and a strict regard to their word as it has been pledged among themselves, and in some cases to others not of their own party, which shows the remains of a moral nature.— Some years since, the island of Sicily, in the Mediterranean Sea, was infested with Banditti. Mr. Brydone gives his readers to understand, in his well-known Tour into that country, that he took some pains to inquire into the character of these robbers. A certain individual, in whom he seems to have had confidence, gave him the following account of them:

66 He says, that in some circumstances these banditti are the most respectable people of the island, and have by much the highest and most romantic notions of what they call their point of honour. That, however criminal they may be with regard to society in general, yet, with respect to one another, and to every person to whom they have once professed it, they have ever maintained the most unshaken fidelity. The magistrates have often been obliged to protect them, and even pay them court, as they are known to be perfectly determined and desperate; and so extremely vindictive, that they will certainly put any person to death who has ever given them just cause of provocation. On the other hand, it never was known that any person who had put himself under their protection, and showed that he had confidence in them, had cause to repent of it, or was injured by any of them in the most minute trifle; but, on the contrary, they will protect him from impositions of every kind, and scorn to go halves with the landlord, like most other conductors and travelling servants, and will defend him with their lives if there is occasion. That those of their number who have thus enlisted themselves in the service of society are known and respected by the other banditti all over the island, and the persons of those they accompany are ever held sacred. For these reasons, most travellers choose to hire a couple of them from town to town, and may thus travel over the whole island in safety."

Mr. Brydone himself further adds in a subsequent passage, "I should have mentioned that they have a practice of borrowing money from the country people, who never dare refuse them; and if they promise to pay it,

they have ever been found punctual and exact, both as to the time and the sum, and would much rather rob and murder an innocent person than fail of payment at the day appointed; and this they have often been obliged to do, only in order (as they say) to fulfil their engagements and to save their honour."

281. Of errors in the statements of travellers.

The views which have been presented in this Chapter obviously explain, so far, at least, as to make them consistent with the doctrine of a natural conscience, many of those cases of wrong and cruelty in the conduct of Savage tribes which have attracted so much of the notice of travellers. It is proper, however, in order to have a fair view of the subject, to make one remark more, viz., that the statements which travellers have given of the immoralities, irreligion, and cruelties of such tribes, are in some cases either mistakes of the facts or exaggerations of the facts. Mr. Stewart distinctly asserts, that this is the case to a considerable extent; without supposing, however, that, as a general thing, such mistakes or exaggerations are intentional. In this view Sir James Mackintosh seems to concur. Speaking of the universality of those great social and moral principles which are the guardians of human society, he remarks, "the exceptions, few as they are, will, on more reflection, be found rather apparent than real. If we could raise ourselves to that height from which we ought to survey so vast a subject, these exceptions would altogether vanish; the brutality of a handful of Savages would disappear in the immense prospect of human nature, and the murmurs of a few licentious sophists would not ascend to break the general harmony."

Certainly the probability is, that a full and just statement of the moral condition of Savage tribes, containing not only an exact specification of the facts, but a philosophical analysis of them considered in reference to the peculiarities of their situation, has never been given to the world. In some instances, travellers have been so much influenced by first impressions as to give an intensity and vividness of colouring to their statements, which

* Discourse on the Law of Nature and of Nations, 2d ed., P. 36.

is far from being warranted by subsequent inquiry. In other instances they have been too hasty in their inductions, and have ascribed a trait of immorality or cruelty to a tribe or nation, which in strictness should have been limited to individuals; and perhaps it may be said, have not, as a general thing, exhibited that degree of philosophical perception and analysis which is requisite to an accurate and just understanding of this subject.

§ 282. Instances in proof of the preceding views.

In some of the early accounts of the Savage tribes of North America (those of Winslow, Hearne, and Colden, for instance), it was confidently asserted that those tribes were destitute of any religion whatever. This was unquestionably a mistake. Winslow afterward corrected it in his Work, entitled, Good News from New-England. "Whereas," he says, "myself and others, in former letters, wrote that the Indians about us are a people without any religion or knowledge of any God, therein I erred, though we could then gather no better."*

Niebuhr, a traveller of deserved celebrity and weight, in speaking of the Arabians, makes the following statement, which may be considered as confirmatory of the suggestion that the narrations of travellers are, in some respects at least, to be received with some degree of caution.

