LIBRARY OF THE University of California. Mrs. SARAH P. WALSWORTH. Received October, 1894. Accessions No.S'J/ 2r:^ - Class No, / Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/essaysonprinciplOOdyiTiori^ch ^^^^'Z,y^4^^C^^.t:t^^ ' forEssoi's orv ^ Trmdpks df Morality jbi C o llui s Bro-tier 3c Co. New York. ESSAYS PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY, AND ON THa PRIVATE AND POLITICAL RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS OF MANKIND. BY JONATHAN DYMOND, AUTHOR OF "an ENQUIRY INTO THE ACCORDANCY OF WAR WITH TUB PRINCIPLES OF CHRISTIANITY," ETC. "As the Will of God is ovir f-ile; to enquire what is our duty, or what we are obliged to do, in any instance, is, in effect, to enquire what is the Will of God in that instance 1 which consequently becomes the whole business of moraJity."— Paley. FIFTH THOUSAND. NEW YORK: COLLINS, BROTHER & CO., 254 PEARL STREET. 1845. |T7»f.?7B ©»• ^r3=» If the Reader approves of these Essays will be please recommend them ? American Publisher*, 8TERE0TYPED BT T. B. SMITH, 216 WILLIAM STRBKT, NEW YORK. SMALL BUT INCREASING NUMBER WHETHER IN THIS COUNTRY OR ELSEWHERE, WHO MAINTAIN IN PRINCIPLE, AND ILLUSTRATE BY THEIR PRACTICE, THE GREAT DUTY OF CONFORMING TO THE LAWS OF CHRISTIAN MORALITY WITHOUT REGARD TO DANGERS OR PRESENT ADVANTAGES, THIS WORK IS RESPECTFUIXY DEDICATED. PREFACE. The Author of this Work died in the spring of 1828, leav- ing in manuscript the three Essays of which it consists. We learn from himself that the undertaking originated in a belief (in which he probably is far from being alone) that the exist- ing treatises on Moral Philosophy did not exhibit the princi- ples nor enforce the obligations of morality in all their per- fection and purity ; that a work was yet wanted which should present a true and authoritative standard of rectitude — one by an appeal to which the moral character • of human actions might be rightly estimated. This he here endeavours to supply. Rejecting what he considered the false grounds of duty, and erroneous principles of action which are proposed in the most prominent and most generally received of our extant theories of moral obligation, he proceeds to erect a system of morality upon what he regards as the only true and legitimate basis — the Will of God. He makes, therefore, the authority of the Deity the sole ground of duty, and His communicated will the only ultimate standard of right and wrong ; and as- sumes, " that wheresoever this will is made known, human duty is determined ; and that neither the conclusions of phi- losophers, nor advantages, nor dangers, nor pleasures, nor suf- ferings, ought to have any opposing influence in regulating our conduct." The attempt to establish a system of such uncompromising morality, must necessarily bring the writer into direct collision with the advocates of the utilitarian scheme, particularly with Dr. Paley ; and accordingly it will be found that he frequently enters the lists with this great champion of Expediency. With what success — how well he exposes the fallacies of that specious but dangerous doctrine — ^how far he succeeds in re- futing the arguments by which it is sought to be maintained, and in establishing another system of obligations and duties and rights upon a more stable foundation, must be left to the reader to determine. In thus attempting to convert a system of Moral Philosophy, dubious, fluctuating, and inconsistent with itself, into a defmite and harmonious code of Scripture Ethics, the Author under X* Vl PREFACE. took a task for which, by the original structure of his mind and his prevailing habits of reflection, he was, perhaps, peculiarly fitted. He had sought for himself, and he endeavours to convey to others, clear perceptions of the true and the right ; and in maintaining what he regarded as truth and rectitude, he shows every where an unshackled independence of mind, and a fear- less, unflinching spirit. The w^ork will be found, moreover, if we mistake not, to be the result of a careful study of the writings of moralists, of much thought, of an intimate ac- quaintance with the genius of the Christian religion, and an extensive observation of human life in those spheres of action which are seldom apt to attract the notice of the meditative philosopher. In proceeding to illustrate his principles, the author has evi- dently sought, as far as might be, to simplify the subject, to disencumber it of abstruse and metaphysical appendages, and, rejecting subtleties and needless distinctions, to exhibit a standard of morals that should be plain, perspicuous and prac ticable. Premising thus much, the work must be left to its own merits. It is the last labour of a man laudably desirous of benefiting his fellow men ; and it will fulfil the Author's wish, if its effect be to raise the general tone of morals, to give dis- tinctness to our perceptions of rectitude, and to add strength to our resolutions to virtue. The following Essays are now published in a cheap form, in order to disseminate more widely right views of the Chris- tian's moral obligation. The importance of having sound views of our moral, social, and political rights and duties can- not be too highly estimated ; and it is hoped, that the exten- sive difl^ision of a work, so ably exposing the laxity of many dangerous popular notions and practices, and the sophistry by which these are upheld — particularly the evil and impolicy of War — may at this period, under the Divine blessing, prove of great utility. The present Edition contains the whole of the original one, published in England in two volumes octavo, at twenty-one shillings sterling ; and, for the more easy reference to any particular subject, a copious Index has been added. CONTENTS. ESSAY I. PART I.— PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY. PAOB CHAP. I. MORAL OBLIGATION, 15 Foundation of Moral Obligation. CHAP. IL STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG, . . . .16 The Will of God— Notices of Theories— The communication of the Will of God — The supreme authority of the expressed Will of God— Causes ' of its practical rejection — The principles of expediency fluctuating and inconsistent— Application of the principles of expediency— Difficulties— Liabihty to abuse — Pagans. The Will op God, ......... 16 The communication op the Will op God, . . . . .19 CHAP. HI. SUBORDINATE STANDARDS OF RIGHT AND WRONG, . 31 Foundation and limits of the authority of subordinate moral rules. CHAP. IV. COLLATERAL OBSERVATIONS, 32 Identical authority op Moral and Religious Obligations, . . 32 Identical authority of moral and reUgious obligations— The Divine attributes — Of deducing rules of human duty from a consideration of the attributes of God— Virtue : " Virtue is conformity with the standard of rectitude " — Motives of action. The Divine Attributes, .... . . 33 Virtue, ....... . . 35 CHAP. V. SCRIPTURE, . 37 The morality of the Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Christian dispensations— Their moral requisitions not always coincident— Supremacy of the Christian morality— Of variations in the Moral Law— Mode of applying the precepts of Scripture to questions of duty — No formal moral system in Scripture — Criticism of Biblical morality — Of particular precepts and general rules Matt. vii. 12. — 1 Cor. x. 31. — Rom. iii. 8. — Benevolence, as it is proposed in the Christian Scriptures. The Morality op the Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Christian DispeN' SATIONS, . . . . . . • . . .37 Mode op Applying the Precepts of Scripture to Questions of Dutt, 42 Benevolence, as it is Proposed in the Christian Scriptures, . 51 CHAP. VI. THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION OF THE WILL OF GOD, 5« Conscience— Its nature— Its authority— Review of opinions respecting a moral sense— Bishop Butler— Lord Bacon— Lord Shaftesbury— Watts — Voltaire — Locke — Sout hey — Adam Smith— Paley— Rousseau— Milton- Judge Hale — Marcus Antoninus — Epictetus — Seneca — Paul — That every human being possesses a moral law — Pagans — Gradations of light — Pro- phecy—The immediate communication of the Divine Will perpetual— Of national vices : Infanticide : Duelling— Of savage Ufe. Section i. Conscience, its Nature and Authority, . . .55 Review op Opinions Respecting a Moral Sense, . . .61 The Immediate Communication of the Will of God, . . 70 VIU CONTENTS. ESSAY I. PART II.— SUBORDINATE MEANS OF DISCOVERING THE DIVINE WILL. PACK CHAP. I. THE LAW OF THE LAND, 80 Its authority — Limits to its aiUliority — Morality sometimes prohibits what the law permits. CHAP. n. THE LAW OF NATURE, 86 Its authority — Limits to its authority — Obligations resulting from the Rights of Nature— Incorrect ideas attached to the word Nature. CHAP. HI. UTILITY, . . . , . . . .91 Obligations resulting from Expediency — Limits to these obligations. CHAP. IV. THE LAW OF NATIONS.— THE LAW OF HONOUR, . . 95 Section I. The Law of Nations, . . . . • .95 Obligations and authority of the Law of Nations — Its abuses, and the limits of its authority— Treaties. Section IL The Law of Honour, . . . . . .99 Authority of the Law of Honour — Its character. ESSAY II. PRIVATE RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS. CHAP I. RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS, 103 Factitious semblances of devotion— Religious conversation : Sabbatical in- stitutions — Non-sanctity of days — Of temporal employments: Travelling: Stage-coaches : " Sunday papers :" Amusements — Ilolydays — Ceremonial institutions and devotional formularies -Utility of forms — Forms of Prayer Extempore prayer— Scepticism — Motives to Scepticism. Sabbatical Institutions, . . . . . . .107 Ceremonial Institutions and Devotional Formularies, . . 112 CHAP. n. PROPERTY, 119 Foundation of the Right to Property— Insolvency : Perpetual obligation to pay debts : Reform of public opinion : Examples of Integrity — Wills, Le- gatees, Heirs : Informal Wills : Intestates— Charitable Bequests— Minor's Debts- A Wife's Debts— Bills of Exchange— Shipments— Distraints— Un- just Defendants — Extortion — Slaves — Privateers— Confiscations — Public Money — Insurance— Improvements on Estates — Settlements — Houses of infamy — Literary property — Rewards. CHAP. in. INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY, . . . .144 Accumulation of Wealth : its proper limits— Provision for Children : "Keep- ing up tJie Family." CHAP. IV. LITIGATION— ARBITRATION, 150 Practice of early Christians — Evils of Litigation — Efficiency of Arbitration. CHAP. V. THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE, . . .154 Cormilexity of Law — Professional Untruths — Defences of Lesal Practice — Effect s of Legal Practice : Seduction : Theft : Peculation— Pleading— The Duties of the Profession — Bfifects of Legal Practice on the profession, and on the public. -CONTENTS. IJ PAOE CLVP. VI. PROMISES.— LIES, 169 Promises. — Definition of a Pi'omise — Parole — Extorted Promises — John Fletclier. Lies. — Milton's Definition — Lies in War: to Robbei-s: to Lunatics : to tlie Sick— Hyperbole— Irony— Complimentary Untrutiis— " Not at Home"— Legal Documents. CHAP. VU. OATHS, W9 Their Moral Ciiaracteu— Their Efficacy as Securities of Vera- cixy- Their Effects, . . . . . . . .179 A Curse— Immorality of oaths— Oaths of the ancient Jews— Milton— Paley — The High Priest's adjuration — Early Cliristians— laefficacy of oaths — Motives to veracity — Religious sanctions : Public opinion : — Legal penal- ties—oaths in Evidence : Parliamentary Evidence : Courts Martial— The United States — Effects of Oaths : Falsehood — General obligations. CHAP. VIII. THE MORAL CHARACTER, OBLIGATIONS, AND EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS, 193 Subscription to Articles op Religion, ..... 