tendency to produce good or evil. In this plan, then, that actions are right, means only that they are useful, and wrong, that they are injurious, but they are not therefore virtuous or vicious. If, as he tells us in the same note, his concern was with actions in the abstract, and that only, he should have adhered to that plan, and in all instances, have substituted utility for virtue, useful for virtuous, and injurious for vicious. His definition of virtue would then have been consistent as a definition of utility, and with this his definition of obligation would correspond. Had he, through the whole of his treatise so deservedly esteemed, adhered strictly to his plan of considering action, in the abstract only, excluding the intention of the agent, it would have been found very little in harmony with that practical moral system, which the Author of nature has ordained for man. He that would write a practical system of morality, to be useful, must study the moral constitution and situation of man; the end and design of that constitution, and the means provided for attaining that end, for carrying the design into effect. This will keep him in a constant communication with human action, with moral action, which can never be found to exist without intention. In such a system, utility will be the important end, but it will be a social not a selfish utility, and virtue will be the means of attainment. Such, notwithstanding the plan which he had announced, of treating actions in the abstract only, was clearly, the author's practical opinion; for we find him almost constantly bringing down his theory to practical morality, which gives to his work its principal value. Thus we find him almost in the outset, in the sixth chapter of his preliminary book, making human happiness first of all, to consist in the exercise of the social affections. By the social affections he must mean a kind disposition in one toward his fellow men, at least, those within the sphere of his connection, which is, in fact, an habitual intention to do them good, as occasion presents. The social affections make the man an integral part of society, and in degree, identify his happiness with that of others; they add what was wanting in the author's definition, the doing good to mankind with affection, that is with good intentions, and unite benevolence with prudence; but the definition includes

prudence only in the motive,-" for the sake of everlasting happiness." And it would have been the same had the avoidance of everlasting misery, been made the motive. There is certainly in the motive nothing of benevolence.—If I am correct in this, it proves that the social affections must, in any moral view, constitute an essential part of that violent motive, which he makes the inducement to moral obligation; it proves also the deficiency of the explanation above given, "that we can be obliged to nothing, but what we ourselves are to gain or lose something by, for nothing else can be a violent motive to us." If the social affections be necessary, which must be the case, to render the obligation moral, what we are ourselves to gain or lose makes but a part, both must unite to complete the motive; one or the other may prevail according to the situation. Where our own life is in immediate danger, self preservation will be the prevailing motive; where the life of another, the social affections. Nor is it any answer to say that blending the social affections in the motive serves to promote our own happiness. It proves that our own happiness is not a mere isolated, selfish consideration.

We will now proceed to inquire into the moral constitution of man the origin and progress of the moral faculty, and the nature and end of moral obligation, as it relates to the individual, and to society. We have before noticed, in the human mind, a susceptibility of impressions,-impressions exciting in the mind feelings agreeable or disagreeable, of pleasure or pain which I shall denominate moral impressions. These are the germ of moral sentiments, and differ from sensation, or those impressions, whether agreeable or disagreeable, pleasurable, or painful, which are received through the organs of sense, and which are for the most part felt at the organ and terminate in the 'pleasure or pain excited; and though they are perceived and distinguished by the mind, yet they are perceived as impressions immediately on the respective external organs. The feelings excited by moral impressions are perceived to be in the mind itself, and to be independent of the organs of sense. There is, indeed, often a sensible and a moral impression from the same object. The sensible impression is direct; but the moral impression appears to be made by way of suggestion; both