"Several travellers accuse them of being cheats, thieves, and hypocrites. An arbitrary government, which impoverishes its subjects by extortion, can have no favourable influence indeed upon the probity of the nation; yet I can say, from my own experience, that the accusations laid against them have been exaggerated above the facts. The Arabs themselves allow that their countrymen are not all honest men. I have heard them praise the fidelity with which the Europeans fulfil their promises, and express high indignation against the knavery of their own nation, as a disgrace to the Mussulman name."+

A single other instance will tend to illustrate and con

* See Francis's Life of Eliot, p. 33.

+ Niebuhr's Travels through Arabia and other Countries in the East, sect. xxix., chap. 4.

firm what has been said on this subject. It has been narrated by travellers, as a prevalent custom among the uncivilized tribes of Africa, that those mothers who bear twins immediately put one of them to death. On this subject Vaillant speaks of himself as having made particular inquiries The result of his inquiries was, that some of the tribes, the Gonaquas, for instance, are exempt from this reproach. In other tribes he admits that the crime exists, but asserts it is very rare. He represents the people as revolting at the very idea of it. And in those few cases in which it actually exists, he expressly adds: "It has its source, however incredible it may seem, in the tenderest love. It is a dread of not being able to nourish two children, or of seeing them both perish, that has induced some mothers to sacrifice one of them." And he subsequently makes the further remark: "It would therefore be a great calumny against these people, to give as a constant practice a few barbarous actions, which they condemn, and which they belie so well by their conduct."*

CHAPTER IV.

IMMUTABILITY OF MORAL DISTINCTIONS.

283. Remarks on the reality of right and wrong, and on the standard of rectitude which is involved in their existence.

IF on some occasion we are asked why we approve of some actions and disapprove of others, the answer which we are very likely to give is, because the action which is approved is RIGHT, and the action which is disapproved is WRONG. If we are asked again why we feel under moral obligation to do some things and to avoid the doing of others, the answer of the same purport will probably be, because the performance in the one case would be RIGHT, while the performance in the other would be WRONG.-This language, if it be properly em

* Vaillant's Travels in Africa, p. 296,

ployed, evidently involves that there is such a thing as right and such a thing as wrong. And the existence of right and wrong further involves, that there is a great standard of Rectitude, by a reference to which the morality of every action is to be measured. This idea we hold to be in the highest sense an important one.

If there is such a thing as right and wrong, and if there is such a thing, as we shall endeavour in this chapter to show, as an immutable distinction between them, it is impossible that the character of human actions, so far as they are done deliberately and voluntarily, should be indifferent. There is a great law, a great rule and measurement of justice held over them, expansive as creation, and lasting as eternity.

§ 284. Of the origin of the ideas or abstract conceptions of right and wrong.

Of the origin of the ideas of right and wrong we have formerly had occasion to speak (vol i., § 192). Of course it will be the less necessary to delay upon that subject here. It may be proper, however, to remind the reader, that the terms right and wrong (which some, perhaps, might regard as a reason for distrusting the reality and permanency of rectitude) do not express anything which is perceptible by the senses. Whatever Right or Rectitude may be, in itself considered, it is obviously not an object of the mere outward perceptivity; we cannot see it nor touch it; we cannot define its shape nor designate its locality. Nevertheless, it is not a matter in any sense remote or doubtful, but is brought home and fully made known to us in a manner less liable to uncertainty and skepticism, viz., by means of the action of the Internal or Pure Intellect; that is to say, the Intellect, operating in virtue of its own nature, and independently of the instrumentality of the senses. It is in this way that we know it, although not under a material shape. Like the Deity himself, it is ever present, but ever invisible; silent, but always operative; enthroned in the centre of the universe, but pervading its utmost limits; and estimating, by the standard of its own perfect and unalterable purity, all moral actions,