veral antient heathen nations, the aged and infirm were expofed. Among the Perfians this was done without any fcruple.

At Rome it was the general custom to leave their old and fick flaves to perish on a certain island in the Tiber; and the favourite entertainment of the Roman people, for many ages, was the barbarous exhibition of gladiators, fome of whom fought with each other, and fome with wild beafts. In this manner many hundreds of flaves, carefully trained up for the purpose, have been sacrificed at one time. This was one of the horrid cuftoms which owed its abolition to the mild fpirit of chriftianity.

One would have thought that compaffion for the diftreffed had been fo deeply rooted in the human heart, and had fo much the fanction of natural confcience, that it could not have been in the power of philofophy to exclude it from a system of morals ; and yet thofe great moralifts the Stoics, abfolutely profcribed it. Their wife man

must

muft have no paffions, and confequently no fympathy. Epictetus, indeed, allows a philofopher to condole with his common friends in words, if that will afford them any relief; but he bids him be very careful that, in reality, he feels nothing all the time.

Some of the philofophers recommend the forgiveness of injuries, but others praise a fpirit of revenge, particularly Democritus; and when Plato introduces Socrates as recommending forgiveness, he speaks of it as contrary to the fentiments of the generality of the philofophers.

The obligation of truth feems to be equal, if not fuperior to that of humanity and compaffion, on account of its obvious importance to fociety, and yet the maxims of fome of the philofophers tended to undermine it. The Stoics thought that lying was lawful if it was profitable, and Plato fays, that man may tell a lie who knows how to do it at a proper time.

Having

Having found the Greek philofophers fuch loose moralifts with refpect to the focial virtues above mentioned, we cannot expect from them any great ftrictness with refpect to the commerce of the fexes. None of the philofophers ever reprefented fimple. fornication, efpecially on the part of the man, as any vice at all, though its tendency is fo pernicious to fociety, and the practice of it fo much depraves the heart. Cato commended a young man for frequenting the public ftews, and Cicero exprefsly fpeaks of fornication as a thing that was never found fault with.

Many of the customs of the Greeks and Romans, and especially their religious cuftoms promoted a difpofition to lewdness. Some of these have been already mentioned. At Sparta, young women appeared naked in the public exercises, and when married women had no children, their husbands were encouraged to lend them to other men, a cuftom which Plutarch vindicates. This was alfo agreeable to the do@rine of the

Stoics,

Stoics; and it is well known that that rigid Stoic, Cato of Utica, lent his wife to his friend Hortenfius. Plato, in his book of Laws, recommends a community of women, and he advifes that foldiers be not reftrained with refpect to any kind of fenfual indulgence, even the most unnatural species of it, when they are upon an expedition.

Incestuous marriages were common in fome Gentile nations, especially Egypt and Perfia; but they were condemned in Greece and Rome.

Let us now fee what maxims relating to the mutual intercourfe of mankind have been adopted by the more celebrated of our modern unbelievers. Bayle fays, that the prohibition of revenge is contrary to the law of reafon and nature, and Tindal makes the doctrine of the forgiveness of injuries an objection to chriftianity. This writer alfo fpeaks very flightly of the obligation of

truth.

Unbelievers

Unbelievers in general make very light of the obligation of chastity, efpecially Tindal and Bolingbroke. This laft mentioned writer does not admit that adultery (which, in ancient heathen ftates, was generally punished with death) is a violation of the law of nature, and he fays that polygamy is founded on the law of nature. Incest he admits to be unnatural, but only in the highest degrees, as between fathers and daughters, fons and mothers; but concerning this he does not pretend to be very pofitive.

If men do not feel and acknowledge the obligation of focial virtue, it cannot be expected that they fhould think themselves under any restraint where the rights of others have no place. When the authority of God, and of the magistrate, are both out of the question, the reafons for purity and decency of conduct, derived from nature only, cannot be supposed to weigh much against the bias of inclination. To provide for a man's happiness in this life was the great object of all the philofophers of antiquity;

and