It is of such a spacious, lofty pitch,
Your roof were not sufficient to contain it."
Henry VI.

Columbus needs a planet to shape his course upon.
Newton and Laplace need myriads of age and thick-strewn
celestial areas. One may say a gravitating solar system
is already prophesied in the nature of Newton's mind.
Not less does the brain of Davy or of Gay-Lussac, from
childhood exploring the affinities and repulsions of
particles, anticipate the laws of organization. Does not
the eye of the human embryo predict the light? the ear of
Handel predict the witchcraft of harmonic sound? Do not
the constructive fingers of Watt, Fulton, Whittemore,
Arkwright, predict the fusible, hard, and temperable
texture of metals, the properties of stone, water, and
wood? Do not the lovely attributes of the maiden child
predict the refinements and decorations of civil society?
Here also we are reminded of the action of man on man. A
mind might ponder its thought for ages and not gain so
much self-knowledge as the passion of love shall teach it
in a day. Who knows himself before he has been thrilled
with indignation at an outrage, or has heard an eloquent
tongue, or has shared the throb of thousands in a national
exultation or alarm? No man can antedate his experience,
or guess what faculty or feeling a new object shall unlock,
any more than he can draw to-day the face of a person whom
he shall see to-morrow for the first time.

I will not now go behind the general statement to explore