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PREFACE.

THE object of this little book is purely practical. It is written to aid parents, teachers, and pastors, in their work of character-building; incidentally, too, to aid each individual to build himself. It grew out of a practical need, and was written wholly with a practical end in view.

Some years ago Dr. J. H. Vincent designed, as a part of his Chautauqua University, a Chautauqua School of Theology. Its object was not to supersede the thorough courses of biblical and theological study pursued in the seminaries, but to supplement them; to aid pastors in pursuing their studies after they had already entered on their parish work, and to enable laymen and others, who were engaged in ministerial or quasi ministerial labor, to equip themselves more thoroughly for their work. He proposed to incorporate in the curriculum of this Chautauqua School of Theology a "Department of Human Nature," the object of which should be to aid the student in studying man, individually and socially; human nature in history, in fiction, in the parish, and in society, thus enabling him to deal more wisely, because more truly scientifically, with the problems of individual and social life. Dr. Vincent asked me to take charge of this department, to create and to cultivate it. With much misgiving, I undertook the task; moved thereto partly by a warm personal affection and esteem for Dr. Vincent, partly by a great respect for the work which he is doing, and partly by a special interest in this particular department.

But no sooner had correspondence been opened with the students who desired to enter on this study, than

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we found ourselves confronted with an unexpected difficulty. There was no analysis of Human Nature which could be prescribed as a basis for our proposed course. The experiment of recommending several treatises, and leaving the students to make their own analysis, was not successful, and I was thus compelled to prepare an introduction to our study before we could prosecute it. Hence this treatise, the product of studies pursued as recreation for many years, but of composition completed in a few months.

Having once undertaken to write at all, I have endeavored to prepare this Study in Human Nature, in a form so practical, so simple, and so broad, that it might be a help to every mother who desires to study the nature of her child, every teacher who wishes to study the nature of his pupil, every pastor who aims to study the character either of his parish, or of a single parishioner. All scholastic subtleties, all doubtful disputations between different schools, all technical terms, I have carefully avoided. My aim is not to expound a system of philosophy, but to incite the reader to a study of Human Nature, and to help him in pursuing it.

Mental science has fallen under a popular ban. It is thought to be a hopeless plowing of a barren soil. But the sublimest work of God is man, and there can be no worthier object of devout study than him whom God has made after his own image; and surely no object about which we are more concerned to know, whether we regard our own welfare or the well-being of our fellow-men. To all who love their fellow-men, and desire to know and serve them better, this little attempt to aid them in that knowledge and service is dedicated by

THE AUTHOR.

CORNWALL-ON-HUDSON, N. Y.

A STUDY IN HUMAN NATURE.

CHAPTER I.

THE NECESSITY OF THE STUDY.

Lord

"KNOW thyself" was an ancient Greek apothegm. Beaconsfield, in his famous address before the University of Edinburgh, declared that the fundamental conditions of success in life were two-knowing one's self, and knowing the needs of one's age or epoch. But of all knowledge, selfknowledge is the rarest; perhaps, also, the most difficult to attain. It is only recently that physiology has become a study in our schools. Until within a few years all knowledge of the body was thought to be a specialty belonging only to the doctors. Even to-day mental science-the organism and operation of the mind-is not studied in our schools. This is left to the higher classes in our colleges, and studied there as an abstract, not as a practical, science. Every man ought to know his own nature; his bodily strength and weakness; his mental strength and weakness; his moral strength and weakness. A knowledge, concrete, not abstract, practical, not theoretical, of human nature, is essential to the best and truest success in life-to health, to development, to useful

ness.

1. No man can keep either mind or body in health unless he knows what his mind and body are. He cannot keep himself in order unless he knows how he is constituted. The body is a wonderfully delicate machine. It is placed in a world where there are many influences at work destructive of it. There is poison in food, in water, in air; there is

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