Article #162 - Music

[The author differs with another Lyceum member, Otley Vernon, who argued for the study of music, saying that since this is a God-given attribute it should be cultivated.]

...The organ of musick [sic], certainly does exist in the brain, so do many others of a similar character...only subordinate faculties, conducing more to the bright polish than the crowning excellence of man, while the higher intellectual and moral organs...are the leading and more important elements...to which all others must yield obedience for it is now a generally conceded fact that there are certain moral religious and intellectual principals [sic] in man’s nature by which

all others must be governed.

[He offers the analogy of a sea captain who furnishes his ship with necessaries such as compass and rudder, rather than paying much attention to ornamenting it.]

...How many noble youth...have been deluded and ruined by trusting their fortunes too much to the barber and musick teacher and the other polite masters of the day. To be read by Josea [?] Jackson