it to be the effect of examination, habit, and gradual improvement. We cannot conceive of a mind juft produced into existence, as furnished with inclinations, attachments, or even ideas of any kind. We have no conception of these as other than the effects of improvement. And we confider a mind at its first entrance into being, as endowed only with the capacity of taking in ideas, as the eye is of viewing objects, when prefented to it. So that we can form no other notion of the elevated degree of goodness, which thofe glorious beings have attained, than as the effect of their having paffed a very long courfe of improvement. Nor do the accounts we have in revelation, of the fall of fome of them, feem fo well to fuit any other fcheme, as that of their having been at that time in a state of difcipline analogous to ours. Be that as it will, it is evident, that to fuch creatures as we are, with capacities and all other circumftances fuch as ours (and had they been different, we should not have been what we are, nor where we are) nothing but a ftate of difcipline could have anfwered the end of producing in us the neceffary attachment to rectitude or virtue. For this attachment or inclination could not have arifen in us of itfelf, and without adequate means.

SECT. V.

The prefent very proper for a State of Difcipline*. Objections anfwered.

ERE we to imagine a plan of a ftate of difcipline, for improving a fpecies of beings fuch as ours for high ftations, and extentive ufefulnels in future ftates; how could we fuppofe it contrived in any manner, that should be materially different from the state we find ourselves in? What fcheme could be imagined, likely to answer the purposes of planting in the mind of the creature the neceffary habit of obedience to the Supreme, Being;

T

The Author would not, if it were to do again, draw up the following Section, altogether as it stands here, feeing, as he thinks, reafon to change his opinion, in fome points (none of them indeed of any material goniy quence) from what it was, when this book was written.

Being; of giving it an inviolable attachment to virtue, and horror at irregularity; and of teaching it to ftudy a rational and voluntary concurrence with the general fcheme of the Governor of the univerfe; what method, I fay, can we conceive of for thefe noble purposes, that fhould not take in, among others, the following particulars, viz. That the fpecics fhould be furnished with fufficient capacity, and advantages of all kinds, for diftinguishing between right and wrong: That the ingenuity of their difpofitions, and the ftrength of their virtue, fhould have full exercife, in order both to its trial, and its improvement: That they fhould have rewards and punishments fet before them, as the moft powerful motives to obedience: And that, upon the whole, they fhould have it fairly in their power to attain the end of their being put in a state of difcipline?

If we confider the prefent as a ftate of difcipline, all is ordered as fhould be. We enter into life with minds wholly unfurnished with ideas, attachments, or biaffes of any kind. kind. After a little time, we find certain inftincts begin to act pretty ftrongly within us, which are neceffary to move us to avoid what might be hurtful, and purfue what is ufeful to the fupport of the animal frame, and thefe inftincts are appointed to anticipate reafon, which does not at firft exert itself; and bring us to that by mechanical means, which we are not capable of being worked to by rational confiderations. Nature has ordered, that our parents fhall be fo engaged to us by irrefiftible affection, as to be willing to undertake the office of caring for us in our helpless years; of opening, and cultivating our reason, as foon as it begins to appear; and of forming us by habit, by precept, and example, to virtue and regularity. As we advance in life, our faculties, by habitually exerting them upon various objects, come to enlarge themfelves, fo as to take in a wider compafs. We become then capable of reafoning upon actions, and their confequences, and accordingly do, in general, reafon juftly enough about matters of right and wrong, where paffion does not blind and miflead us. When we come into the vigorous and flourishing time of life, excited by our paffions

and

and appetites, without which, with the low degree of reason we then enjoy, we fhould be but half animated, we proceed to enter into various fcenes of action. It is true, that innumerable irregularities and follies are the confequence. But without paffions and appetites, we could not be the compounded creatures we are, nor confequently fill our proper ftation between the angelic and animal ranks. Here then is the proper opportunity for exercifing our virtue; for habituating us to keep continually on our guard againft innumerable affaults; for watching over ourselves, that we may not be furprized, and fall before temptation; or if we fall, that by fuffering from our errors, we may be moved to greater diligence and attention to our duty, to a ftronger attachment to virtue, and a more fixed hatred to the crimes which have brought fuch fufferings upon us. And though the neceffary propenfions of our nature do indeed eventually lead us, through our own folly, into irregularity and vice, it must yet be owned at the fame time, that by the wife and kind conftitution of nature, we have innumerable natural directions, and advantages, toward reftraining and bringing them under fubjection, and innumerable ill confequences are made to follow naturally upon our giving a loose to them. Which ought in all reafon to lead us to reflect, that the government of our paffions and appetites is a part of our wifdom and our duty.

