love, as it would be to resolve hunger and thirst into self-love.

These appetite are necessary for the preservation of the individual. Benevolent affections are no less necessary for the preservation of society among men, without which man would become an easy prey to the beasts of the field.

We are placed in this world, by the Author of our being, surrounded with many objects that are necessary or useful to us, and with many that may hurt us. We are led, not by reason and self-love only, but by many instincts, and appetites, and natural desires, to seek the former, and to avoid the latter.

But of all the things of this world, man may be the most useful, or the most hurtful to man. Every man is in the power of every man with whom he lives. Every man has power to do much good to his fellow men, and to do more hurt.

We cannot live without the society of men; and it would be impossible to live in society, if men were not disposed to do much of that good to men, and but little of that hurt, which it is in their power to do.

But how shall this end, so necessary to the existence of human society, and consequently to the existence of the human species be accomplished?

If we judge from analogy, we must conclude, that in this, as in other parts of our conduct, our rational principles are aided by principles of an inferior order, similar to those by which many brute animals live in society with their species; and that by means of such principles, that degree of regularity is observed, which we find in all societies of men, whether wise or foolish, virtuous or vicious.

The benevolent affections planted in human nature, appear therefore no less necessary for the preservation of the human species, than the appetites of hunger and thirst.

CHAP. IV.

OF THE PARTICULAR BENEVOLENT AFFECTIONS.

HAVING premised these things in general, concerning benevolent affections, I shall now attempt some enumeration of them.

1st, The first I mention is that of parents and children, and other near relations.

This we commonly call natural affection. Every language has a name for it. It is common to us with most of the brute animals; and is variously modified in different animals, according as it is more or less necessary for the preservation of the species.

Many of the insect tribe need no other care of parents, than that the eggs be laid in a proper place, where they shall have neither too little nor too much heat, and where the animal, as soon as it is hatched, shall, find its natural food. This care the parent takes, and no more.

In other tribes, the young must be lodged in some secret place, where they cannot be easily discovered by their enemies. They must be cherished by the warmth of the parent's body. They must be suckled, and fed at first with tender food; attended in their excursions, and guarded from danger, till they have learned by experience, and by the example of their parents, to provide for their own subsistence and safety. With what assiduity and tender affection this is done by the parents, in every species that requires it, is well known.

The eggs of the feathered tribe are commonly hatched by incubation of the dam, who leaves off at once her sprightly motions and migrations, and confines herself to her solitary and painful task, cheered by the song

of her mate upon a neighbouring bough, and sometimes fed by him, sometimes relieved in her incubation, while she gathers a scanty meal, and with the greatest despatch returns to her post.

The young birds of many species are so very tender and delicate, that man, with all his wisdom and experience, would not be able to rear one to maturity. But the parents, without any experience, know perfectly how to rear sometimes a dozen or more at one brood, and to give every one its portion in due season. They know the food best suited to their delicate constitution, which is sometimes afforded by nature, sometimes must be cooked and half digested in the stomach of the parent.

In some animals, nature has furnished the female with a kind of second womb, into which the young retire occasionally, for food, warmth, and the conveniency of being carried about with the mother.

It would be endless to recount all the various ways in which the parental affection is expressed by brute animals.

He must, in my apprehension, have a very strange complexion of understanding, who can survey the various ways in which the young of the various species are reared, without wonder, without pious admiration of that manifold Wisdom, which has so skilfully fitted means to ends, in such an infinite variety of ways.

In all the brute animals we are acquainted with, the end of the parental affection is completely answered in a short time; and then it ceases as if it had never been. The infancy of man is longer and more helpless than that of any other animal. The parental affection is necessary for many years; it is highly useful through life; and therefore it terminates only with life. It extends to children's children without any diminution of its force.

How common is it to see a young woman, in the gayest period of life, who has spent her days in mirth, and her nights in profound sleep, without solicitude or care, all at once transformed into the careful, the solicitous, the watchful nurse of her dear infant; doing nothing by day but gazing upon it, and serving it in the meanest offices; by night, depriving herself of sound sleep for months, that it may lie safe in her arms. Forgetful of herself, her whole care is centered in this little object.

Such a sudden transformation of her whole habits, and occupation, and turn of mind, if we did not see it every day, would appear a more wonderful metamorphosis than any that Ovid has described.

This, however, is the work of nature, and not the effect of reason and reflection. For we see it in the good, and in the bad, in the most thoughtless, as well as in the thoughtful.

Nature has assigned different departments to the father and mother in rearing their offspring. This may be seen in many brute animals; and that it is so in the human species, was long ago observed by Socrates, and most beautifully illustrated by him, as we learn from Xenophon's Oeconomicks. The parental affection in the different sexes is exactly adapted to the office assigned to each. The father would make an awkward nurse to a new-born child, and the mother too indulgent a guardian. But both act with propriety and grace in their proper sphere.

It is very remarkable, that when the office of rearing a child is transferred from the parent to another person, nature seems to transfer the affection along with the office. A wet nurse, or even a dry nurse, has commonly the same affection for her nursling, as if she had borne it. The fact is so well known that nothing needs be said to confirm it; and it seems to be the work of nature.

Our affections are not immediately in our power, as our outward actions are. Nature has directed them to certain objects. We may do kind offices without affection; but we cannot create an affection which nature has not given.

Reason might teach a man that his children are particularly committed to his care by the providence of God, and, on that account, that he ought to attend to them as his particular charge; but reason could not teach him to love them more than other children of equal merit, or to be more afflicted for their misfortunes or misbehaviour,

It is evident, therefore, that that peculiar sensibility of affection, with regard to his own children, is not the effect of reasoning or reflection, but the effect of that constitution which nature has given him.

There are some affections which we may call rational, because they are grounded upon an opinion of merit in the object. The parental affection is not of this kind. For though a man's affection to his child may be increased by merit, and diminished by demerit, I think no man will say, that it took its rise from an opinion of merit. It is not opinion that creates the affection, but affection often creates opinion. It is apt to pervert the judgment, and create an opinion of merit where there

is none.

The absolute necessity of this parental affection, in order to the continuance of the human species, is so apparent, that there is no need of arguments to prove it. The rearing of a child from its birth to maturity requires so much time and care, and such infinite attentions, that, if it were to be done merely from considerations of reason and duty, and were not sweetened by affection in parents, nurses, and guardians, there is reason to doubt, whether one child in ten thousand would ever be reared. [Note Q.]