On the education of the imbecile / by Dora Greenwell.

  • Dora Greenwell
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the education of the imbecile / by Dora Greenwell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    is there between these two wedded mates any such dis¬ parity of native rank and lineage as a proud and ignorant spiritualism has been pleased to place. Each is originally beautiful, originally noble; each is ‘ created free, although born in chains;’ each is fallen and perverted from its clear original ideal; each seems capable of utter, even final de¬ gradation ; each contains within it the hints and rudiments of ultimate perfection, while in each lie wrapped the seeds of death and ruin. It is not in vain that spiritual and natural life and death, moral and physical well-being and decay, are so full of affinities, that we can scarcely speak of one without making use of some term that seems more pro¬ perly to belong to the other. The springs of life, of all life, lie close together, they may be tracked up to the same remote and hidden source, more hard to find than that of Nile or Niger, that c well-spring of life’ which remains the secret of* God himself—they lead down to one unfathom- able sea. Physiology reveals so many marvels, so extends our views of the capabilities of man; it shows us, both in his body and mind, such vast reserves of power, such sheathed and crippled energies; it lays bare such springs of latent ecstasy, dark in their flow, and silent as is a sub¬ terraneous river, that need but a touch to bid them flash and kindle into air and light, to allow the heart or the in¬ tellect to believe that either man’s body or his soul can perish. Yes ! I would say further, that physiology stands in need of Christianity as its complement; it makes sense (to speak familiarly) with the gospel, and with it alone. It requires a commandment that is exceeding broad, and no creed will suit it but that which saves both soul and body,