readily reply, that the beauty is not in any of the parts or members of a pillar, but refults from the whole, when that complicated figure is prefented to an intelligent mind, fufceptible to thofe finer fenfations. "Till fuch a fpectator appear, there is nothing but a figure of fuch particular dimenfions and proportions: From his fentiments alone arife its elegance and beauty.

Again; attend to Cicero, while he paints the crimes of a Verres or a Catiline; you must acknowledge that the moral turpitude refults, in the fame manner from the contemplation of the whole, when prefented to a being whofe organs have fuch a particular ftructure and formation. The orator may paint rage, infolence, barbarity on the one fide: Meeknefs, fuffering forrow, innocence on the other: But if you feel no indignation or compaffion arife in you from this complication of circumstances, you would in vain afk him, in what confifts the crime or villany, which he fo vehemently exclaims against: At what time, or on what fubject it firft began to exist: And what has a few months afterwards become of it, when every difpofition and thought of all the actors is totally altered or annihilated. No fatisfactory answer can be given to any of these queftions upon the abftract hypothefis of morals; and we muft at last acknowledge, that the crime or immorality is no particular fact or relation, which can be the object of the understanding; but arifes entirely from the fentiment of disapprobation, which, by the structure of human nature, we unavoidably feel on the apprehenfion of barbarity or treachery.

IV. Inanimate objects may bear to each other all the fame relations which we obferve in moral agents; though the former can never be the object of love or hatred, nor are confequently fufceptible of merit or iniquity.

iniquity. A young tree which overtops and destroys its parent, ftands in all the fame relations with Nero when he murdered Agrippina; and if morality confift éd merely in relations, would, no doubt, be equally criminal.

V. It appears evident, that the ultimate ends of human actions can never, in any cafe, be accounted for by reason, but recommend themfelves entirely to the fentiments and affections of mankind, without any dependence on the intellectual faculties. Afk a man, "why he uses exercife;" he will anfwer," becaufe he defires to keep his health." If you then inquire, "why he defires health;" he will readily reply, "because sickness is painful." If you push your inquiries farther, and defire a reason, "why he hates pain,” it is impoffible he can ever give any. This is an ultimate end, and is never referred to any other object.

Perhaps, to your fecond question," why he defires health;" he may also reply, that "it is neceffary for the exercise of his calling." If you ask, "why he is anxious on that head;" he will anfwer, " because he defires to get money. If you demand "Why?" "It is the instrument of pleasure," fays he: And beyond this it is an abfurdity to ask for a reafon. It is impoffible there can be a progrefs in infinitum; and that one thing can always be a reafon why another is defired. Something must be defirable on its own account, and because of its immediate accord or agreement with human fentiment and affection.

Now, as virtue is an end, and is defirable on its own account, without fee or reward, merely for the imme-diate fatisfaction which it conveys; it is requifite that there fhould be fome fentiment which it touches; fome internal taste or feeling, or whatever you please

to

to call it, which diftinguishes moral good and evil, and which embraces the one, and rejects the other.! Thus the diftinct boundaries and offices of reafon and of taste are easily afcertained. The former conveys the knowledge of truth and falfehood: The latter gives the fentiment of beauty and deformity, vice and virtue. The one difcovers objects, as they really stand in nature, without addition or diminution: The other has a productive faculty, and, gilding or ftaining all natural objects with the colours, borrowed from internal fentiment, raifes in a manner a new creation. Reason, being cool and difengaged, is no motive to action, and directs only the impulfe received from appetite or inclination, by fhowing us the means of attaining happiness or avoiding mifery: Tafte, as it gives pleasure or pain, and thereby conftitutes happiness or mifery, becomes a motive to action, and is the first fpring or impulfe to defire and volition. From circumstances and relations, known or fuppofed, the former leads us to the difcovery of the concealed and unknown: After all circumftances and relations are laid before us, the latter makes us feel from the whole a new fentiment of blame or approbation. The standard of the one, being founded on the nature of things, is eternal and inflexible, even by the will of the Supreme Being: The standard of the other, arifing from the internal frame and conftitution of animals, is ultimately derived from that Supreme Will, which bestowed on each being its peculiar nature, and arranged the feveral claffes and orders of existence.

APPENDIX II.

ad

THE

Of Self-love.

HERE is a principle fuppofed to prevail among many which is utterly incompatible with all virtue or moral fentiment; and as it can proceed from nothing but the most depraved difpofition, fo in its turn it tends ftill further to encourage that depravity. This principle is, that ail benevolence is mere hypocrify, friendship a cheat, public spirit a farce, fidelity a fnare to procure truft and confidence; and that, while all of us, at bottom, purfue only our private interest, we wear these fair disguises in order to put others off their guard, and expofe them the more to our wiles and machinations. What heart one must be poffeffed of who profeffes fuch principles, and who feels no internal fentiment that belies fo pernicious a theory, it is eafy to imagine: And alfo, what degree of affection and benevolence he can bear to a fpecies whom he reprefents under fuch odious colours, and fuppofes fo little fufceptible of gratitude or any return of affection. Or if we fhould not afcribe these principles wholly to a corrupted heart, we must at leaft account for them from the most carelefs and precipitate examination. Superficial reafoners, indeed, obferving many falfe pretences among mankind, and feeling, perhaps, no very strong restraint in their own difpofition, might draw a general and a hafty conclufion, that all is equally corrupted, and that men, different from all

other

other animals, and indeed from all other fpecies of exiftence, admit of no degrees of good or bad, but are, in every inftance, the fame creatures under different difguifes and appearances.

There is another principle fomewhat refembling the former, which has been much infifted on by philofophers, and has been the foundation of many a system; that, whatever affection one may feel, or imagine he feels for others, no paffion is, or can be difinterested.; that the most generous friendship, however fincere, is a modification of felf-love; and that, even unknown to ourselves, we feek only our own gratification, while we appear the most deeply engaged in fchemes for the liberty and happiness of mankind. By a turn of imagination, by a refinement of reflection, by an enthusiasm of paffion, we seem to take part in the interefts of others, and imagine ourselves divested of all felfish confiderations: But, at bottom, the most ge nerous patriot and moft niggardly mifer, the bravest hero and most abject coward, have, in every action, an equal regard to their own happiness and welfare.

Whoever concludes from the feeming tendency of this opinion, that those who make profeffion of it, cannot poffibly feel the true fentiments of benevolence, or have any regard for genuine virtue, will often find himfelf, in practice, very much mistaken. Probity and honour were no ftrangers to Epicurus and his fect. Atticus and Horace, feem to have enjoyed from nature, and cultivated by reflection, as generous and friendly difpofitions as any difciple of the aufterer schools. And among the modern, Hobbes and Locke, who maintained the selfish fyftem of morals, lived irreproachable lives; though the former lay not under

any