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t
Tbe  Rarmony of  Cieatlw*
ADDRESS
deiivixed scronx TUB
MEDICAL  DEPARTMENT
WESTERN  RESERVE  COLLEGE;







       Cleveland, February 3-1, 184T.   W
BY REV.  ELIJAH P. BARROWS.
HUDSON






   IS-17, 
 
         The Harmony  of  Creation:
And the subordination of the Physical part of it to the
                  Moral.
AN  ADDRESS
DELIVERED BEFORE THE
TRUSTEES, FACULTY, AND STUDENTS
MEDICAL DEPARTMENT
WESTERN RESERVE COLLEGE.              ^>

  Cleveland, February 21, 184T.     > _^6 ° ^, Tv
        BY ELIJAH P. BARROWS,
*rofessor of Sacred Literature in the Western Reserve College.
PUBLISHED BY REQUEST-OF THE FACULTY OF MEDICINE.
 HUDSON:
OBSERVER PRESS.
1847. 
 
ADDRESS.
   If one were asked to name that principle which, more prominently
 than any other, pervades the universe of created beings material and
 immaterial, interpenetrating, so to speak, each of its parts, considered
 separately, and the  parts themselves, considered as making up one
 whole; he would answer, if he viewed the whole in the relation of
 its parts to each other, harmony; if he viewed the parts as constituting
 tl whole, unity—harmony and unity with reference to a high moral
 end.   The grand proof from natural religion of  the unity of God is
 the unity of the  creation.  It is not  an  aggregate of individuals,
 thrown together, like the sand on the sea-shore,  without  order or
 design, and having no other relation to each other but that of juxta-
 position, so that any part might be  taken away at pleasure without
 detriment to the rest; but an organization,  through  every part of
 which, from  the insect  that hums  by us on a summer's day to the
 highest order of hierarchies before  the throne of God, the same all-
 pervading mind manifests itself.   As the different members of the
 human body, though many, are so woven and compacted together as
 to make one whole, and the soul and body, though entirely  different
 in their nature, are so adapted each to the other, as to make but one
 man;  thus also the  different parts of the universe, material  and
 immaterial, are, by means of innumerable relations and adaptations,
 compacted into one perfect system, from which no  single part could
'be taken away  without damage \o  all the rest.   Even moral evil,
 the only  real disorder which exists in the  creation, is, in a most
 important sense, in harmony with it.  For, although moral evil itself
 is not essential to the system, but is, so far as it is introduced, a dis- 
                                4
turbing and distracting element, the liability to moral evil is essential
to it, as a system the final end of which, out of  God, is the develop-
ment and discipline of the powers  of  free moral agents, who, in the
process of this training, are necessarily entrusted, in a  certain meas-
ure, with  the keeping of their own destiny.
   If we look for examples of this interlacing and interweaving  of
the  different parts of  God's works, they offer  themselves on every
side.  The most common object serves as well to  illustrate it, as the
most curious  and far-fetched.
   Let us suppose that the thoughtful  observer  of  nature  has, in the
course of a solitary walk,  cast himself down in the shade  of some
majestic oak,  and begins to muse with himself  thus,  concerning  its
origin, nature, and relations.
   What is this mysterious principle which we call }ife?  How has
it, from a minute germ, developed this mighty oak?  And how does
each particular  kind of life,  with  unerring certainty, clothe itself
with its own particular kind  of body?  Life  is  a wondrous archi-
tect.  It builds itself a house to live and work in.   And it is a most
fastidious architect.  The life of  each kind of plant and animal has
its own  form of habitation, differing  in  all  its parts external  and
internal from that of every other species.   This pak is unjike a]l the
other trees of the forest, not only outwardly in the form of its limbs,
and leawss and fruit, but also in its inward nature  and properties.—
It is throughout oak, and nothing but oak, and it propagates only  its
own kind.  Here we see that, in  this oak, our student  of  nature has
recognized the highest and most general law of organized  beings,
that each species of life shall have  its own peculiar laws of develop-*
ment, and shall propagate  only its own kind.   Thus this  particular
tree  is seen to be included in the operation of a  general law of the
organized  creation; and, by being tlms  included,  it  appears no longer
.s an isolated being, but as  a part  of the entire system.
   But he  proceeds in his inquiries—What is this relation which the oak
before me has to the elements of light and heat?  How  is it that, upon
the return of  spring, it awakes  from its torpidity, and puts forth buds
and leaves, and again,  upon the approach of winter, goes into a state of
naction?  Here is an adaptation as manifest as  in  the  relation of the
parts of $ machine to each other.   The nature of the tree lias reference 
                                  5
to the "nature of light and heat, and these  again to its nature.   He has
now recognized a second  general law of organized  nature —its depen-
dence for the development of its forms on the element of heat, and, to a
great extent, of light also; and, in this law, he sees a new link connect-
ing this particular tree with the general system.
   Next he looks at the relation of the tree to the nutritive substances
that surround it.  The wide-spreading roots of the oak, while they serve
to anchor it  firm in the  earth, are also  endowed  with the power of
extracting nutriment from the soil in which they have buried themselves,
while the leaves perform the  double office of absorbing that which the
plant needs for its nourishment, and  exhaling that which is superfluous.
