power gone. Who would not prefer safety from injury, to the having revenged an injury? Who can dwell upon a scene of tortures though practised on the vilest wretch, or can delight either in the sight or description of vengeance prolonged beyond all necessity of self-defence or public interest? "The pleasure of revenge, then, bears the same comparison to the pleasures of Humanity and Virtue, as the slaking of the incessant burning thirst of a fever, does to the natural enjoyments of grateful food in health."

The pursuits of the learned have often as much folly in them as any others, when studies are not valued according to their use in life, or their real pleasures but for their difficulty and obscurity, and consequently their rarity and distinction. Nay, an abuse may be made of the most noble and manly studies, even of morals, politics, and religion itself, if our admiration and desire terminate upon the knowledge itself, and not upon the possession of the dispositions and affections, which should be inculcated in these studies. No part of knowledge indeed can be called entirely useless; abstract mathematics, mythology, painting, music, architecture have their own pleasures, the only fault lies in letting any of those inferior tastes engross the whole man to the exclusion of other pursuits of virtue and humanity.

In governing our moral sense and desires of virtue, nothing is more necessary than to study the nature and tendency of human actions, and to extend our views to the whole species and to all sensitive natures, as far as they can be affected by our conduct. Our moral sense thus regulated and constantly followed in our actions, may be the most constant source of the most stable pleasure; and also, the most probable means of obtaining the pleasures of honor. The public good can never be opposed to private virtue, and had all men true opinions, honor could only be obtained by virtue or serving the public.

Moral Good and Evil.-The universal benevolence towards all men, we may compare to that principle of gravitation, which, perhaps, extends to all bodies in the Universe, but increases as the distance is diminished, and is strongest when bodies come to touch each other. Now

this increase upon nearer approach, is as necessary as that there should be any attraction at all. For a general attraction equal in all distances, would, by the contrariety of such multitudes of equal forces, put an end to all regularity of motion, and perhaps stop it altogether. Besides this general attraction, the learned in these subjects show us a great many other attractions among several sorts of bodies, answering to some particular sorts of passions, from some special causes. And that attraction or force by which the parts of each body cohere, may represent the self-love of each individual.

Every moral agent justly considers himself as a part of this rational system which may be useful to the whole; so that he may be, in part, an object of his own universal benevolence; and the preservation of the system requires every one to be innocently solicitous about himself. Benevolence denotes the internal spring of virtue; it may mean a calm extensive affection or good-will towards all beings capable of happiness or misery: or towards smaller systems, or to individuals, as patriotism and friendship; or the several kinds of particular passions, as love, pity, sympathy, and congratulation.

The morality of every agent consists of a compound proportion of his benevolence and abilities, and his goodness depends on these two jointly. In different agents, their abilities being equal, the quantity of good is proportioned to the goodness of temper or benevolence; and the goodness of temper being equal, the quantity of good is as the abilities. Virtue or goodness of temper, is, (other things being equal) directly as the amount of good, and inversely as the abilities; for where the ability is the greatest, there is evidently less virtue in the same amount of good. In most actions, self-love is another force, sometimes conspiring with, and sometimes opposing benevolence. Perfection of goodness or virtue is when the amount of good fully equals the abilities.

HENRY ST. JOHN'S

PHILOSOPHY.

Every event that happens in the course of human affairs, how contingent soever it may seem, has a real and peculiar cause. But when these causes are too remote, or too complicated, to be easily, or at all discerned by us, we call the event contingent, and the cause chance. Thus we endeavor to supply our want of ideas, to think with less confusion, to discourse more intelligibly, and to make up the sum with counters which we can not make up with money. But in this kind of payment there has been much abuse, and much deceit. Superstition attempted to make these counters pass for real money; and, instead of keeping the word chance to signify in its application nothing more than this, that the cause of an event was unknown, to make it pass for an actual cause and a positive Being, superstition impersonated it under the name of fortune.

The law of their Nature is the concern of all men alike. All men are, therefore, able alike to discover this law, and the constitution of things from which it is derived. All men do not discover it indeed alike, though all men, even the most savage and ignorant, have, as I believe, some imperfect notions of it, which observation and experience force into their minds.