excite feelings of pleasure or pain; but from habit, if they excite pleasure in a common degree only, they pass for indifferent. We are more sensible to any thing in a small degree painful. The feelings excited by moral impression are of the social kind; they have always some relation to society, to others; not so the mere sensible impression. Where they do not, by way of suggestion, cause some moral impression, the feelings excited terminate in self. Nor is it an objection, that we wish others to enjoy with us a fine picture or a fine present, That wish is a moral sentiment, introduced by suggestion.Indeed, there is not perhaps a sensible impression or sensation, which may not, on occasion, impress some moral sentiment, suggest some moral reflection. Moral sentiments may be just or unjust. It is not their rectitude that constitutes them moral in the sense of the term here used, but their social nature. But some entertain unsocial sentiments; are these of a moral nature? Certainly they are, and it is still in relation to society, that they have their moral quality. Of the susceptibility of moral impressions we have the same proof, as we have of a susceptibility of sensations, a universal consciousness of the impressions. We may therefore consider it to be clearly established as a first principle. Such is the constitution of the human mind, that the feelings excited by those impressions, whether agreeable or disagreeable, are always reflected back upon the object, and are considered as belonging to the object as the cause. In proportion as the feelings excited are pleasant or agreeable, they are accompanied with complacency toward the object; if disagreeable or painful, with disgust or resentment. These feelings appear to rise spontaneously, or rather without any intention in the mind to excite them; nay, to be often uncontrollable; although they may, by a course of discipline, be brought under restraint. That these things are so, we know from observation and experience; but why they are so, until we are able to discover further principles, we must resolve into the constitution of the human mind, or rather into the great first cause where all our researches must finally terminate. In infancy the range of moral impressions is very limited, because the comprehension of moral objects is also limited, and it is extended only as the comprehension of those objects is

extended. It is not easy to determine, how early the human mind is capable of these impressions, how early the susceptibility exists; but we have reason to believe it to be co-existent with mind. For the first mental acts which we observe in children are complacency in acts of kindness and resentment of injuries. In that state, however, from the absence or weakness of intellect, these acts are not considered as moral, in the sense of being imputable; it seems like the embryo state of the moral powers. Nor do infants distinguish, as moral, the objects from which they receive the impressions, and often resent with the same violence an injury received from an inanimate as an animate, from an irrational as a rational, object; nor do they begin to distinguish between intentional and unintentional injuries, until some development of the rational powers has taken place. The susceptibility of moral impressions, having its origin in nature, is entitled to be considered as a first principle, and as much an essential part of the mental, as the organs of sense are of the animal constitution. The moral faculty is, however, yet in its germ-something farther is necessary towards its cultivation and improvement; we find it here wrapt in self. It cannot be said fully to act a moral part; and the means of improvement are found intimately connected with its first principle. I have before said, that moral sentiments are of a social nature, and have shown that the social affections, by which man is connected with, and becomes an integral part of society, have their origin in a mental susceptibility of impressions. This is the same susceptibility which we have now found to be the first simple principle of the moral faculty; and the process by which the social affections, springing from that natural source, were shown to be cultivated, is in every step a moral process. Thus by this simple natural principle, the social and moral relations are found to be indissolubly connected, or with more strict propriety may be said to be identified. The sentiments of complacency and resentment excited in the infant mind, by the impressions made by different objects, are but the germ of moral sentiments, not being yet accompanied with a conception of moral right and wrong, which is necessary to their becoming practically moral, in the sense to be imputable. The cultivation of the

social affections contributes to this end, but which can be fully attained, only by a development of the intellectual powers. A degree of intellect is, we have before said, necessary, not only to the development of the moral faculty, but to the moral quality of human actions, as imputable to the agent. Without this a human action is no more imputable than the actions of a brute animal, or the movements of a machine. It is the province of the intellectual powers to combine and distinguish the moral relations, to discern and appreciate their results in duty, and to direct the performance of those duties, as they are found to conduce not only to the interest of the individual, but to the general interest of society, and the promotion of human happiness. Still, the moral powers must always be imperfect. They are the moral powers of man, liable to be led astray by his vicious habits, by his passions and appetites, by his weakness and sometimes by his reason.

In this same constitution, and originating in the same principle, nature has founded her moral law, the law of human conduct; and the next inquiry is, what provision is made for enforcing on the human mind a sense of obligation to observe and obey that law? This will be found originating in the same principle and an essential part of the same moral constitution. When actions come to be considered as right or wrong, according to their beneficial or injurious effects and tendency, from this circumstance, the sentiment of complacency in regard to a beneficent act, becomes as referred to the agent, a rational sentiment of approbation, and that of resentment for an injurious act, of disapprobation. Nature has also given an early and ready discernment of analogy by which not only man, but animals in general, distinguish their species, and each discerns that the species to which it belongs, has a common nature, on which they all rely with confidence in their mutual intercourse. Hence every man relies that all other men have, under the same circumstances, the same feelings and the same sentiments with himself, and finds it confirmed by observation and experience. In viewing the conduct of others, he is conscious of a sentiment of approbation of the right, and disapprobation of the wrong, accompanied with a sense of desert, of praise for the one,