my pride, and to do all
justice, however it may conflict with my interest; and which calls me to
rejoice with love in all that is beautiful, good, holy, happy, in
whatever being these attributes may be found. This principle is a ray of
Divinity in man. We do not know what man is, still something of the
celestial grandeur of this principle in the soul may be discerned. There
is another grand view of man, included indeed in the former, yet
deserving distinct notice. He is a free being; created to act from a
spring in his own breast, to form himself and to decide his own destiny;
connected intimately with nature, but not enslaved to it; connected still
more strongly with God, yet not enslaved even to the Divinity, but having
power to render or withhold the service due to his Creator; encompassed
by a thousand warring forces, by physical elements which inflict pleasure
and pain, by dangers seen and unseen, by the influences of a tempting,
sinful world, yet endued by God with power to contend with all, to
perfect himself by conflict with the very forces which threaten to
overwhelm him. Such is the idea of a man. Happy he in whom it is
unfolded by earnest thought!

Had I time, I should be glad to speak of other great ideas belonging to
the science of mind, and which sum up and give us, in one bright
expression, the speculations of ages. The idea of human life, of its
true end and greatness; the idea of virtue, as the absolute and ultimate
good; the idea of liberty, which is the highest thought of political
science, and which, by its intimate presence to the minds of the people,
is the chief spring of our country's life and greatness,--all these might
be enlarged on; and I might show how these may be awakened in the
laborer, and may give him an elevation which many who are above labor
want. But, leaving all these, I will only refer to another, one of the
most important results of the science of mind, and which the laborer, in
common with every man, may and should receive, and should strengthen by
patient thought. It is the idea of his importance as an individual. He
is to understand that he has a value, not as belonging to a community,
and contributing to a general good which is distinct from himself, but on
his own account. He is not a mere part of a machine. In a machine the
parts are useless, but as conducing to the end of the whole, for which
alone they subsist. Not so a man. He is not simply a means, but an