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other words, that every created being in the universe ought to ftudy perfect rectitude in all his defires and wishes. He who defires any thing contrary to the Divine Nature, and will, or to what is right and good, is guilty of rebellion against the Supreme Governor of the Univerfe.

The paffions, as they are commonly, but improperly called, of the human mind, are various, and fome of them of fo mixed and compounded a nature, that they are not easily ranged under claffes. The following are the principal. Love, or complacence, or defire, whofe object is, whatever appears to us good, amiable, or fit for us, as God, our fellow-creatures, virtue, beauty; joy, excited by happinefs, real or imaginary, in poffeffion, or profpect; fympathy, or a humane fenfe of the good or bad condition of our fellow-creatures; felf-love; ambition, or defire of glory, true, or falfe; covetoufnefs; love of life; appetites of eating, drinking, recreation, fleeping, and mutual defires of the fexes; mirth; anger; hatred; envy; malice; revenge; fear; jealoufy; grief.

It is the whole foul, or whole man, that loves, hates, defires, or fears. Every paffion is a motion of the whole being, toward or from fome object, which appears to him either defirable or difagreeable. And objects appear to us defirable, or difagreeable, either from the real excellence our understanding perceives to be in them, as in virtue, beauty, proportion, and their contraries, as vice, deformity, and confufion; or from tome peculiar fitness, or congruity between the objects and our particular make, or caft of mind, which is the pure arbitrary effect of our make; as in the reciprocal love of the fexes, and the antipathy we have at certain creatures.

Now the Divine Will, the dignity of our nature, and perfect rectitude, unite in requiring that every one of our paffions, and appetites be properly directed, and exerted in a proper manner and degree; not that they be rooted out and destroyed, according to the romantic notion of the ancient Stoic Philofophers. It is in many cafes equally unfuitable to the dignity of our nature, that the motions of our minds be too weak and languid,

as that they be too ftrong and vigorous. We may be as faulty in not fufficiently loving God and Virtue, as in loving the vanities of this world too much,

Previous to what may be more particularly obferved on the conduct of the natural inclinations or paffions of the mind, it may be proper briefly to mention fome general directions, which will be found of abfolute neceffity toward our undertaking the bufinefs of regulating our paffions with any reasonable profpect of fuccess. The first preparatory direction I fhall give, is, To habituate ourselves as early, and as conftantly as poffible, to confideration.

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The faculty or capacity of thought is what raises our nature above the animal. But if we do not use this noble faculty for the purpose of diftinguishing between right and wrong, for finding out, and practising our duty, we had been as well without it, Nay, the beasts have the advantage of thofe of our fpecies, who act the part of beasts; in as far as they are not capable of being called to an account, or punished, as unthinking men, for the neglect or abuse of the nobleft of God's good good gifts, facred reafon. It is dreadful to think of the conduct of by far the greatest part of our fpecies, in refpect of inconfideratenefs. Mankind feem to think, nothing more is neceffary, to remove at once all guilt, than only to drown all thought and reflection, and then give themselves up to be led or driven at the pleasure of paffion or appetite. But how will thofe poor unthinking creatures be hereafter confounded, when they find the voluntary neglect of thought and confideration treated as a moft atrocious infult upon the goodness of the Author of our being! And what indeed can be more impious, or contemptuous, than for beings endowed with a capacity of thought and understanding, to fpurn from them the ineftimable gift of heaven, or bury that talent which was given them to be used for the most important purposes of diftinguishing between good and evil, and purfuing their own happiness, and then pretend, in excufe for all the madness they are guilty of, that they did not think, because they cared not to take the pains?

If thought be the very foundation of the dignity of our nature; if one man is preferable to another, according as he exerts more reafon, and fhews more understanding in his conduct, what must be faid of thofe, who glory in what ought to be their fhame, in degrading themselves to the level of inferior beings?