Here is another most evident adaptation.   The alimentary substances by
which the tree is surrounded were useless, unless it possessed the power
of appropriating them to itself, and this power were useless, if the sub-
stances themselves were wanting.  He has now developed another general
law to Which all  living beings are subject—their dependence for nour-
ishment upon bodies foreign to themselves, and the consequent incessant
change that is  going on in the  particles of  which they are composed.
   And, if he lifts his eyes upward, and  contemplates  the magnificent
canopy of green beneath which he is reclining, how many reflections
will crowd upon him!  He will think of that wise arrangement by which
the tree is enabled, upon the approach of winter, to  cast off its leaves —
its lungs—when they can no  longer be  used with safety or profit, and
thus to  go into  a state  of  hybernation; and here he will discern  &
special  law having reference  to the change of the seasons, and thus
connecting the fall of the  leaves in Autumn with the motion of the earth
round the sun, and the inclination of her axis  to the  plane of her orbit
   He will inquire, further- Whence that  change of hue which the frosts
.of  Autumn produce in the leaves of this  tree and of the  other trees of
■the forest, making them most  glorious to view as they  are about taking
their flight?   This will lead him directly  into the contemplation of the
entire theory  of colors, and their dependence  upon the  chemical  consti-
tution of bodies.  Thus may he proceed adding link after link to  the ties
which bind this particular tree to the general system.
   Or, should  his reflections  take a different  turn, he  may inquire,
What  is  the  end of this  oak as a work of  God?   Physiologically
considered, its  end is to propagate itself.   As a mere plant, it has  ful- 
                                 e
filled its destiny when it has borne acorns, endowed with  the power o?
producing new oaks.   But, economically considered, its end is to benefit
man and beast.   Here, again, he  sees a wonderful harmony between
these two ends.   Considered in a physiological point of view, its might}
trunk and wide spreading limbs serve for the development of its leaves,
and the whole together, for the growth of its fruit.   But, while they
accomplish this end, they also  accomplish other economical ends.   The
bark which, in its physiological office, sheaths the trunk and limbs and
protects the sap in its descent, how useful to man!  Of its trunk, beams.
and planks, and boards are manufactured; its limbs,  in their separation
from the trunk, furnish knees for ships, its leaves a grateful shade, and
its fruit sustenance  to many  animals.   In this oak,  then, he sees that
harmonious blending together of  the physical and economical,  which
pervades the whole material creation, and stamps it as  the product -of one
mind.    He sees  that, in its relations to the whole  system, the oak, and
with it the whole  vegetable kingdom, was made to subserve the wants of
the animal kingdom which is above  it in the scale  of  worth; and, since
man is the head of  the animal kingdom, that  it was made to minister  to
his wants;  and since, moreover, man's animal nature is  subservient  to
his higher spiritual nature—a truth  which will  be considered more  at
large hereafter—he arrives at last at this conclusion, that the final end of
the oak, in the system to which it belongs, is to minister to the wants of
man, considered  as a rational  accountable  subject  of the moral govern-
ment of God.
   But not to insist longer upon this illustration, though we have by  no
means exhausted it, let us turn our thoughts  to another which derives
peculiar appropriateness from the circumstances of  the present occasion.
 Let us look at man in his whole nature^ rational and spiritual, and  in
 his relations to the system in which he is placed.   Here it is immaterial,
except as a matter of convenience, where we  begin;  for the contempla-
tion of any one part will, in the end, lead us up to his spiritual nature,
 and to the relations which, through that  nature, he sustains to God, and
 fo the other  orders of moral beings with which  revelation  makes  us
 acquainted.
   Let us then begin with the bones.  If we cast our eye on a human
 skeleton, we see  at a glance  that, although consisting of many parts, it
 is yet one.   It is one  system in which each  member is  adapted to  all 
                                 7
the rest.   But the skeleton, being not the whole, but only a part of  the
man, cannot explain itself.  We see indeed that each of its bones is
fitted to the rest, but we do not see why, of the innumerable forms  and
sizes, and textures, which it might have assumed, it has taken this par-
ticular form and size, and texture.   The several  bones, moreover, have
various processes, and enlargements, and curvatures, and varieties of
jointure, for which an explanation must be sought in the parts to which
the skeleton itself  stands related.                                     '
   Proceeding next to  the  muscular apparatus, we find a  new  system
superadded to the  former, and the two so fitted to each other as to consti-
tute one whole.   The insertions of  the muscles also explain many par-
ticulars with regard  to the form of the bones,  which were not understood
l>efore; but we have  not yet arrived at the solution of the problem before
us.
   And when we add the fleshy integuments  which cover the bones and
muscles, and  the external covering which encases the whole, a majestic
and beautiful form rises to our view, which, considered as a mere piece
of mechanism, is exquisitely perfect.  The whole body is so interlaced
and interpenetrated with muscles working in every direction, as to be
brought completely under their control.   And when we add those won-
derful organs of communication between mind and matter—the nerves
of  motion—and see  this curious piece of mechanism in actual operation,
we are filled with admiration at the precision, the ease, the beauty, and
the endless variety of its movements.
