CHAPTER IV.

ARGUMENTATIVE PIÈCES.

SECTION 1.

Happiness is founded in rectitude of conduct..

:

ALL men pursue good, and would be happy, if they knew how not happy for minutes, and miserable for hours; but happy, if possible, through every part of their existence. Either, therefore, there is a good of this steady, durable kind, or there is not. If not, then all good must be transient and uncertain; and if so, an object of the lowest value, which can little deserve our attention or inquiry. But if there be a better good, such a good as we are seeking; like every other thing, it must be derived from some cause; and that cause must either be external, internal, or mixed; in as much as, except these three, there is no other possible. Now a steady, durable good, cannot be derived from an external cause; since all derived from externals must fluctuate as they fluctuate. By the same rule, it cannot be derived from a mixture of the two; because the part which is external, will proportionably destroy its essence. What then remains but the cause internal? the very cause which we have supposed, when we place the sovereign good in mind,—in rectitude of conduct,

HARRIS

SECTION II.

Virtue man's highest interest.

I FIND myself existing upon a little spot, surrounded every way by an immense unknown expansion.— Where am I? What sort of place do I inhabit? Is it exactly accommodated in every instance to my con-venience? Is there no excess of cold, none of heat, to offend me? Am I never annoyed by animals, either of my own, or a different kind? Is every thing subservient to me,, as though I had ordered all myself? No-nothing like it-the farthest from it possible. The world appears not, then, originally made for the private convenience of nie alone?-It does not. But is it not possible so to accommodate it, by my own - particular industry? If to accommodate man and beast, heaven and earth, if this be beyond me, it is not possible. What consequence then follows; or can there be any other than this-If I seek an interest of my own detached. from that of others, I seek an interest which is chimerical, and which can never have existence.

How then must. I determine? Have I no interest at all? If I have not, I am stationed here to no purpose. But why no interest? Can I be contented with none but one separate and detached? Is a social interest, joined with others, such an absurdity as not to be admitted? The bee, the beaver, and the tribes of herding animals, are sufficient to convince me, that the thing is somewhere at least possible. How, then, am I assured that it is not equally true of man? Admit if and what follows? If so, then honour and justice

are my interest; then the whole train of moral virtues are my interest; without some portion of which, not even thieves can maintain society.

But, farther still-I stop not here-I pursue this social iuterest as far as I can trace my several relations. I pass from my own stock, my own neighbourhood, my own nation, to the whole race of mankind, as dispersed throughout the earth. Am I not related to them all, by the mutual aids of commerce, by the general intercourse of arts and letters, by that common nature of which we all participate?

Again I must have food and clothing. Without a proper genial warmth, I instantly perish. Am I not related, in this view, to the very earth itself; to the distant sun, from whose beams I derive vigour? to that stupendous course and order of the infinite host of heaven, by which the times and seasons ever uniformly pass on? Were this order once confounded, I could not probably survive a moment; so absolutely do I depend on this common general welfare. What, then, have I to do, but to enlarge virtue into piety? Not only honour and justice, and what I owe to man, is my interest; but gratitude also, acquiescence, resignation, adoration, and all I owe to this great polity, and its great Governor our common Parent.

HARRIS.

SECTION 111.

The injustice of an uncharitable spirit.

A SUSPICIOUS, uncharitable spirit is not only inconsistent with all social virtue and happiness, but it is

also, in itself, unreasonable and unjust. In order to form sound opinions concerning characters and actions, two things are especially requisite, information and impartiality. But such as are most forward to decide unfavourably, are commonly destitute of both. Instead of possessing, or even requiring, full information, the grounds on which they proceed are frequently the most slight and frivolous. A tale, perhaps, which the idle have invented, the inquisitive have listened to, and the credulous have propagated; or a real incident which rumour, in carrying it along, has exaggerated and disguised, supplies them with materials of confident assertion, and decisive judgment. From an action they presently look into the heart, and infer the motive. This supposed motive they conclude to be the ruling principle; and pronounce at once concern ing the whole character.

Nothing can be more contrary both to equity and to sound reason, than this precipitate judgment. Any man who attends to what passes within himself, may easily discern what a complicated system the human character is: and what a variety of circumstances must be taken into the account, in order to estimate it truly. No single instance of conduct whatever, is sufficient to determine it. As from one worthy action, it were credulity, not charity, to conclude a person to be free from all vice; so from one which is censurable, it is perfectly unjust to infer that the author of it is without conscience, and without merit. If we knew all the attending circumstances, it might appear in an excusable light; nay, perhaps, under a commendable form. The motives of the actor may have been entirely differ

ent from those which we ascribe to him; and where we suppose him impelled by bad design, he may have been prompted by conscience and mistaken principle. Admitting the action to have been in every view criminal, he may have been hurried into it through inadvertency and surprise. He may have sincerely repented; and the virtuous principle may have now regained its full vigour. Perhaps this was the corner of frailty; the quarter on which he lay open to the incursions of temptation; while the other avenues of his heart were firmly guarded by conscience.

It is therefore evident, that no part of the government of temper deserves attention more, than to keep our minds pure from uncharitable prejudices, and open to candour and humanity in judging of others.The worst consequences, both to ourselves and to society, follow from the opposite spirit.

SECTION IV.

BLAIR.

The misfortunes of men mostly chargeable on themselves.

WE find man placed in a world, where he has by no means the disposal of the events that happen.. : Calamities sometimes befall the worthiest and the best, which it is not in their power to prevent, and where nothing is left them, but to acknowledge, and to submit to, the high hand of Heaven. For such visitations of trial, many good and wise reasons can be assigned, which the present subject leads me not to discuss. But