must be happiness; and that happiness, if, according to the full import of the precept, we loved each other, would be most successfully promoted, most widely diffused, and most surely enjoyed. But in vain should we be commanded to love our neighbour, unless we were placed in a situation where that love could exert itself, unless our reason distinctly perceived the fitness of such exertion, and unless the impulses of our own minds concurred with the authority of Revelation, in cherishing and supporting the principle of benevolence. There is, however, a mischievous and deceitful kind of philosophy, the patrons of which indulge their spleen, or display their sagacity, in the most humiliating descriptions of human nature. The very same men who would prepossess us against Christianity, as a gloomy and a degrading system, have endeavoured to weaken the ordinary, and, in truth, the most efficacious obligations to virtue, by showing that we are incapable of being virtuous-that in every attempt we make to deserve the approbation of our own minds, we are under the secret, though irresistible influence, of self delusion--that our supposed excellencies are real imperfections-that our social affections are only modifications of the selfish-that it is impossible for us to love our neighbour sincerely and purely-and that every action by which we mitigate his sufferings, or promote his well being, proceeds from the love which we latently and indirectly bear to ourselves. But if the opinions of these writers be well-founded, the precept of our Lord would doubtless be frivolous, and even insulting. It

would set our characters, as Christians, at variance with our conditions as men; and, under the pretended sanction of God's authority, it would seem to impose a duty which God himself has not enabled us to fulfil.

In order, therefore, both to illustrate and to justify the precept of loving our neighbour as ourselves, I shall first endeavour to show that a principle of benevolence really exists in the human mind.

Secondly, I shall inquire in what manner that principle is formed; and I shall adopt and defend the opinion of those philosophers who deduce it, not from instinct, but association.

Thirdly, I shall consider the degree in which it operates, both as an affection and a duty.

Fourthly, I shall trace out the respect which it bears to the whole of our nature.

Lastly, for reasons which will hereafter be mentioned, I shall correct some mistakes, and obviate some objections, which have arisen upon the qualities and extent of benevolence, part, it may be, from the ambiguities of language, and part, I fear, from the refinements of speculation.

The limits assigned to discourses from the pulpit, will prevent me from delivering all the observations which I have had occasion to make in this comprehensive, and, I hope, not inaccurate view of the subject; and as some of them lie rather removed from the train of thinking usually pursued in sermons, I have the consolation to reflect that such parts may be omitted without any inconvenience. I have therefore selected the first and the last heads

* The whole is here printed.

as most proper to be produced, and from the discussion of them, either in this or a subsequent discourse, I shall find opportunities for passing on, to that important branch of the virtue which is more immediately connected with the purpose of our present meeting. Let me, however, premise that upon a topic which has been so often and so ably discussed, every attempt at novelty would argue the weakest affectation, or the most offensive arrogance. You will, therefore, consider the opinions which I am going to lay before you as the result of my own impartial inquiry and serious reflection. They will not be recommended by any artifices of refinement, or any splendour of declamation. They are to be appreciated only by their truth and their importance; and they will be addressed not to the tumultuous and transient emotions of your passions, but to the calin and sober suggestions of your reason. First, then, I shall shew that the principle of benevolence does exist in the human mind.

In many inquiries which relate to the natural course of external things we are for a time perplexed, either by contrary and irreconcileable appearances, or by sudden deviations frem the general order, or by some minute and singular circumstance which deters us from assigning the phenomenon to any general and known class. So secret, indeed, and so intricate are the operations of causes which are totally independent of human agency, that our propensity to apply some received principle to a fact hitherto unexplained, is itself a fruitful source of error; and hence it has been remarked, that among

many solutions which may be offered, the antecedent probability lies in favour of that which would be first rejected by a superficial observer, and which occurs last even to the most attentive. But when we would examine what passes in our own mindswhat is subject to our own understanding and willwhat is to govern our own behaviour-and to determine our own happiness, the cause which more immediately presents itself is generally the true one; and though very recondite and very subtle explications may gratify our vanity, they for the most part mislead our judgements. We are made indeed for action, not for knowledge; or rather for knowledge, so far as it affects action, and therefore we are most interested, as we are also most qualified, to know ourselves; and are guided by the united force of observation and sympathy, to ascribe the same faculties and the same affections to our fellow creatures.

Now the general consent of mankind, as to the reality of benevolence, can only be the result of general experience. About the motions of bodies, or about the composition and energy of material objects, we may be deceived by the most striking appearances. Nay, upon the causes by which men are sometimes actuated, we, in particular instances, may be at a loss to decide, because our general rules are suspended, and because the very same experience which forms them, prepares us to suspend them by the imperfections of the best and the errors of the wisest men, by the sudden starts of caprice predominating over reason, and by the influence of casual situations, unknown indeed to the observer, but

powerful enough to drive off the agent from the ordinary bias of his temper. But in speaking of benevolence we are describing surely our own real feelings, and though the motives of men, being sometimes mixed, escape our notice, even while we are acting from them, reflection easily separates those which were at first blended, and enables us to analyze them, however complex, into their primary and constituent parts. He that mourns for the sufferings of a man by whose counsels he has been directed in difficulty, by whose beneficence he has been supported in distress, or by whose kind and assiduous attentions he has been consoled in the pangs of sickness or under the pressure of sorrow, may be supposed to intermingle some considerations of his own private happiness, to anticipate the loss of every fond endearment, every generous exertion, which he once experienced, and which he now remembers with the more painful anxiety, because he is to experience them no

But reverse the case, and imagine the benefactor to stand in sad and silent anguish over the sufferings of him to whom he has formerly shown kindness, without the prospect of return. In this instance surely sympathy is the effect of mere unmixed benevolence, and so far as it is invigorated by the recollection of services performed, it shows only the force of the principle, which clings to its object with tender solicitude, when the power of supplying relief is for ever lost. If this be resolved into the mechanical power of habit, I must ask-the habit of what? and the obvious answer is-the habit of loving and of being beloved, where mutual bene