   Still the problem  with which we commenced, why the human body,
considered  as the work of a designing mind,  has this  upright  and
majestic form, rather than  that of an ox, or  a serpent, remains wholly
unexplained, nor is there any thing in the entire range of physiology
that sheds light upon it.  It is the nature  and destiny of the human  soul
that solves this problem.   Socrates, the wisest of the heathen philoso-
phers, understood this, when reasoning with an atheist,  he said, "Is it
not most  manifest to you that, in comparison with other animals,  men
live as gods, having by nature the pre-eminence both in body and in
soul.  For neither if one had the body of an ox with the soul of a man,
would he be able to accomplish his desires; nor are those animals which
have hands but are destitute of reason, raised above their fellow brutes
by the possession."   And  this too  Milton saw, when  in describing the 
                                 8
 various classes of beings which met the eye of Satan upon his intrusion
 into Paradise,
                  --------------"all kind
         Of living creatures, new to sight and strange,"
 lie said,
           Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall,
           Godlike erect, with native honor clad,
•          In naked majesty seemed lords of all,"
 But the nature of man,  which constitutes him  the  natural lord of this
 world, cannot be  considered  apart  from his  moral nature, as a beino-
 endowed with reason, conscience, and  free will, and  subject to the con-
 trol of  a moral law,  of  whioh God is the author, and  which he  will
 enforce with appropriate rewards and penalties.    Thus we  arrive at
 the  last and the highest relation of man,  that which he  holds to his
 Maker, as a moral being, which includes in itself and explains all his
 lower relations, and unites the whole  in one  sublime system  of which
 God is the Head.

   Hitherto we have  restricted  our view to  the  relations which  the
 different parts of man have to each other, leaving out of account the
 innumerable connections which exist between him and the world  in
 which he lives.  Let us now go back and take a new survey of his
 constitution with reference to these connections.
   To begin, then, once more, with the skeleton and muscular system ;
 we find that these, in respect to massiveness  and strength, are nicely
 proportioned to the weight of the human body, and the average resis-
 tance of the various obstacles which man, in providing for his wants,
 must overcome.  Thus  the size and strength of the bones and muscles
 on the one hand, and on the other, the magnitude and density of  the
 earth (upon which depend the weight of all  bodies) and the constitu,
 tion of objects on its surface, are seen to hold a definite relation to
 each  other, and to be adapted to  each other as parts of  one whole.
   But we will look at some connections that are  more immediate.
   The alimentary apparatus of the human system, taking the term in
 its widest sense, occupies a most conspicuous place in man's thoughts,
 in man's labors, and in man's destiny.
   The wants of the stomach bind him immediately and indissolubly,
 to the organic creation animal and vegetable whence he  derives his 
                                9
sustenance; and, since the organic and the inorganic are inseparable
from each other, to the entire organization and products of the earth's
surface.   These again have a fixed relation to  the  distance of the
earth from the sun, the quantity of light and heat which she receives
from him, and to her daily and yearly revolutions;  so  that, through
the medium  of the  alimentary system, man  is  linked  in  not  only
with the entire constitution and products of this  globe, but  also with
the solar system to which it belongs.
   On the wonderful adaptation of the stomach to the products of the
earth I need not dwell.   I will here only quote  the words  of a gen-
tleman of your own  profession.  "Some physiologists," says he,  "will
have it that the stomach is a mill; others that it  is a  fermenting vat;
others, again, that it is a stew-pan;  but in my view of the matter it
is neither a mill, a fermenting vat, nor  a stew-pan—but a stomach
gentlemen, a stomach."
  #The stomach, with the whole alimentary system,  has  laws of  its
own.   It is above the laws  of  chemistry, and yet subject to them —
above  them in that it resists, within certain limits, their  influence, and
produces new and peculiar  products of its own; subject to them, in
that it cannot absolutely  rise above  them, as we see in the case of
 poisons and medicinal agents generally.
   And here, did time permit, we could dwell on the special adapta-
tions of the human  stomach to man's higher nature, and to the infi-
 nitely diversified circumstances in which he is destined to live.   \Y e
could  speak also of the  lungs which  indissolubly  connect the san-
guineous system,  and, by necessary consequence, the  entire animal
economy of man, with the constitution of  the atmosphere; of  the
 eye, which brings him into an immediate relation with tht  properties
of light; of the ear, which also, in another way, connects  him with
the properties of the atmosphere, and of all the senses  which are but
so many links between man and the world in which he lives.   Thus
might we  proceed without end, pointing out  one after  another of the
innumerable ties which bind his physical nature  to the material world
around him, and the inseparable relations of these to his higher spir-
itual nature.   But these details would be tedious and unnecessary.
   Leaving them, therefore, let  us consider some of the general rela-
tions which the material  in  man holds to the immaterial and moral. 