Right reason consists in a conformity with truth, and truth in a conformity with nature. Nature, or the aggregate of things which are, is the great source from whence all the rivulets of real knowledge must be derived. When we can not go up, and as far as we cannot go up thither, we must remain in ignorance.

The great principles of moral truth are as much founded in the nature of things, as those of mathematical truth; and it is not a little less absurd to contradict the moral by our words or actions, than to deny the mathematical. We perceive the truth of both with equal evidence; but as the former are much more important to us than the latter, we may be ignorant of all mathematical, we cannot be so of all moral, truth. We discover one, the other discovers itself; it obtrudes itself on the mind, and the mind per

ceives it with greater satisfaction. He who demonstrates that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles, or that a square is double to a triangle of equal base and height, has a dry inward complacency. But he who contemplates the obvious advantages of benevolence and justice to society, and of society to mankind, will feel a pleasure much more sensible; and the same proportion will hold in all the progress the mind makes to discover mathematical and moral truth.

The phænomena of Nature, the greatest and the most minute, establish the doctrine of final causes, and, therefore, the intelligence of the first cause, by innumerable proofs, which are at all times obvious to our senses. Many of these proofs amount to geometrical certainty; since a multitude of things, which might be made in manners, and placed in positions almost infinite, are so made, so placed, so contrived, that they are visibly appropriated to the particular uses to which they serve, and to no other. If the scheme of particular providences was supported by proofs like these, no reasonable man could doubt of the truth of it. But it is not so supported.

The two assumed propositions, "that man is the final cause of the world," and that the communication of happiness to him is the final cause of his creation, are most certainly false, as the scheme of particular providences that force the laws of Nature, is no doubt, and as that may be which supposes these providences exercised in a manner agreeable to these laws. That the world is fitted in many respects to be the habitation of men, or that men are fitted for this habitation, is true. But will it follow, even from the first, that the world therefore was made for the sake of man, any more, than it will follow that it was made for any other species of animals, for all of whom, according to their several natures, it is equally well fitted, and for all of whom we may believe on this account very reasonably that it was made, as well as for us? It is as well fitted for Bownce (a dog) as for you, with respect to physical nature; and with respect to moral nature, he has little to do beyond hearkening to the still whispers, the secret suggestions, and the sudden influences of instinct. In the works of men, the most complicated schemes pro

11

duce, very hardly and very uncertainly, one single effect. In the works of God, one single scheme produces a multitude of different effects, and answers an immense variety of purposes.

MARY WORTLEY MONTAGUE'S

LETTERS FROM TURKEY.

The Effendis, (that is, the learned men,) do very well deserve this name; they have no more faith in the inspiration of Mahomet, than in the infallibility of the pope. They make a frank profession of deism among themselves, or to those they can trust.

I know no European court, where the ladies would have behaved themselves in so polite a manner to such a stranger, as at the Turkish bagnio at Sophia. I was here convinced of the truth of a reflection I have often made, that, if it were the fashion to go naked, the face would be hardly observed. I perceived that the ladies of the most delicate skins and finest shapes had the greatest share of my admiration, though their faces were sometimes less beautiful than those of their companions. They would fain have undressed me for the bath. I excused myself with some difficulty. They being, however, all so earnest in persuading me, I was at last forced to open my shirt, and show them my stays, which satisfied them very well; for I saw they believed I was locked up in that ma chine, and that it was not in my own power to open it, which contrivance they attributed to my husband.

Those ladies that are rich have all their money in their own hands. Upon the whole, I look upon the Turkish women as the only free people in the empire; the divan pays a respect to them; and the grand seignior himself, when a pacha is executed, never violates the privileges of the haram, (or women's apartment) which remains unsearched and entire to the widow.

The small-pox, so fatal, and so general among us, is here entirely harmless, by the invention of ingrafting, which is the term they give it. I intend to try it on my dear little son. I am patriot enough to take pains to bring this useful invention into fashion in England, and I should