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Towards God; as piety, reverence, refignation, gratitude, &c.

Towards other men (or relative duties); as juf tice, charity, fidelity, loyalty, &c.

Towards ourselves; as chastity, fobriety, temperance, preservation of life, care of health, &c. More of thefe diftinctions have been propofed, which it is not worth while to fet down.

I fhall proceed to ftate a few observations, which relate to the general regulation of human conduct; unconnected indeed with each other, but very worthy of attention; and which fall as properly under the title of this chapter as of any other.

I. Mankind act more from habit than reflection. It is on few only and great occafions that men deliberate at all; on fewer ftill, that they inftitute any thing like a regular inquiry into the moral rectitude or depravity of what they are about to do; or wait for the refult of it. We are for the most part determined at once; and by an impulse, which is the effect and energy of pre-established habits. And this conftitution feems well adapted to the exigencies of human life, and to the imbecility of our moral principle. In the current occafions and rapid opportunities of life, there is oft-times little leifure for reflection; and were there more, a man, who has to reafon about his duty, when the temptation to tranfgrefs it is upon him, is almoft fure to reason himfelf into an error.

If we are in fo great a degree paffive under our habits, where, it is afked, is the exercise of virtue, the guilt of vice, or any ufe of moral and religi-, ous knowledge? I anfwer, in the forming and contracting of thefe habits.

And from hence refults a rule of life of confiderable importance, viz. that many things are to be done, and abftained from, folely for the fake of

habit.

habit. We will explain ourselves by an example or two. A beggar, with the appearance of extreme distress, asks our charity. If we come to argue the matter, whether the diftrefs be real, whether it be not brought upon himfelf, whether it be of public advantage to admit fuch applications, whether it be not to encourage idlenefs and vagrancy, whether it may not invite impoftors to our doors, whether the money can be well fpared, or might not be better applied; when these confiderations are put together, it may appear very doubtful, whether we ought or ought not to give any thing. But when we reflect, that the mifery before our eyes excites our pity, whether we will or not; that it is of the utmost confequence to us to cultivate this tendernefs of mind; that it is a quality, cherished by indulgence, and foon ftifled by oppofition: when this, I fay, is confidered, a wife man will do that for his own fake, which he would have hesitated to do for the petitioner's; he will give way to his compaffion, rather than offer violence to a habit of fo much general use.

A man of confirmed good habits will act in the fame manner without any confideration at all.

This may ferve for one inftance: another is the following. A man has been brought up from his infancy with a dread of lying. An occafion prefents itself, where, at the expence of a little veracity, he may divert his company, fet off his own wit with advantage, attract the notice and engage the partiality of all about him. This is not a small temptation. And when he looks at the other fide of the question, he fees no mifchief that can enfue from this liberty, no flander of any man's reputation, no prejudice likely to arife to any man's interest. Were there nothing farther to be confidered, it would be difficult to fhow why a man under fuch circumftances might not indulge his humour. But when he reflects that his fcruples about lying have

hitherto

hitherto preferved him free from this vice; that occafions like the prefent will return, where the inducement may be equally ftrong, but the indulgence much lefs innocent; that his fcruples will wear away by a few tranfgreflions, and leave him fubject to one of the meaneft and moft pernicious of all bad habits, a habit of lying whenever it will ierve his turn: when all this, I fay, is confidered, a wife man will forego the prefent, or a much greater pleafure, rather than lay the foundation of a character fo vicious and contemptible.

From what has been faid may be explained alfo the nature of habitual virtue. By the definition of Virtue, placed at the beginning of this chapter, it appears, that the good of mankind is the fubject, the will of God the rule, and everlafting happinefs the motive and end of all virtue. Yet in fact a man fhall perform many an act of virtue, without having either the good of mankind, the will of God, or ever afting happiness in his thoughts. How is this to be underflood? in the fame manner as that a man may be a very good fervant, without being confcious at every turn of a particular regard to his matter's will, or of an exprefs attention to his mas ter's intereft; indeed your best old fervants are of this fort; but then he must have ferved for a length of time under the actual direction of thefe motives. to bring it to this: in which fervice his merit and virtue confift.