                               10
   That a spirit endowed with reason, conscience  and  free will, and
thus apparently  fitted  in  its nature to  range at large through the
works of God, should  be imprisoned in a body  of flesh  and blood,
bv which it is made subject to the  laws of matter, and limited and
impeded in all its movements, has appeared to some to be  an evil  of
the greatest magnitude, and they have  compared the soul's release
from the body to that of a prisoner from his cell, as if  this  event
must necessarily be an  introduction to liberty and happiness.   We
are by no means  disposed to deny that  the soul  which has made a
good use of the discipline to which it has been subjected in the body
is, at death, elevated to a  higher sphere of action and enjoyment.—
But is it not evident that the discipline itself was needed  to prepare
it  for  this  elevation?   It  may reasonably be  questioned whether
a finite being, like man, could  at the commencement of his being,  be
safely entrusted  with unrestrained liberty.   He is made to live in a
social system, and that  under the authority of  law.  Of such a sys-
tem obedience, self-denial and mutual  dependence are the basis—-
obedience, because, without this, the law itself which binds together
the whole system in harmony and happiness is annulled:  self-denial,
because no individual  in the system can appropriate to himself all
the natural good which it  contains: mutual  dependence, because,  in
a social system,  no  one can separate  his particular interests from
those of the whole.
   Now what arrangement could be  more  admirably  adapted  to
develop these virtues than the present, in which man, by means  of
the connection of his spiritual with a material nature, finds himself
naturally placed under a stern necessity to obey, to deny himself, and
to depend upon others?   He begins his being in a state  of helpless
infancy.   He is dependent upon  the  will of others for food, for
clothing, for education, for life itself.   Absolute submission, w ith  no
alternative,  is proposed to  him at the outset.   Thus the hard but
necessary lesson of obedience and dependence begins with the cradle;
and  it is not long before  that  of self-denial begins also.  He soon
learns that all the good things in this  world are not his, and that
such  is the arrangement of things that the  attempt  to  appropriat-
them to himself will  subject  him to  pains and penalties  innu-
merable both natural and positive.     As  his  reasoning faculties 
                               II
gradually unfold themselves he comes to understand that a cneerfuf
spirit of  obedience and self-denial, and dependence both upon the
providence of God,  and the kind  services of his  fellow men (for
which he must in return give his kind services^) is the only path to
blessedness.   And is not this a noble discipline—a discipline not for'
time alone, but also for eternity?  Considered, then, with reference
to the wants of the spirit, as a rational, accountable, immortal being,
destined  for a higher  sphere of  action, this union  of the soul  and
body, which secures  such a noble training, is not an evil but a good.
   Again; we may state it as a general law of finite intelligences, that
their capacities will never be  fully developed unless they are com-
pelled to exert themselves to  the  utmost.  Now by the union of the
spirit with a body of flesh and blood, God has placed man in such
circumstances that he cannot  remain idle.   His constantly recurring
wants assail him like a strong man  armed, and compel  him to put
forth all his energy.  In none of the departments of life is success-
obtained without unremitting toil.
   The heaven-appointed price  of eminence is labor—hard labor.  It
is true that the depravity of man  so  perverts this arrangement of
Providence as to make it the  occasion of much oppression and suffer-
ing.  But the arrangement itself is wise  and  salutary, having, like
every other arrangement which God has made in this world, ultimate
regard to the  good of  man's  spiritual  nature.   We have abundant
evidence from the experience of the world in all ages, that no greater
curse can befall the  young than to be exempted from the necessity of
labor, and that severe  and long continued.
   Once  more: it has seemed strange to some that a being  of such
exalted powers as man should  be subjected to contingency;  that his
success  in life, and even the  gift  of life itself  should be made to de-
pend upon innumerable casualities  which he can neither foresee nor
guard against.   But here also  we shall find the providential govern-
ment of God  over this world in perfect harmony with  the wants of
man's spirit.   It is a government uniting a wise combination of
uniformity with contingency—a government  of  uniformity in the
midst of contingency.   It  is conducted hy  general laws,  which,
remaining unaltered from age to age, furnish all necessary encour-
 agement to human  effort, and yet the results of these  laws  are, ia 
                               12
anany important respects, made subject to contingency,  that is, to
•combinations of circumstances so variable that thev cannot be made
matters of human calculation.
   The  revolutions of the seasons, for example, depend upon fixed
laws.   There are times for sowing and for reaping, and  for ceasing
from all agricultural  pursuits.   The  husbandman who neglects  the
opportunities which these fixed laws bring and take away in succes-
sion, must come to remediless want.   And yet with these invariable
laws contingency is so combined that the results of his toil are uncer-
tain.   It is indeed certain that  if he does  not sow he  will not reap.
But, after he has done his utmost, many casualties remain.  Excessive
rains may sweep away his crops, drought may consume them, armies
of insects devour them, or untimely frosts nip them in the bud.  The
same uncertainty holds true with regard to every worldly occupation,
nay even with regard  to life itself.   Industry, temperance,  and virtue
all promote  health and long life, but they  are no guarantee against
an untimely end.  In spite of  all human precaution,  fatal diseases
will assail  the human  frame,  and ten thousand casualties, against
which no human foresight can provide, stand ready at God's bidding
to sever the golden cord of life.
   In all this the atheist sees nothing but chance.   In his  view man
is the sport of accident.  He  is nothing but a thistle-down driven
before the  tempest,  only to find a lodgment in some  crevice, or
beneath some bush, there to perish forgotten and uncared for.  But
the christian discerns, in the subjection of all his earthly possessions
to contingencies against  which  his foresight cannot provide, a  wise
arangement of God for the cultivation of the higher part of  his nature.