195 Oath of Allegiance — Oath in Evidence — Perjury — Military oath — Oath against Bribery at Elections— Oath against simony — University oaths — Subscrip- tion to articles of religion— Meaning of the 39 articles'literal— Refusal to subscribe. CHAP. IX. IMMORAL AGENCY 206 Publication and circulation of books— Seneca— Circulating Libraries— Pub- lic-houses — Prosecutions — Political affairs. CHAP. X. THE INFLUENCE OF INDIVIDUALS UPON PUBLIC NOTIONS OF MORALITY, 213 Public notions of morality — Errors of public opinion : their effects — Duel- ling—Scottish Bencli—Glor}'— Military virtues— Military talent— Bravery —Courage— Patriotism not the soldier's motive— Military fame— Public opinion of unchastity : In women : In men— Power of character — Char- acter— Character in Legal men — Fame— ^Faults of Great men — The Press — Newspapers — History : Its defects : Its power. CHAP. XI. INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION, 239 Ancient Classics — London University — The Classics in Boarding-schools — English Grammar — Science and Literature — Improved sy.stem of Educa- tion—Orthography : Writing : Reading : Geography : Natural History : Biography : Natural Philosophy : Political Science — Indications of a revo- lution in tlie system of Education — Female Education — The Society of Friends. CHAP. Xn. MORAL EDUCATION, 254 Union of Moral principle with the affections— Society— Morality of the An- cient Classics— The supply of motives to virtue — Conscience — Subjugation of the Will — Knowledge of our own Minds — Offices of public worship. CHAP. Xm. EDUCATION OF IHE PEOPLE, 266 Advantages of extended Education — Infant Schools — Habits of enquiry. CHAP. XIV. AMUSEMENTS, 269 Tlie Stage— Religious Amusements— Masquerades— Field Sports— The Turf — Boxing — Wrestling — Opinions of Posterity — Popular amusements needless. CHAP. XV. DUELLING, 273 Pitt and Tierney— Duelling the offspring of intellectual meanness, fear, and servility — " A fighting man" — Hindoo immolations — Wilberforce — Seneca. CHAP. XVI. SUICIDE, 280 Unmanliness of Suicide — Forbidden in the New Testament— Its folly— Le- gislation respecting suicide — Vertlict of Felo de se. CHAP. XVn. RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE, 235 These rights not absolute— Their limits— Personal attack — Preservation of property— Much resistance lawful— Effects of forbearance— Sharpe— Bar- daj—Ellwood. * CONTENTS. ESSAY III. POLITICAL RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS rxam CHAP, I. PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE, . . .294 I. " Political Power is rightly exercised only when it is possessed by con- Bent of the community "—Governors officers of the Public— Tiunsfer of their rights by a whole people— The people hold the sovereign power- Right of Governors — A conciliating system. II. " Political Power is rightly exercised only when it subserves the wel- fare of the community"— Interference with other nations— Present expe- dients for present occasions— Proper business of Governments. III. " Political Power ia rightly exercised only when it subserves the wel- fare of the community by means which the Moral Law permits ''—The Moral Law alike binding on nations and individuals— Deviation from rec- titude impolitic— " The Holy Alliance"— Durable fame. I. "Political Power is rightly possessed only when it is pos- sessed BY Consent op the community," . . . . .295 n. "Political Power is rightly exercised only when it subserves the Welfare op the community," . . . . . .301 III. " Political Power is rightly exercised only when it subserves the Welfare of the community by means which the Moral Law PERMITS," .......... 305 CHAP. II. CIVIL LIBERTY, 310 Loss of Liberty— War— Useless laws. CHAP. m. POLITICAL LIBERTY, 312 Political Liberty the right of a community— Public satisfaction. CHAP. IV. RELIGIOUS LIBERTY, .314 Civil disabilities— Interference of the Magistrate— Pennsylvania— Toleration —America— Creeds— Religious Tests—" The Catholic Question." CHAP. V. CIVIL OBEDIENCE, 322 Expediency of Obedience— Obligations to Obedience— Extent of the Duty —Resistance to the Civil Power— Obedience may be withdrawn— King James— America— Non-compliance — Interference of the Magistrate- Oaths of Allegiance. CHAP. VL FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, 333 Some general principles— Monarchy— Balance of interests and passions — Changes in a constitution — Popular government — The world in a state of improvement— Character of legislators. CHAP. VII. POLITICAL INFLUENCE— PARTY— MINISTERIAL UNION, 342 Influence of the Crown — Effects of influence — Incongruity of public notions — Patronage — American States — Dependency on the mother country — Party —Ministerial Union—" A party man " — The council board and the senate — Resignation of offices. CHiP. Vm. BRITISH CONSTITUTION 353 Influence of the Crown— House of Lords— Candidates for a peerage— Sud- den creation of peers— The bench of Bishops— Proxies— House of Com- mons—The wishes of the people— Extension of the elective franchise — Universal suffrage — Frequent elections — Modes of election — Annual par- liaments — Qualification of voters and representatives — Of choosing the clergy— Duties t)f a representative— Systematic opposition— Placemen and pensioners — Posthumous fame. CHAP IX. MORAL LEGISLATION, 375 Duties of a Ruler— The two objects of moral legislation— Education of the People— Bible Society— Lotteries— Public-houses— Abrogation of bad lawa —Primogeniture— Accumulation of property. CONTENTS. 11 PAOB CHAP. X. AD>nNISTRATION OF JUSTICE, 384 Substitution of justice for law— Court of Chancei-y— Of fixed laws— Their inadequacy — They increase litigation — Delays — Expenses — Infornnalities — Precedents — Verdicts — Legal proof— Courts of Arbitration — An extend- ed svstem of arbitration — Arbitration in criminal trials — Constitution of courts of arbitration— Their effects— Some alterations suggested— Techni- calities — Useless laws. CHAP. XI. OF THE PROPER SUBJECTS OF PENAL ANIMADVERSION, 403 Crimes regarded by the Civil and the Moral Law— Created offences— Seduc- tion— Duelling—Insolvents— Criminal debtors— Gradations of guilt in In- solvency—Libels : mode of punishing— Effects of the laws respecting Libels— Effects of public censure— Libels on the Government— Advanta- ges of a free statement of the truth — Freedom of the Press. CHAP. Xn. OF THE PROPER ENDS OF PUNISHMENT, . . . 4SSI The three Objects of Punishment :— Reformation of the Offender: — Exam- ple :— Restitution — Punishment may be increased as well as diminished. CHAP. XIH. PUNISHMENT OF DEATH, 428 Of the three objects of punishment, the punishment of death regards but one — Reformation of minor offenders : Greater criminals neglected — Capital punishments not efficient as examples — Public executions — Paul — Grotius— Murder— The punishment of death irrevocable — Rousseau- Recapitulation. CHAP. XIV. RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS, 438 The primitive church— The established church of Ireland— America— Ad- vantages and disadvantages of established churches — Alliance of a church with the state— An established church perpetuates its own evils— Persecu- tion generally the growth of religious establishments — State religions in jurious to the civil welfare of a people — Legal provision for Christian teachers — Voluntary payment — ^Advancement in the church — The appoint- ment of religious teachers. CHAP. XV. THE RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND, 463 The English Church the offspring of the Reformation, the Church establish- ment, of Papacy— Alliance of Church and State—" The Priesthood averse from Reformation" — Noble Ecclesiastics — Purchase of advowsons — Non-residence — Pluralities— Parliamentary Returns — The Clergy fear to preach the truth— Moral Preaching— Recoil from Works of Philanthropy —Tithes— "The Church is in Danger"— The Church establishment is in danger— Monitory Suggestion. CHAP. XVI OF LEGAL PROVISION FOR CHRISTIAN TEACHERS.— OF VOLUNTARY PAYMENT, AND OF UNPAID MINISTRY, . . 486 Compulsory payment— America— Legal provision for one church unjust— —Payment of Tithes by dissenters— Tithes a "property of the church" — Voluntary payment — The system of remuneration — Quahfications of a minister of the gospel— Unpaid ministry— Days of greater purity. CHAP. XVn. PATRIOTISM, 502 Patriotism as it is viewed by Christianity— A Patriotism which is opposed to general benignity — Patriotism not the soldier's motive. CHAP. XVIII. SLAVERY, 50$ Requisitions of Christianity professedly disregarded— Persian Law— The slave system a costly iniquity. CHAP. XIX. WAR, 511 Causes of War, . . . . . . . . .513 Want of enquiry : Indifference to human misery : National irritability : In- terest : Secret motives of Cabinets : Ideas of glory — Foundation of mili- tary glory. Consequences of War, ....... 521 Destruction of human life : Taxation ; Moral depraTity : Familiarity with plunder : Implicit submission to superiors : Resignation of moral agency : Bondage and degradation — Loan of armies— Effects on the community. Xii CONTENTS. FAOB Lawfulness op War, . . . . . . .631 Influence of habit — Of appealing to antiquity — Tlie Christian Scriptures — Subjects of Christ's benediction— Matt, xxvii. 52.— The Apostles and Evangelists — The Centurion — Cornelius — Silence not a proof of approba- tion — Luke xxii. 36. — John the Baptist- Negative evidence — Prophecies of the Old Testament — The requisitions of Christianity of present obli- gation — Primitive Christians — Example and testimony of early Christians — Christian soldiers — Wars of the Jews — Duties of individuals and nations Oflfensive and defensive war — Wars- always aggressive — Paley — War wholly forbidden. Of the probable and practical Effects of adherintj to the Moral Law in respect to War, ....... 558 Quakers in America and Ireland — Colonization of Pennsylvania— Uncondi- tional reliance on Providence— Recapitulation— General Observations. CONCLUSION, 566 INTRODUCTORY NOTICES. Of the two causes of our deviations from Rectitude — want of Knowledge and want of Virtue — the latter is undoubtedly the more operative. Want of knowledge is, however, sometimes a cause ; nor can this be any subject of wonder when it is recol- lected in what manner many of our notions of right and wrong are acquired. From infancy, every one is placed in a sort of mora, school, in which those with whom he associates, or of whom he hears, are the teachers. That the learner in such a school will often be taught amiss, is plain. — So that we w^ant information respecting our duties. To supply this information is an object of Moral Philosophy, and is attempted in the present work. When it is considered by what excellences the existing trea- tises on Moral Philosophy are recommended, there can remain but one reasonable motive for adding yet another — the belief that these treatises have not exhibited the Principles and enforced the Obligations of Morality in all their perfection and purity. Per- haps the frank expression of this belief is not inconsistent with that deference which it becomes every man to feel when he ad- dresses the pubhc ; because, not to have entertained such a be- lief, were to have possessed no reason for writing. The desire of supplying the deficiency, if deficiency there be ; of exhibiting a true and authoritative Standard of Rectitude, and of estimating the moral character of human actions by an appeal to that Stand- ard, is the motive which has induced the composition of these Essays. In the First Essay the writer has attempted to investigate the Principles of Morality. In which term is here included, first the Ultimate Standard of Right and Wrong ; and, secondly, those Subordinate Rules to which we are authorized to apply for the direction of our conduct in life. In these investigations he has been solicitous to avoid any approach to curious or metaphysical enquiry. He has endeavoured to act upon the advice given by Tindal, the Reformer, to his friend John Frith : " Pronounce not or define of hid secrets, or things that neither help nor hinder whether it be so or no ; but stick you stiffly and stubbornly in earnest and necessary things." In the Second Essay these Principles of Morality are applied in the determination of various questions of personal and relative duty. In making this application, it has been far from the writer's 2 XIT INTRODUCTORY NOTICES. desire to deliver a system of Morality. Of the unnumbered par- ticulars to which this Essay might have been extended, he haa therefore made a selection ; and in making it. has chosen those subjects which appeared peculiarly to need the enquiry, either because the popular or philosophical opinions respecting them ap peared to be unsound, or because they were commonly little ad- verted to in the practice of life. Form has been sacrificed to utility. Many great duties have been passed over, since no one questions their obligation ; nor has the author so little consulted the pleasure of the reader as to expatiate upon duties simply be- cause they are great. The reader will also regard the subjects that have been chosen as selected, not only for the purpose of elucidating