a "Sense of the Unseen," he will not give up to any argumentation whatsoever. And the fact and truth which the man can see in his "family," that Moral Teaching may be true and real teaching, although it is not consciously perceptible to the subjects of it, this aids him to see that all these influences, which are asserted in the Holy Scripture, and yet he feels not consciously, may still exist and be good, and have a true and real effect.

And again: we find the faculty ever seeking "Moral Harmony,' ever testifying by its desire after it to the natural want of it, yet ever struggling towards it as an object. Here, then, in its sense of incongruity, unsuitableness, inability in the natural state-here is its testimony to the doctrine of Original Sin. Ten thousand orators may prove to their own satisfaction that " men are now born as the first man came out of the hands of his Creator," but the "Spiritual Reason" of each man shall say "No" to their eloquence and their arguments. It shall say, "I wish,-desire,-seek after,—aim at ‘Moral Harmony;' and in Nature by itself I feel it not." And the inner voice shall confute the eloquent argumentation of the orator and man of genius, and to the plain preacher of the Gospel, that proclaims the doctrine of Original Sin, that "man is fallen," it shall uphold and support the truth he asserts.

Having thus brought this subject to a conclusion, so far as it is in the province of Natural Ethics, I would recapitulate; and from that recapitulation enforce another inference that may be drawn very distinctly.

First. There is a certain, distinct and clear body of definite, eternal moral truths, which are ever the same, and do not vary with circumstances.

Secondly. These have Institutions organized for the purpose of teaching them, which do, under all circumstances, teach consciously or unconsciously.

Thirdly. There is a peculiar faculty in each individual man, adapted to receive these truths.

Therefore to them that have these truths, and know them by earnest and true realization, whether Parent, or Magistrate, or Clergyman-these three principles say,-"That which you know as Divine Truth of the Spiritual Reason, that teach fearlessly, earnestly, zealously and no matter though a multitude were against you; the Harmony of Nature, the frame of Society, and its institutions, nay, the very unseen world itself, Angel and Arch

angel, Cherubim and Seraphim, shall lend you aid; and in the very being and frame of the individual man, even of him who opposes you, therein shall that faculty that is the Image of God desire and yearn after the Eternal Truths that come from God; and a word of these from you shall be a seed that shall bear fruit after years are gone.

Let the Parent, then, not fear his own weakness,-or the Magistrate his want of eloquence,-or the Clergyman his want of influence—if the "eternal truths" are in him held and acted upon really and honestly, he has a power that shall and will tell in the strongest way.

But if he only talks, and is "eloquent and impressive," or even learned, in a mere logical, or mental, or rhetorical way, upon things of which he has no "Spiritual Apprehension," or Feeling, or Principle; he may be sure that he cannot communicate to others that which he has not himself. He need not wonder that in uttering to children, or pupils, or citizens, or congregations, the words and bare verbal enunciation, the outward shell of that Eternal Truth, that they should not make quite so great an impression as the same words shall from the mouth of the man who feels, and apprehends, and realizes that truth, as a Law of life more precious than gold or silver, and which he would be hewn asunder before he would transgress.

This subject, then, of the Divine Reason, we here dismiss, leaving it here, because only under the light of Revelation can it be completed; but yet so far as Natural Ethics go, discussed and examined, we trust satisfactorily. The remainder of the subject, the "Moral Harmony" of the Spiritual Reason, and its progress to perfection, properly belong to Religion.

BOOK IV.

THE HEART OR AFFECTIONS.

CHAPTER I.

Heart or Affections.-Its meaning.-Towards Persons.--Appetites and Desires towards Things.-It is towards Persons in Society.-Society in reference to this Power is a School of Love.-Errors that may be avoided by this consideration.-Use of Instinct in Animals.-Moral Principle and Rule of the Affections deducible from this.-What is "Nobleness" of Heart, and what Meanness.

WE have entitled this book of the "Heart or Affections, thereby manifestly taking the one phrase and the other to be identical, as to that particular class of emotions that they signify. And we have given the two titles to the book, because each of these words is liable to be used in a somewhat varying sense, so that either might be mistaken for something that we do not mean; but the union of the two in the title, and the use of the one as an equivalent to the other, will, better than any formal definition, convey to our readers that particular idea that we wish to give to them.

