lities as pure abstractions, are
stripped of their _human_ interest: and few adults even could write
endurably upon such subjects in such a shape; though many might have
written very pleasingly and judiciously upon a moral _case_--_i. e._
on a moral question _in concreto_. Grant that a school-boy has no
independent thoughts of any value; yet every boy has thoughts
dependent upon what he has read--thoughts involved in it--thoughts
derived from it: but these he will (_caeteris paribus_) be more or less
able to express, as he has been more or less accustomed to express
them. The unevolved thoughts which pass through the youngest--the
rudest--the most inexperienced brain, are innumerable; not
detached--voluntary thoughts, but thoughts inherent in what is seen,
talked of, experienced, or read of. To evolve these, to make them
apprehensible by others, and often even to bring them within their own
consciousness, is very difficult to most people; and at times to all
people: and the power, by which this difficulty is conquered, admits
of endless culture: and, amongst the modes of culture, is that of
written composition. The true value of this exercise lies in the
necessity which it imposes of forming distinct ideas--of connecting
them--of disposing them into such an arrangement as that they can be
connected--of clothing them in words--and many more acts of the mind:
both analytic and synthetic. All that is necessary is--to determine
for the young composer his choice of matter: require him therefore to
narrate an interesting story which he has formerly read; to rehearse
the most interesting particulars of a day's excursion: in the case of
more advanced students, let them read one of the English state trials,
where the evidence is of a complex character (as the trials on Titus
Oates's plot), or a critical dissertation on some interesting
question, or anything in short which admits of analysis--of
abstraction--of expansion--or exhibition in an altered shape. Subjects
for all this are innumerable; and, according to the selection made,
more or less opportunity is given for collecting valuable knowledge:
but this purpose is collateral to the one we are speaking of: the
direct purpose is to exercise the mind in unravelling its own
thoughts, which else lie huddled and tangled together in a state unfit
for use, and but dimly developed to the possessor's own
consciousness.--The three other modes of producing a love of
knowledge, which the