the subjects themselves, but as furnishing illustration of the General Principles — as the compiler of a book of mathe- matics proposes a variety of examples, not merely to discover the solution of the particular problem, but to familiarize the applica- tion of his general rule. Of the Third Essay, in which some of the great questions of Political rectitude have been examined, the subjects are in them- selves sufficiently important. The application of sound and pure Moral Principles to questions of Government, of Legislation, of the Administration of .Justice, or of Religious Establishments, is manifestly of great interest ; and the interest is so much the greater, because these subjects have usually been examined, as the writer conceives, by other and very different standards. The reader will probably find, in each of these Essays, some principles or some conclusions respecting human duties to which he has not been accustomed — some opinions called in question which he has habitually regarded as being indisputably true, and some actions exhibited as forbidden by morality which he has supposed to be lawful and right. In such cases I must hope for his candid investigation of the truth, and that he will not reject conclusions but by the detection of inaccuracy in the reasonings from which they are deduced. I hope he will not find himself invited to alter his opinions or his conduct without being shown why ; and if he is conclusively shown this, that he will not reject truth because it is new or unwelcome. With respect to the present influence of the Principles which these Essays illustrate, the author will feel no disappointment if it is not great. It is not upon the expectation of such influence that his motive is founded or his hope rests. His motive is, to advocate truth without reference to its popularity ; and his hope is, to promote by these feeble exertions, an approximation to that state of purity, which he believes it is the design of God shall eventually beautify and dignify the condition of mankind. ESSAY I. PART I. PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY CHAPTER I. MORAL OBLIGATION. Foundation of Moral Obligation. There is little hope of proposing a definition of Moral Obligation which shall be satisfactory to ever)^ reader ; partly because the phrase is the representative of different notions in individual minds. No single definition can, it is evident, represent various notions ; and there are probably no means by which the notions of individuals respecting Moral Obliga- tion can be adjusted to one standard. Accordingly, whilst attempts to define it have been very numerous, all probably have been unsatisfactory to the majority of mankind. Happily this question, like many others upon which the world is unable to agree, is of little practical importance. Many who dispute about the definition, coincide in their judg- ments of Avhat we are obliged to do and to forbear ; and so long as the individual knows that he is actually the subject of Moral Obligation, and actually responsible to a superior power, it is not of much consequence whether he can criti- cally explain in what Moral Obligation consists. The writer of these pages, therefore, makes no attempts at strictness of definition. It is sufficient for his purpose that man is under an obligation to obey his Creator ; and if any one curiously asks " Why ?" — he answers, that one reason at least is, that the Deity possesses the power, and evinces the intention, to call the human species to account for their ac- tions, and to punish or reward them. There may be, and I believe there are, higher grounds upoa which a sense of Moral Obligation may be founded ; 16 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. [eSSAY I. such as the love of goodness for its own sake, or love and gratitude to God for his beneficence : nor is it unreasonable to suppose that such grounds of obligation are especially ap- Tiroved bv the universal Parent of mankind. CHAPTER II. STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. The Will of God — Notices of Theories — The communication of the Will of God — The supreme authority of the expressed Will of God — Causes of its practical rejection — The principles of expediency fluctuating and inconsistent — Application of the principles of expediency — Difii- culties — Liabihty to abuse — Pagans. -^ It is obvious that to him who seeks the knowledge of his duty, the first enquiry is, What is the Rule of Duty ? What is the Standard of Right and Wrong ? Most men, or most of those with whom we are concerned, agree that this Standard consists in the Will of God. But here the coincidence of opinion stops Various and very dissimilar answers are given to the question. How is the Will of God to be discovered ? These differences lead to diflering conclusions respecting hu- man duty. All the proposed modes of discovering his Will cannot be the best nor the right ; and those which are not right are likely to lead to erroneous conclusions respecting what his Will is. It becomes therefore a question of very great interest — How is the Will of God to be discovered ? and if there should appear to be more sources than one from which it may be de- duced — What is that source which, in our investigations, we are to regard as paramount to every other ? THE WILL OF GOD. When we say that most men agree in referring to the Will of God as the Standard of Rectitude, we do not mean that all those who have framed systems of moral philosophy have set out with this proposition as their fundamental rule ; but we mean that the majority of mankind do really believe (with whatever indistinctness) that they ought to obey the Will of God i and that, as it respects the systems of philosophical GHAP. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. 17 men, they will commonly be found to involve, directly or in- directly, the same belief. He w^ho says that the " Under- standing"* is to be our' moral guide, is not far from saying that we are to be guided by the Divine Will ; because the understanding, however we define it, is the offspring of the Divine counsels and power. When Adam Smith resolves moral obligation into propriety arising from feelings of " Sym- pathy,"! the conclusion is not very different ; for these feelings are manifestly the result of that constitution which God gave to man. W^hen Bishop Butler says that we ought to live ac- cording to nature, and make conscience the judge whether we do so live or not, a kindred observation arises ; for the exist- ence and nature of conscience must be referred ultimately to the Divine Will. Dr. Samuel Clarke's philosophy is, that moral obligation is to be referred to the eternal and necessary differences of things. This might appear less obviously to have respect to the Divine W^ill, yet Dr. Clarke himself sub- sequently says, that the duties which these eternal differences of things impose, " are also the express and unalterable will, command, and law of God to his creatures, whfph he cannot but expect should be observed by them in obedience to his supreme authority."! Very similar is the practical doctrine of Wollaston. His theory is, that moral good and evil con- sist in a conformity or disagreement with truth — " in treating every thing as being ivhat it is.'^ But then he says, that to act by this rule " must be agreeable to the Will of God, and if so, the contrary must be disagreeable to it, and, since there must be perfect rectitude in his will^ certainly icrong^^ It is the same with Dr. Paley in his far-famed doctrine of Expe- diency. " It is the utility of any action alone which consti- tutes the obligation of it ;" but this very obligation is deduced from the Divine Benevolence ; from which it is attempted to show, that a regard to utility is enforced by the Will of God. Nay, he says expressly, " Every duty is a duty towards God, since it is his vnll which makes it a duty."|| Now there is much value in these testimonies, direct or in- direct, to the truth — that the Will of God is the Standard of Right and Wrong. *The indirect testimonies are perhaps the more valuable of the two. He who gives undesigned evi- dence in favour of a proposition, is less liable to suspicion in his motives. * Dr. Price: Review of Principal Questions in Morals, t Theory of Moral Sentiments. \ Evidence of Natural and Revealed Religion^ § Religion of Nature Delineated. || Moral and Political Philosophy. 2* 18 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WROXG. [eSSAY I. But, whilst we regard these testimonies, and such as these, as containing satisfactory evidence that the Will of God is our Moral Law, the intelligent enquirer will perceive that many of the proposed Theories are likely to lead to uncertain and unsatisfactory conclusions respecting what that Will re- quires. They prove that His Will is the Standard, but they do not clearly inform us how we shall bring our actions into juxtaposition with it. One proposes the Understanding as the means ; but every observer perceives that the understandings of men are often contradictory in their decisions. Indeed many of tliose who now think their understandings dictate the rectitude of a given action, will find that the understandings of the intelligent pagans of antiquity came to very different conclusions. A second proposes Sympathy, regulated indeed and re- strained, but still Sympathy. However ingenious a philoso- phical system may be, I believe that good men find, in the practice of life, that these emotions are frequently unsafe, and sometimes erroneous guides of their conduct. Besides, the emotions are, to be regulated and restrained ; which of itself intimates the necessity of a regulating and restraining, that is, of a superior power. To say we should act according to the " eternal and neces- sary differences of things," is to advance a proposition which nine persons out of ten do not understand, and of course can- not adopt in practice ; and of those who do understand it, per- haps an equal majority cannot apply it, with even tolerable facility, to the concerns of* life. Why indeed should a writer propose these eternal differences, if he acknowledges that the rules of conduct which result from them are " the express will and command of God ?" To the system of a fourth, which says that virtue consists in a " conformity of our actions with truth," the objection pre- sents itself — what is truth ? or how, in the complicated affairs of life, and in the moment perhaps of sudden temptation, shall the individual discover what truth is ? Similar difficulties arise in applying the doctrine of Utility in " adjusting our actions so as to promote, in the greatest de- gree, the happiness of mankind." It is obviously difficult to apply' this doctrine in practice. The welfare of mankind de- pends upon circumstances which, if it were possible, it is not easy to foresee. Indeed in many of those conjunctures in which important decisions must instantly be made, the com- putation of tendencies to general happiness is wholly im* practi '-able. • CHAP. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. 19 Besides these objections which apply to the systems sepa- rately, there is one which applies to them all — That they do not refer us directly to the Will of God. They interpose a medium ; and it is the inevitable tendency of all such me- diums to render the truth uncertain. They depend not in- deed upon hearsay evidence, but upon something of which the tendency is the same. They seek the Will of God not from positive evidence but by implication ; and we repeat the truth, that every medium that is interposed between the Di- vine Will and our estimates of it, diminishes the probability that we shall estimate it rightly. These are considerations which, antecedently to all others, would prompt us to seek the Will of God directly and imme- diately ; and it is evident that this direct and immediate knowledge of the Divine. Will, can in no other manner be possessed than by his own Communication of it. THE COMMUNICATION OF THE WILL OF GOD. That a direct communication of the Will of the Deity re- specting the conduct which mankind shall pursue, must be very useful to them, can need little proof. It is sufficiently obvious that they who have had no access to the written re- velations, have commonly entertained very imperfect views of right ^nd wrong. What Dr. Johnson says of the ancient epic poets, will apply generally to pagan philosophers : They " were very unskilful teachers of virtue," because " they wanted the light of revelation." Yet these men were inquisitive and acute, and it may be supposed they would have discovered moral truth if sagacity and inquisitiveness had been sufficient for the task. But it is unquestionable, that there are many ploughmen in this country, who possess more accurate know- ledge of morality than all the sages of antiquity. We do not indeed sufficiently consider for how much knowledge respect- ing the Divine Will we are indebted to his own Communica- tion of it. " Many arguments, many truths, both moral and religious, which appear to us the products of our understand- ings and the fruits of ratiocination, are in reality nothing more than emanations from Scripture ; rays of the Gospel imper- ceptibly transmitted, and as it were conveyed to our minds in a side hght."