lation of a son and father, as well as the consequence of the action, the savage would not feel what every other human being feels, because it is easy to assume, by begging the question, any point of controversy. But where is the proof of the assertion? We cannot verify the supposition by exact experiment, indeed, for such a savage, so thoroughly exempted from every social prejudice, is not to be found, and could not be made to understand the story even if he were found. But, though we cannot have the perfect experiment, we may yet have an approximation to it. Every infant that is born may be considered very nearly as such a savage; and as soon as the child is capable of knowing the very meaning of the words, without feeling half the force of the filial relation, he shudders at such a tale, with as lively abhorrence, perhaps as in other years, when his prejudices and habits, and every thing which is not originally in his constitution, may be said to be matured.

We can imagine vessels sent on voyages of benevolence, to diffuse over the world the blessings of a pure religion,-we can imagine voyages of this kind to diffuse the improvements of our sciences and arts. But what should we think of a voyage, of which the sole object was to teach the world that all actions are not, in the moral sense of the term, absolutely indifferent, and that those who intentionally do good to the society to which they belong, or to any individual of that society, ought to be objects of greater regard than he whose life has been occupied in plans to injure the society in general, or at least, as many individuals of it as his power could reach? What shore is there at which such a vessel could arrive, however barren the soil, and savage the inhabitants,-where these simple doctrines, which it came to diffuse, could be regarded as giving any instruction? The half-naked animal, that has no hut in which to shelter himself,-no provision beyond the precarious chase of the day,—whose language of numeration does not extend beyond three or four, and who knows God only as something which produces thunder and the whirlwind, -even this miserable creature, at least as ignorant as he is helpless, would turn away from his civilized instructors with contempt, as if he had not heard any thing of which he was not equally aware before. The vessel which carried out these simple primary essential truths of morals might return as it went. It could not

make a single convert, because there would not have been one who had any doubts to be removed. If, indeed, instead of teaching these truths, the voyagers had endeavoured to teach the natives whom they visited the opposite doctrine, as to the absolute moral indifference of actions, there could then be little doubt that they might have taught something new, whatever doubt there might justly be as to the number of the converts.

When Labienus, after urging to Cato a variety of motives, to induce him to consult the oracle of Ammon, in the neighbourhood of whose temple the little army had arrived, concludes with urging a motive, which he supposed to have peculiar influence on the mind of that great man,-that he should at least make use of the opportunity of inquiring of a being who could not err, what it is which constitutes that moral perfection, which a good man should have in view for the guidance of his life,

"Saltem vitutis amator

Quære quid est virtus et posce exemplar honesti,”

How sublimely does the answer to this solicitation express the omnipotent divinity of virtue!

"Cast your eyes," says Rousseau, over all the nations of the world, and all the histories of nations. Amid so many inhuman and absurd superstitions-amid that prodigious diversity of manners and characters, you will find every where the same principles and distinctions of moral good and evil. The Paganism of

* Lucan. Pharsalia, Lib. ix. v. 562-567, and 569-577.

the ancient world produced, indeed, abominable gods, who on earth would have been shunned or punished as monsters, and who offered as a picture of supreme happiness, only crimes to commit, and passions to satiate. But Vice, armed with this sacred authority, descended in vain from the eternal abode: She found, in the heart of man, a moral instinct to repel her. The continence of Xenocrates was admired by those who celebrated the debaucheries of Jupiter-the chaste Lucretia adored the unchaste Venus→→→ the most intrepid Roman sacrificed to Fear. He invoked the God who dethroned his father, and he died without a murmur by the hand of his own. The most contemptible divinities were served by the greatest men. The holy voice of Nature, stronger than that of the Gods, made itself heard, and respected, and obeyed on earth, and seemed to banish as it were to the confinement of Heaven, guilt and the guilty."

There is, indeed, to borrow Cicero's noble description, one true and original law, conformable to reason and to nature, diffused over all, invariable, eternal, which calls to the fulfilment of duty and to abstinence from injustice, and which calls with that irresistible voice, which is felt in all its authority wherever it is heard. This law cannot be abolished or curtailed, nor affected in its sanctions by any law of man. A whole senate, a whole people, cannot dispense from its paramount obligation. It requires no commentator to render it distinctly intelligible, nor is it different at Rome, at Athens, now, and in the ages before and after, but in all ages and in all nations, it is and has been, and will be one and everlasting,-one as that God, its great author and promulgator, who is the common Sovereign of all mankind, is himself one. Man is truly man, as he yields to this Divine influence. He cannot resist it, but by flying as it were from his own bosom, and laying aside the general feelings of humantiy-by which very act, he must already have inflicted on himself the severest of punishments, even though he were to avoid whatever is usually accounted punishment. "Est quidem vera lex, recta ratio, naturæ congruens,-diffusa in omnes, constans, sempiterna; quæ vocet ad officium jubendo, vetando a fraude deterreat; quæ tamen neque probos frustra jubet aut vetat, nec improbos jubendo aut vetando movet. Huic legi, nec obrogari fas est, neque derogari ex hac aliquid licet, neque tota abrogari potest. Nec vero, aut per senatum aut per populum,

