The Arkansas advocate., 1830-06-16

1 the companion and cheerer Of the low
 Fest toll and the humblest flreside. Diff
 fusion Is the watehwerd ef the age; and i:sII
 unless the spread Of intelligence keeps
 pace with that of power, of wealth, and of religious liberty, t t will become the 'saotto of universal disappointment and
 defeat.'
 To the objections which are started
 against these projects as visionary and limpractieable-or that, if successful, not
 much good can be effected-that the sciences are for scholars 10 understand
 Ito be learnt in colleges, &c. objections
 uAieh.we hear almost every day, it is
 said--Ss I he objects oftfis kind of study
 are Gods worlzs-works which were
 expressly designed to be studied and ad-
 mired ;" and to the question, why should
 not, and why cannot, ,allmen know them?
 it is pertinentLy replied--
 "The objects to be examined are all
 around them; the subjects of study are
 the very elements with which they are every moment eonversant; the iHstru-
 ments are their senses; to see, to hear, IS to know. The times for study are ali times that are not necessarily engrossed with other pursuits; when they take a walk, when they look around them upon the works of nature, especially when ttssi they are at leisure. Whycannot a man who sits down before his evening fire, spend an hour in reading few para graphs that will teach the curious and beautiful theory of combustion? Why cannot any man read enough upon the nature and changes of the atmosphere, the clouds and the seasons, to be in the habit of refecting philosophically on what is passing around him, intead of receiving, as passiyeiy, in this respect, as the post before his door, the visitation of the elements? And as to time, the time that makes a wise man is the time that makes fool; and the counters with which the untaught loose the game are the same as those with which the slilful win it. says. or should say some pro verb of the East or West. Itis strictly truein thismatter. that < time and chance happen to all men;" but all men do not know now to use them. The thing to be learned is ssnot in heaven, nor be- yond the sea, but is nigh to us.n The foundation of the sciences Is obserya- ton. The business of philosophy is not to construct theories but to state facts; not to deal with mysteries in mysterious language, but to deal with plain matters in ineligible language. Science, in- stead of being a high and abstruse mys- tery, is a clearer up of the mysteries that lie in our daily path. We have no doubt, that the casual observations of a few practical and plain men, if they had been properly and philosophically noted down ii their own minds. would have laid the foundation for much use ful philosophy. The judgment, for in- stance, which seafaring persons form of the weather, which seems at once as sure and as mysterious as instinct, is no doubt founded on actual and careful ob- seryation. If the observer had been in this respect a Philosopher; if he had been able fully to state the grounds of his most unerring predictions, he might have furnished far more valuable aid in the science of meteorology; than is now given in dry tables of temperature, wind, rain and sunshine. And if the same ob- seryations were made on the land, it would not be difficult to form a Farmers Manual or Travellers Dictionary, which in many cases, would be of great and utility.n
 On the question of utility, the review CT says
 "That emphatically is useful which contributes to the happiness ofthe mind. And if this is true. then ideas, refec- tions, thoughts are to be set down on the scale of utility, and are to be set highest on that scale. Though not reck- oned on the leger, tho not gatheredinto the granary nor deposited in the ware house; though neither manufactured nor bought, nor sold, yet thoughts are useful. Nothing is so much to a man as what he thinks z As man ttihiiniz- eth so is he,' and especially so is he happy or miserable.
 "And yet there is, with many, kind of regular and set exclusion of the mind itselfirom theestimate of humanwelfare and an exclusion, by the same rule Of knowledge from the objects that arc worthy of a distinct, professed and prac- teal attention, among the mass ofman- kind.-knowledge indeed, is allowed to be usefuL but tits useful as being aux