In this arrangement he  reads his duty, while he diligently usestthe
appointed means of success, to maintain, at the same time, a humble,
prayerful, submissive and dependent spirit, and not to set his heart
upon earthly treasures.
   And  so we might  proceed, adding illustration to illustration,  all
showing that the  material universe  is  one  mighty system  bound
together by  innumerable bands  and ligatures, and  the  whole  having
for its final end the education and discipline of man for  eternity.—
Man, the immortal accountable free agent, is placed in the midst of a
material system, and subjected to its power, b»t he is not of it.  It 
                               13
Mas made for him, not he for it.  His very subjection to it evinces his
pre-eminence above it.  It is not the subjection of a slave to a master,
but that of a son and heir to tutors and governors appointed to train
him for the inheritance in reserve for him.
  Thus we see that the great problem  of the  present constitution of
the material creation finds  its solution  in man's spiritual  nature, to
the wants of which it is designed to  minister.    But man's spiritual
nature is its own interpreter.   It sheds light on the constitution of the
whole inferior creation, but borrows  no light from  any source save
from God its author; and he, in creating men  intelligent free agents,
and implanting in the very substance of their  souls  a sense of moral
obligation  and responsibility, has  clearly indicated  for  what end
they were made, and what destiny awaits them.   If true to their
nature, God, in giving them this nature, has pledged himself to raise
them to the society  of the heavenly hierarchies,  for admission to
which it qualifies  them; but, if false,  he  has, by the  same  nature,
 forewarned them that their end shall be degradation and ruin.
   Some  of the practical lessons which this view of the harmony of
creation, and its subserviency to man's  moral nature teaches will now
 be considered.
   I. Each particular department of truth derives  new interest and
value from the perception  of its harmony and  connection with the
whole.   It is indeed in the knowledge  of this harmony and connec-
tion that our knowledge of any particular  portion  of  truth mainly
lies.  He knows a piece of mechanism who knows it in its relations
and ends.    The professor of anatomy does not introduce his  pupils
to a full  comprehension of the human heart by simply  laying this
organ on the table, and pointing out its size, and texture, and cavities
and valves.  All these it is necessary to  know, but how much more
 than these.  No man can understand  the  heart without understand-
 ing the arteries that proceed from it, and  the veins which terminate
 in it.  And these cannot be  understood  without understanding the
structure and office of the  lungs, and the constitution of the atmos-
phere and of the blood, and the functions of the  entire alimentary
system, and of the  various secreting  and excreting  glands.   In a
word, no one can understand the  heart  without understanding the
whole  man, considered in his  animal nature.  The  heart is  to be 
                               14
studied, not as an organ by itself, but as a part of the man.    Its
wonderful nature manifests itself in the office which it performs in
the entire economy of  the system.
   The same principle  applies  to the whole range of truth.  It is all
interwoven into one body, so to speak, and each part is to be studied
in its connections with the rest.  It is understood when its relations
are understood and not before.   How often, in the history of science,
has some fact, or class of facts, that had been well known for centu-
ries, but had excited no interest, because it was regarded simply by
itself, become all at once invested with new  beauty and  value, and
been studied with intense interest, because its relations to other truths
have been discovered!   To draw an  illustration  from geology—the
various strata which compose  the earth's surface, with the vegetable
and animal remains imbedded  in them, were, at least to some extent,
known for ages before the rise of the modern science of geology.—
But because they  were  not considered in their bearing  upon  other
great truths, they were viewed with indifference or idle curiosity.—
But now, studied with reference to the great problem of the successive
stages by which the earth's surface has been brought  to  its present
organization, with what new interest and  value are they invested!
   Thus is it with  all truth.   Its true dignity and value is seen in the
part which it plays in the general  system.   To him who has learned
thus to investigate and judge of each particular department of truth,
it appears invested with a loveliness and majesty of which the  care-
less observer knows nothing.   He feels a living interest in all  truth
because he sees ('in some humble measure) the  relations of each part
to the whole system of which  God is the Author and Head.   And
where he does not discern these relations, he does not, with the super-
ficial  narrow-minded materialist and atheist,  sneeringly ask, "  What
it the use of this?^ but he humbly waits for more light.
   II.  Another benefit of studying truth in its connections and rela-
tions, is that  it shows  us the high supremacy of the  moral part of
man's nature over the  physical.  For we  have seen that, with what-
ever part of  his material  frame we begin, we come at last to this
result, that it was intended to subserve the wants of his spirit.  And
the same we find to hold true  of all  the physical  arrangements of
this  world, and of his very subjection  to their power.   Without 
15
 man, the world appears^like a vast and complicated piece of mechan-
 ism, evidently intended to accomplish high results, but not yet direct-
 ed towards those results.   With man,  the  system is seen in full
 operation.   Under its powerful influence the immortal  soul is under-
 going a process of severe but necessary discipline for a more perfect
 state of being.
