CONCLUSION.
[Sidenote: Very many things to be learned in this world.]
I have thus, in the Three Parts of this book, described to you some of
the wonderful things that are all around you upon the earth and in the
water. But there are many more things than I have described. In this
book you have only begun to learn what is in the world, and you could
not learn all if you should study all your lifetime, and even if your
life should be as long as Methuselah’s was. But I hope that you will
go on to learn as much as you can. With your mind wide awake, you will
see and hear, as you go about from day to day, a great many interesting
things that I have not mentioned. I have told you about many things
in plants; but if you look at different plants as you meet with them,
you will soon see that you can learn much about them that you can not
find any where in this book. So, also, if you watch animals, large and
small, as you see them, you will find many more interesting things in
them than I have told you. And the same is true of the subjects of the
Third Part--air, water, light, etc. I have only opened to you a few of
the leaves in the Book of Nature, and you can go on to open more of
them for yourselves.
[Sidenote: Think while you look.]
[Sidenote: Every fact valuable.]
To know much about things, you must not merely look at them. You must
examine them--that is, you must think while you look. You must think
what this is for and what that is for. In this way you can find out a
great deal for yourselves. You will not merely see that what I and
others tell you is true, but you will find out things that no one has
told you, and perhaps some things that no one has found out before
you. Newton, who found out so many things that men did not before
know, always thought about things as he saw them; and so did Franklin,
who, as you remember, discovered that lightning is electricity. They
began early, when they were children, to think while they looked. They
had a _habit_ of doing it. If they had not, they would not have been
such discoverers. Though perhaps none of you may ever discover as
many things or as great things as they did, any of you may make some
discoveries. Though your discoveries may be small ones, they are not to
be despised. They will be worth something. _Every fact that is found
out is of some value._ And if you always think while you see and hear,
you may find out for yourselves many facts, and some of them may prove
to be of great value.
Sometimes a fact that would appear to be of no value turns out to be
worth a great deal. Most people would not think that there was much to
be learned from a hen’s muddy tracks on a pile of sugar; but, as you
remember I told you in Part First, Chapter XXIX., some one observed the
fact that the sugar was whitened wherever the tracks were, and thought
about this fact; and the result was that moistened clay came to be used
in every sugar refinery in whitening sugar.
One that is in the habit of thinking while he looks will find something
interesting wherever he goes. He will not be obliged to go to some
museum to see wonderful things, but he will find them all about him.
In the most common plants and animals, which most people do not think
of much, he will see many things to interest and astonish him; and to
him the air and the water, and even the stones under his feet, will be
full of wonders.
[Sidenote: Much to be learned that is not in books.]
You see by what I have said that there is a great deal to be learned
that is not in books. Indeed, books will not do you much good if they
do not wake up in you a disposition to learn more than they tell you.
People that know much are not content with learning merely what they
find in books, but learn what they can from every body and from every
thing. They use books only as helps, and the most of what they know
they learn by observing--that is, seeing and thinking upon what they
see.
[Sidenote: Knowing the reasons of things.]
It is very pleasant to know the reasons of things. I have therefore
told you in this book, as I have gone along, as much as I could do,
why things are as I have described them; but you will remember that I
have now and then said about some things that you are not old enough
yet to understand them. As you grow older you can learn more and more,
and so the things that you will be interested in will be all the time
increasing. But, though you may keep on learning all your lives, there
are some things that you never can understand. God understands the
reasons of every thing, but there are many, very many things that the
wisest of men can not explain.
[Sidenote: What Newton said about what he knew.]
Very wise men are not apt to be proud of their wisdom. They commonly
feel that what they know is very little when it is compared with what
they do not know. Newton was one of the wisest men that ever lived. He
was so wise that he discovered more things than any other man ever
has. But he was very humble about his knowledge. He said this about it:
He felt that what he knew was like a few pebbles that he had picked up
on the sea-shore, and that there was so much of what he did not know
that it was like the great ocean that was before him.
[Sidenote: Our knowledge in another world.]
You remember that I told you in Part Second that all that we know we
learn by the senses of our bodies--the sight, the hearing, etc. But the
glorified bodies which the Bible says that we shall have in another
life will be fitted with better means of getting knowledge. Some things
that are mysterious to us now we shall then understand. We shall know
more than Newton and all the wise men of this world ever knew here, and
we shall ever be learning more and more of the wonders of God’s power,
and wisdom, and goodness.
_Questions._--What is said about learning all that is in the world?
How can you learn about things for yourselves? What is said about
Newton and Franklin? Can you make some discoveries? What is said about
the value of facts? What about finding wonders all around us? How
can books help you to learn more than is in them? What is said about
understanding the reasons of things? What is said about the feelings
of very wise men? Tell what Newton said about his knowledge. What is
said about our getting knowledge in another world?
THE END.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Child's Book of Nature, by Worthington Hooker