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There is not a nobler quality to diftinguish us, than that of an indifference to ourfelves-a readinefs to forego our own liking for the ease and advantage of our fellow-creatures. And it is but justice, indeed, that the conveniences of many should prefcribe to those of one: whatever his fortune may be, as he owes all the fervice he has from it to the concurrence of numbers, he ought to make it of benefit to them, and by no means to conclude, that what they are not to take from him, they are not to fhare.

Nor fhould it be unremarked, that the gratifications, best suited to nature, are of all the cheapest: fhe, like a wife parent, has not made thofe things needful to the well-being of any of us, which are prejudicial to the interefts of the reft. We have a large field for enjoyment, at little or no charge, and may very allowably exceed the bounds of this; but we should always remember, that the verge of right is the entrance upon wrong-that the indulgence, which goes to the full extent of a lawful expence, approaches too near a criminal one, to be wholly clear from it.

Again, Care fhould be taken that our pleafures be in character.

The ftation of fome, the profeffion of others, and an advanced age in all, require that we should decline many pleatures allowable to those of an inferior rank-of a different profession-of much younger years.

Do your decifions conftitute the law does your honour balance the plebeian's oath? How very fitting is it that you should never be feen eager on trifles-intent on boyish sports-unbent to the loweft amufements of the populace-folicitous after gratifications, which may fhew, that neither your fagacity is greater, nor your fcruples fewer than what are found in the very meaneft of the community!

Am I fet apart to recommend a reasonable and useful life-to reprefent the world as a scene of vanity and folly, and propose the things above as only proper to engage our affections? how ungraceful a figure do I then make, when I join in all the common amusements-when the world feems to deligut me full as much as my hearers, 6

and the only difference between us is, that their words and actions correfpond, and mine are utterly inconsistent!

Have you attained the years, which extinguifh the relifh of many enjoymentswhich bid you expect the speedy conclufion of the few remaining, and ought to inftruct you in the emptiness of all those of the fenfual kind? We expect you should leave them to fuch who can taste them better, and who know them lefs. The mafly vestment ill becomes you, when you fink under its weight; the gay affembly, when your dim eyes cannot diftinguish the perfons compofing it: your feet fcarcely fupport you; attend not, therefore, where the conteft is, whose motions are the gracefulleft: fly the reprefentation defigned to raise the mirth of the spectators, when you can only remind them of their coffins.

Lattly, every pleasure should be avoided, that is an offence to the fcrupulous, or a fnare to the indiscreet. I ought to have nothing more at heart than my brother's innocence, except my own; and when there are so many ways of entertaining ourfelves, which admit of no mifconftruction, why should I chufe fuch, as afford occafion for any?

To be able greatly to benefit our fellowcreatures is the happiness of few, but not to hurt them is in the power of all; and when we cannot do the world much good, we must be very unthinking indeed, if we endeavour not to do it the leaft poflible mischief,

How this action will appear, to what interpretation it is liable, ought to be our confideration in whatever we engage. We are here fo much interested in each other's morals, that, if we looked not beyond our prefent being, it fhould never be a point indifferent to us, what notions our conduct may propagate, and for what corruptions it may be made the plea: but profeffing the doctrine of Chrift as our rule, we can in nothing more directly oppofe it, than in taking thofe liberties, by which the virtue of any is endangered. Which of our pleafures have this pernicious tendency, it will be more proper for my readers to recollect, than for me to defcribe. To those who are in earnest I have faid enough; to the infincere more would be fruitlefs. What has been said deserves, I think, fome confideration, and that it may have a ferious one, is the most earnest with of, Dear Sir,

Your, &c.

§ 146.

a quite different effect from what, alas! we

$146. A Letter to a young Nobleman, foon every where fadly experience. after his leaving School.

SIR,

The obligations I have to your family cannot but make me folicitous for the welfare of every member of it, and for that of yourself in particular, on whom its hoHours are to defcend.

Such inftructions and fuch examples, as it has been your happiness to find, muft, neceffarily, raise great expectations of you, and will not allow you any praise for a common degree of merit. You will not be thought to have worth, if you have not a diftinguished worth, and what may fuit the concurrence of so many extraordinary advantages.

In low life, our good or bad qualities are known to few-to those only who are related to us, who converfe with, or live near, us. In your ftation, you are expofed to the notice of a kingdom. The excellencies or defects of a youth of quality make a part of polite conversation are a topic agreeable to all who have been liberally educated; to all who are not amongst the meanest of the people.

