God, so it enables him to conclude, that his own constitution is in reality the minimal end of correspondence, and the microcosm of the microcosm. It opens up a highway from man to God, a broad path upon which the angels are ascending and descending; and empowers us to conclude with reverent intentions from the one to the other, and to reconcile the science of correspondence with the truth, that "His thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor his ways as our ways." We may, therefore, now pass on to finite man, as the secondary fountain of correspondence, or the modifying principle of the universe. Let us, then, narrow our field for a time to this convenient limit, and illustrate the law of correspondency from our own familiar actions and objects.
Now, what is the series and procession of all human works? Man undoubtedly lives for a multiplicity of ends, which arise to him one after another; and he proposes them to himself, in the sevenfold ages of his lifetime. These ends, we must repeat, are not abstractions, but objects containing indefinite details. For instance, the love of which children are the object; or, to abridge so extensive a theme, let us take only that portion of the love which proposes the education of our offspring. Here the end or object (the end and object are the same ultimately, and the end is complete in proportion as it is correlative to the object primarily) comprises, or may comprise, all the results of moral and intellectual training, all the perfections of the character of the child; which perfections are the points to be attained. When the end is somewhat comprehended in detail, the next step is to place under or submit to it a series of means exactly adapted to advance it; so that, for every item that is desired, there shall be a specific adequate instrument or cause of gratification, and at least as many pieces in the cause as there are general divisions in the end. In the present instance, these pieces of the cause are all the suitable means of education. The last step is to direct the end, and to apply the causes, to the proper subject, or to the child, the genuine natural effect, recipient of education; an effect, however, less manifold than the cause, even as the cause is comparatively poor, in relation to the universal end.
