strange that even our moral feelings should be liable
to abuse; but it is so, even with the best. Benevolence and charity may
be misplaced or be in excess of our means. They assume the shape of
vices in the form of prodigality and extravagance. The honest desire to
acquire the necessities of life or the means for moral and intellectual
improvement may in excess become cupidity or covetousness, and lead even
to the appropriation of what is not our own. Kleptomania is met with in
the book-worm or the antiquarian, as well as in the feminine lover of
dress or those in poverty and distress. Firmness may become obstinacy;
the justifiable love of self may, by abuse, become pride; and a proper
and chaste wish for the approbation of others may be turned into the
most absurd of vanities. Even religion itself may be carried to
uncharitableness, fanaticism and persecution. Still more strange it must
appear that even the intellectual faculties should be liable to abuse;
but it is part of the pains and penalties of the constitution of man
that it should be so. It is so to teach us that moderation is wisdom and
the only conduct that leads to health and happiness.

The abuse of the moral faculties is directly injurious; that of the
intellectual faculties mostly so in an indirect manner. Such abuses are
more hurtful by the influence they have upon the conduct than they have
upon the intellect itself. If a man's judgment is unsound, for example,
it leads to deleterious consequences, not only to himself, but to
others. If the powers of observation are weak, and a person is deficient
in the capacity of judging of form, distance or locality, he will be
incapacitated from success in many pursuits of life without his
suffering thereby, except in an indirect manner. The imagination, the
noblest manifestation of intellect, may, without judgment, be allowed to
run riot, or abused by its exaltation; and with the faculty of wonder
may lead to superstition, fanaticism and folly. The intellectual
faculties may be altogether weak or almost wanting. In such cases we
have foolishness merging into idiocy.

The examples here given of use, as opposed to neglect, misuse, or abuse,
are simply illustrative of the point in question. They might be extended
in an indefinite degree, especially if it were proposed to enter into
details. They will, however, suffice for the purpose in view, which is
to show that the use of all the powers and faculties granted to u