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Morality is taught in Scripture in this wife. neral rules are laid down of piety, juftice, benevolence, and purity: fuch as worshipping God in fpirit and in truth; doing as we would be done by ; loving our neighbour as ourself; forgiving others, as we expect forgiveness from God; that mercy better than facrifice; that not that which entereth into a man, (nor, by parity of reafon, any ceremonial pollutions) but that which proceedeth from the heart, defileth him. Thefe rules are occafionally illuftrated, either by fictitious examples, as in the parable of the good Samaritan, and of the cruel fervant, who refufed to his fellow-fervant that indulgence and compaffion which his mafter had fhewn to him: or in inftances which actually prefented themfelves, as in Chrift's reproof of his difciples at the Samaritan village; his praife of the poor widow, who caft in her laft mite; his cenfure of the Pharifees, who chofe out the chief rooms-and of the tradition, whereby they evaded the command to fuftain their indigent parents: or laftly, in the refolution of questions, which those who were about our Saviour propofed to him; as in his answer to the young man who asked him, "What lack I yet?" and to the honest scribe, who had found out, even in that age and country, that "to love God and his "neighbour was more than all whole burnt offer ings and facrifice."

And this is in truth the way in which all practical sciences are taught, as Arithmetic, Grammar, Navigation, and the like.-Rules are laid down, and examples are fubjoined; not that thefe exam. ples are the cafes, much lefs all the cafes which will actually occur, but by way only of explaining the principle of the rule, and as fo many fpecimens of the method of applying it. The chief difference is, that the examples in Scripture are not annexed to the rules with the didactic regularity to which we are now-a-days accustomed, but delivered difperfedly, as particular occafions fuggefted them; which

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gave them however, especially to thofe who heard them, and were prefent to the occafions which produced them, an energy and perfuafion, much beyond what the fame or any inftances would have appeared with, in their places in a system.

Befide this, the Scriptures commonly pre-fuppofe, in the perfons to whom they speak, a knowledge of the principles of natural justice; and are employed not fo much to teach new rules of morality, as to enforce the practice of it by new fanctions, and by a greater certainty: which laft feems to be the proper business of a revelation from God, and what was moft wanted.

Thus the "unjuft, covenant breakers and extortioners" are condemned in Scripture, fuppofing it known, or leaving it, where it admits of doubt, to moralifts to determine, what injuftice, extortion, or breach of covenant are.

The above confiderations are intended to prove that the Scriptures do not fuperfede the use of the fcience of which we profess to treat, and at the fame time to acquit them of any charge of imperfection or infufficiency on that account.

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HE father of Caius Toranius had been pro

"T fcribed by the triumvirate. Caius Toranius,

"coming over to the interefts of that party, difco"vered to the officers, who were in purfuit of his "father's life, the place where he concealed him"felf, and gave them withal a description, by which "they might diftinguish his perfon, when they "found him. The old man, more anxious for the fafety and fortunes of his fon, than about the lit

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"tle that might remain of his own life, began immediately to inquire of the officers who feized him, "whether his fon was well, whether he had done "his duty to the fatisfaction of his generals. That "fon, replied one of the officers, fo dear to thy affec"tions, betrayed thee to us; by his information "thou art apprehended, and dieft. The officer "with this ftruck a poniard to his heart, and the un-" happy parent fell, not fo much affected by his fate, as by the means to which he owed it "*

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Now the question is, whether, if this ftory were related to the wild boy, caught fome years ago in the woods of Hanover, or to a favage, without experience and without inftruction, cut off in his infancy from all intercourfe with his fpecies, and, confequently, under no poffible influence of example, authority, education, fympathy, or habit; whether, I fay, fuch a one would feel, upon the relation, any degree of that fentiment of disapprobation of Toranius's conduct which we fell, or not.

They who maintain the existence of a moral fenfe -of innate maxims-of a natural confcience—that the love of virtue and hatred of vice are inftinctiveor the perception of right and wrong intuitive, (all which are only different ways of expreffing the fame opinion) affirm that he would.