* Of Lord Herbert's book. Be Veritate, which was designed to disprove the validity of Revelation, it is ob- served by the editor of his " Life," that it is " a book so strongly embued with the light of revelation relative to the * Balguy . Tracts Moral and Theological : — Second Letter to a Deist. 20 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. [eSSAT I. moral virtues and a future life, that no man ignorant of the Scriptures or of the knowledge derived from them, could have written it."* A modern system of moral philosophy is founded upon the duty of doing good to man, because it appears, from the benevolence of God himself, that such is his Will. Did those philosophers then, who had no access to the written expression of his will, discover with any distinctness this seemingly obvious benevolence of God 1 No. " The heathens failed of drawing that deduction relating to morality, to which, as we should now judge, the most obvious parts of natural knowledge, and such as certainly obtained among them, were sufficient to lead them, namely, the goodness of Gocl.^j — We . are, I say, much more indebted to revelation for moral light, than we commonly acknowledge or indeed commonly perceive. But if in fact we obtain from the communication of the Will of God, knowledge of wider extent and of a higher order than was otherwise attainable, is it not an argument that that com- municated Will should be our supreme law, and that, if any of the inferior means of acquiring moral knowledge lead to conclusions in opposition to that Will, they ought to give way to its higher authority ? Indeed the single circumstance that an Omniscient Being, and who also is the Judge of mankind, has expressed his Will respecting their conduct, appears a sufficient evidence that they should regard that expression as their paramount rule. They cannot elsewhere refer to so high an authority. If the expression of his Will is not the ultimate standard of right and wrong, it can only be on the supposition that his Will itself is not the ultimate standard ; for no other means of ascertaining that Will can be equally perfect and authori- tative. Another consideration is this, that if we examine those sa- cred volumes in which the Avritten expression of the Divine Will is contained, we find that they habitually proceed upon the supposition that the Will of God being expressed, is for that reason our final law. They do not set about formal proofs that we ought to sacrifice inferior rules to it, but conclude, as of course, that if the Will of God is made known, human duty is ascertained. " It is not to be imagined that the Scriptures would refer to any other foundation of virtue than the true one, and certain it is that the foundation to which they con- stantly do refer is the Will of God:'X Nor is this all : they refer to the expression of the Will of God. We hear nothing * 4th Ed., p. 336. t Pearson : Remarks on the Theory of Morals. 1 Pearson: Theorv of Mor. c. 1. CHAP. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. 21 of any other ultimate authority — nothing of " Sympathy" — nothing of the " eternal fitness of things" — nothing of the " pro- duction of the greatest sum of enjoyment ;" — but we hear, re- peatedly, constantly, of the Will of God ; of the voice of God ; of the commands of God. To be obedient unto his voice^''* is the condition of favour. To hear the " sayings of Christ and do them,"t is the means of obtaining his approbation. To " fear God and keep his commandments^ is the whole duty of man. "J Even superior intelligences are described as " do- ing his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word."^ In short, the whole system of moral legislation, as it is exhi- bited in Scripture, is a system founded upon authority. The propriety, the utility of the requisitions are not made of im- portance. That which is made of importance is, the authority of the Being who legislates. " Thus saith the Lord," is re- garded as constituting a sufficient and a final law. So also it is with the moral instructions of Christ. " He put the truth of what he taught upon authority .''^'^ In the sermon on the mount, / say unto you, is proposed as the sole, and sufficient, and ultimate ground of obligation. He does not say, My precepts will promote human happiness, therefore you are to obey them : but he says. They are my precepts, therefore you are to obey them. So habitually is this principle borne in mind, if we may so speak, by those who were commis- sioned to communicate the Divine WiU, that the reason of a precept is not often assigned. The assumption evidently was, that the Divine Will was all that it was necessary for us tc know. This is not the mode of enforcing duties which one man usually adopts in addressing another. He discusses the reasonableness of his advices and the advantages of following them, as well as, perhaps, the authority from which he de rives them. The difference that exists between such a mode and that which is actually adopted in Scripture, is analogous to that which exists between the mode in which a parent communicates liis instructions to a young child, and that which is employed by a tutor to an intelligent youth. The tutor re- commends his instructions by their reasonableness and pro- priety : the father founds his upon his own authority. Not that the father's instructions are not also founded in propriety, but that this, in respect of young children, is not the ground upon which he expects their obedience. It is not the ground upon which God expects the obedience of man. We can, undoubtedly, in general perceive the wisdom of his laws, and * Deut. iv. 30. t Matt. vii. 24. X Eccl. xii. 13. § Ps. ciii. 20. li Paley: Evid. of Chris, p. 2, c. 2. 22 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. [eSSA^ I. it is doubtless right to seek out that wisdom ; but whether we discover it or not, does not lessen their authority nor alter our duties. In deference to these reasonings, then, we conclude, that the communicated Will of God is the Final Standard of Right and Wrong — that wheresoever this will is made known, hu- man duty is determined — and that neither the conclusions of philosophers, nor advantages, nor dangers, nor pleasures, nor sufferings, ought to have any o])posing influence in regulating our conduct. Let it be remembered that in morals there can be no equilibrium of authority. If the expressed will of the Deity is not our supreme rule, some other is superior. This fatal consequence is inseparable from the adoption of any other ultimate rule of conduct. The Divine law becomes the decision of a certain tribunal — the adopted rule, the decision of a superior tribunal — for that must needs be the superior' which can reverse the decisions of the other. It is a consi- deration, too, which may reasonably alarm the enquirer, that if once we assume this power of dispensing with the divine law, there is no limit to its exercise. If we may supersede one precept of the Deity upon one occasion, we may super- sede' every precept upon all occasions. Man becomes the greater authority, and God the less. If a proposition is proved to be true, no contrary reasonings can show it to be false ; and yet it is necessary to refer to such reasonings, not indeed for the sake of the truth, but for the sake of those whose conduct it should regulate. Their confidence in truth maybe increased if they discover that the reasonings which assail it are fallacious. To a considerate man it will be no subject of wonder that the supremacy of the expressed Will of God is often not recognized in the writings of moralists or in the practice of life. The specula- tive enquirer finds, that of some of the questions which come before him. Scripture furnishes no solution, and he seeks for some principle by which all may be solved. This indeed is the ordinary course of those who erect systems, whether in morals or in physics. The moralist acknowledges, perhaps, the authority of revelation ; but in his investigations he passes away from the precepts of revelation to .some of those subor- dinate means by which human duties may be discovered — means which, however authorized by the 'Deity as subser- vient to his great purpose of human instruction, are wholly unauthorized as ultimate standards of right and wrong. Hav- ing fixed his attention upon these subsidiary means, he prac- tically loses sight of the Divine law which he acknowledges ; CHAP. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. 23 and thus without any formal, perhaps without any conscious, rejection of the expressed Will of God, he really makes it subordinate to inferior rules. Another influential motive to pass by the Divine precepts, operates both upon writers and upon the public : — the rein which they hold upon the desires and passions of mankind, is more tight than they are willing to bear. Respecting some of these precepts we feel as the rich man of old felt : we hear the^injunction and go away,, if not with sorrow yet without obedience. Here again is an obvious motive to the writer to endeavour to substitute som6 less rigid rule of conduct, and an obvious motive to the reader to acquiesce in it as true without a very rigid scrutiny into its foundation. To adhere with fidelity to the expressed Will of Heaven, requires greater confidence in God than most men are willing to repose, or than most moralists are willing to recommend. But whatever have been the causes, the fact is indisputa- Jble, that few or none of the systems of morality which have been offered to the world, have uniformly and consistently applied the communicated Will of God in determination of those questions to which it is applicable. Some insist upon its supreme authority in general terms ; others apply it in de- termining some questions of rectitude : but where is the work that applies it always ? Where is the moralist who holds every thing, Ease, Interest, Reputation, Expediency, " Ho- nour," — ^personal and national, — in subordination to this Moral Law ? One source of ambiguity and of error in moral philosophy, has consisted in the indeterminate use of the term, 5' the Will of God." It is used without reference to the mode by which that will is to be discovered — and it is in this mode that the essence of the controversy lies. We are agreed that the Will of God is to be our rule : the question at issue is. What mode of discovering it should be primarily adopted? Now the term, "the "Will of God," has been applied, interchangeably, to the precepts of Scriptiire, and to the deductions which have been made from other principles. The consequence has been that the imposing sanction, ''' the Will of God," has been ap- plied to propositions of very different authority. To inquire into the validity of all those principles which have been proposed as the standard of rectitude, would be foreign to the purpose of this essay. That principle which appears to be most recommended by its own excellence and beauty, and which obtains the greatest share of approbation in the world, is the principle of directing " every action so as 24 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. [esSAY I. lo produce the greatest happiness and the least misery in our power." The particular forms of defining the doctrine are various, but they may be conveniently included in the one ge- neral term — Expediency. We say that the apparent beauty and excellence of this rule of action are so captivating, its actual acceptance in the world is so great, and the reasonings by which it is supported are so acute, that if it can be shown that this rule is not the ulti- mate standard of right and wrong, we may safely