Should I, in any company, begin a character of my friend with the hard name, whom I hope you left well at they would naturally ask me, What relation he bore to the Emperor's minister ? When I answered, That I had never heard of his bearing any; that all I knew of him was, his being the fn of a German merchant, fent into this kingdom for education; I, probably, fhould be thought impertinent, for introducing fuch a fubject; and I, certainly, fhould foon be obliged to drop it, or be wholly difregarded, were I unwife enough to continue t

But if, upon a proper occafion, I mentioned, that I had known the Honourable from his infancy, and that I had made fuch obfervations on his capacity, his application, his attainments, and his general conduct, as induced me to conclude, he would one day be an eminent ornament and a very great bleffing, to his country, I should have an hundred questions afked me about him-my narrative would appear of confequence to all who heard it, and would not fail to engage their attention.

I have, I must own, often wondered, that the confideration of the numbers, who are continually remarking the behaviour of the perfons of rank among us, has had fo litthe influence upon them-has not produced

Negligere quid de fe quifque fentiat, non folum arrogantis eft, fed etiam omnino diffoluti. I need not tell you where the remark is: it has, indeed, so much obvious truth, that it wants no fupport from authority. Every generous principle must be extinct in him, who knows that it is said of him, or that it justly may be faid of him-How different is this young man from his noble father! the latter took every course that could engage the public esteem: the former is as induftrious to forfeit it. The Sire was a pattern of religion, virtue, and every commendable quality: his defcendant is an impious, ignorant, profligate wretch: raised above others, but to have his folly more public-high in his rank, only to extend his infamy.

A thirst after fame may have its inconveniences, but which are by no means equal to thofe that attend a contempt of it. Our earnestnefs in its purfuit may poffibly flacken our purfuit of true defert; but indifferent we cannot be to reputation, without being fo to virtue.

In thefe remarks you, Sir, are no farther concerned, than as you muft, fometimes, converse with the perfons to whom they may be applied, and your deteftation of whom one cannot do too much to increase. Bad examples may justly raise our fears even for him, who has been the most wifely educated, and is the most happily dif pofed: no caution against them is fuperfluous: in the place, in which you are at préfent, you will meet with them in all shapes.

Under whatever disadvantages I offer you my advice, I am thus far qualified for giving it, that I have experienced fome of the dangers which will be your trial, and had fufficient opportunity of obferving others. The obfervations I have made, that are at all likely to be of fervice to you, either from their own weight, or the hints they may afford for your improving upon them, I cannot conceal from you. What comes from him who wishes you fo well, and fo much efteems you, will be fufficiently recommended by its motives; and may, therefore, poffibly be read with a partiality in its favour, that fhall make it of more ufe than it could be of from any intrinfic worth.

But, without farther preface or apology, let me proceed to the points that I think deferving your more particular confidera

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In the purfuit of natural or mathematical knowledge we engage, difpofed to take things as we find them to let our affent be directed by the evidence we meet with: but the doctrines of religion each infpects, not in order to inform himfelf what he ought to believe and practife;, but to reconcile them with his prefent faith and way of life with the paffions he favours-with the habits he has contracted.

And that this is, really, the cafe, is evident, from the little alteration there is in the manners of any, when they know as much of religion as they ever intend to know. You fee them the fame perfons as formerly; they are only furnished with arguments, or excufes, they had not before thought of; or with objections to any rules of life differing from those by which they guide themselves; which objections they often judge the only defence their own practice ftands in need of.

I am fure, Sir, that to one of your understanding the abfurdity of fuch a way of proceeding can want no proof; and that your bare attention to it is your fufficient guard against it.

Religion is either wholly founded on the fears or fancies of mankind, or it is, of all matters, the most serious, the weightieft, the most worthy of our regard. There is no mean. Is it a dream, and no more? Let the human race abandon, then, all pretences to reason. What we call fuch is but the more exquifite fenfe of upright, unclad, two-legged brutes; and that is the best you can fay of us. We then are brutes, and fo much more wretched than other brutes, as deftined to the miferies they feel not, and deprived of the happinefs they enjoy; by our forefight anticipating our calamities, by our reflection recalling them.Our being is without an aim; we can have no purpose, no defign, but what we ourfelves must fooner or later defpife. We are formed, either to drudge for a life, that, upon fuch a condition, is not worth our

preferving; or to run a circle of enjoy. ments, the cenfure of all which is, that we cannot long be pleased with any one of them. Difintereftednefs, generofity, public fpirit, are idle, empty founds; terms, which imply no more, than that we should neglect our own happiness to promote that of others.

