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noticed; that he may probably be fuppofed to have come to church with the hope, or with the premeditated defign, of being fummoned away in the face of the congregation, and of thus augmenting the idea of his business and importance. His general character and conduct must be already despicable, if they will not exempt him, in proportion as they are known, from the fufpicion of fuch diffimulation.

Finally, let not the Phyfician hesitate, through a fervile or avaricious fear of offending fome of his patients, and lofing their future employment, to take an active and fteady, but temperate part in any local or public bufinefs which may arife, when his conscience tells him that he ought to stand forward. The members of every profeffion have their trials, and are called upon at times to make their peculiar facrifices. And he who shrinks back when put to the proof, may advance perhaps fome of his petty interefts of the moment; but he advances them at the expence of Christian duty.

CHAP. XIII.

ON THE DUTIES OF PERSONS ENGAGED IN TRADE AND BUSINESS.

THE perfons, to whom this chapter is intended principally to refer, are bankers, merchants, factors or agents, and manufacturers.

The method which will be pursued is the following. Those general principles of moral obligation, which may obviously be applied to men engaged in any of the above-mentioned employments, will be stated and enforced in the first place. And in a subsequent confideration of each of thofe four employments in its turn, the bearing of fome of these principles on the conduct of men occupied in it will be illustrated; and fuch particular obfervations will be introduced as, in confequence of their referring to circumftances chiefly or exclufively pertaining to one of the profeffions, could not be diftinctly advanced in the preliminary remarks.

The

The leading purposes which trade and commerce, and confequently every business and profeffion which exifts by being fubfidiary to them, appear deftined by the will of Providence to answer, are to promote the cultivation of the earth; to call forth into use its hidden treasures; to excite and fharpen the inventive industry of man; to unite the whole human race in bonds of fraternal connection; to augment their comforts and alleviate their wants by an interchange of commodities fuperfluous to the original poffeffors; to open a way for the progress of civilization, for the diffusion of learning, for the extenfion of fcience, for the reception of Chriftianity; and thus to forward that ultimate end, to which all the designs and difpenfations of God, like rays converging to a central point, feem evidently directed, the increase of the sum of general happiness.

Nations and individuals, in planning or executing commercial undertakings, rarely enlarge their views beyond the sphere of their own immediate advantage. The ufual object even of good governments in encouraging

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trade is merely to replenish the public coffers, to strengthen the national marine, and thus to render the ftate formidable to rival powers. The aim of the individual in pushing his traffic is commonly limited to the acquifition of fubfiftence, wealth, and eminence, for himfelf and his family. Yet while the Government is attending folely to national interest, and the individual to private emolument; they will in most cases manifeftly promote, however unintentionally, the divine plan of universal good. But when a Legislature sanctions, and a subject practises, a branch of trade which, though not unjust and immoral in itself, has an obvious tendency to diminish human happiness; being bound not only to observe the ftrict principles of juftice, but likewife to evince their regard to the dictates of benevolence by adverting to the probable effects of their conduct, they act in oppofition to the will of God, and are in confequence highly criminal. Such, it is poffible, may be the cafe, even where the traffic is chargeable with no violation of probity and fair dealing; as the working of fome of the unwholesome mines in the Spanish provinces in America, and perhaps the carrying on of fome domeftic

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manufactures in a manner deeply pernicious to the health and morals of the persons employed in them. But it commonly happens that a trade, adverse in its nature to the good of mankind,involves likewise the pofitive guilt of fraud and rapine. And for the evils refulting from its known tendency, as well as for those positive crimes, all who encourage its continuance, while they are conscious of its guilt, become in a greater or a lefs degree refponfible. The Government which shall allow its fubjects to continue the flave trade, now that its nature and effects are thoroughly understood; the merchant who shall fit out the ship; the captain who shall command it; the manufacturer who fhall furnish it with manacles and fetters; will have to anfwer, each according to the juft fcale of divine retribution, not merely for the blood spilled and the iniquities committed on the coaft of Africa; but for the general mifery, the blindness, and the barbarifm created and upheld by a traffic repugnant to the fundamental principles of justice, and bidding defiance both to the spirit and the precepts of Christianity (a).

Enlarged

(a) The late difcuffions refpecting the abolition of the flave trade have apprized the public of the baneful effects

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