conclude that none other which philosophy has proposed can make pre- tensions to such authority. The truth indeed is, that the ob- jections to the doctrine of expediency will generally be found to apply to every doctrine which lays claim to moral supremacy — which application the reader is requested to make for him- self as he passes along. Respecting the principle of Expediency — ^the doctrine that we should, in every action, endeavour to produce the greatest sum of human happiness — let it always be remembered that the only question is, whether it ought to be the parameunt rule of human conduct. No one doubts whether it ought to influence us, or whether it is of great importance in estima- ting the duties of morality. The sole question is this : — /When an expression of the Will of God, and our calculations respecting human happiness, lead to different conclusions re- specting the rectitude of an action — ^whether of the two shall we prefer and obey ? We are concerned only with Christian writers. ' Now, when we come to analyze the principles of the Christian 'ad- vocates, of Expediency, we find precisely the result which we should expect/-a perpetual vacillation between two irre- concilable doctrines. As Christians, they necessarily acknow- ledge the. authority, and, in words at least, the supreme autho- .rity of the Divine Law : as advocates of the universal appli- cation of the law of Expediency, they necessarily sometimes set aside the Divine Law, because they sometimes cannot de- duce, from both laws, the same rule of action. Thus there is ■induced a, continual fluctuation and uncertainty both in prin- ciples and in practical rules : a continual endeavour to " serve two masters." Of these fluctuations an example is given in the article, " Moral Philosophy," in Rees's Encyclopsedia — an article in which the principles of Hartley are in a considerable degree adopted. " The Scripture precepts," says the writer, " are in themselves the rule of life." — " The supposed tendency of actions can never be put against the law of God as delivered CHAP. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONO. 25 to US by revelation, and should not therefore be made our chief guide." This is very explicit. Yet the same article says, that the first great rule is, that " we should aim to direct every action so as to produce the greatest happiness and the least misery in our power." This rule, however, is some- what difficult of application, and therefore " instead of this most general rule we must substitute others, less general, and subordinate to it :" of which subordinate rules, to " obey the Scripture precepts''^ is one ! — I do not venture to presume that these writers do really mean what their words appear to mean — ^that the law of God is supreme and yet that it is subordi- nate ; but one thing is perfectly clear, that either they make the vain attempt " to serve two masters," or that they employ language very laxly and very dangerously. The high language of Dr. Paley respecting Expediency as a paramount law, is well known : — " Whatever is expedient is right."* — " The obligation of every law depends upon its ' ultimate utility."! — " It is the utility of any moral rule alone which constitutes the obligation of it."J Perjury, Robbery, and Murder, " are not useful, and for that reason, and that reason only, are not right."^ It is obvious that this language affirms that utility is a higher authority than the expressed Will of God. If the utility of a moral rule alone constitutes the obligation of it, then is its obligation not constituted by the divine command. If murder is wrong only because it is not useful, it is not wrong because God has said, " Thou shalt noikill." But P^ley was a Christian, and therefore could neither formally displace the Scripture precepts from their station of supremacy, nor SiYoid formally acknowledging that the/ were supreme. Accordingly he says, " There are two methods of coming at the Will of God on any point : First — By his ex- press declarations, when they are to be had, and which must be sought for in Scripture. "|| Secondly — ^by Expediency . And again. When Scripture precepts " are clear and positive, there is an end to all further deliberation. "T[ This makes the ex- pressed Will of God the final standard of right and wrong. And here is the vacillation, the attempt to serve two masters of which we speak : for this elevation of the express decla- rations of God to the supremacy, is also absolutely incompati- ble with the doctrines that are quoted in the preceding paragraph. These incongiiiities of principle are sometimes brought into * Mor. and Pol. Phil. B. 2, c. 6. t B. 6, c. 12. t B. 2, c. 6. § B. 2, c. 6. II B. 2, c. 4. IT B. 2, c 4 : Note 36 STANDARD OT RIGHT AND WRONG. [eSSAT I. operation in framing practical rules. In the chapter on Sui- cide it is shown that Scripture disallows the act. Here then we might conclude that there was " an end to all further de- liberation ;." and yet, in the same chapter^ we are told that suicide would nevertheless be justifiable if it were expedient. Respecting Civil Obedience he says, the Scriptures " incul- cate the duty" and " enforce the obligation ;" but notwithstand- ing this, he pronounces that the " anly ground of the subjects' obligation" consists in Expediency* If it consists only in expediency, the divine law upon the subject is a dead letter. In one chapter he says that murder would be right if it was useful ;t in another, that " one word" of prohibition " from Christ is final ^X The words of Christ cannot be final, if we are afterwards to enquire whether murder is " useful" or not. One other illustration will suffice. In laying down the rights of the magistrate, as to making laws respecting religion, he makes Utility the ultimate standard ; so that whatever the magistrate tlnnks it useful to ordain, that he has a right to ordain. But in stating the subjects' duties as to obeying laws respecting religion, he makes the commands of God the ulti- mate standard.*^ The consequence is inevitable, that it is right for the magistrate to command an act, and right for the subject to refuse to obey it. In a sound system of morality such contradictions would be impossible. There is a contra- diction even in terms. In one place he says, " Wherever there is a right in one person there is a corresponding obliga- tion upon others."l| In another place, " The right of the ma- gistrate to ordain and the obligation of the subject to obey, in matters of religion, may be very different"*^ Perhaps the reader will say that these inconsistencies, how- ever they may impeach the skilfidness of the writer, do not prove that his system is unsound, or that Utility is not still the ultimate standard of rectitude. We answer, that to a Christian writer such inconsistencies are unavoidable. He is obliged, in conformity with the principles of his religion, to acknowledge the divine, and therefore the supreme authority of Scripture ; and if, in addition to this, he assumes that any other is supreme, inconsistency must ensue. For the same consequence follows the adoption of any other ultimate stan- dard — ^whether sympathy, or right reason, or eternal fitness, or nature. If the writer is a Christian he cannot, without falling into inconsistencies, assert the supremacy of any of these principles : that is to say, when the precepts of Scrip- « Mor. and Pol. Phil. B. 6, c. 3. t B. 2, c. 6. t B. 3, p. 3. c. 2. § B. 6, p. 3. c. 10. II B. 2, c. 9. V B. 6, p. 3, c. 10 CHA.P. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. 27 ture dictate one action, and a reasoning from his principle dictates another, he must make his election : If he prefers his principle, Christianity is abandoned : if he prefers Scrip- ture, his principle is subordinate : if h^ alternately prefers the one and the other, he falls into the vacillation and incon- sistency of which we speak. Bearing still in mind that the rule " to endeavour to pro- duce the greatest happiness in our power," is objectionable only when it is made an ultimate rule, the reader is invited to attend to these short considerations. I. In computing human happiness, the advocate of Expe- diency does not sufficiently take into the account our happi- ness in futurity. Nor indeed does he always take it into account at all. One definition says, " The test of the morality of an act is its tendency to promote the temporal advantage of the greatest number in the society to which we belong." Now many things may be very expedient if death were anni- hilation, which may be very inexpedient now : and therefore it is not unreasonable to expect, nor an unreasonable exercise of humility to a,ct upon the expectation, that the divine laws may sometimes impose obligations of which we do not per- ceive the expediency or the use. " It may so fall out," says Hooker, " that the reason why some laws of God were given, is neither opened nor possible to be gathered by the wit of man."* And Pearson says, " There are many parts of mo- rality, as taught by revelation, which are entirely independent of an accurate knowledge of nature."! And Gisborne, " Our experience of God's dispensations by no means permits us to affirm, that he always thinks fit to act in such a manner as is productive of particular expediency ; much less to conclude that he wills us always to act in such a manner as we suppose would be productive of it. "J All tliis sufficiently indicates that Expediency is wholly inadmissible as an ultimate rule. II. The doctrine is altogether unconnected with the Chris- tian revelation, or with any revelation from heaven. It was just as true, and the deductions from it just as obligatory, two or five thousand years ago as now. The alleged supreme law of morality — " Whatever is expedient is right" — might have been taught by Epictetus as well as by a modern Christian. But are we then to be told that the revelations from the Deity have conveyed no moral knowledge to man 1 that they make no act obligatory which was not obligatory before ? that ho who had the fortune to discover that " whatever is expedient * Eccles. Polity, B. 3, s. 10. t Theory of Morals : c. 3. X Principles of Mor. PhiL 26 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND "WRONG. [eSSAY I is right," possess^ed a moral law just as perfect as that which God has ushered into the world, and much more comprehen- sive ? III. If some subordinate rule of conduct were proposed — some principle which served as an auxiliary moral guide — I should not think it a valid objection to its truth, to be told that no sanction of the principle was to be found in the written revelation : but if some rule of conduct were proposed as being of universal obligation, some moral principle which was para- mount to every other — and I discovered that this principle was unsactioned by the written revelation, I should think this want of sanction was conclusive evidence against it : because it is not credible that a revelation from God, of which one great object was to teach mankind the moral law of God, would have been silent respecting a rule of conduct which was to be an universal guide to man. We apply these con- siderations to the doctrine of Expediency : Scripture contains not a word upon the subject. IV. The principles of Expediency necessarily proceed upon the supposition that we are to investigate the future, and this investigation is, as every one knows, peculiarly without the limits of human sagacity : an objection which derives ad- ditional force from the circumstance that an action, in order to be expedient, " must be expedient on the whole, at the long run, in ail its effects, collateral and remote."* I do not know whether, if a man should sit down expressly to devise a moral principle Avhich should be uncertain and difficult in its appli- cation, he could devise one that would be more difficult and uncertain than this. So that, as Dr. Paley himself acknow- ledges, " It is impossible to ascertain every duty by an imme- diate reference to public utility."! The reader may therefore conclude with Dr. Johnson, that " by presuming to determine what is fit and what is beneficial, they presuppose more know- ledge of the universal system than man has attained, and there- fore depend upon principles too complicated and extensive for our comprehension : and there can he no security in the consequence when the premises are not understood. ^'1^ Y. But whatever may be the propriety of investigating all consequences " collateral and remote," it is certain that such an investigation is possible only in that class of moral ques- tions which allows a man time to sit down and deliberately to think and compute. As it respects that large class of cases in which a person must decide and act in a moment, it is * Mor. and Pol. Phil. B. 2, c. 8. t B. 6. c. 12 I Western Isles. CHAP. II.] STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. 