Publisher's Synopsis
From the introductory CHAPTER I.
Among the many evidences of life, are there any so forcible as that of motion? So instinctive in the mind is the connection between life and motion, that, wherever a child sees continued and active motion for the first time, it immediately personifies the thing as a living object, and gives to it a motive to action; saying, "What for does it do" this or that. The story of the watch being taken for a live animal by the savage, is familiar to all.
Inertness or immobility naturally suggests the idea of death, in an object which we have been accustomed to see alive; and unadaptedness to the reception of life, or the impossibility of vivification in that of others. Hence the term "dead matter," and many similar forcible expressions in common use. Hence also, by contrast, are such epithets as 'full of life," applied to objects which manifest great activity and vigor.
Strange that this, so obvious a sign of life, should have been suggestive of so little. It has become the custom in this wise and artificial age, not to look at the obvious quality and meaning of things, but to obstinately close our eyes to what is plainly visible, and seek for some hidden meaning, unseen by other minds, that thereby we may display the superiority of our penetration or research.
Hence this obvious sign of life, motion, has been suggestive of so little, either in reference to man's body, to his temporal or his spiritual welfare; when not only is it the most apparent but the most far-reaching principle in them all; and has its correspondence in everything which regards him. What is the body without motion; what is thought without action -- knowledge without uses?
Were it possible for, a man to possess a great truth, and yet be incapable of reducing it to practice himself, or of conveying a knowledge of it to another being, whereby in process of time it might be suggestive of some use, it is evident it would be as a thing unborn. At best the truth was but in embryo, and never possessed a separate life. How many truths does man strangle, to the one he brings to the birth? The best of us must plead guilty to the charge of knowing far better than we do. How much would knowledge itself be increased by giving action to all our best thoughts -- by nurturing them until they take shape in conviction, and then by giving them birth -- life in action!...
