This organ is situated at the inferior range of the parietal bone. The faculty of the mind is a tendency to _acquire_ whatever is regarded valuable and whether riches or learning or articles of vertu be the object of acquisition, there appears to be little doubt, that such a faculty is natural to the nature of man. Although such an instinctive desire presents the aspect of meanness we must in some measure look at its effects; what would England or any civilized country be, if there had never been a desire for storing up the products of intellect and philosophy,--and the wealth that enables England to send out millions in spreading the word of God over a benighted and barbarous world?--If industry were to be limited by present wants, man would always continue the creature of mere impulse; it is the faculty of acquisitiveness that directs a systematic aim at supplying the comforts and elegancies of life, and to this, accumulation is necessary: when however the pursuit of wealth becomes the chief business of life the moral sentiments are deadened, the intellect and the nobler faculties of the mind become engrossed in a debasing pursuit, the sympathy that characterizes a true christian is lost sight of. To provide for immediate wants of ourselves and those dependant upon us, to furnish the means of some repose for the body so as to enable the mind to enjoy cultivation, and to provide for the education of offspring:--to give a natural tendency for learning, for religious instruction, or the acquisition of that knowledge which is power, may be set down as the proper objects of this faculty: where the faculty of acquisitiveness is unduly exercised, and the propensity to acquire is not balanced by veneration and conscientiousness, the character is often influenced to dishonesty. In ABUSE; a miserly hoarding and total neglect of charity is evident, covetousness which St Paul condemns as idolatry, avarice and selfishness, a total disregard of distress, of conscientious principle, and of honour and duty are first and foremost;--from this organ, the weak fall a prey to the strong, the poor to the avarice of the lovers of mammon as they are called, that riches are valued more than public virtue or private integrity--that riches are pursued to the total ruin of the loftier principles of human nature, and to this prostitution of spirit and of soul is owing the difficulty of a rich man's entering the kingdom of heaven. If there be such an instinctive tendency of the human mind, no better advice can ever be offered than that of the christian's pattern "seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all other things shall be added unto you." "For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?"--