29 "wholly useless, ifiere are thousands of conjunctures in life in which a man can no more stop to calculate effects collate- ral and remote, than he can stop to cross the Atlantic : and it is difficult to conceive that any rule of morality can be ab- solute and universal, which is totally inapplicable to so, large a portion of human affairs. VI. Lastly, the rule of Expediency is deficient in one of the first requisites of a moral law — obviousness and palpa- bility of sanction. What is the process by which the sanc- tion is applied ? Its advocates say, the Deity is a Benevolent Being : as he is benevolent himself, it is reasonable to con- clude he wills that his creatures should be benevolent to one another: this benevolence is to be exercised by adapting every action to the promotion of the " universal interest" of man: "Whatever is expedient is right:" or, God wills that we should consult Expediency. — Now we say that there are so many considerations placed between the rule and the act, that the practical authority of the rule is greatly diminished. It is easy to perceive that the authority of a rule will not come home to that man's mind, who is told, respecting a given ac- tion, that its effects upon the universal interest is the only thing that makes it right or wrong. All the doubts that arise as to this effect are so many diminutions of the sanction. It is like putting half a dozen new contingencies between the act of thieving and the conviction of a jury ; and every one knows that the want of certainty of penalty is a great encou- ragement to offences. The principle too is liable to the most extravagant abuse — or rather extravagant abuse is, in the pre- sent condition of mankind, inseparable from its general adop- tion. " Whatever is expedient is right," soliloquizes the moonlight adventurer into the poultry-yard : " It will tend more to the sum of human- happiness that my wife and I should dine on a capon, than that the farmer should feel the satisfac- tion of possessing it ;" — and so he mounts the hen-roost. I do not say that this hungTy moralist would reason soundly, but I say that he would not listen to the philosophy which replied, " Oh, your reasoning is incomplete : you must take into account all consequences collateral and remote ; and then you will find that it is more expedient, upon the whole and at the long run, that you and your wife should be hungry, than that hen-roosts should be insecure." It is happy, however, that this principle never can be gene- rally applied to the private duties of man. Its abuses would be so enormous that the laws would take, as they do in fact take, better measures for regulating men's conduct than this 80 STANDARD OF RIGHT AND WRONG. [eSSAY I. doctrine supplies. And happily too, the Universal Lawgiver has not left mankind without more distinct and more influen- j tial perceptions of his will and his authority, than they could ^ ,J ever derive from the principles of Expediency. *f But an objection has probably presented itself to the reader, that the greater part of mankind have no access to the written expression of the Will of God : and how, it may be asked, can that be the final standard of right and wrong for the hu- man race, of which the majority of the race have never heard ? The question is reasonable and fair. We answer then, first, that supposing most men to be desti- tute of a communication of the Divine Will, it does not affect the obligations of those who do possess it. That communi- cation is the final law to me, whether my African brother en- joys it or not. Every reason by which the supreme author- ity of the law is proved, is just as applicable to those who do enjoy the communication of it, whether that communica- tion is enjoyed by many or by few; and this, so far as the argument is concerned, appears to be a sufficient answer. If any man has no direct access to his Creator's will, let him have recourse to " eternal fitnesses," or to " expediency ;" but his condition does not affect that of another man who does possess this access. '^ But our real reply to the objection is, that they who are destitute of Scripture, are not destitute of a direct communi- - cation of the Will of God. The proof of this position must be deferred to a subsequent chapter ; and the reader is soli- cited for the present, to allow us to assume its truth. This ,direct communication may be limited, it may be incomplete, *but some communication exists ; enough to assure them that sqme things are acceptable to the Supreme Power, and that some are not ; enough to indicate a distinction between right and wrong ; enough to make them moral agents, and reason- ably accountable to our Common Judge. If these principles are true, and especially if the amount of the communication is in many cases considerable, it is obvious that it will be of great value in the direction of individual conduct. We say of individual conduct, because it is easy to perceive that it would not often subserve the purposes of him who frames public rules of morality. A person may possess a satisfac- toiy assurance in his own mind, that a given action is incon- sistent with the Divine Will, but that assurance is not con- veyed to another, unless he participates in the evidence upon which it is founded. That which is wanted in order to sup- C«AP> III.] tStJBORDINATE STANDARDS, ETC 31 |4y paMic rules for human conduct, is a publicly aTOucI" cd autliority ; so that a writer, in deducing those rules, has to apply, ultimately, to that Standard which God has publicly sanctioned. CHAPTER IIL SUBORDINATE STANDARDS OF RIGHT AND WRONG. Foundation said limits «f the authority ef siAordinate moral rules. The ^vritten expression of the Divine Will does not con- tain, and no writings can contain, directions for our conduct in ev€ry circumstance of life. If the precepts of Scripture were mnltiplied a hundred or a thousand fold, there would still arise a multiplicity of questions to which none of them wonld specifically apply. Accordingly, there are some subordinate authorities, to which, as can be satisfactorily shown, it is the Will of God that we should refer. He who does refer to them, and regidate his conduct by them, conforms to the will of God. - ^ To a son who is obliged to regulate all his actions by his father's will, th«re are two ways in which he may practise 'obedience — one, by receiving, upon each subject, his father's direct instructions ; and the other by receiving instructions from those whom his father commissions to teach him. The parent may appoint a governor, and enjoin, that upon all ques- tions of a certain kind the son shall conform to his instrucr tions ; and if the son does this, he as truly and really per- forms his father's will, and as strictly makes that will the guide of his conduct, as if he received the instructions im- mediately from his parent. • But if the father have laid down certain general rules for his son's observance, as that he shall devote ten hours a-day to study, and not less — although the governor should recommend or even command him to de- vote fewer hours, he may not comply ; for if he does, the governor, and not his father, is his supreme guide. The sub- ordination is destroyed. This case illustrates, perhaps, with sufficient precision, the situation of mankind with respect to moral rules. Our Crea- tor has given direct laws, some general and some specific. These are of final authority. But he has also sanctioned, or 32 IDENTICAL AUTHORIl i OF [eSSAT I permitted an application to, other rules ; and in conforming to these, so long as we hold them in subordination to his lavv^ we perform his will. Of these subordinate rules it were possible to enumerkte many. Perhaps, indeed, few principles have been proposed as " The fundamental Rule* of Virtue," which may not rightly be brought into use by the Christian in regulating his conduct in life : for the objection to many of these principles is, not so much that they are useless, as that they are unwarranted as paramount laws. " Sympathy" may be of use, and " Na- ture" may be of use, and " Self-love," and " Benevolence ;" and to those who know what it means, " Eternal fitnesses too." Some of the subordinate rules of conduct it will be proper hereafter to notice, in order to discover, if we can, how far their authority extends, and where it ceases. The observa- tions that we shall have to offer upon them may conveniently " bo made under these heads : The Law of the Land, The Law of Nature, The Promotion of Human Happiness or Expe- diency, The Law of Nations, The Law of Honour. These observations will, however, necessarily be preceded by an enquiry into the great principles of human duty as they are delivered in Scripture, and into the reality of that com- munication of the Divine Will to the mind, which the reader has been requested to allow us to assume. CHAPTER IV. COLLATERAL OBSERVATIONS. The reader is requested to regard the present chapter as parenthetical. The parenthesis is inserted here, because the writer does not know where more appropriately to place it. IDENTICAL AUTHORITY OF MORAL AND RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. Identical authority of moral and religious obligations — The Divine attri- butes — Of deducing rules of human duty from a consideration of the attributes of God — Virtue : " Virtue is conformity with the standard of rectitude" — Motives of action. This identity is a truth to which we do not sufficiently ad- \ert either in our habitual sentiments or in our practice. CHAP. IV.] MORAL AND RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 33 There are many persons who speak of religious duties, as if there was something sacred or imperative in their obligation that does not belong to duties of morality — many, who would perhaps offer up their lives rather than profess a belief in a false religious dogma, but who would scarcely sacrifice an hour's gratification rather than violate the moral law of love. It is therefore of importance to remembojiv that the authority which imposes moral obligations and religious obligations is one and the same — the Will of God. Fidelity to God is just as truly violated by a neglect of his moral laws, as by a compro- mise of religious principles. Religion and Morality are ab- stract terms, employed to indicate different cfasses of those duties which the Deity has imposed upon mankind ; but they are all imposed by Him, and all are eijjorced by equal author- ity. Not indeed that the violation of every particular portion of the Divine Will involves equal guilt, but that each viola- tion is equally a disregard of the Divine Authority. Whe- ther, therefore, fidelity be required to a point of doctrine or of practice, to theology or to morals, the obligation is the same. It is the Divine requisition whicJi constitutes this ob- ligation, and not the nature of the duty required ; so that, whilst I think a Protestant does no more than his duty when he prefers death to a profession of the j^oman Catholic faith, I think also that every Christian who believes that Christ has prohibited swearing, does no more than his duty when he prefers death to taking an oath. I would especially solicit the reader to bear in mind this principle of the identity of the authority of moral and religious obligations, because he may otherwise imagine that, in some of the subsequent pages, the obligation of a moral law is too strenuously insisted on, and that fidelity to it is to be purchased at " too great a sacrifice" of ease and enjoyment. THE DIVINE ATTRIBUTES. The purpose for which a reference is here made to these sacred subjects, is to remark upon the unfitness of attempting to deduce human duties from the attributes of God. It is not indeed to be afiirmed that no illustration of those duties can be derived from them, but that they are too imperfectly cog- nizable by our perceptions to enable us to refer to them for specific moral rules. The truth indeed is, that we do not ac- curately and distinctly know what the Divine Attributes are. We say that God is merciful ; but if we attempt to define, with strictness, what the term merciful means, we shall find 34 IDENTICAL AUTHORITY CF [ESSAY 1. it a difficult, perhaps an impracticable task ; and especially we shall have a difficult task if, after the definition, we at- tempt to reconcile every appearance which presents itself in the world, with our notions of the attribute of mercy. I would speak with reverence when I say that we cannot always per- ceive the mercifulness of the Deity in his administrations, either towards his rational or his irrational creation. So, again, in respect of the attribute of Justice, who can deter- minately define in what this attribute consists ? Who, espe- cially, can prove that the Almighty designs that we should always be able to trace his justice in his government ? We believe that he is unchangeable ; but what is the sense in which we understand the term ? Do we mean that the attri- bute involves the necessity of an unchanging system of moral government, or that the Deity cannot make alterations in, or additions to, his laws for mankind ? We cannot mean this, for the evidence of revelation disproves it. Now, if it be true that the Divine Attributes, and the uni- form accordancy of the divine dispensations with our notions of those attributes, are not sufficiently within our powers of investigation to enable us to frame accurate premises for our reasoning, it is plain that we cannot always trust with safety to our conclusions. We cannot deduce rules for our conduct from the Divine Attributes without being very liable to error ; and the liability will increase in proportion as the deduction attempts critical accuracy. Yet this is a rock upon which the judgments of many have suffered wreck, a quicksand where many have been involved in inextricable difficulties. One, because he cannot recon- cile the commands to exterminate a people with his notions of the attribute of mercy, questions the truth of the Mosaic writings. One, because he finds wars permitted by the Al- mighty of old, concludes that, as he is unchangeable, they cannot be incompatible with his present or his future Will. One, on the supposition of this unchangeableness, perplexes himself because the dispensations of God and his laws have been changed ; and vainly labours, by classifying these laws into those which result from his attributes, and those which do not, to vindicate the immutability of God. We have no business with these things, and I will venture to affirm that he who will take nothing upon trust — who will exercise no faith — who will believe in the divine authority of no rule, and in the truth of no record, which he is unable to reconcile with the Divine Attributes — ^must be consigned to hopeless Pyr rhonism. CHAP. IV.] MORAL AJJD RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 35 The lesson which such considerations teach is a simple but an important one : That our exclusive business is to dis- cover the actual present Will of God, without enquiring why his will is such as it is, or why it has ever been different ; and without seeking to deduce, from our notions of the Di- vine Attributes, rules of conduct which are more safely and more certainly discovered by other means, VIRTUE. The definitions which have been proposed of Virtue have necessarily been both numerous and various, because many and discordant standards of rectitude have been advanced; and virtue must, in every man's system, essentially consist in conforming the conduct to the standard which he thinks is the true one. This must be true of those systems, at least, which make Virtue consist in doing right. — Adam Smith in- deed says, that " Virtue is excellence ; something uncom- monly great and beautiful, which rises far above what is vul- gar and ordinary."* By which it would appear that Virtue is a relative quality, depending not upon some perfect or per- manent standard, but upon the existing practice of mankind. Thus the action which possessed no Virtue amongst a good •community, might possess much in a bad one. The practice which " rose far above" the ordinary practice of one nation, might be quite common in another : and if mankind should become much worse than they are now, that conduct would be eminently virtuous amongst them which now is not vir- tuous at all. That such a definition of Virtue is likely to lead to very imperfect practice is plain ; for what is the probability that a man will attain to that standard which Ood proposes, if his utmost estimate of Virtue rises no higher than to an in ■ determinate superiority over other men ? Our definition o^^Virtue necessarily accords with the Prin- ciples of Morality which have been ad^'anced in the preced- ing chapter : Virtue is conformity with the Standard of Recti- tude ; which standard consists, primarily, in the expressed Will of God. Virtue, as it respects the meritoriousness of the agent, is another consideration. The quality of an action is one thing, the desert of the agent is another. The business of him who illustrates moral rules, is not with the agent, but with the act. He must state what the moral law pronounces to be right and wrong : but it is very possible that an individual may do what ♦ Theo. Mor. Sent. 36 IDENTICAL AUTHORITY OF, ETC. [eSSAY I. is right without any Virtue, because there may be no rectitude in his motives and intentions. He does a virtuous act, but he is not a virtuous agent. Although the concern of a work like the present is evi- dently with the moral character of actions, without reference to the motives of the agent ; yet the remark may be allowed, that there is frequently a sort of inaccuracy and unreasonable- ness in the judgments which we form of the deserts of other men. We regard the act too much, and the intention too little. The footpad who discharges a pistol at a traveller and fails in his aim, is just as wicked as if he had killed him ; yet we do not feel the same degree of indignation at his crime. So, too, of a person who does good. A man who plunges into a river and saves a child from drowning, im- presses the parents with a stronger sense of his deserts than if, with the same exertions, he had failed. — We should en- deavour to correct this inequality of judgment, and in forming our estimates of human conduct, should refer, much more than we commonly do, to what the agent intends. It should habi- tually be borne in mind, and especially with reference to our own conduct, that to have been unable to execute an ill inten- tion deducts nothing from our guilt ; and that at that tribunal where intention and action will be both regarded, it will avail little if we can only say that we have done no evil. Nor let it be less remembered, with respect to those who desire to do good but have not the power, that their Virtue is not diminished by their want of ability. I ought, perhaps, to be as gTateful to the man who feelingly commiserates my sufferings but cannot relieve them, as to him who sends me money or a physician. The mite of the widow of old was estimated even more highly than the greater offerings of the rich. CHAP, v.] PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, ETC. 37 CHAPTER V SCRIPTURE. The morality of the Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Christian dispensations — Their moral requisitions not always coincident — Supremacy of the Christian morality — Of variations in the Moral Law — Mode of apply- ing the precepts of Scripture to the questions of duty — No formal mo- ral system in Scripture — Criticism of Biblical morality — Of particular precepts and general rules — Matt. vii. 12. — 1 Cor. x. 31. — Rom. iii. 8. — Benevolence, as it is proposed in the Christian Scriptures. THE MORALITY OF THE PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS. One of the very interesting considerations wMch are pre- sented to an enquirer in perusing the volume of Scripture, consists in the variations in its morality. There are three distinctly defined periods, in which the moral government and laws of the Deity assume, in some respects, a different character. In the first, without any system of external in- struction, he communicated his Will to some of our race, either immediately or through a superhuman messenger. In the second, he promulgated, through Moses, a distinct and extended code of laws, addressed peculiarly to a selected people. In the third, Jesus Christ and his commissioned ministers, delivered precepts, of which the general character was that of greater purity or perfection, and of which the ob- ligation was universal upon mankind. That the records of all these dispensations contain declara- tions of the Will of God, is certain : that their moral requisi- tions are not always coincident, is also certain ; and hence the conclusion becomes inevitable, that to us, one is of primary authority ; — that when all do not coincide, one is paramount to the others. That a coincidence does not always exist, may easily be shown. It is manifest, not only by a compari- son of precepts and of the general tenor of the respective re- cords, but from the express declarations of Christianity itself. One example, referring to the Christian and Jewish dis- pensations, may be found in the extension of the law of Love. Christianity, in extending the application of this law, requires us to abstain from that which the law of Moses permitted us to do. Thus it is in the instance of duties to our " neigh- bour," as they are illustrated in the parable of the Samaritan.* * Luke, X. 30. 4 38 PATRIAttCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAY I. Thus, too, in the sermon on the mount : " It hath been said hy them of old time, Thou shalt love thy neighbour and hate thine enemy : but / say unto you, Love your enemies."* It is indeed sometimes urged that the words " hate thine enemy," were only a gloss of the expounders of the law : but Grotius writes thus — " What is there repeated as said to those of old, are not the words of the teachers of the law, but of Moses ; either literally or in their meaning. They are cited by our Saviour as his express words, not as interpretations of them."t If the authority of Grotius should not satisfy the reader, let him consider such passages as this : " An Ammonite or a Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord. Because they met you not with bread and with water in the way, when ye came forth out of Egypt. Thou shall not seek their peace nor their prosperity all thy days for ever,"| This is not coincident with, " Love your enemies ;" or with, " Do ^ood to them that hate you ;" or with that temper which is recommended by the words, "to him that smiteth thee on one cheek, turn the other also."^ " Pour out thy fury upon the heathen that know thee not," and upon the families that call not on thy name,"|| — is not coincident with the reproof of Christ to those who, upon simi- lar grounds, would have called down fire from heaven. 1" * The Lord look upon it and require it,"** — is not coincident with, " Lord, lay not this sin to their charge."tt " Let me see thy vengeance on them," J j: — "Bring upon them the day of evil, and destroy them with double destruction,"^ § — is not coincident with " Forgive them, for they know not what they do."|||L Similar observations applying to Swearing, to Polygamy, to Retaliation, to the motives of murder and adultery. And as to the express assertion of the want of coincidence : — " The law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did."T[^ " There is verily a disannulling of the commandment going before, /or the weakness and unprofitable- ness thereof."*** If the commandment now existing is not weak and unprofitable, it must be because it is superior to that which existed before. But although this appears to be thus clear with respect to the Jewish dispensation, there are some who regard the * Matt. V. 43. t Rights of War and Peace. X Deut. xxiii. 3, 4, 6. § Matt. v. 39. |I Jer. x. 25. IT Luke, ix. 54. ** 2 Chron. xxiv. 22. +t Acts, vii. 60. XX Jer. XX. 12. §§ Jer. xvii. 18. t||| Luke, xxiii. 