If priority of sensation alone were to be regarded, the sense of _touch_ might deserve to be considered in the first place; as it must have been exercised long before birth, and is probably the very feeling with which sentient life commences. The act of _birth_, in relation to the mind of the little stranger, who is thus painfully ushered into the wide scene of the world, is a series of feelings, of this class; and the first feeling which awaits him, on his entrance,--in the change of temperature to which he is exposed,--is still to be referred to the same organ. It is at this most important moment of existence, when one dark and solitary life of _months_, of which no vestige is afterwards to remain in the memory, is finished, and a new life of _many years_,--a life of sunshine and society,--is just beginning, that, in the figurative language of the author, whom I am about to quote to you, _Pain_, the companion of human life, receives him on the first step of his journey, and embraces him in his iron arms. “Primas tactus agit partes, primusque minutæ Laxat iter cæcum turbæ, recipitque ruentem. Non idem huic modus est qui fratribus; amplius ille Imperium affectat senior, penitusque medullis, Viceribusque habitat totis, pellisque recentem Funditur in telam, et late per stamina vivit. Necdum etiam matris puer eluctatus ab alvo Multiplices solvit tunicas, et vincula rupit; Sopitus molli somno, tepidoque liquore Circumfusus adhuc; tactus tamen aura lacessit Jamdudum levior sensus, animamque reclusit. Idque magis, simul ac solitum blandamque calorem Frigore mutavit cœli, quod verberat acri Impete inassuetos artus; tum sævior adstat, Humanæque comes vitæ Dolor excipit; ille Cunctantem frustra et tremulo multa ore querentem Corripit invadens, ferreisque amplectitur ulnis.”[83] It is at this moment, so painful to himself, that he is affording to _another_ bosom, perhaps the purest delight of which our nature is capable, and has already kindled, in a heart, of the existence of which he is as ignorant, as of the love which he excites in it, that warmth of affection, which is never, but in the grave, to be cold to _him_, and to which, in the many miseries that may await him,--in sorrow, in sickness, in poverty,--and perhaps too in the penitence of guilt itself,--when there is no other eye, to whose kindness he can venture to look, he is still to turn with the confidence, that he has yet, even on earth, _one friend_, who will not abandon him,--and who will still think of that innocent being, whose eye, before it was conscious of light, seemed to look to her for the love and protection, which were ready to receive him. FOOTNOTES: [79] Pope's Essay on Criticism, v. 374--381. [80] Quintus Curtius, lib. v. cap. 7. [81] Mart. Scrib. Book I. c. 7. with some exclusions. [82] Page 98, 99. [83] Gray de Princip. Cogit. lib. i. v. 64-80. LECTURE XXII.