   When we consider how constantly men  are,  from the necessities
 of their condition, occupied with objects of sense, it will be manifest
 that the habit of  thus viewing the material world in  its subserviency
 to the moral, must exert the most salutary influence.   And it would
seem that  this is especially necessary in the case of those whose
 profession  naturally leads them to the contemplation of the material
 rather than the spiritual in man's  nature.   One whose immediate
business is with the animal part of man,  and who is constantly wit-
 nessing the immense power which this exerts over his mental faculties
 and moral feelings;  who has often occasion to notice the  connection
 between a disordered state  of the stomach  and an irritable temper;
 between a torpid liver and mental  sluggishness and despondency;
 and, in genera1, between different constit utions of the body and their
 corresponding  mental and  moral  temperaments;   and  who  sees,
 moreover,  that a blow on the head, or an effusion of blood on the
brain has power  to  suspend, and various diseases  to derange  the
operation of the mental faculties—one whose employment leads him
thus to consider, from the material side only, the connection of  mind
 and matter, might be in danger of  hastily drawing  the  conclusion
 that the whole  soul lies in the bodily organization, and that  there is
 no purely  spiritual and moral principle,  connected indeed  with the
 body in the present life, yet, so far as its  essential attributes are con-
 cerned, above it, and independent of it.
   This nascent feeling of  materialism could be met^only negatively
 on purely  physiological grounds.  Physiology would be able to fur-
nish such analogies as the following.
   The eye is to the soul the organ through which it takes  cognizance
of all visible objects.   When this is destroyed  the power of seeing
perishes  with it.  But it  woujd be a most absurd  inference that,
because the power of seeing is gone, (the  being which exercised this
power has  perished.    The only rational conclusion is, that, while the
mind itself has suffered no lesion in any of its essential attributes, it 
            *                  16
has been  deprived of one of the instruments  through which it has
heretofore held converse with the external world.
  Again: incases  of drowning, the circulation of the blood  is so
suspended that all feeling and motion, and, so far as we can see, all
mental activity cease.  Upon the restoration  of  the circulation, sup-
posing it possible to effect this, thought and feeling and motion return.
It would be  an  unwarrantable supposition  in this case, that  the
spiritual substance itself which thinks, and feels, and acts, has suffered
any injury in  its own proper essence.  All that  we can legitimately
infer is  that the body, the mind's appointed  medium of action,  has
been  temporarily brought into  such a  state that it could  no longer
act in it and through it.
  Lf  now we  suppose that  resucitation cannot  be effected, then the
body  is speedily  disorganized, and the soul  loses permanently  the
instrument through which, in life, it thought, and felt, and acted.—
That the soul  itself has perished, physiology  affords  no ground  for
believing; but neither, on the  other hand, does it teach  what  other
means  it may have  in a disembodied state of exercising its powers.
Whether, when its  connection  with  the body  has entirely ceased, it
may not, as a pure spirit, enjoy  the highest activity, or  whether it
may not be left in a state of unconsciousness and inactivity—respect-
ing these momentous  questions  physiology alone  is able  neither to
affirm nor deny.   All that it can say is that  it  has no evidence that
the soul is annihilated  with the disorganization  of the  body.   Its
testimony is only  negative, and, as such, meets  not the wants of  the
spirit in the hour of dissolution.
  But the subordination  of the whole material creation to  man's
spiritual nature, according to the view which we  have taken, sheds
positive light upon this great question—light v\hich is not to be  de-
spised or undervalued because  we enjoy the clearer and more author-
itative teachings of revelation, but which, as it is in glorious harmony
with these teachings, ought ever to be contemplated in  connection
with them.  \\ e  have seen  that all the parts of the material world
find their end  in ministering to  man as a rational accountable subject
of moral government; that  while God has with his own finger writ-
ten within upon  the soul  its responsibility to law, he has also, by
means of the physical constitution which he has given to man's body 
                               17
and to the world in which he has placed it, and the relations which
he  has established between these, commenced  a  process  of moral
training, which evidently has  reference to ihe development of his
powers as a free moral agent, and which, as it is continued up to the
very hour of his departure from this world, manifestly has reference
to the employment of these powers, when thus developed,  in  some
future sphere of activity.  We cannot believe that all this  labor
bestowed upon a mind capable of unlimited enlargement  in all its
faculties is for no high end.   But it can find a worthy end only in
the preparation  of the soul for a future state  of being.   And here
revelation comes in to confirm the conclusions of unbiased reason, and
by a  voice from the excellent glory, declares that man is  made for
immortality:  that the present life is a  seed-time of which eternity  is
 the harvest; and warns him, in view of this solemn truth, to sow not
to the flesh but to the spirit.
   III. The habit of  contemplating truth in its connections and rela-
tions tends'powerfully to produce that child-like candor and humility
 which  is the  highest ornament of every scholar  and professional
 man.   How it  accomplishes this is obvious.    Instead  of chaining
the mind down to one narrow department of knowledge, it opens to
 it the  whole field of truth in all its immensity, and, in contrast with
 this,  compels it to see  and acknowledge its own ignorance.   By
 showing also the innumerable ties which bind together all the  differ-
ent  departments of knowledge,  it preserves  the professional  man,
 who must  of  necessity devote his main strength to his own particular
 branch of  science, from  that foolish vanity and ostentation which are
 at once the offspring  and the index of a narrow and contracted mind.
