Every indication of choice is exhibited to SENSE in that well known toy, the magic swan. When this effigy of animality is on the verge of the sphere of attraction, the child cries "La, mamma! it is afraid

to be caught only look

how it hesitates whether to take the bread or not!" But, when in the full tide of attraction, the child is assured of re-established confidence, and yet intends to outwit the would-be swan, he suddenly reverses the pole, and discovers every symptom of displeasure in the disappointed bird. Oh! fatal ignorance in the adult to be played upon by appearance because the dog catches at roast beef and refuses a stone. Is there the slightest difference in the two cases !—are they not equally acts of Instinct, grounded in the very nature of matter to obey the law of the strongest impulse! I have heard it asserted that mind can move matter but surely not without

the intervention of mind. The generalissimo evidently commands through the intervention of mind. At the word "March!"-all his myrmidons are in motion. But let the same electric word be repeated to the same body of men when lying breathless on the bed of honour, and it proves entirely powerless. Hence we may infer that mind acts on mind, and that matter acts

on matter. So that to think is the proof of spirit, and to move is the proof of matter. This brings us back to

the poet's query :

"Has matter more than motion? has it thought?"

Instinctive acts are uniform, and never show any progressive improvement. The first bee deposited its winter store in as perfect a hexagon cell as the bee of to-day, though he might have gleaned experience from the innumerable bygone centuries of his interminable predecessors. Not so man-he surpasses the instinct of animals in possessing choice, as is evinced by his daily progress in science. Adam was unacquainted with the vast and overpowering effects produced by steam, nor was the garden of Eden illumined by gas. Yet what are the boasted discoveries of the nineteenth century, when compared with the development of REASON in the two millionth! The magnitude of the thought almost annihilates us in the contemplation, and proves to CONVICTION that man is endowed with a power different, indeed, in its nature from animal instinct. What is this power? - REASON!

Now, as instinct acts from foreign impulse, and as REASON is different from this power, it must of necessity act uninfluenced by other powers. Hence it follows

no other laws than those which emanate from itself: thus REASON is wholly free from every effect of nature whatsoever, and obeys no other laws than those of its own constitution. The objects of instinct are palpable to SENSE, while those of REASON, being wholly uninfluenced by SENSE, must be insensible, that is, imperceptible, by SENSE: then they must be spiritual.

REASON is the faculty of drawing conclusions.

But, as conclusions have never been witnessed by SENSE, they must of course be spiritual essences, confirmed by REASON. REASON, therefore, is quite, distinct from the other two faculties of the mind, SENSE and UNDERSTANDING.

The importance of the subject demands the utmost attention; for, should a fundamental error any where lie

concealed, all the reasoning we have exhibited with so much formality will be entirely abortive, and a new investigation must be instituted. This will account for our pursuing the subject to so great a length, in order to give every opportunity for the detection of hidden errors or concealed subtilties.

The great fault committed in reasoning on the subject of instinct is the usual logical blunder of taking that to be true which only appears to be so, but really is not. Thus we err in assuming that the sagacious Elephant reasons, because in unloading his panniers and placing the barrels in the boat he adroitly finds a pebble to prevent their rolling apart-is this more than instinct?

-No !—it is nothing more than a direct act to obtain a certain end, and is as free from choice as the power instilled into every drop of water to find its level. Every particle of steel filings shows as much love and affection for one pole of the magnet as it does antipathy to the other. Instances of this distressing logical blunder may be multiplied to an enormous extent.

A more beautiful exemplification of the instinctive power in matter cannot well be conceived than is afforded to the spectators of the feats of horsemanship in the Circus. When the horse and the rider are

quiescent, the particles of matter of which they are composed obey the direct law of gravitation, and arrange themselves in perpendicular lines to the centre of gravity. But, the instant they are put in motion, they are acted upon by two opposing laws - the centrifugal and the centripetal forces. Hence these very same particles assume a new direction, and form an angle proportionate to the velocity, with an instinctive view of preserving the great law of nature - a perfect equilibrium.

What, however, is still more imposing, and also forms a more complete proof of our theory, is that if the rider is engaged in throwing up a marble, intending to catch it again in a quart bottle, he takes no pains to calculate where he shall be when the marble returns to the bottle for the instinctive law in matter saves him this trouble. He merely throws up the marble as if he stood still. - nature does the rest. How exquisitely beautiful to find even a detached piece of matter the marble-strictly obeying its own instinctive law, though detached from man and horse! Otherwise we should be compelled to say the horse reasoned, for he also obeys the law of nature instinctively planted in matter. He even does this with the utmost mathematical pre