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Untitled Article
ledge * For what does it avail , to know the distinctive marks of each of the thirty-six genera of the testaceous order of worms ? or to have found out something new about a stamen in the calyx of a male flower of the third genus of the eleventh
order of the twenty second class of plants ? Plainly nothing , if not for some help , however remotely felt , which we derive from it in the pursuit of other and higher truths . It is the general foible of scientific
men , and indeed of all whose inquiries are limited to particular objeets , that they will not accept a subordinate credit , but demand—each for his own
pursuit—independent value . It ought to be considered no disparagement to any study , thattaken by itself—it is devoid of effective beneficial power . Unless the universal mutual
dependence of the matter of knowledge is to be recognised in principle , we must be content to remain collectors and virtuosos , and to forego all hopes
of raising a lasting monument of our age . Taking scientific men , however , for what they are , — regarding them , that is to say , as hoijpurable and indispensable commissioners of truth , as
the agents and travellers for the philosopher , and admitting them consequently to an exemption from cares beyond their immediate province , — then we come at once to the fact , that there is an office and station above them , in which the duty is , to convert all facts into principles ^ to find the aver-
Untitled Article
age in every number , to arrange and contrast evidence , to piece and match , to methodise and to apply . Then the machine is put into working condition that otherwise is a mere piece of lumber .
Some-of the principal Sufferings ° f Truth may be set forth in this manner . Amongst her enemies—Truth oppugned ; Truth undermined ; Truth garbled ; Truth counterfeited ; Truth made offensive :
Truth made ridiculous . Amongst her friends—Truth misdressed ; Truth overworked ; Truth weakly vindicated ; Truth alloyed ;
and , as before , Truth made offensive ; Truth made ridiculous . Such would be among the heads of a discourse that I could wish were written . Each
would be found capable of illustration the most instructive , and would suggest such rules of conduct for the mind in its inquiries , as would materially facilitate philosophical practice . One principal feature of such
an essay would be its historical examples . Every one of the above aspects of truth has its signal periods of history for our reference and consideration , and by taking an elevated and
comprehensive view of surrounding circumstances , as regards an age or a country , we should probably be able not only to detect the true source of the particular moral griev-
Untitled Article
118 Of the Sufferings of Truth .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 1, 1837, page 118, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1834/page/46/
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