There are babits, not only of drinking, fwearing, and lying, and of fome other things, which are commonly acknowledged to be habits, and called fo; but of every modification of action, fpeech, and thought. Man is a bundle of habits. There are habits of industry, attention, vigilance, advertency; of a prompt obedience to the judgment occurring, or of yielding to the firft impulfe of pallion; of extending our views to the future, or of reting upon the prefent; of apprehending, me.

thodizing,

thodizing, reafoning; of indolence and dilatorinefs; of vanity, felf-conceit, melancholy, partiality; of fretfulness, fufpicion, captioufnefs, cenforiousness; of pride, ambition, covetoufnefs; of over-reaching, intriguing, projecting. In a word, there is not a quality, or function, either of body or mind, which does not feel the influence of this great law of animated nature.

II. The Chriftian religion hath not ascertained the precife quantity of virtue neceffary to falvation.

This has been made an objection to Christianity; but without reafon. For, as all revelation, however imparted originally, must be tranfmitted by the ordinary vehicle of language, it behoves those who make the objection to fhew that any form of words could be devised, which might exprefs this quantity; or that it is poffible to conftitute a ftandard of moral attainments, accommodated to the almoft infinite diverfity which fubfifts in the capacities and opportunities of different men.

It seems most agreeable to our conceptions of justice, and is confonant enough to the language of fcripture, to fuppofe, that there are prepared for us rewards and punishments, of all poffible degrees, from the moft exalted happiness down to

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• "He which foweth fparingly fhall reap alfo fparingly; and "he which foweth bountifully fhall reap alfo bountifully." 2 Cor. ix. 6.—" And that fervant which knew his Lord's will, "and prepared not himfelf, neither did according to his will, fhall be beaten with many ftripes; but he that knew not, fhall be beaten with few ftripes." Luke xii. 47, 48.-" Whofoever "fhall give you a cup of water to drink in my name because ye belong to Chrift, verily I fay unto you, he fhall not lose his "reward;" to wit, intimating that there is in referve a proportionable reward for even the finallest act of virtue. Mark ix. 41. -See alfo the parable of the pounds, Luke xix. 16, &c. where he whole pound had gained ten pounds, was placed over ten cities and he whofe pound had gained five pounds, was placed

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over five cities.

extreme

extreme mifery; fo that our labour is never in "vain" whatever advancement we make in virtue, we procure a proportionable acceffion of future happiness; as, on the other hand, every accumulation of vice, is the "treasuring up of fo much "wrath against the day of wrath." It has been faid, that it can never be a just œconomy of Providence, to admit one part of mankind into heaven, and condemn the other to hell, fince there must be very little to choose, between the worst man who is received into heaven, and the best who is excluded. And how know we, it might be answered, but that there may be as little to choofe in their conditions?

Without entering into a detail of fcripture morality, which would anticipate our fubject, the following general pofitions may be advanced, I think, with fafety:

1. That a state of happiness is not to be expected by those who are conscious of no moral or religious rule. I mean thofe, who cannot with truth. fay, that they have been prompted to one action, or withheid, from one gratification, by any regard to virtue or religion, either immediate or habitual.

There need no other proof of this, than the confideration, that a brute would be as proper an object of reward as fuch a man; and that, if the cafe were fo, the penal fanctions of religion could have no place. For whom would you punish, if you make fuch a one as this happy?-or rather indeed religion itself, both natural and revealed, would ceafe to have either ufe or authority.

2. That a state of happiness is not to be expected · by thofe, who referve to themfelves the habitual practice of any one fin, or neglect of one known duty.

Because, no obedience can proceed upon proper motives which is not univerfal, that is, which is

not

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