What Tully has obferved on the connexion there is between religion, and the virtues which are the chief fupport of fociety, is, I am perfuaded, well known to you.

A proper regard to focial duties wholly depends on the influence that religion has upon us. Deftroy, in mankind, all hopes and fears, refpecting any future ftate; you inftantly let them loofe to all the methods likely to promote their immediate convenience. They, who think they have only the prefent hour to truft to, will not be with-held, by any refined confiderations, from doing what appears to them certain to make it pafs with greater fatisfaction.

Now, methinks, a calm and impartial enquirer could never determine that to be a vifionary scheme, the full perfuafion of the truth of which approves our exiftence a wife defign-gives order and regu larity to our life-places an end in our view, confeffedly the nobleft that can engage it-raifes our nature-exempts us from a fervitude to our paffions, equally debafing and tormenting us-affords us the trueft enjoyment of ourselves-puts us on the due improvement of our facultiescorrects our felfishness-calls us to be of ufe to our fellow-creatures, to become public bleffings-infpires us with true courage, with fentiments of real honour and generofity-inclines us to be fuch, in every relation, as fuits the peace and profperity of fociety-derives an uniformity to our whole conduct, and makes fatisfaction its infeparable attendant-directs us to a course of action pleafing when it employs us, and equally pleafing when we either look back upon it, or attend to the expectations we entertain from it.

If the fource of fo many and such vaft advantages can be fuppofed a dream of the fuperftitious, or an invention of the crafty, we may take our leave of certainty; we may fuppofe every thing, within and without us, confpiring to deceive us.

That there fhould be difficulties in any fcheme of religion which can be offered us, is no more than what a thorough ac

quaint

quaintance with our limited capacities would induce us to expect, were we ftrangers to the feveral religions that prevailed in the world, and propofed, upon enquiry into their refpective merits, to embrace that which came best recommended to our belief.

But all objections of difficulties must be highly abfurd in either of these cases-

When the creed you oppofe, on account of its difficulties, is attended with fewer than that which you would advance in its ftead; or

When the whole of the practical doctrines of a religion are fuch, as, undeniably, contribute to the happiness of mankind, in whatever ftate, or under whatsoever relations, you can confider them.

To reject a religion thus circumftanced, for fome points in its scheme lefs level to our apprehenfion, appears to me, I confefs, quite as unreasonable, as it would be to abftain from our food, till we could be fatisfied about the origin, insertion, and action of the muscles that enable us to fwallow it.

I would, in no cafe, have you reft upon mere authority; yet as authority will have its weight, allow me to take notice, that men of the greatest penetration, the acuteft reafoning, and the most folid judgment, have been on the fide of christianity have expreffed the firmest persuasion of its truth.

I cannot forgive myself, for having fo long overlooked Lord Bacon's Philofophical Works. It was but lately I began to read them; and one part of them I laid down, when I took my pen to write this. The more I know of that extraordinary man, the more I admire him; and cannot but think his understanding as much of a fize beyond that of the rest of mankind, as Virgil makes the ftature of Mufæus, with respect to that of the multitude surrounding him

Medium nam plurima turba

He, who fo clearly faw the defects in every fcience-faw from whence they proceeded, and had fuch amazing fagacity, as to dif cover how they might be remedied, and to point out thofe very methods, the pursuit of which has been the remedy of many of them-He, who could discern thus much, left it to the witlings of the following age, to discover any weakness in the foundation of religion.

To him and Sir Ifaac Newton I might add many others, of eminent both natural and acquired endowments, the most unsuspected favourers of the chriftian religion; but these two, as they may be confidered ftanding at the head of mankind, would really be difhonoured, were we to feek for any weight, from mere authority, to the opinions they had jointly patronized, to the opinion they had maintained, after the stricteft enquiry what ground there was for them.

That the grounds of christianity were thus enquired into by them, is certain: for the one appears, by the quotations from the bible interfperfed throughout his works, to have read it with an uncommon care; and it is well known, that the other made it his chief study, in the latter part of his life.

It may, indeed, appear very idle, to produce authorities on one fide, when there are none who deferve the name of such on the other. Whatever elfe may have rendered the writers in favour of infidelity remarkable, they, certainly, have not been fo for their fagacity, or fcience-for any fuperior either natural, or acquired, endow ments. And I cannot but think, that he who takes up his pen, in order to deprive the world of the advantages which would accrue to it were the chriftian religion generally received, fhews fo wrong a head in the very defign of his work, as would leave no room for doubt, how little credit he could gain by the conduct of it.