 The only reason why men are ever vain of their acquirements is that
 the little world of truth  in which they live and move is to them the
 whole world.   Like  the cottager's child,  who  has never been away
 from his father's premises, aad  who thinks that the  narrow spot of
 -round which the blue circle of the horrizon encompasses is the entire
 universe, so they, having  never traveled beyond  their own depart-
 ment, vainly imagine that in  it are contained all  the treasures  of
 wisdom and knowledge.
   It cannot have escaped your notice that men's  vanity is generally
 inversely  as  the  magnitude  of  their  pursuits.   A  mountebank, a 
                               IS
rope-dancer, a horse-jockey, prides himself more on his powers than
a Chatham  or a Washington.   The reason is that the more trivial
the object of a man's pursuit, the more it narrows down the field ol
his vision: on the contrary, the higher and nobler an  emplopment,
the wider the scope of truth which it includes.  It is one of  the bles-
sed effects  of true  learning, that, by opening to men's view,  vast
fields of research on every side, all bound  together by  indissoluble
ties of fellowship, it  teaches them how  little thev know, and  how
intimately that little is connected with other fields of knowledge yet
to be  explored, and  thus removes far away from them  the dogmati-
zing self-conceited spirit that marks the sciolist, as distinguished from
the ripe  scholar.
   According to the testimony of your own writers, your profession,
gentlemen, is not a little troubled by the intrusion of ignorant preten-
ders.   Now the very essence of quackery—so far as it  is not simply
a money-making affair—lies in the narrow and contracted spirit that
"has been animadverted upon.   Your regular quack has taken up one
remedial agent, real or supposed, and in this he includes the whole
healing art.  His nostrum  is ('for the time being, for he may  soon
change it for something ehe) his world,  and he is quite sure there is
nothing  lying outside of it.  He can bring innumerable certificates,
and these too signed by ministers  of  the gospel of high standing in
their  own profession (and  of  course —so he would seem to judge—
capable  of  pronouncing,  ex cathedra,  on questions  in an entirely
different profession^—he can bring innumerable certificates to prove
that  his heal-all has power to clarify the human  system from every
species of disease,  as certainly and as safely as an egg  will clarify a
cup of coffee.  His error is precisely that which we have  been  con-
sidering.  He takes  one remedial  agent real or pretended out of its
proper place and relations, making  it,  instead of a remedy,  to be
used  like other remedies, when fhe symptoms of the disease indicate
its use, the  remedy to which every other article cf materia medica is,
in all circumstances, to give place.  Thus that  which  in its proper
 place and  measure  was   truth, out of its  place  becomes pernicious
 falsehood.  To constitute a man a  quack it is not necessary that his
 nostrum should be  absolutely worthless.   On the contrary it may be,
 in its place, very valuable.  Hydropathy, for example, has its p!ac3 
                               19
among remedial agents, and no  enlightened person would accuse a
physician of  quackery on the  simple ground that he resorted to thin
remedy.   But, when we see an hydropafhist ready to swoon away at
the mention  of calomel, opium, or  quinia, we  discover that narrow
and exclusive mode of judging which is the  very essence of empiri-
cism.  One  of the chief advantages of a thorough  and comprehen-
sive course of medical  training, such  as we are  proud  to  say this
medical  school furnishes, is that it does away with these contracted
ideas,  and teaches the  physician to give to every article of materia
medica,  and  to every mode of medical treatment its proper place.
   I am unwilling to dismiss this snbject, without alluding to another
species of empiricism which may properly be called moral.   I have
reference to that materialistic philosophy, unhappily too prevalent at
 the present day, which, without directly denying the eternal  and
 immutable obligation  of moral law, virtually undermines it, by teach-
 ing that man is the passive creature of circumstances.  According to
 the doctrine of this school, all crime has its source in a bad organiza-
 tion  of  the  brain, or  in unpropitious  outward circumstances.  The
 offender against law human  or divine is not guilty, but unfortunate.
 He has  only acted in conformity with  influences which impelled bin.
 forward by  a physical necessity, just as the tiger is impelled to blood
 and carnage.   It is wrong, therefore, to inflict upon  him retributive
 suffering, as an expression of the demerit of  his deeds: the idea ot
 demerit, and of penalty as  expressive of demerit,  is a pernicious
 prejudice which ought to be  got rid of as soon as possible; all pun-
 ishment has for  its  only end  the good  of the offender; it is not to be
 regarded as an infliction of  merited  suffering for violated law;  but
 as°a medicine, bitter indeed,  but salutary, and intended for the resto-
 ration cf the patient:  the infliction of capital punishment is utterly
 wrong, and the  idea of an eternal retribution hereafter a fable.
    Such is a brief summary  of the code of  this sensuous philosophy.
