previously argued with himself, and determined, that he neither can nor ought to live under fuch or fuch circumftances; being influenced in this judgment by a sense of false shame, false pride, or false honour. As the one therefore is void of all principle, fo the other wants all folidity of principle; and the failure in both seems to derive its origin from the same source, namely, a want of serious and religious culture in early life. It is defigned in the prefent chapter to trace the diftant caufes, which prepare the mind for the commiffion of outrageous and defperate fuicide in due time; that is, for such as proceeds from a want of all principle or sense of what is serious and good, and which fo frequently forms the conclufion of a vicious and abandoned courfe of life. The other fort will have a large attention paid to it hereafter in various fhapes; fuch as, in pointing out fome particular refinements of principle, which lead to these fallacious conclufions; in answering the general arguments adduced in favour of suicide; in reviewing the works of writers in its defence; and in delineating the characters of certain perfons, who have been led to its commiffion, on the ftrength, or rather weakness, of these refinements of principle. Suicide is an action of so much horror in itself, and fo fubverfive of the first regards of human nature, that one should wonder, how any thing less than a real infanity could lead to its perpetration. But when the matter is traced to the fountain-head [G], it will be found, that however furprising and fudden it may feem, it is usually (and efpecially when preceded by a vicious courfe of life) the refult of a combination of caufes, fome of which prepare the mind for its future commiffion, whilft others determine its immediate execution: the former fhall be examined in this place. There is little room to doubt, but that the present mode of education tends much, through a chain of dependent causes and effects, to prepare the mind in due time for the perpetration of felf-murder. The ornamental parts of education daily gain ground on the fubftantial; the fhowy and the fpecious on the [G] "But thou be fhock'd, while I detect the cause YOUNG, Night V. folid folid and virtuous. The endowments of the mind and cultivation of the heart are forced to yield to the external accomplishments and graces of the body, and polished manners are too generally preferred to found morals. The importance of fashion is inculcated in oppofition to reafon; religion is made to bow down before the shrine of honour, and the fear of the world is taught to fuperfede the fear of God. But what superstructure can be raised on so sandy a foundation ? It can support no incumbent weight, and in confequence it cannot be deemed surprising, that an inundation of folly and vice, like a fweeping torrent, fhould bear down all before it. The dignity of personal worth and character is a point on which too little attention or encouragement is beftowed. Brilliant parts, which are mere gifts of nature, not acquifitions of application and industry, (and in which therefore there is not the leaft fhadow of intrinfic merit) fuperfede found judgment and wisdom in public [H] estimation; while the very idea of disinterested virtue, integrity, and public fpirit, is almoft every where ridiculed and laughed out of countenance. When a whole nation, impelled by the force of general corruption, is immersed in voluptuousness, what must become of the interefts of perfonal good character? Where the vanity of drefs, of title, of expence, and gaudy fhow affumes an unbounded [1] control, the confcious dignity and pride of virtue is no more. Hence the fpur of emulation is wanting to excite to the practice of whatever is great, noble and virtuous; since the uncertain prospect of encouragement, or even of cold approbation, is little calculated to call forth the powers and energy of the foul into useful and honourable exertion. A vacuity fucceeds in the mind, which however quickly yields to the intrusion of every light and trivial object; to an effeminacy [K] of manners, a frivolity of conduct, and to a fwoln tide of profufe and profligate habits. The gratifications of unbounded luxury are productive of the most pernicious and fatal effects. The fenfual liver is the mere flave of his paffions, which, like froward children, daily multiply their demands upon him, and will bear no denial. His feelings, indeed, may be fometimes quickened, but they are the feelings of wild paffion alone, which begin, which center, and which end in felf. No fenfibility can the follower of diffipation and luxury fhow for the pains and afflictions of others, [H] Satis eloquentiæ, fapientiæ parum.