They who deny the existence of a moral fenfe, &c. affirm that he would not.

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And upon this iffue is joined.

"Caius Toranius triumvirum partes fecutus, profcripti pa"tris fui prætorii et ornati viri latebras, ætatem, notafque corporis, quibus agnofci poffet, centurionibus edidit, qui eum perfe"cuti funt. Senex de filii magis vitâ, et incrementis, quam de reliquo fpiritu fuo follicitus; an incolumis effet, et an impera"toribus fatisfaceret, interrogare eos cœpit. Equibus unus: "ab illo, inquit, quem tantopere diligis, demonftratus, noftro "minifterio, filii indicio occideris: protinufque pectus ejus gla"dio trajecit. Collapfus itaque eft infelix, auctore cædis, quam "ipfâ cæde, miferior."

VALER. MAX. Lib. IX. Cap. 11.

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As the experiment has never been made; and from the difficulty of procuring a fubject (not to mention the impoffibility of propofing the question to him, if we had one) is never likely to be made, what would be the event, can only be judged of from probable reasons.

Those who contend for the affirmative observe, that we approve examples of generofity, gratitude, fidelity, &c. and condemn the contrary, inftantly, without deliberation, without having any intereft of our own concerned in them, oft-times without being conscious of, or able to give, any reafon for our approbation that this approbation is uniform and univerfal; the fame forts of conduct being approved or difapproved in all ages and countries of the worldcircumftances, fay they, which ftrongly indicate the operation of an inftinct or moral fenfe.

On the other hand, anfwers have been given to most of these arguments, by the patrons of the oppofite fyftem and,

First, as to the uniformity above alledged, they controvert the fact. They remark, from authentic accounts of hiftorians and travellers, that there is fcarcely a fingle vice, which in fome age or country of the world, has not been countenanced by public opinion that in one country it is efteemed an office of piety in children to fuftain their aged parents, in another to dispatch them out of the way; that fuicide in one age of the world has been heroifm, is in another felony, that theft, which is panifhed by moft laws, by the laws of Sparta was not unfrequently rewarded; that the promifcuous commerce of the fexes, although condemned by the regulations and cenfure of all civilized nations, is practifed by the favages of the tropical regions without referve, compunction, or disgrace; that crimes, of which it is no longer permitted us even to speak, have had their advocates amongst the fages of very renowned times; that, if an inhabitant of the polifhed nations of Europe is delighted with the appearance, wherever he

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meets with it, of happiness, tranquillity, and comfort, a wild American is no lefs diverted with the writhings and contortions of a victim at the ftake; that even amongst ourselves, and in the prefent improved ftate of moral knowledge, we are far from a perfect confent in our opinions or feelings; that you hall hear duelling alternately reprobated and applauded, according to the fex, age, or station of the perfon you converse with, that the forgiveness of injuries and infults is accounted by one fort of people magnanimity, by another meannefs; that in the above inftances, and perhaps in moft others, moral approbation follows the fathions and inftitutions of the country we live. in which fashions alfo and inftitutions themselves have grown out of the exigencies, the climate, fituation, or local circumftances of the country; or have been fet up by the authority of an arbitrary chieftain, or the unaccountable caprice of the multitude -all which, they observe, looks very little like the fteady hand and indelible characters of nature. But, Secondly, because, after these exceptions and abatements, it cannot be denied, but that fome forts of actions command and receive the esteem of mankind more than others; and that the approbation of them is general, though not univerfal as to this they fay, that the general approbation of virtue, even in inftances where we have no intereft of our own to induce us to it, may be accounted for, without the affiftance of a moral fenfe, thus:

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Having experienced, in fome inftance, a "particular conduct to be beneficial to ourselves, or obferved that it would be fo, a fentiment of approbation rifes up in our minds, which fentiment "afterwards accompanies the idea or mention of the "fame conduct, although the private advantage "which firit excited it no longer exist."

And this continuance of the paffion, after the reafon of it has ceafed, is nothing more, fay they, than what happens in other cafes; efpecially in the love of money, which is in no perfon fo eager, as it is often

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