f nature. But we should know that the same sublime principle is
constantly operating thro out universal nature. Let that be suspended,
cease its active operations for a moment, and our own earth will be
decomposed into particles; the sun, moon and stars will dissolve and
mingle with the common dust; all creation will crumble into atoms, and
one vast ocean of darkness and chaos will fill the immensity of space.

Are you then prepared to deny the principles for which we are
contending? I think you will not; but accede the ground, that such being
the fact, true in nature, language, correctly explained, is only the
medium by which the ideas of these great truths, may be conveyed from
one mind to another, and must correspond therewith. If language is the
sign of ideas, and ideas are the impressions of things, it follows of
necessity, that no language can be employed unless it corresponds with
these natural laws, or first principles. The untutored child cannot talk
of these things, nor comprehend our meaning till clearly explained to
it. But some people act as tho they thought children must first acquire
a knowledge of words, and then begin to learn what such words mean.
This is putting the "cart before the horse."

Much, in this world, is to be taken for granted. We can not enter into
the minutiae of all we would express, or have understood. We go upon the
ground that other people know something as well as we, and that they
will exercise that knowledge while listening to our relation of some new
and important facts. Hence it is said that "brevity is the soul of wit."
But suppose you should talk of surds, simple and quadratic equations,
diophantine problems, and logarithms, to a person who knows nothing of
proportion or relation, addition or subtraction. What would they know
about your words? You might as well give them a description in Arabic or
Esquimaux. They must first learn the simple rules on which the whole
science of mathematics depends, before they can comprehend a
dissertation on the more abstruse principles or distant results. So
children must learn to observe things as they are, in their simplest
manifestations, in order to understand the more secret and sublime
operations of nature. And our language should always be adapted to their
capacities; that is, it should agree with their advancement. You may
talk to a zealot in politics of religion, the qualities of forbearance,
candor, and veracity; to the enthusiast of