Is there a juft foundation for our affent to the christian doctrine? Nothing should

Hunc habet, atque humeris extantem fufpicit altis. then be more carefully confidered by us, or have a more immediate and extenfive influence upon our practice.

EN. L. VI. 667, 8.

or as Homer reprefents Diana's height, among the nymphs sporting with her

Πασάων δ' ὑπερ εγε κάρη ἔχει ἐδὲ μέτωπα.

OD. L. VI. 107.

Throughout his writings there runs a vein of piety: you can hardly open them, but you find fome or other teftimony of the full conviction entertained by him, that chriftianity had an especial claim to our regard,

Shall I be told, that if this were a right confequence, there is a profeffion, in which quite different perfons would be found, than we at prefent meet with ?

I have too many failings myself, to be willing to cenfure others; and too much love for truth, to attempt an excufe for what admits of none. But let me fay, that confequences are not the less true, for their

truth

truth being difregarded. Lucian's defcription of the philofophers of his age is more odious, than can belong to any fet of men in our time and as it was never thought, that the precepts of philofophy ought to be flighted, because they who inculcated, difgraced them; neither can it be any reflection on nobler rules, that they are recommended by persons who do not observe them.

Of this I am as certain as I can be of any thing, That our practice is no infallible teft of our principles; and that we may do religion no injury by our fpeculations, when we do it a great deal by our manners. I should be very unwilling to rely on the ftrength of my own virtue in fo many instances, that it exceedingly mortifies me to reflect on their number: yet, in whichfoever of them I offended, it would not be for want of conviction, how excellent a precept, or precepts, I had tranfgreffed-it would not be because I did not think, that a life throughout agreeable to the commands of the religion I profefs, ought to be conftantly my care.

How frequently we act contrary to the obligations, which we readily admit ourfelves to be under, can fcarcely be otherwife than matter of every one's notice; and if none of us infer from thofe purfuits, which tend to destroy our health, or our understanding, or our reputation, that he, who engages in them, is perfuaded that difeafe, or infamy, or a fecond childhood, deferves his choice; neither fhould it be taken for granted, that he is not inwardly convinced of the worth of religion, who appears, at fome times, very different from what a due regard thereto ought to make him.

Inconfiftency is, through the whole compafs of our acting, fo much our reproach, that it would be great injuftice towards us, to charge each defect in our morals, upon corrupt and bad principles. For a proof of the injuftice of fuch a charge, I am confident, none need look beyond themselves. Each will find the complaint of Medea in the poet, very proper to be made his own -I fee and approve of what is right, at the Jame time that I do what is wrong.

Don't think, that I would juftify the faults of any, and much lefs theirs, who, profefling themfelves fet apart to promote the interefts of religion and virtue, and having a large revenue affigned them, both that they may be more at leifure for fo noble a work, and that their pains in it

may be properly recompenfed, are, certain ly, extremely blameable, not only when they countenance the immoral and irreligious; but even, when they take no care to reform them.

All I aim at, is, That the cause may not fuffer by its advocates.-That you may be juft to it, whatever you may dislike in them -That their failures may have the allowance, to which the frailty of human nature is entitled-That you may not, by their manners, when worst, be prejudiced against their Doctrine; as you would not cenfure philofophy, for the faults of philofophers.

The prevalency of any practice cannot make it to be either fafe, or prudent; and I would fain have your's and mine fuch, as may alike credit our religion, and underftanding: without the great reproach of both, we cannot profess to believe that rule of life, to be from God, which, yet, we model to our paffions and interests.

Whether fuch a particular is my duty, ought to be the first confideration; and when it is found fo, common fenfe fuggefts the next-How it may be performed.

But I must not proceed. A letter of two fheets! How can I expect, that you fhould give it the reading? If you can perfuade yourself do do it, from the conviction of the fincere affection towards you, that has drawn me into this length; I promise you, never again to make fuch a demand on your patience.--I will never again give you fo troublesome a proof of my friendship. I have here begun a fubject, which I am very defirous to profecute; and every letter, you may hereafter receive from me upon it, whatever other recommendation it may want, fhall, certainly, not be without that of brevity. Dean Bolton.

§ 147. Three Eays on the Employment

of Time.

PREFACE.

The effays I here publish, though at first penned for the benefit of fome of the author's neighbours in the country, may, it is hoped, from the alterations fince made in them, be of more general ufe. The fubject of them is, in itfelf, of the higheft importtance, and could, therefore, never be unfeasonably confidered; but the general practice, at prefent, more especially entitles it to our notice. The principles on which their argumentative part proceeds, are denied by none whofe conviction it confults. Such as regard the human frame as only

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