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By the "Heart," then, "or the Affections," we mean to imply the third of the "governing" powers of man,-those four powers, namely, by which we take him to be a moral being, and which we take him to have, as a living creature having a Spirit;" and the animals not to have, as not having a "Spirit." While we admit, at the same time, that as being an "Animal," he has the "Animal" Mind and all its qualities; just as being an "extended" and "material" body, he has the qualities that

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belong to "matter filling space." But as a "man," he has to these last two, superadded the "Spirit" or "Rational Soul," of which we have taken "Conscience," "Reason," "the Affections," "the Will," to be the four faculties.

For this word "Heart" which we have employed, there are doubtless many significations which may occupy the attention of those that wish to quarrel and argue upon words; but there is no doubt at all that the one predominant meaning, setting aside peculiarities of idiom and metaphor, is that one which we have given. And he, who in ordinary discourse hears the word, save that its meaning is determined to some other of the other senses by the connection, he shall generally understand "the Affections," and these Affections, as not belonging by any means to the brute creation, but as peculiar to man; in one word, he shall conceive it to be peculiarly a Human faculty, and only by a very high metaphor, which every one that hears shall understand to be an exaggeration of speech, shall he apply the words to the brute creation. To the Dog, the Horse, or the Elephant, those that come nearest to the human race of all mere animals, the word "Heart" is never applied. This, then, is one distinction which serves to mark off and limit the meaning, that it is a quality that belongs not to brute animals, but to men

And when we look at it as so limited to man, notwithstanding a multitude of meanings derived from various idioms and various circumstances, still in our own Anglo-American, and, indeed, I believe in all the Gothic dialects, we shall find the predominant signification to be that the Heart means the "Affections."

True, there are other meanings. It means memory, or seems to do so, in that strange phrase, "getting by heart," commemorated and illustrated in the epigram:

"John has no heart, they say,-I do deny it :

He has a heart-and gets his speeches by it."

Again, in the dissolute times that followed close upon the English Commonwealth, there was a translation into English of a French Idiom, in which profligate men spoke of "Affairs of the Heart," (affaires du Cœur,) meaning seductions and adulteries; and licentious women spoke of "wanderings of the heart," (egaremens du Coeur,) meaning thereby adulterous love and profligate And there is undoubtedly a whole range of English

amours.

literature, that of the age of Charles the Second, in which this word is so employed as the vile translation into English of the word cœur, employed in as vile a sense in French. But it is now antiquated, the word has cast off the meaning, and but few would understand it in that sense. This meaning, then, being merely the idiom of a time, and now fallen into almost total disuse, we shall pass by, having noticed it merely for the sake of distinctness.

Again, there is another idiom which is naturalized in our language, that which makes the "Heart" to be an idiomatic expression for courage or strength of mind as noticeable in the phrases, "Take heart," "Faintness of heart," "In good heart." And this we at once distinguish as an idiom, by using it in the phrase in that sense; but even in the same words apart from the phrase in an utterly different meaning. For instance, we say such "man is of a good heart," this is a moral commendation,—but "be of good heart" denotes courage.

Again, there is in a passage of the Bible an idiomatical use of it for the "Conscience," by the verbal translation of which, the verse is made almost unintelligible, "Brethren, if our heart condemn us not, then have we peace with God; if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our hearts, and knoweth all things."* A passage in which the Greek and English are only verbal, not real translation of the Hebrew word, "leb," (heart,) meaning "conscience."

So far with regard to the idiomatic meanings of the word. We shall now proceed to the metaphoric meaning. It means unquestionably, in metaphor, the innermost part of anything; as for instance, "the heart of the earth," "the heart of the country," "the heart of a tree," all which are figurative meanings for the "innermost part." And in this sense it may employed as a metaphor for the "whole moral nature" of man as the inner and most mysterious part of his being, but still this shall be only metaphoric, and not a proper and peculiar sense.

Another metaphoric meaning, derived undoubtedly from the heart, the physical organ, is that which signifies that part wherein the strength lies, as "the farmers are the heart of the country;" and "to give heart," is to give strength.

* John iii. 20.