The operation of the principle of individuation, is not confined to the infant, but continues to maintain its place during all the after stages of life, whenever any thing new and uncommon is presented as an object of knowledge. Every thing is new to the infant, and therefore this principle is more conspicuous during the early stages of education.--But it is still equally necessary for the child or the youth in similar circumstances; and Nature compels him, as it were, still to concentrate the powers of his mind upon every new object, till he has received and become familiar with the information it is calculated to furnish.--Every one must have observed the intensity with which a child examines an object which he has never seen before, and the anxiety which he evinces to know all about it.--It requires a considerable effort on his own part, and still greater on the part of others, to detach his mind from the object, till it has surrendered the full amount of information which the young enquirer is seeking. The boy with his new drum will attend to nothing else if he can help it, as long as he has any thing to learn concerning it, and the noises it is capable of producing.--And even when he has tired himself with beating it, he is not satisfied till he has explored its contents, to find out the cause which has created the sounds. The girl with her doll, in the same way, will voluntarily think of nothing else, as long as it can provide her with mental exercise; that is, as long as it can add something new to her present stock of knowledge. And it is here worthy of remark, that the apparent exception in this case, arising from the greater length of time that a doll and a few other similar toys will amuse a child, is in reality a striking confirmation, and illustration of the principle of which we are speaking.--Such toys amuse longer, because it is longer before the variety of which they are capable is exhausted.--The doll is fondled, and scolded, and cradled, and dressed, and undressed in so many different ways, that the craving for new ideas continues for a long period to be amply gratified;--but the effect would be quite different, were the very same doll placed where it could only be looked at. Every new movement with the toy is employed by Nature, for the cultivation of the mental powers, by reiterating the ideas thus imparted, and on which the imagination delights to dwell; and also in receiving a knowledge of individual objects and ideas, which, when once known, are to form the elements of future groupings, and of an endless variety of information.