- -SALL. CAT. [1] Si lubido poffidet, ea dominatur; animus nihil valet. SALL. Cat. [K] Viros pati muliebria. SALL. CAT. neither neither can his foul rife to the exertion of friendly [L], focial, or public virtue, when it stands in competition with private gratification. Profufe in the midst of public want, he caroufes in the hour of public [M] ruin. The concerns of pleasure are alone important, and the discoverer of a new mode of diffipation is in his eye the most [N] useful member of fociety. Prodigal of his [o] own, he covets the wealth of others, fince no two vices are more intimately united than luxury and avarice. In a word, (for In a word, (for it would be needless to dive deeper into the abyss of diffipation) luxury tends in all shapes to enervate the body and to depress the faculties of the foul; to deprave the morals and to corrupt the heart and when the heart of man is become corrupt, it teems with an abundance [P] of evil. But [1] Cato the elder used to say, that there could be no friendship in a man, whose palate had quicker fenfations than his brain or heart.- -See his life in Plutarch. Præfcriptum & intonfi Catonis Aufpiciis veterumque normâ. Privatus illis cenfus erat brevis, - Commune magnum.HOR. Lib. II. Od. xv. [N] The Perfian kings offered great rewards to the discoverers of a new pleasure, or a new dish.See Athenæus, Lib. XII. and Val. Max. Lib. IX. c. i. -Dux vitæ-Dia voluptas, fays Lucretius, Lib. II. [o] Alieni appetens, fui profufus.-SALL. Luxuria & avaritia are perpetually joined by Salluft. [P] The effects of luxury are fo fimilar in every age and nation, that when we read Sallust, Juvenal, Tacitus, Athenæus and others, it is impoffible not to apply almost every reflection of these writers to our own times and experience. The turning night into day, and day into night, the desertion of the country to live in a croud, and thereby avoid habits of reflection, is no new or modern invention of luxury. Athenæus (Lib. VI. p. 273) mentions it as the boast of some Sybarites and others, that they had not seen the fun rife or fet for twenty years together. Varro (De Re Rufticâ, Lib. II.) writes thus. << Igitur quod nunc "intra murum" ferè patresfamiliæ correpferunt, relictis falce & aratro, & manus movere maluerunt in theatro ac circo quàm in fegetibus ac vinetis." And Columella alfo (De Re Ruftica Lib. I.) fays, "Omnes enim (ficut M. Varro jam temporibus avorum conqueftus eft) patresfamilia falce ac aratro relictis, intra murum correpfimus, & in circis potius ac theatris quàm in fegetibus ac vinetis manus movemus: attonitique miramur geftus effoeminatorum, quòd a naturâ fexum viris denegatum, muliebri motu mentiantur decipiantque oculos fpectantium. Noctes libidinibus & ebrietatibus, dies ludo vel fomno confumimus. Ac nofmetipfos ducimus fortunatos, quod nec orientem folem videmus nec occidentem: itaque iftam vitam focordem perfequitur valetudo. Nam fic juvenum corpora fluxa & refoluta funt, ut nihil mors mutatura videatur."-But among ancient nations the palm of luxurious C 2 But the powers of the understanding, and all its refources of internal enjoyment, were given to control the violence of the paffions and groffer appetites. When thefe powers therefore are diffolved in habits of indolence and luxury, are impaired and depreffed by perpetual diffipation, there is neither room nor inclination left for fuch an exertion. The man, whofe foul is unhinged by the fascinations of perpetual gaiety and pleasure, never feeks fatisfaction in mental refources, because indeed he has none fuch within him. For how should the understanding be capable of relifhing internal delights, or the heart be fruitful of liberal, noble, or virtuous fentiments, without previous attention and cultivation [o] Where this has been wanting, there must needs be a wild vacuity within, which will render the mind unable to contribute its proportion of enjoyments, or to maintain its due degree of fuperiority. This being the cafe, the paffions muft of course predominate, and lead their poffeffor captive at will. Now the paffions, it is well known, are no friends to ferious thinking, virtue or religion. Reflection through their means is foon drowned in the rapid current of pleasure, fober