Discourses on the Objects and Uses of Science and Literature

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Harper & Brothers, 1843 - Education, Higher - 332 pages

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Page 222 - If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.
Page 211 - Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? or who laid the corner stone thereof; When the morning stars sang together, and all the Sons of God shouted for joy?
Page xix - But the greatest error of all the rest, is the mistaking or misplacing of the last or farthest end of knowledge : for men have entered into a desire of learning and knowledge...
Page 184 - The motive for continuing in the same state or action is only the present satisfaction in it; the motive to change is always some uneasiness; nothing setting us upon the change of state, or upon any new action, but some uneasiness. This is the great motive that works on the mind to put it upon action, which for shortness' sake we will call "determining of the will" ; which I shall more at large explain.
Page ix - If I were to pray for a taste which should stand me in stead under every variety of circumstances, and be a source of happiness and cheerfulness to me through life, and a shield against its Ills, however things might go amiss, and the world frown upon me, it would be a taste for reading.
Page 124 - ... treats which science affords us is the knowledge of the extraordinary powers with which the human mind is endowed. No man, until he has studied philosophy, can have a just idea of the great things for which Providence has fitted his understanding — the extraordinary disproportion which there is between his natural strength, and the powers of his mind and the force he derives from them.
Page 118 - Chemistry is not behind in its wonders. That the diamond should be made of the same material with coal ; that water should be chiefly composed of an inflammable substance ; that acids should be almost all formed of different kinds of air, and that one of those acids, whose strength can dissolve almost any of the metals, should be made of the self-same ingredients with the common air we breathe...
Page xxx - Wise men have said are wearisome; who reads Incessantly, and to his reading brings not A spirit and judgment equal or superior (And what he brings, what needs he elsewhere seek) Uncertain and unsettled still remains, Deep versed in books and shallow in himself, Crude or intoxicate, collecting toys, And trifles for choice matters, worth a sponge; As children gathering pebbles on the shore.
Page 278 - We have said that Mr. Watt was the great Improver of the steamengine ; but, in truth, as to all that is admirable in its structure, or vast in its utility, he should rather be described as its Inventor. It was by his inventions that its action was so regulated as to make it capable of being applied to the finest and most delicate manufactures, and its power so increased as to set weight and solidity at defiance. By his admirable...
Page 126 - Providence, every part would be in harmony with a plan of absolute benevolence. Independently, however, of this most consoling inference, the delight is inexpressible of being able to follow, as it were, with our eyes, the marvellous works of the Great Architect of Nature, to trace the unbounded power and exquisite skill which are exhibited in the most minute, as well as the mightiest parts of his system.

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