Efpecially, what profpect does the prefent age yield, in which we seem to vie with one another, who fhall carry pleasure and vanity, to the greatest height, and who fhall do the moft to discountenance fober thought, and regular conduct? To determine of times and feafons, and how long a nation may continue to flourish, in which luxury and extravagance have taken place of all that is rational and manly; is what I do not pretend to. But I appeal to thofe who beft understand human nature, and the nature of government, and who know the hiftory of other states and kingdoms, which have been corrupted in the fame manner, whether we have not every thing to fear from the prefent univerfal inconfiderate diffolution of manners, and decay of virtue, public and private. May heaven take into its own. hands the reformation of a degenerate people; and give comfort, and more agreeable profpects, to those who bleed inwardly for the decline of their finking country! To return; let any perfon confider the natural effects which an attentive and habitual confideration of his own character and conduct are likely to produce; and then judge, whether it is not his duty to refolve to act the part of a reasonable creature. With refpect to the conduct of his paffions and appetites, let a man make it his conftant cuftom to fpend fome time every day in confidering the following points, viz. Whether he indulges paffion and appetite beyond the intention of nature; whether, for example, he fets his heart upon gratifying the bodily appetites, for the fake of luxurious. indulgence, or if he only confults health, in eating, drinking, fleeping, and recreations; whether he gives himself up to anger upon fmall or no provocation; whether he fets his love wholly upon the vanities of life, or if he afpires habitually after fomething nobler than any worldly purfuit, and fo of the rest Let a

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man accustom himfelf to recollect every evening the mifcarriages of the day in refpect of his paffions and appetites, and he will foon find, if he be faithful to himfelt, which are prevalent, and ought to be fubdued. Unless we can bring our minds to fome tolerable degree of tranquillity and fobriety, we cannot hope to redrefs the irregularities of our paffions and inclinations. What condition muft that foul be in, which is continually engaged, and diftracted various ways after pleafure, horour, or riches? If any irregularity, or redundancy, fprings up in fuch a mind, there it muft abide, and flourish, and ftrengthen more and more, till it become too deeply rooted ever to be eradicated. How do we accordingly fee the gay, the ambitious, and the covetous, give themfelves to be driven in a perpetual whirl of amufements and purfuits, to the abfolute neglect of all that is worth attending to? But if the men of bufinefs cannot find time, for getting of money, and the fons and daughters of pleasure are too much engaged in hearing mufic, feeing plays, and in the endlefs drudgery of the card-table; to find time for getting acquainted with themfelves, and regulating their minds, I can tell them one truth, and a terrible one; They muft find time to die, whether they have prepared themfelves for death or not.

Before any thing can be done to purpofe toward bringing the paffions under due fubjection, it will be neceffary to bring down high-fwelling pride and selfopinion, and to cultivate humility, the foundation of all virtues. For this purpofe, it will be our wisdom to endeavour to view ourselves in the light we may fuppofe we appear in before that Eye which fees all things exactly as they are. We are therefore to confider, that we do not appear to our Maker under the fame diftinctions as we do to one another. He does not regard one as a king, another as a hero, or a third as a learned man! He looks down from where he fits enthroned above all conceivable height, through the vast scale of being, and beholds innumerable different orders, all gradually defcending from himself, the higheft created nature infinitely inferior to his own original perfection! At a

very great distance below the fummit of created excellence, and at the very lowelt degree of rational nature, we may fuppofe the All-comprehenfive Eye to behold. our humble fpecies juft rifing above the animal rank! How poor a figure muft we make before him in this, our infancy of being, placed on this fpeck of creation, 'creeping about like infects for a day, and then finking into the duft! Nor is this all. For what appearance must a set of such lawless beings as we are, make before that Eye which is too pure to look upon evil without abhorrence? How muft we appear to perfect Reclitude and Purity, guilty and polluted as we are, and covered with the ftains of wickednefs, which are the difgrace of any rational nature? Is pride fit for fuch an order of creatures as we are, in our prefent ftate of humiliation. and pollution? Can we value ourselves upon any thing of our own? Have we any thing, that we have not received? And does any reafonable creature boast of what it owes to another? Have we not infinite reafon to loathe ourselves, and to be covered with fhame and confufion? And are fhame and pride, in any refpect, confiftent?

The few advantages we poffefs at prefent want only to be confidered, to convince us how little they are to be boasted of. The whole of our bodily perfections may be fummoned up in two words, ftrength, and beauty. As for the firft, this is a poor qualification to boaft of, in which we are, to fay the leaft, equalled by the plodding ox, and ftupid afs. Befides, it is but three days fickness, or the lofs of a little blood, and a Hercules becomes as manageable as a child! Who then would boaft of what is fo very precarious?

As to beauty, that, fatal ornament of the female part of our fpecies, which has exhausted the human wit in raptures to its praise, which so often proves the misfortune of its poffeffor, and the difquiet of him who gives himself to the admiration of it; which has ruined cities, armies, and the virtue of thousands: What is beauty? A pleafing glare of white and red reflected from a skin, incomparably exceeded by the gloffy hue of the humble daily, which was made to be trod upon by every quadruped. The mild glitter of an eye, outfhone by every

dew.

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