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ON JUSTICE AND GENEROSITY.

LYSIPPUS is a man whofe greatness of foul the whole world admires. His generofity is fuch, that it prevents a demand, and faves the receiver the trouble and the confufion of a requeft. His liberality alfo does not oblige more by its greatness, than by his inimitable grace in giving. Sometimes he even diftributes his bounties to ftrangers, and has been known to do good offices to thofe who profeffed themselves his enemies. All the world are unanimous in the praise of his generofity; there is only one fort of people who complain of his conduct. Lyfippus does not pay his debts.

It is no difficult matter to account for a conduct fo feemingly incompatible with itself. There is greatnefs in being generous, and there is only fimple juftice in fatisfying his creditors. Generofity is the part of a foul raised above the vulgar. There is in it fomething of what we admire in heroes, and praise with a degree of rapture. Juftice, on the contrary, is a mere mechanic virtue, fit only for tradefmen, and what is practifed by every broker in Change Alley.

In paying his debts a man barely does his duty, and it is an action attended with no fort of glory. Should Lyfippus fatisfy his creditors, who would be at the pains of telling it to the world? Generofity is a virtue of a very different complexion. It is raifed above duty, and from its elevation attracts the attention, and the praises of us little mortals below.

In this manner do men generally reafon upon juftice and generofity. The firft is defpifed, though a virtue effential to the good of fociety; and the other attracts our esteem, which too frequently proceeds from an impetuofity of temper, rather directed by vanity than reason. Lyfippus is told that his banker

afks a debt of forty pounds, and that a diftreffed acquaintance petitions for the fame fum. He gives it without hefitating to the latter; for he demands as a favour what the former requires as a debt.

Mankind in general are not fufficiently acquainted with the import of the word Juftice: it is commonly believed to confift only in a performance of thofe duties to which the laws of fociety can oblige us. This I allow is fometimes the import of the word, and in this fenfe juftice is diftinguished from equity; but there is a juftice ftill more extenfive, and which can be fhewn to embrace all the virtues united.

Juftice may be defined to be that virtue which impels us to give to every perfon what is his due. In this extended fenfe of the word, it comprehends the practice of every virtue which reafon prefcribes, or fociety fhould expect. Our duty to our maker, to each other, and to ourselves, are fully anfwered, if we give them what we owe them. Thus juftice, properly speaking, is the only virtue, and all the reft have their origin in it.

The qualities of candour, fortitude, charity, and generofity, for inftance, are not, in their own nature, virtues; and, if ever they deserve the title, it is owing only to juftice, which impels and directs them. Without fuch a moderator candour might become indifcretion, fortitude obftinacy, charity imprudence, and generofity mistaken profufion.

A difinterested action, if it be not conducted by juftice, is at beft indifferent in its nature, and not unfrequently even turns to vice. The expences of fociety, of presents, of entertainments, and the other helps to chearfulness, are actions merely indifferent, when not repugnant to a better method of difpofing of our fuperfluities, but they become vicious when they obftruct or exhaust our abilities from a more virtuous difpofition of our circumstances.

True

True generofity is a duty as indifpenfably neceffary as thofe impofed upon us by law. It is a rule impofed upon us by reafon, which fhould be the fovereign law of a rational being. But this generofity does not confift in obeying every impulfe of humanity, in following blind paffion for our guide, and impairing our circumftances by prefent benefactions, fo as to render us incapable of future ones.

Mifers are generally characterized as men without honour, or without humanity, who live only to accumulate, and to this paffion facrifice every other happiness. They have been described as madmen, who, in the midft of abundance, banifh every pleafure, and make, from imaginary wants, real neceffities.. But few, very few correfpond to this exaggerated picture; and, perhaps, there is not one in whom all thefe circumftances are found united. ftead of this, we find the fober and the industrious branded by the vain and the idle, with this odious appellation. Men who, by frugality and labour, raise themselves above their equals, and contribute their fhare of industry to the common stock.

In

Whatever the vain or the ignorant may fay, well were it for fociety had we more of this character amongst us. In general, these close men are found at laft the true benefactors of fociety. With an avaricious man we feldom lofe in our dealings, but too frequently in our commerce with prodigality.

A French priest, whofe name was Godinot, went for a long time by the name of the Griper. He refufed to relieve the moft apparent wretchednefs, and by a fkilful management of his vineyard, had the good fortune to acquire immenfe fums of money. The inhabitants of Rheims, who were his fellow-citizens, detefted him, and the populace, who feldom love a mifer, wherever he went, received him with con

tempt.

tempt. He ftill, however, continued his former fimplicity of life, his amazing and unremitted frugality. This good man had long perceived the wants of the poor in the city, particularly, in having no water but what they were obliged to buy at an advanced price; wherefore, that whole fortune, which he had been amaffing, he laid out in an aqueduct, by which he did the poor more useful and lafting fervice, than if he had distributed his whole income in charity every day at his door.

Among men long converfant with books, we too frequently find those misplaced virtues, of which I have been now complaining. We find the studious animated with a ftrong paffion for the great virtues, as they are mistakenly called, and utterly forgetful of the ordinary ones. The declamations of philofophy are generally rather exhausted on thefe fupererogatory duties, than on fuch as are indifpenfably neceffary. A man, therefore, who has taken his ideas of mankind from study alone, generally comes into the world with an heart melting at every fictitious diftrefs. Thus he is induced by mifplaced liberality, to put himself into the indigent circumftances of the perfon he relieves.

I fhall conclude this paper with the advice of one of the Antients, to a young man whom he saw giving away all his fubftance to pretended difterss.

It is poffible, that the perfon you relieve may "be an honeft man; and I know that you who "relieve him are fuch. You fee, then, by your "generofity, you only rob a man, who is certainly "deferving, to beftow it on one who may poffibly "be a rogue. And while you are unjuft in rewarding uncertain merit, you are doubly guilty by "ftripping yourself."

66

SOME

SOME PARTICULARS

RELATING TO

FATHER FREIJO.

Primus mortales tollere contra

Eft oculos anfus, primufque affurgere contra.

LUCR.

THE Spanish nation has, for many centuries past, been remarkable for the groffeft ignorance in polite literature, especially in point of natural philofophy; a fcience fo ufeful to mankind, that her neighbours have ever efteemed it a matter of the greateft importance, to endeavour by repeated experiments to ftrike a light out of the chaos, in which truth feemed to be confounded. Their curiofity in this refpect was fo indifferent, that, though they had difcovered new worlds, they were at a lofs to explain the phænomena of their own, and their pride fo unaccountable, that they difdained to borrow from others that inftruction, which their natural indolence permitted them not to acquire.

It gives me, however, a fecret fatisfaction, to behold an extraordinary genius now exifting in that nation, whofe ftudious endeavours feem calculated to undeceive the fuperftitious, and inftruct the ignorant I mean the celebrated Padre Freijo. In unravelling the myfteries of Nature, and explaining phyfical experiments, he takes an opportunity of difplaying the concurrence of fecond caufes in those very wonders, which the vulgar afcribe to fupernatural influence.

An example of this kind happened a few years ago in a small town of the kingdom of Valencia. Paffing through at the hour of mafs, he alighted VOL. IV.

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