value mental gratifications."* He concludes very truly, that Morality is completed by a belief of moral government. But the Inquiry concerning Virtue had reached that conclusion by a better road. It entirely escaped his sagacity, as it has that of nearly all other moralists, that the coincidence of Morality with well-understood interest in our outward actions, is very far from being the most important part of the question; for these actions flow from habitual dispositions, from affections and sensibilities, which determine their nature. There may be, and there are many immoral acts, which, in the sense in which words are commonly used, are advantageous to the actor. But the whole

sagacity and ingenuity of the world may be safely challenged to point out a case in which virtuous dispositions, habits, and feelings, are not conducive in the highest degree to the happiness of the individual; or to maintain that he is not the happiest, whose moral sentiments and affections are such as to prevent the possibility of any unlawful advantage being presented to his mind. It would indeed have been impossible to prove to Regulus that it was his interest to return to a death of torture in Africa. But what, if the proof had been easy? The most thorough conviction on such a point would not have enabled him to set this example, if he had not been supported by his own integrity and generosity, by love of his country, and reverence for his pledged faith. What could the conviction add to that greatness of soul, and to these glorious attributes? With such virtues he could not act otherwise than he did. Would a father affectionately interested in a son's happiness, of very lukewarm feelings of morality, but of good sense enough to weigh gratifications and sufferings exactly, be really desirous that his son should have these virtues in a less degree than Regulus, merely because they might expose him to the fate which Regulus chose? On the coldest calculation he would surely perceive, that the

high and glowing feelings of such a mind during life altogether throw into shade a few hours of agony in leaving it. And, if he himself were so unfortunate that no more generous sentiment arose in his mind to silence such calculations, would it not be a reproach to his understanding not to discover, that, though in one case out of millions such a character might lead a Regulus to torture, yet, in the common course of nature, it is the source not only of happiness in life, but of quiet and honour in death? A case so extreme as that of Regulus will not perplex us, if we bear in mind, that though we cannot prove the act of heroic virtue to be conducive to the interest of the hero, yet we may perceive at once, that nothing is so conducive to his interest as to have a mind so formed that it could not shrink from it, but must rather embrace it with gladness and triumph. Men of vigorous health are said sometimes to suffer most in a pestilence. No man was ever so absurd as for that reason to wish that he were more infirm. The distemper might return once in a century: if he were then alive, he might escape it; and even if he fell, the balance of advantage would be in most cases greatly on the side of robust health. In estimating beforehand the value of a strong bodily frame, a man of sense would throw the small chance of a rare and short evil entirely out of the account. So must the coldest and most selfish moral calculator, who, if he be sagacious and exact, must pronounce, that the inconveniences to which a man may be sometimes exposed by a pure and sound mind, are no reasons for regretting that we do not escape them by possessing minds more enfeebled and distempered. Other occasions will call our attention, in the sequel, to this important part of the subject; but the great name of Leibnitz seemed to require that his degrading statement should not be cited without warning the reader against its egregious fallacy.

MALEBRANCHE.

This ingenious philosopher and beautiful writer is the only celebrated Cartesian who has professedly handled the theory of Morals. † His theory has in some points of view a conformity to the doctrine of Clarke; while in others it has given occasion to his English follower Norris to say, that if the Quakers understood their own opinion of the illumination of all men, they would explain it on the principles of Malebranche. "There is," says he, "one parent virtue, the universal virtue, the virtue which renders us just and perfect, the virtue which will one day render us happy. It is the only virtue. It is the love of the universal order, as it eternally existed in the Divine Reason, where every created reason contemplates it. This order is composed of practical as well as speculative truth. Reason perceives the moral superiority of one being over another, as immediately as the equality of the radii of the same circle. The relative perfection of beings is that part of the immovable order to which men must conform their minds and their conduct. The love of order is the whole of virtue, and conformity to order constitutes the morality of actions." It is not difficult to discover, that in spite of the singular skill employed in weaving this web, it answers no other purpose than that of hiding the whole difficulty. The love of universal order, says Malebranche, requires that we should value an animal more than a stone, because it is more valuable; and love God infinitely more than man, because he is infinitely better. But without presupposing the reality of moral distinctions, and the power of moral

* Born, 1638; died, 1715.

†Traité de Morale. Rotterdam, 1684.

Author of the Theory of the Ideal World, who well copied, though he did not equal, the clearness and choice of expression which belonged to his master.

feelings, the two points to be proved, how can either of these propositions be evident, or even intelligible? To say that a love of the Eternal Order will produce the love and practice of every virtue, is an assertion untenable, unless we take Morality for granted, and useless, if we do. In his work on Morals, all the incidental and secondary remarks are equally well considered and well expressed. The manner in which he applied his principle to the particulars of human duty, is excellent. He is perhaps the first philosopher who has precisely laid down and rigidly adhered to the great principle, that Virtue consists in pure intentions and dispositions of mind, without which, actions, however conformable to rules, are not truly moral; — a truth of the highest importance, which, in the theological form, may be said to have been the main principle of the first Protestant Reformers. The ground of piety, according to him, is the conformity of the attributes of God to those moral qualities which we irresistibly love and revere. * "Sovereign princes," says he, "have no right to use their authority without reason. Even God has no such miserable right."† His distinction between a religious society and an established church, and his assertion of the right of the temporal power alone to employ coercion, are worthy of notice, as instances in which a Catholic, at once philosophical and orthodox, could thus speak, not only of the nature of God, but of the rights of the Church.

"Il faut aimer l'Etre infiniment parfait, et non pas un fantôme épouvantable, un Dieu injuste, absolu, puissant, mais sans bonté et sans sagesse. S'il y avoit un tel Dieu, le vrai Dieu nous défendroit de l'adorer et de l'aimer. Il y a peut-être plus de danger d'offenser Dieu lorsqu'on lui donne une forme si horrible, que de mépriser son fantôme." Traité de Morale, chap. viii.

† Ibid. chap. xxii.

JONATHAN EDWARDS.

This remarkable man, the metaphysician of America, was formed among the Calvinists of New England, when their stern doctrine retained its rigorous authority. His power of subtile argument, perhaps unmatched, certainly unsurpassed among men, was joined, as in some of the ancient Mystics, with a character which raised his piety to fervour. He embraced their doctrine, probably without knowing it to be theirs. "True religion," says he, "in a great measure consists in holy affections. A love of divine things, for the beauty and sweetness of their moral excellency, is the spring of all holy affections." Had he suffered this noble principle to take the right road to all its fair consequences, he would have entirely concurred with Plato, with Shaftesbury, and Malebranche, in devotion to "the first good, first perfect, and first fair." But he thought it necessary afterwards to limit his doctrine to his own persuasion, by denying that such moral excellence could be discovered in divine things by those Christians who did not take the same view as he did of their religion. All others, and some who hold his doctrines with a more enlarged spirit, may adopt his principle without any limitation. His ethical theory is contained in his Dissertation on the Nature of True Virtue; and in another, On God's chief End in the Creation, published in London thirty years after his death. True virtue, according to him, consists in benevolence, or love to "being in general," which he afterwards limits to "intelligent being," though "sentient" would have involved a more reasonable limitation. This good-will is felt towards a particular being, first in proportion to his degree of existence (for,

Born in 1703, at Windsor in Connecticut; died in 1758, at Princeton in New Jersey.

† See Note O.

On Religious Affections, pp. 4. 187.