The youth of the British empire will best show their conviction of these important truths by their persevering obedience to the laws, and their prudent use of the blessings conferred by their native country. But to defend this venerable edifice of liberty from the machinations of domestic, and the assaults of foreign enemies, is a charge which devolves more immediately upon the nobility, and upon those who are deputed to represent their countrymen in parliament. The conscientious and careful exercise of this most honourable trust is a duty which they owe to their ancestors, to themselves, and their descendants; and what labour can be too unremitting, what vigilance too active, what public spirit too exalted and ardent, to preserve unsullied and unimpaired a ConstituTION, which is the brightest ornament, the most glorious privilege, and the most valuable inheritance ever enjoyed by mankind?

Hail sacred Polity, by Freedom rear❜d!

Hail sacred Freedom, when by law restrain'd!
Without you what were men? a grov'ling herd,
In darkness, wretchedness, and want enchain'd.
Sublim'd by you, the Greek and Roman reign'd
In arts unrivall'd: O! to latest days,
In Albion may your influence unprofan'd
To godlike worth the gen'rous bosom raise,
And prompt the sage's lore, and fire the poet's lays.
BEATTIE'S MINSTREL.

END OF THE HISTORICAL CLASS

CLASS THE FOURTH.

PHILOSOPHY.

CHAPTER I.

LOGIC, OR THE RIGHT USE OF REASON.

IT is a very great error for any one to suppose, that logic consists only in those formal debates and verbal disputations, in which the schoolmen and their followers consumed so much time in the dark ages, previous to the revival of classical learning. It is equally a mistake to imagine, that it is merely intended to teach the method of disputing by rules, and to instruct a young man to converse, not from a love of truth, but a desire of victory. As there is nothing more disingenuous than such a conduct as this, nothing more unbecoming a rational being, than to oppose sophistry to good sense, and evasion to sound argument, the logician disclaims this abuse of the principles of his art, and vindicates its rights by displaying its true and proper office. It is in reality capable of affording the most important assistance to the understanding in its inquiries after truth; it is eminently useful in the common affairs of life, and renders the greatest service to science, learning, virtue and religion.

Logic is the art of forming correct ideas, and of deducing right inferences from them; or it may be said to constitute the knowledge of the human mind, inasmuch as it traces the progress of all our information, from our first and most simple conceptions of things, to those numerous conclusions, which result from comparing them together. It teaches us in what order our thoughts succeed each other, and it instructs us in the relation which subsists between our ideas, and the terms in which we express them. It distinguishes their different kinds, and points out their properties; discovers the sources of our intellectual mistakes, and shows how we may correct and prevent them. It displays those principles and rules, which we follow, although imperceptibly, whenever we think in a manner conformable to truth.

The faculty of reason is the preeminent quality, by which mankind are distinguished from all other animals but still we are far from finding that they possess it in the same degree. There is indeed as great an inequality in this respect in different persons, as there is in their strength and agility of body. Nor ought this disproportion to be wholly ascribed to the original constitution of the minds of men, or the difference of their natural endowments; for, if we take a survey of the nations of the world, we' shall that find some are immersed in ignorance and barbarity, others enlightened by learning and science and what is still more remarkable, the people of the same nation have been in various ages distinguished by these very opposite characters. It is therefore by due cultivation, and proper diligence, that we increase the vigour of our minds, and carry reason to perfection. Where this method is followed, the intellect acquires strength, and know

:

ledge is enlarged in every direction; where it is neglected, we remain ignorant of the value of our own powers; and those faculties, by which we are qualified to survey the vast fabric of the world, to contemplate the whole face of nature, to investigate the causes of things, and to arrive at the most important conclusions as to our welfare and happiness, remain buried in darkness and obscurity. No branch of science therefore affords us a fairer prospect of improvement, than that which relates to the understanding, defines its powers, and shows the method, by which it acquires the stock of its ideas, and accumulates general knowledge :this is the province of logic.

It is properly divided into four parts, viz.

I. PERCEPTION. II. JUDGMENT.

III. REASON

In this division the logicians have followed the course of nature, as we shall find, if we reflect upon the conduct and progress of the understanding. These divisions have so close a connexion with each other, that it is scarcely possible to arrive at perfection in one of them, without the assistance of the others. To treat of perception we must make use of method; and in order to reason we must form every proposition with a due regard to rules.

I. PERCEPTION consists in the attention of the understanding to the objects acting upon it, whereby it becomes sensible of the impressions they make; and the notices of these impressions, as they exist in the mind, are distinguished by the name of ideas. If we attend carefully to our thoughts, we shall observe two fountains or sources of knowledge, from which the understanding is supplied with all its, ideas, or

materials of thinking.-These are sensation and reflection.

Sensation is the source of our original ideas, and comprehends the notices conveyed into the mind by impulses or impressions made upon the organs of sense. Such are the perceptions of colours, sounds, tastes, &c. But we derive all these ideas, great as is their number, solely from external objects. Another source of impressions arises from the attention of the mind to its own perceptions, and considers the various modes, in which it employs itself concerning them. Thus we acquire the ideas of thinking, doubting, believing, &c. which are the different intellectual operations represented to us by our own consciousness. This act of the mind is called reflection; and it evidently implies sensation, as the impressions it furnishes proceed from the powers of the understanding occupied in the contemplation of ideas, with which it has been previously stored.

A proper consideration of these two sources of our thoughts will give us a clear and distinct view of the nature of the mind, and the first steps it takes in the path of knowledge. From these simple beginnings all our discoveries derive their origin; for the mind thus stored with its original notices of things has a power of combining, modifying, and placing them in an infinite variety of lights, by which means it is enabled to multiply the objects of its perception, and finds itself possessed of an inexhaustible stock of materials for reflection and reasoning. It is in the various comparisons of these ideas, according to such combinations as are best adapted to its ends, that we exert ourselves in the acts of judging and reasoning, enlarge our mental prospects, and can extend them in