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PREFACE.

In the following Discourses, disapprobation is expressed of a work now in use in the Examinations of the University of Cambridge, -Paley's Moral Philosophy. It is with great reluctance that I thus object to a book which forms part of the University course of reading on a very important subject, without pointing out some other book which may be substituted for it with advantage. But it appeared to me that the evils which arise from the countenance thus afforded to the principles of Paley's system are so great, as to make it desirable for us to withdraw our sanction from his doctrines without further delay; although I am not at present aware of any System of Ethics, constructed on a sounder basis, which I should recommend to the adoption of the University.

Indeed it would be very difficult to find a work which might take the place of Paley's,

if we were to insist upon its containing, not only a consistent exposition of more genuine principles of morality, but the same practical sense, moderation, and acuteness, conveyed with the same striking clearness and poignancy of style. But these merits of the work, although they secure a large portion of admiration and regard to the author, even from those who disapprove of his doctrines, do not counterbalance the great faults which it possesses, when considered as a part of our University teaching. For the common fortune of books employed for such purposes is, that the logical connexion and the necessary consequences of their principles are forced upon men's minds, while their accessory excellencies and beauties lose their effect. In thus using a book, we are compelled to refer to the positive propositions which it contains, separated from the context, exhibited in various aspects, repeated even to weariness, and stripped of all the softenings in which the writer's skill had clothed them: and thus if the principles be really false, insufficient, or dangerous, these evils cannot be remedied by

any accidental merits of manner or temper. This consideration renders it in the highest degree important that all works familiarly employed in University teaching should be true in their foundations, and logical in their reasonings. When that is the case, those who are induced to study such works, even if they do so without love or zeal, acquire a permanent hold upon the genuine fundamental ideas which they contain, and are thus prepared to pursue such speculations further, when the inducement occurs. Whereas, when that which is taught for solid truth is, in fact, a collection of loose notions, precarious assumptions, and illogical reasonings, the minds of students are rendered incapable of consistent thought and real knowledge on the subjects thus unhappily misrepresented. I do not think it can be doubted that the general currency which Paley's Moral Philosophy has acquired, (a currency due in no small degree to the adoption of the work by this University,) has had a very large share in producing the confusion and vacillation of thought respecting the grounds of morals, which is at pre

sent so generally prevalent in England, even among persons of cultivated minds.

It is on this very many readers an For the shew of

The writer whom I have adduced as the principal representative of a better system than Paley's, is Bishop Butler. Butler has delivered no System of Morals; and, (in the part of his works here referred to,) is employed mainly in the discussion of the fundamental principle of the subject. account that he appears to obscure and vague writer. clearness is easily acquired by him who has to trace into its consequences a principle already admitted or assumed; but the effort by which we obtain possession of the peculiar idea involved in a new principle, is hard to communicate in a precise manner. Butler has, however, treated his subject in a way which will hardly fail to convey his meaning to an attentive reader; and especially to one who considers the various phrases which the author employs, as so many different modes of pointing to that peculiar idea, of an absolute law of action, which is the basis of independent morality; as, for example, when he

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speaks of man being a law to himself;-of a difference in kind among man's principles of action as well as a difference in strength;-of an internal constitution in which conscience has a natural and rightful supremacy;-and other forms of expression.

As I have stated in the following pages, in order to fix and develope among men such a fundamental idea of a moral law, it would be requisite, in this as in other subjects, to employ their minds upon the reasonings and deductions to which this idea may give rise; -that is, to construct a detailed system of Ethics upon this foundation. It appears to me that such an undertaking is both possible, and highly interesting: but, even if I felt myself prepared for such a task, other avocations and objects with which I am already engaged, would probably long prevent my making the attempt. I should rejoice much to see the subject taken up by some more competent person.

In the mean time, till such a system appears, we may, I conceive, find, in the study of Butler's works, much that may, to a certain

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