  It is, very generally found associated with phrenology; yet phrenology,
  kept within its  proper province, does  not lead to such conclusions.—
  Here let me say that with phrenology itself, as a science resting upon
  deductions  from alleged facts,  I have at present no concern.  Whetl -
 «r it be, in its leading principles, true or false, is immaterial to tl e
  present question.  We find, as a matter of fact, the greatest diver- 
                               20
 sity in the relative strength  of men's passions and propensities, just
 as  we find  also  the  greatest diversity  in their  external  circum-
 stances.  Some men have, whether  by the original constitution of
 their minds, or by education and the force of circumstances, or by
 such a  difference of bodily organization as  phrenology  affirms,
 stronger animal passions  (very often  stronger propensities in some
 particular direction J or  more pride and ambition, or more  impetu-
 osity, or more courage and resolution, than others.  And these diver-
 sities of temperament and character, however we  may account for
 them, undoubtedly vary indefinitely the kind  and degree of  tempta-
 tion which different men must overcome in order to adhere to recti-
 tude.
   But it is a first principle in morals that, so long as a man retains
 the exercise of his reason by which he discerns the distinctions between
 right and  wrong, no  amount  of  temptation  can constitute  a valid
 excuse for sin.   The obligation of right is supreme  and absolute.  It
 does not admit of  being guaged and measured, and weighed with the
 pleasures of sin.   The moment we admit that a low degree of tempta-
 tion does not excuse the violation of hnown right, but a high degree
 does excuse it,  we have undermined the whole foundation of  morals.
 Who then is to decide how much or how little the degree of tempta-
 tion shall be?  It must be left to each man, under the excitement of
 passion, to  decide for  himself.   There is  no longer  any absolute
 immutable standard of morality.  Law is  made  subordinate to  pas-
 sion, and there  is an end to all personal virtue and social order.
   Let it be remembered,  further,  that the  obligation  to obey mora]
 law does not depend in the least upon the  acuteness  or  bluntness of
 our moral feelings.  We  know that the habit of obeying the dictates
 of conscience cherishes the moral feelings, and makes them more
 tender and susceptible; and that the habit of disobeying the voice of
 conscience stifles and blunts these feeling, so that the hardened offen-
 der can perpetrate with comparative indifference deeds which, at the
 commencement of his  career of crime, would  have filled him with
 horror.   But if this callousness of moral feeling excuses or even  pal-
liates his crimes, we come directly to the monstrous conclusion  that
 one  by steeping his conscience in  crime, until  he has stupified it,
 makes himself at last an innocent man!  And some pretended philan- 
                               21
thropists of the present day, are, it would seem, acting  upon this
principle.   For there is  no surer way  to enlist their sympathies and
efforts for a criminal and against the laws, than that he should have
perpetrated  some high-handed deed of lust or  blood which evinces
the greatest obtuseness of moral feeling.
   This materialistic philosophy, which virtually annihilates the eter-
nal  distinctions of right  and wrong, and  resolves all  crime into
misfortune, by making it simply the product of unpropitious circum-
stances or an  unhappy natural  temperament, has again  and again
reared its  snaky head in  this world,  hissing defiance  at  God, and
right, and law, and heaven and hell; willing to reduce man to a level
 with the brutes, by making him a creature of mere impulse,  if so it
 might also deliver him from moral responsibility; and its prevalence
 has ever been the signal for the most  open and shameless  profligacy
 of morals.  I  need not say, gentlemen, how much the  success  or
 defeat of this mischievous philosophy  will depend upon your attituce
 and bearing towards it.  The community confidently expect in you
 powerful defenders of the cause  of law and  morals, at  the presei.t
 crisis when so much is said and written to undermine both.
    In the department of medical jurisprudence an arduous  and respon-
 sible office will be, from time to time, devolved upon you.   It will
 be yours, on the one hand, to protect the really insane  from unde-
 served suffering, and, on the other, to maintain unsullied the  sanctity
 of  law.  You will need to  plant your feet firmly on the  basis of the
 immutable and eternal obligation  of  right, and to maintain with no
  faltering accents, the principle that, so long  as the reason  discerns
  the distinction between right and wrong, no amount of  excited pas-
  sion can constitute a valid excuse for criminal deeds.

             GENTLEMEN OF THE GRADUATING CLASS--
     You go out with our best  wishes  for your welfare.   We rejoice
  in the  testimony we  have before  us  this day both of the continued
  and increasing prosperity  of this Medical School, and of your pro-
  ficiency in medical science, which is such as to  warrant in us the
  ,„ost sanguine hopes that you will become bright  ornaments to your
  profession.
     Remember, young gentlemen, that you are  entering upon the dufces 
                              22
of a profession that once received the  highest honor  from him who
was himself above all human praise.   When the Savior tabernacled
in the, flesh, almost all his miracles were  wrought upon the persons
of the sick.  He performed no mighty  work for mere ostentation and
effect, but, wherever he  saw  suffering humanity,  he hasted to  its
relief.   Methinks it must be to you a delightful and inspiring thought
that you are endeavoring, in a humble  manner, to imitate his example
in relieving the sorrows to which flesh is heir.   Suffer me to remind
you that, wherever you meet with the poor, who need your assistance,
you should, like him, give your  services freely, expecting no earthly
recompense: and though you are not called upon, as he was, to make
spiritual instruction your proper employment,  yet, like  him, you
ought ever to  consider and treat man's spiritual nature as of para-
mount importance and excellence; and, while you are ministering to
the wants of the body, to omit no opportunity which the  providence
of  God opens  to you of doing good also to the immortal spirit. 
 
• 
 
CLEVELAND ML.DICAL COLLEGE
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