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THE

ELEMENTS

OF

MORAL SCIENCE.

WITH QUESTIONS FOR EXAMINATION.

BY

FRANCIS WAYLAND, D. D.,

LATE PRESIDENT OF BROWN UNIVERSITY, AND PROFESSOR OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY.

WITH NOTES AND ANALYSIS,

BY JOSEPH ANGUS, D. D.,

AUTHOR OF THE BIBLE HAND-BOOK,

AND EDITOR OF BISHOP BUTLER'S ANALOGY AND SERMONS.

LONDON:

THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY;
56, PATERNOSTER ROW; 65, ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD; AND

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LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET.

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EDITOR'S PREFACE.

IN introducing this volume into the educational series of the Religious Tract Society, a few words may be allowed to the editor on the subject of this edition.

The work is intended for all classes and will probably be found a more satisfactory treatise on Ethics than any other in the English language. It is remarkable for the clearness of its style, the soundness of its philosophy, and the scripturalness of its ethical system. The positive form which its teaching assumes is a great recommendation, though this quality has the effect of concealing the many errors which the author quietly repels or condemns.

The notes which the present editor has appended are meant, in two or three instances, to modify the statements of the text; and especially to aid the student in comparing Dr. Wayland's views with those of earlier writers.' In the second part, on Practical Ethics, a few notes have been given to connect the ethical principles announced in the book with the provisions of

"It is indispensably necessary in the study of moral theories, that you should consider to what systems they have succeeded, and to what they are opposed. This consideration is commonly omitted in practice; and yet there is none more essential for the right understanding of moral as well as religious doctrines."-Bishop Hampden, Lectures on the Study of Moral Philosophy, Lect. vii.

actual law. Throughout (it will be seen) the editor is indebted for many suggestions to the Elements of

Morality,' published by Dr. Whewell.

The only omissions in this volume (compared with the American Edition of 1850), is in Part II. Division I. ch. i. sec. 2., and ch. iv. class III. ch. i. sec. 2., comprising the paragraphs of the author on the duty of the State in relation to the support of religion. The passages left out extend to about one page and a half.

The analysis, Index and selected questions will, it is hoped, render the volume the more acceptable both to professional and to general readers.

A popular, scientific, and scriptural text book on Ethics is confessedly one of the wants of the age. That want this treatise is intended to supply. If it gain the attention of young men, it will prove conducive in no small degree, to the progress of commercial honour, of personal virtue, and of religious truth.

PREFACE

TO THE

FIRST EDITION.

IN presenting to the public a new treatise upon Moral Science, it may not be improper to state the circumstances which led to the undertaking, and the design which it is intended to accomplish.

When it became my duty to instruct in Moral Philosophy, in Brown University, the text-book in use was the work of Dr. Paley. From many of his principles I found myself compelled to dissent, and, at first, I contented myself with stating to my classes my objections to the author, and offering my views, in the form of familiar conversations, upon several of the topics which he discusses. These views, for my own convenience, I soon committed to paper, and delivered, in the form of lectures. In a few years, these lectures had become so far extended, that, to my surprise, they contained, by themselves, the elements of a different system from that of the text-book which I was teaching. To avoid the inconvenience of teaching two different systems, I undertook to reduce them to order, and to make such addi

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