qua ciples, especially amidst the numberless trials to which they are exposed in this mixed scene of human life. Yet how many of our fellow-creatures do we esteem and loxg, who perhaps never coolly reflected on the beauty or fair proportions of virtue, or turned it into a subject of their moral approbation and complacency! Philosophers, or contemplative men, may very laudably amuse themselves with such charming theories, and often do contemplate every the minutest trace of virtue, about themselves with a parental fondness and admiration, and by those amiable images reflected from themselves, they may perhaps be confirmed in the esteem of whatever is honest and praise worthy. However, it is not generally among this recluse set of men that we expect to find the highest flights of virtue; but rather among men of action and business, who, through the prevalence of a natural good temper, or from generous affections to their friends, their country,, or mankind, are truly and transcendently, good. Whatever that lity is which we approve in any action, and count worthy our esteem, and which excites an esteem and love of the agent, we call the virtue, merit, or formal goodness of that action. And if actions invested with such a quality have the ascendant in a character, we call that character virtuous or good: now it is certain that those qualities or principles mentioned above, especially those of the public and benevolent kind, how simple, how instinctive soever, are viewed with approbation and love. The very nature of that principle we call conscience, which approves these benevolent affections; and whatever is done through their influence intimates that virtue or merit is present in the mind before conscience is exercised, and that its office is only to observe it there, or to applaud it. For if virtue is something that deserves our esteem and love, then it must exist before conscience is exerted, or gives its testimony. Therefore to say that 1 the testimony of conscience is necessary to the being or form of a virtuous action, is, in plain terms, to affirm that virtue is not virtue till it is reflected on and approved as virtue. The proper business of reason, in forming the virtuous character, is to guide the several affections of the mind to their several objects, and to direct us to that conduct, or to those measures of action, which are the most proper means of acquiring them. Thus, with respect to benevolence, which is the virtue of a character, or a principal ingredient of merit, its proper object is the public good. The business of reason then is to inform us wherein consists the greatest public good, what conduct and which actions are the most effectual means of promoting it. After all, the motions of the mind are so quick and imperceptible, and so complicated with each other, that perhaps seldom do any indulge the virtuous or good affections without an approving consciousness; and certainly the more that virtue is contemplated with admiration and love, the more firm and inflexible will the spectator be in his attachment to it. Divisions of When the mind is ignorant or uncertain conscience. about the moment of an action, or its tendency to private or public good, or when there are several circumstances in the case, some of which, being doubtful, render the mind dubious concerning the morality of the action, this is called a doubtful or scrupulous conscience; if it mistakes concerning these, it is called án erroneous conscience. If the error or ignorance is involuntary or invincible, the action proceeding from that error, or from that ignorance, is reckoned innocent, or not imputable. If the error or ignorance is supine or affected, i. e. the effect of negligence, or of affectation and wilful inadvertence, the conduct flowing from such error, or such ignorance, is criminal and imputable. Not to follow one's conscience, though erroneous and ill-in formed, formed, is criminal, as it is the guide of life; and to counteract it, shews a depraved and incorrigible spirit. Yet to follow an erroneous conscience is likewise criminal, if that error which misled the conscience was the effect of inattention, or of any criminal passion*. If it be asked, "how an erroneous con- How consci ence is to be science shall be rectified, since it is supposed rectified. to be the only guide of life, and judge of morals?" We answer in the very same way that we would rectify reason if at any time it should judge wrong, as it often does, viza by giving it proper and sufficient materials for judging right, i. e. by inquiring into the whole state of the case, the relations, connections, and several obligations of the actor, the consequences and other circumstances of the action, or the surplusage of private or public good which results, or is likely to result, from the action or from the omission of it. If those circumstances are fairly and fully stated, the conscience will be just and impartial in its de cision: for, by a necessary law of our nature, it approves and is well affected to the moral form; and if it seems to approve of vice or immorality, it is always under the notion or mask of some virtue. So that, strictly speaking, it is not conscience which errs; for its sentence is always conformable to the view of the case which lies before it: and is just, upon the supposition that the case is truly such as it is represented to it. All the fault is to be imputed to the agent, who neglects to be better informed, or who, through weakness or wickedness, hastens to pass sentence from an imperfect evidence. Thus he who persecutes another for the sake of conscience, or a mistake in religious opinion, does not approve of injustice or cruelty any more than his mistaken neighbour who suffers by it; but, thinking the severity he uses conformable to Vid. Hutches. Moral Inst. Lib. II. Chap. 3. the the divine will, or salutary to the patient, or at least to the society of the faithful, whose interests he reckons far preferable not only to the interest of so small a part, but to all the vast remainder of mankind; and thinking withal that severity is the only means of securing that highest interest, he passes a sentence as just, and consequential from those principles, as a physician, who to save the whole body, orders the amputation of a gangrened limb, thinking that the only remedy. Perhaps, in the latter case, an abler practitioner might have accomplished the cure by a less dangerous operation: and in the former, a better casuist, or a greater master in spiritual medicine, might have contrived a cure full as sure and much more innocent. Having now given the general divisions of duty or virtue, which exhibit its different faces and attitudes as it stands directed to its respective objects; let us next descend into particulars, and mark its more minute features and proportions as they appear in the detail of human life. SECTION II. Of Man's Duty to himself. Of the nature of Good, and the chief Good, Divisions of EVERY creature, by the constitution of his nature, is determined to love himself; to purque whatever tends to his preservation and happiness, and to avoid whatever tends to his hurt and misery. Being endued with sense and perception, he must necessarily receive pleasure from some objects, and pain from others. Those objects which give pleasure, are called good; and those which give pain, evil. To the former he feels that attraction attraction or motion we call desire, or love: to the latter, that impulse we call aversion, or hatred. To objects which suggest neither pleasure nor pain, and are apprehended of no use to procure one or ward off the other, we feel neither desire nor aversion; and such objects are called indifferent. Those objects which do not of themselves produce pleasure or pain, but are the means of procuring either, we call useful or noxious. Towards them we are affected in a subordinate manner, or with an indirect and reflective rather than a direct and immediate affection. All the original and particular affections of our nature lead us out to and ultimately rest in the first kind of objects, viz. those which give immediate pleasure, and which we therefore call good, directly so. The calm affection of self-love alone is conversant about such objects as are only consequentially good, or merely useful to ourselves. But, besides those sorts of objects which Moral good. we call good merely and solely as they give pleasure, or are means of procuring it, there is an higher and nobler species of good, towards which we feel that peculiar movement we call approbation or moral complacency, and which we therefore denominate moral good. Such are our affections, and the consequent actions to them. The perception of this is, as has been already observed, quite distinct in kind from the perception of the other species; and though it may be connected with pleasure or advantage by the benevolent constitution of nature, yet it constitutes a good independent of that pleasure and that advantage, and far superior not in degree only, but in dignity, to both. The other, viz. the natural good, consists in obtaining those pleasures which are adapted to the peculiar senses and passions. susceptible of them, and is ás various as are those senses and passions. This, viz. the moral good, lies in the right conduct |