thoughts are not fuffered to intrude, prudence is defpifed, reason banished, and the suggestions of confcience ftifled in the birth. Under fuch an influence fhould the mind ever make a faint effort to exert its rational faculties, it becomes eafily biaffed in all its opinions by the instigation of sensual appetites and worldly interests; coinciding with which the weakeft sophistry takes place of found reafon, judgment and truth. luxurious effeminacy is generally beftowed on the Sybarite, who flourished during the infancy of Rome in the part of Italy now called Calabria. To fuch a pitch of effeminacy had they arrived, (as Athenæus reports, Lib. XII.) that they would not fuffer blacksmiths or carpenters, or any noify tradesmen to live in their city, left their fleep fhould ever perchance be broken by them: and for the fame reafon they banished cocks likewife-thofe early difturbers. Seneca alfo mentions (Lib. II. c. xxv. de Irâ) one Mendycides, a citizen of Sybaris, who was fo fatigued at "feeing" another 'man dig, that he ordered no fuch work ever to be performed in his prefence. The fame man often complained, because on his bed of rofes fome of the leaves would get doubled under him, and disturb his reft. "Where ' pleasure (adds Seneca) has corrupted both foul and body, there nothing can be endured, not because "of the feverity, but the foftnefs of the fufferance." [] It was a fhrewd obfervation of a good old writer, (author of the Book of Wisdom) "How แ can he get wisdom, whofe talk is of bullocks?" But rufticity is not more an enemy to knowledge than effeminacy. With the fame propriety, therefore, it may now be asked, "How can he get wisdom, "whofe talk is of drefs, of wagers, of cards, of borough-jobbing, horfes, women and dice."-Estimate of Manners, vol, i. p. 74. But But the profligate and luxurious man, who is a prey to his grofs appetites and paffions, can scarce with fuch opinions and systems to be true, as admit a ruling Providence and a day of future account. Better to fuch an one are the gloomy thoughts of annihilation after death, than all the joys and bleffings of heaven; better to lie down for ever in the filent grave than to cherish any hopes of life. and immortality. His profpects of futurity are fo obfcured and clouded by his libertine conduct, that to him there can be no comfort in the view. He will not throw off his diforderly habits, but he gladly fhrinks, as far as ever he can, from all notions of virtue, Providence, and a future ftate of retribution. He shuts his eyes against the light of argument and truth, and what he takes pains not to fee himself (being blinded by error and vice) he is unwilling to believe can be manifest to another. How greedily, therefore, does he devour fuch pernicious writings, of which there are plenty to be found, as fap the very foundations of virtue by painting vice in amiable colours; as harbour the most delufive and pernicious conceits under a confufed application of fome honourable terms; as affect to unite the ideas of fenfibility and generous feelings with (what they truly abhor) the most direct deviations from the plaineft duties of common life; fuch as make duelling honourable, adultery fpecious, and fuicide lawful! Thus with a good inclination to throw down all the barriers between virtue and vice; with an hearty wifh, that the elegancies of the latter (as they are termed) may prevail over the dull fubftance (as it is called) of the former; and with a mind afloat as to all folid principles, the diffipated character is ripening apace for the advantageous perufal of all fceptical and atheistical performances; which, under familiar and popular titles, and clothed in fafcinating language, attempt underhand to explain away the moral government, if not the very existence of a Deity; and thus kindly "to free us from the pain of fuperftition [R], that we may fleep quietly in our beds." Thefe minute philofophers would fain vindicate man to what they call the free ufe of his natural liberty; that is, to do whatever he pleafes during life, and to live only as long as he pleases. Under the direction of fuch kind and ingenious inftructors, a man of unstable principles is foon bewildered in all the mazes of fcepticifin and infidelity; his heart becomes callous, his confcience is feared, and his tafte is too refined to be longer a dupe "To all the nurfe and all the priest have taught". [R] See Hume's Effay on Suicide, confidered in Part VI. c. 2, any of |