their real importance. It used to be thought that misery came down directly from God, and that he sent it for the spiritual good of men. But now, some at least have made the discovery, that all our miseries reach us circuitously-a small part coming round through nature being avoidable, and the other springing from us and our fellows, which might be dispensed with.

Among the faults of our age which not unfrequently appear, may be mentioned some impatience, and want of candor, a little recklessness, some ingratitude, or rather forgetfulness of gratitude, and occasionally we witness the bold avowal of false principle.

Now if the above descriptions are truthful, every young man who would meet the demands of this age, and act an efficient part therein, must see the necessity, in the first place, of INDUSTRIOUS ACTIVITY.

Whoever stands still, will soon be left behind, by a distance equal to the diameter of the whole visible horizon. Many ideas are being constantly struck out. To keep up a general intelligence of passing events, a person must read much, and remember well. When a man sees a good occasion for doing something, he must perform the deed immediately, or the occasion will pass from him in the general whirl, or another will become the author of the deed, and reap its advantage.

Secondly, HE Must seek for suBSTANTIAL KNOWLEDGE AND PERSONAL EXCELLENCES. The world, i. e., those men who now do the business of the world, and are beginning to sway it, care but a trifle about from whom a man is descended, or to whom he is related, or what titles he writes after his name, or what certificates he has received, or what particular body of men off yonder once did him great honors. They ask, categorically and simply, What do you know, what can you say, and how do you live? Yes-HOW DO YOU LIVE? for the world has not yet lost respect for a good life. No, it has not forsaken God, or Heaven, or Christ, or duty, although it seems to some of the antiquated to have done, God is God to the world yet, if it speak of Him and praise Him too familiarly. Men love to hear one discourse of God, his character, attributes, purposes, works and ways, if he talk not subtly and theologically, but naturally and philosophically. They may have lost their taste in part for mysterious doctrines, but they have an increasing admiration for Christian precepts, and although some may boldly advocate wrong principles, the majority, when they come to understand them, hiss at them.

so.

Thirdly, HE MUST STUDY FIRST PRINCIPLES, CUltivate his reaSONING POWERS, AND LABOR TO MAKE THE WORLD HAPPIER. "This is an age of inquiry for first principles. Man is not now so much interested to discover some unknown countries, or conquer a national foe, as to ascertain the principles upon which the world was created. And he is beginning to perceive that he may make improvements, not only in the place of his habitation, mechanical instruments, and in the means of bringing into subserviency the elements, but that he also may improve his social, political, and even religious ideas." Men do not love dry metaphysics, and speculations like those of the "schoolmen," but they admire transparent reasoning on useful subjects, and a good analytical philosopher. And whoever labors well for human improvement, labors to diminish the sum of suffering, and increase the amount of happiness, although he may have

to encounter some opposition and prejudice, will eventually awaken even the somewhat dormant gratitude of our times.

In conclusion, I would remark, that the exhortation of an apostle, "Awake unto righteousness," applies with peculiar force to our young men. Never, since the time of the apostles, "went there by an age" which so much resembled theirs, as does our own. Now, as then, the old is going down with a crash, and the new is appearing amidst revolu tions, as by magic. Upon us, as upon them, "the ends of the world have come." Now shall we, on whom all hope for the future must rest, as older laborers are being called from the field, and as all the mighty momentous responsibilities of this age's crises are being rolled down upon us, shrink back, make no effort at preparation, spend our youth in dissipation, or waste it on trifles? God forbid !

WILKINSON, CONN., July 10, 1848.

For the American Phrenological Journal.

ARTICLE L.

LOVE OF THE BEAUTIFUL.

BY J. H. COOK.

"THE whole broad earth is beautiful to minds attuned aright." This tuning the mind “aright”—this having the faculties in sweet accord with all nature around—is "a consummation devoutly to be wished." To be able to appreciate, enjoy, and perceive the truly beautiful, that every where and at all times greets us, in its multitude of varied forms, is a source of wealth that many a miser never possessed, but which is experienced by many who are poor and humble. Oh, if we should thank our God for any gift, it is that He ever instituted this semi-heavenly power! Neither trouble, poverty, care, or excessive toil can deprive us of it. Ye who are deficient in the sense of the truly beautiful, cultivate it; for all nature is beautiful, as well as useful. How many places of great natural beauty might be made still more attractive, if their owners but had Ideality. How many farmers, possessing the most charming locations, neglect entirely to beautify their premises, from the mistaken idea that it is useless and wasteful. What multitudes, in traveling along our majestic rivers, environed by the most enrapturing beauty, engage in the low game of chance, or become absorbed in talking upon the low and selfish schemes of gain, or upon some romance-some war of the passions-some daring adventure, or bloody achievement. I am not speaking of that flitting, hotbed sense of beauty, engendered and fostered by "the fashions;" but of that innate sense of the TRULY beautiful, which elevates and refines. It will rarely be found, that active Ideality accompanies the vicious and depraved criminal.

66

Let all of every rank, condition, and pursuit-cultivate, within its proper sphere and toward its proper objects, this purifying, humanizing, and Christianizing faculty. Of such it may be said, Whate'er adorns the princely dome, the column, and the arch-the breathing marble and the sculptur'd goldbeyond the proud possessor's NARROW claim, his tuneful breast enjoys."

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »