Firmness Or Stiffness Of The Mind Is

Let Us Suppose The Mind To Be, As We Say, White Paper, Void Of All Characters, Without Any Ideas; How Comes It To Be Furnished? Whence Comes It By That Vast Store Which The Busy And Boundless Fancy Of Man Has Painted On It With An Almost Endless Variety? Whence Has It All The Materials Of Reason And Knowledge? To This I Answer, In One Word, From Experience.

I Doubt Not, But From Self-evident Propositions, By Necessary Consequences, As Incontestable As Those In Mathematics, The Measures Of Right And Wrong Might Be Made Out.

Where Danger Shews It Self, Apprehension Cannot, Without Stupidity, Be Wanting; Where Danger Is, Sense Of Danger Should Be; And So Much Fear As Should Keep Us Awake, And Excite Our Attention, Industry, And Vigour; But Not To Disturb The Calm Use Of Our Reason, Nor Hinder The Execution Of What That Dictates.

The Next Thing Is By Gentle Degrees To Accustom Children To Those Things They Are Too Much Afraid Of. But Here Great Caution Is To Be Used, That You Do Not Make Too Much Haste, Nor Attempt This Cure Too Early, For Fear Lest You Increase The Mischief Instead Of Remedying It.

We Are All A Sort Of Chameleons, That Still Take A Tincture From Things Near Us: Nor Is It To Be Wondered At In Children, Who Better Understand What They See, Than What They Hear.