Pleasure and pain, health and difeafe, fuccefs and misfortune, reward and punishment, often at a very great distance of time after the action, are made the natural, or at leaft frequent confequences of our general behaviour here; to fuggeft to us the reafonableness of concluding that an extenfive uniformity prevails through the whole of the Divine moral government, and that what we fee here in fhadow, will in the future ftate appear in substance and perfection, and that it not only will, but ought, to be fo, and cannot be otherwife.

If we confider the oppofite natural tendences and effects of virtue and vice, in the prefent ftate, we fhall from thence fee reafon to conclude, that the former is pleafing to the Governor of the world, and the latter

the contrary. The natural effects of temperance are health, length of days, and a more delicate enjoyment of the innocent pleafures of life. The natural effects of gluttony, drunkenness, and lewdness, are disease and pain, disgust and disappointment, and untimely death. The natural effects of univerfal benevolence, justice, and charity, are the love of mankind, fuccefs in life, and peace in one's own mind. The confequences to be expected from ill-will, injuftice, and felfishness, are the contempt and hatred of mankind, and punishment by the laws of nations. When we fay fuch an effect follows naturally from fuch a caufe, we mean, that it does fo by the Divine appointment. For what is natural, is only fo, becaufe the rectitude requires it to be so.

Now, if our bodily frame is fo formed that its wellbeing confifts in temperance, and that an immoderate indulgence of appetite tends to diforder and unhinge it; if the make of the human mind, and our focial state in life, are fuch, that the focial virtues tend to produce univerfal happiness, and all this by the conftitution and courfe of nature, of which God himfelf is the Author; if these things be fo, who is fo blind, as not to see in all this a moral government already established under God, even in this world, and going on to perfection? That we fee in fact innumerable deviations from the natural connection between virtue and happiness, and vice and mifery; and that, through the perverfeness, the wickedness, and fometimes the mere caprice of mankind, and the unnatural and diforderly ftate things are got into, it comes to pafs, that the natural confequences of things do not invariably follow, is by no means an objection against the conclufion I have drawn from the state of things, as the Divine Wisdom conftituted them, any more than the poffibility of refifting the power of gravitation, or lifting a heavy body, is a proof, that there is no fuch law established in the natural world by the Author of Nature.

That we may not, by a continued courfe of ease and happiness, be led either to fuch arrogance and pride, as

to

to conclude ourselves the lords of nature, and to forget that there is One above us; or to fix our affections. upon the prefent ftate, which is only intended to be tranfient and temporary, not lafting and final; to anfwer these important ends, we are placed in the school of affliction, to be broke and tamed to obedience. That happiness too eafily come at, and a conftant feries of fuccefs and profperity, are by no means proper for such unprincipled and unexperienced beings as we are, is too evident from the effects of eafe and affluence, which very few can bear without almoft lofing their reafon. The scenes of madness run into by victorious princes, of which history is full; the pranks from time to time played by our nobility and rich commoners, and the fate of whole nations, whenever they arrive at the pinnacle of greatness and riches, fhew the abfolute neceffity of affliction to force us upon confideration, to put us in mind of the frailty of our nature and ftate, and to make us remember that we are under the government of One, who can raise or humble, afflict or relieve, reward or punish, as to him feems good,

That we may never lose fight of our duty, nor have it in our power to pretend ignorance, and to filence even the poor excufe of thoughtleffnefs, confcience, that everwatchful and faithful monitor, is placed within the mind itself, to be always at hand, to judge of our characters and actions, and to alarm us with its flings and reproaches, whenever we do amifs. And there is no mind fo grofs and ftupid, as not to feel at times fome pangs of remorfe. The very Cannibal has a clear enough fenfe of right and wrong, to know when he himfelf is injured, though he will not ftick to injure his neighbour. This effectually faftens guilt upon him. And the lowest and most favage of mankind, who fhall hereafter be condemned, will be obliged to own, that with all his difadvantages for knowing his duty, he might have acted his part better than he did.

Not only confcience within, but every object in nature presents us fome moral leffon. Tempeits, thunders, and lightnings from above; inundations and earthquakes from beneath; the fword, famine, and peftilence