ESSAY X. OF COHABITATION. No fubject is of more importance in the morality of private life than that of cohabitation. Every man has his ill humours, his fits of peevishness and exacerbation. Is it better that he should spend thefe upon his fellow beings, or fuffer them to fubfide of themselves? It seems to be one of the most important of the arts of life, that men fhould not come too near each other, or touch in too many points. Exceffive familiarity is the banc of focial happiness. There is no practice to which the human mind adapts itself with greater facility, than that of apologifing to itself for its miscarriages, and giving to its errors the outfide and appearance of virtues. The paffionate man, who feels himself continually prompted to knock every one down that feems to him pertinacious and perverfe, never fails to expatiate upon the efficacy of this mode of correcting error, and to fatirife with great vehemence the Utopian abfurdity of him who who would fet them right by ways of mildness and expoftulation. The dogmatift, who, fatisfied of the truth of his own opinions, treats all other modes of thinking as abfurd, and can practise no forbearance for the prejudices of his neighbours, can readily inform you of the benefit which the mind receives from a rude fhock, and the unceasing duration of errors which are only encountered with kindness and reafon. The man who lives in a ftate of continual waspishness and bickering, easily alleges in his favour the falutary effects which arise from giving pain, and that men are not to be cured of their follies but by making them feverely feel the ill confequences that attend on them. The only method therefore of accurately trying a maxim of private morality, is to put out of the question all perfonal retrofpect, and every inducement to the apologifing for our own habits, and to examine the subject purely upon its general merits. In the education of youth no refource is more frequent than to a harsh tone and a peremptory manner. The child does amifs, and he is rebuked. If he overlook this treatment, and make overtures of kindness, the anfwer is, No, indeed, G 4 indeed, I fhall take no notice of you, for you have done wrong. All this is the excefs of familiarity. The tyrant governor practifes this, and applauds himself for his virtue. He reviews his conduct with felf-complacence; he fees in fancy the admirable confequences that will refult from it; and, if it fails, he congratulates himself at least that he has proceeded with the most exemplary virtue, He does not know that, through the whole fcene, he has been only indulging the most fhameful vices. He had merely been accumulating a certain portion of black bile, and in this proceeding he has found a vent for it. There was no atom of virtue or benevolence in his conduct. He was exercifing his defpotism in fecurity, because its object was unable to refift, He was giving fcope to the overflowings of his fpite, and the child, who was placed under his direction, was the unfortunate victim. There is a reverence that we owe to every thing in human fhape. I do not fay that a child is the image of God. But I do affirm that he is an individual being, with powers of reasoning, with fenfations of pleasure and pain, and with principles of morality; and that in this defcrip know that to inspire hatred to himself and dife tafte to his leffons, was not the most promifing road to inftruction. He would endeavour to do justice to his views of the subject in discussion ; he would communicate his ideas with all practicable perfpicuity; but he would communicate them with every mark of conciliation and friendly attention. He would not mix them with tones of acrimony, and airs of lofty command. He would perceive that fuch a proceeding had a direct tendency to defeat his purpose. He would deliver them as hints for confideration, not as fo many unappealable decifions from a chair of infallibility. But we treat adults of either fex, when upon a footing of undue familiarity, our wife or our comrade, in a great degree as we do children. We lay afide the arts of ingenuous perfuafion; we forfake the mildness of expoftulation; and we expect them to bow to the defpotifm of command or the impatience of anger. No fooner have we adopted this conduct, than in this cafe, as in the cafe of education, we are perfectly ready to prove that it has every feature of wisdom, profound judgment and liberal virtue. The ill humour which is fo prevalent through all the different walks of life, is the refult of familiarity, miliarity, and confequently of cohabitation. If we did not fee each other too frequently, we fhould accuftom ourselves to act reasonably and with urbanity. But, according to a well known maxim, familiarity breeds contempt. The first and moft fundamental principle in the intercourfe of man with man, is reverence; but we foon cease to reverence what is always before our eyes. Reverence is a certain collectedness of the mind, a paufe during which we involuntarily imprefs ourselves with the importance of circumftances and the dignity of perfons. In order that we may properly exercise this sentiment, the occafions for calling it forth towards any particular individual, fhould be economised and rare. It is true, that genuine virtue requires of us a certain franknefs and unreferve. But it is not lefs true, that it requires of us a quality in some degree contrafted with this, that we fet a guard upon the door of our lips, that we carefully watch over our paffions, that we never forget what we owe to ourselves, and that we maintain a vigilant confciousness strictly animadverting and commenting upon the whole feries of our actions. Thefe remarks are dictated with all the licence of a fceptical philofophy. Nothing, it will be retorted, is more eafy than to raise objections. All |