solvi hac lege possumus. Neque est querendus explanator aut interpres ejus alius. Nec erit alia lex Romæ alia Athenis,-alia nunc, alia posthac; sed et omnes gentes, et omni tempore, una lex et sempiterna, et immortalis continebit; unusque erit communis quasi magister, et Imperator omnium, Deus,-Ille legis hujus inventor, disceptator, lator; cui qui non parebit, ipse se fugiet, ac naturam hominis aspernabitur; atque hoc ipso luet maximas pœDas, etiam si cætera supplicia quæ putantur effugerit."

I have already, in a former Lecture, alluded to the strength of the evidence, which is borne by the guilty to the truth of those distinctions which they have dared to disregard. If there be any one who has an interest in gathering every argument which even sophistry can suggest, to prove that virtue is nothing, and vice therefore nothing, and who will strive to yield himself readily to this consolatory persuasion, it is surely the criminal who trembles beneath a weight of memory which he cannot shake off. Yet even he who feels the power of virtue only in the torture which it inflicts, does still feel this power, and feels it with at least as strong conviction of its reality, as those to whom it is every moment diffusing pleasure, and who might be considered perhaps as not very rigid questioners of an illusion which they felt to be delightful. The spectral forms of superstition have, indeed, vanished; but there is one spectre which will continue to haunt the mind, as long as the mind itself is capable of guilt, and has exerted this dreadful capacity,—the spectre of a guilty life, which does not haunt only the darkness of a few hours of night, but comes in fearful visitations, whenever the mind has no other object before it that can engage every thought, in the most splendid scenes, and in the brightest hours of day. What enchanter is there who can come to the relief of a sufferer of this class, and put the terrifying spectre to flight? We may say to the murderer, that in poisoning his friend, to succeed a little sooner to the estate, which he knew that his friendship had bequeathed to him, he had done a deed as meritorious in itself, as if he had saved the life of his friend at the risk of his own; and that all for which there was any reason to upbraid himself was, that he had suffered his benefactor to remain so many years in the possession of means of enjoyment, which a few grains of opium or arsenic might have transferred sooner to him. We may strive to make him laugh at the absurdity of the

scene, when on the very bed of death, that hand which had often pressed his with kindness before, seemed to press again with delight the very hand which had mixed and presented the potion. But, though we may smile-if we can smile-at such a scene as this, and point out the incongruity with as much ingenious pleasantry as if we were describing some ludicrous mistake, there will be no laughter on that face from which we strive to force a smile. He who felt the grasp of that hand will feel it still, and will shudder at our description; and shudder still more at the tone of jocular merriment with which we describe what is to him so dreadful.

What, then, is that theory of the moral indifference of actions, which is evidently so powerless,-of which even he, who professes to regard it as sound philosophy, feels the importance as much as other men, when he loves the virtuous, and hates the guilty,-when he looks back with pleasure on some generous action, or with shame and horror on actions of a different kind, which his own sound philosophy would teach him to be, in every thing that relates to his own internal feelings, exclusively of the errors and prejudices of education, equal and indifferent? It is vain to say, as if to weaken the force of this argument, that the same self-approving complacency, and the same remorse, are felt for actions, which are absolutely insignificant in themselves,-for regular observance or neglect of the most frivolous rites of superstition. There can be no question that self-complacency and remorse are felt in such cases. But it surely requires little philosophy to perceive, that, though a mere ceremony of devotion may be truly insignificant in itself, it is far from insignificant when considered as the command of Him, to whose goodness we owe every thing which we value as great, and to disobey whose command, therefore, whatever the command may be, never can be a slight offence. To consider the ceremonial rite alone, without regard to Him who is believed to have enjoined it, is an error as gross, as it would be to read the statutes of some great people, and paying no attention to the legislative power which enacted them, we laugh, perhaps, at the folly of those who thought it necessary to conform their conduct to a law, which was nothing but a series of alphabetic characters on a scrap of paper or parchment, that in a single moment could be torn to pieces or burnt.

Why do we smile on reading, in the list of the works of the