34. TV Heb. viL 19. «** Heb. viL 18. CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS. 39 moral precepts which were delivered before the period of that dispensation, as imposing permanent obligations : they were delivered, it is said, not to one peculiar people, but to individuals of many ; and, in the persons of the immediate survivors of the deluge, to the whole human race. This argu- ment assumes a ground paramount to all questions of subse- quent abrogation. Now it would appear a sufficient answer to say — If the precepts of the Patriarchal and Christian dis- pensations are coincident, no question needs to be discussed ; if they are not, we must make an election ; and surely the Christian cannot doubt what election he should make. Could a Jew have justified himself for violating the Mosaic law, by urging the precepts delivered to the patriarchs ? No. Neither then can we justify ourselves for violating the Christian law, by urging the precepts delivered to Moses. We indeed have, if it be possible, still stronger motives. The moral law of Christianity binds us, not merely because it is the present expression of the Will of God, but because it is a portion of his last dispensation to man — of that which is avowedly not only the last, but the highest and the best. We do not find in the records of Christianity that which we find in the other Scriptures, a reference to a greater and purer dis- pensation yet to come. It is as true of the Patriarchal as of the Mosaic institution, that " it made nothing perfect," and that it referred us from the first, to " the bringing in of that better hope which did." If then the question of supremacy is between a perfect and an imperfect system, who will hesi- tate in his decision 1 There are motives of gratitude, too, and of aflfection, as well as of reason. The clearer exhibition which Christianity gives of the attributes of God ; its distirlct disclosure of our immortal destinies ; and above all, its wonderful discovery of the love of our Universal Father, may well give to the moral law with which they are connected, an authority which may supersede every other. These considerations are of practical importance ; for it may be observed of those who do not advert to them, that they sometimes refer indiscriminately to the Old Testament or the New, without any other guide than the apparent greater ap- plicability of a precept in the one or the other, to their pre- sent need : and thus it happens that a rule is sometimes acted upon, less perfect than that by which it is the good pleasure of God we should now regulate our conduct. — It is a fact which the reader should especially notice, that an appeal to the Hebrew Scriptures is frequently made when the precepts of 40 . PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAY I. Christianity would he too rigid for our purpose. He who in- sists upon a pure morality, applies to the New Testament : he who desires a little more indulgence, defends himself by arguments from the Old. Of this indiscriminate reference to all the dispensations, there is an extraordinary example in the newly discovered work of Milton. He appeals, Tbelieve, almost uniformly to the precepts of all, as of equal present obligation. The con- sequence is what might be expected — ^his moral system is not consistent. Nor is it to be forgotten, that in defending what may be regarded as less pure doctrines, he refers mostly, or exclusively, to the Hebrew Scriptures. In all his disquisi- tions to prove the lawfulness of untruths, he does not once refer to the New Testament.* Those who have observed the prodigious multiplicity of texts which he cites in this work, will peculiarly appreciate the importance of the fact. — • Again : " Hatred," he says, " is in some cases a religious duty."t A proposition at which the Christian may reasonably wonder. And how does Milton prove its truth ? He cites from Scripture ten passages ; of which eight are from the Old Testament and two from the New. The reader will be curi- ous to know what these two are : — " If any man come to me and hate not his father and mother — he cannot be my dis- ciple. "J And the rebuke to Peter ; " Get thee behind me, Satan."§ The citation of such passages shows that no pas- sages to the purpose could be found. It may be regarded therefore as a general rule, that none of the injunctions or permissions which formed a part of the former dispensations, can be referred to as of authority to us, except so far as they are coincident with the Christian law. To our own Master we stand or fall ; and our Master is Christ.- — And in estimating this coincidence, it is not requi- site to show that a given rule or permission of the former dis- pensations is specifically superseded in the New Testament. It is sufficient if it is not accordant with the general spirit ; and this consideration assumes greater weight when it is con- nected with another which is hereafter to be noticed — ^that it is by the general spirit of the Christian morality that many of the duties of man are to be discovered. Yet it is always to be remembered, that the laws which are thus superseded were, nevertheless, the laws of God. Let not the reader suppose that we would speak or feel re- specting them otherwise than with that reverence which their * Christian Doctrine, p. 660. t P. 641. t Luke xiv. 26. § Mark viii. 33. CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS, 41 origin demands — or that we would take any tiling from their present obligation but that which is taken by the Lawgiver nimself. It may indeed he observed, that in all his dispen- sations there is a harmony, a one pervading piinciple, which, without other evidence, indicates that they proceeded from the same authority. The variations are circumstantial rather than fundamental ; and, after all, the great principles in which they accord, far outweigh the particular applications in wliich they differ. The Mosaic Dispensation was " a schoolmaster" to bring us, not merely through the medium of types and pro- phecies, but through its moral law, to Christ. Both the one and the other were designed as preparatives ; and it was pro^ bably as true of these moral laws as of the prophecies, that the Jews did not perceive their relationship to Christianity as it was actually introduced into the world. Respecting the variations of the moral law, some persons greatly and very needlessly perplex themselves by indulging in such questions as these. — " If," say they, " God be perfect, and if all the dispensations are communications of his will, how happens it that they are not uniform in their requisitions ? How happens it that that which was required by Infinite Knowledge at one time, was not required by Infinite Know- ledge at another?" I answer — I cannot tell. And what then? Does the enquirer think this a sufficient reason for rejecting the authority of the Christian law ? If inability to discover the reasons of the moral government of God be a good motive to doubt its authority, we may involve ourselves in doubts without end. — Why does a Being who is infinitely pure permit moral evil in the world ? Why does he who is perfectly benevolent permit physical suffering ? Why did he suffer our first parents to fall ? Why, after they had fallen, did he not immediately repair the loss ? Why was the Mes- siah's appearance deferred for four thousand years 1 Why is not the religion of the Messiah universally known and univer- sally operative at the present day ? To all these questions and to many others, no answer can be given ; and the difficulty ari- sing from them is as great, if we choose to make difficulties for ourselves, as that which arises from variations in his moral laws. Even in infidelity we shall find no rest ; the objections lead us onward to atheism. He who will not believe in a Deity unless he can reconcile all the facts before his eyes with his notions of the divine attributes, must deny that a Deity exists. I talked of rest : — Alas ! there is no rest in infidelity or in atheism. To disbelieve in revelation or in God, is not to escape 4* 42 PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAY I from a belief in things which you do noi comprehend, but to transfer your belief to a new class of such things. Unbelief is credulity. The infidel is more credulous than the Chris- tian, and the atheist is the most credulous of mankind : that is, he believes important propositions upon less evidence than any other man, and in opposition to greater. It is curious to observe the anxiety of some writers to re- concile some of the facts before us with the " moral perfec- tions" of the Deity ; and it is instructive to observe into what doctrines they are led. They tell us that all the evil and all the pain in the world, are parts of a great system of Benevo- lence. " The moral and physical evil observable in the sys- tem, according to men's limited views of it, are necessary parts of the great plan ; all tending ultimately to produce the greatest sum of happiness upon the whole, not only with re- spect to the system in general, but to each individual, accord- ing to the station he occupies in it."* They affirm that God is an " allwise Being, who directs all the movements of na- ture, and who is determined, by his o\vn unalterable perfec- tions, to maintain in it at all times, the greatest possible quantity of happiness."! The Creator found, therefore, that to inflict the misery which now exists, was the best means of promot- ing this happiness — that to have abated the evil, the suffer- ing, or the misery, would be to have diminished the sum of felicity — and that men could not have been better or more at ease than they are, without making them on the whole more vicious or unhappy ! — These things are beacons which should warn us. These speculations show that not only religion, but reason, dictates the propriety of acquiescing in that degree of ignorance in which it has pleased God to leave us ; because they show, that attempts to acquire knoAvledge may conduct us to folly. These are subjects upon which he acts most ra- tionally, who says to his reason — ^be still. MODE OF APPLYING^THE PRECEPTS OF SCRIPTURE TO aUESTlONS OF DUTY. It is remarkable that many of these precepts, and especially those of the Christian Scriptures, are delivered, not systemati- cally but occasionully . They are distributed through occa- sional discourses and occasional letters. Except in the in- * This is given as the belief of Dr. Priestly. See Memoirs : Ap. No. 5. t Adum Smith : Theory of Moral Sentiments. See also T. Southwood Smith's Illustrations of the Divine Government, in which unbridled li- cense of speculation has led the writer into some instructive absurdities. CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAPr DISPENSATIONS. 43 stance of the law of Moses, the speaker or writer rarely set about a formal exposition of moral truth. The precepts were delivered as circumstances called them forth or made them needful. There is nothing like a system of morality ; nor, consequently, does there exist that completeness, that distinct- ness in defining and accuracy ih limiting, which, in a system of morality, we expect to find. Many rules are advanced in short absolute prohibitions or injunctions, without assigning any of those exceptions to their practical application, which the majority of such rules require. — The enquiry, in passing, may be permitted — Why are these things so 1 When it is considered what the Christian dispensation is, and what it is designed to effect upon the conduct of man, it cannot be sup- posed that the incompleteness of its moral precepts happened by inadvertence. The precepts of the former dispensation are much more precise ; and it is scarcely to be supposed that the more perfect dispensation would have had a less pre- cise law, unless the deficiency were to be compensated from some other authoritative source : — which remark is offered as a reason, a priori, for expecting that, in the present dispensa- tion, God would extend the operation of his law written in the heart. But whatever may be thought of this, it is manifest that considerable care is requisite in the application of precepts, so delivered, to the conduct of life. To apply them in all cases literally, were to act neither reasonably nor consistently with the designs of the Lawgiver : to regard them in all cases as mere general directions, and to subject them to the unau- thorized revision of man, were to deprive them of their pro- per character and authority as divine laws. In proposing some grounds for estimating the practical obligation of these precepts, I would be first allowed to express the conviction, that the simple fact that such a disquisition is needed, and that the moral duties are to be gathered rather by implication or general tenor than from specific and formal rules, is one indication amongst the many, that the dispensation of which these precepts fonn a part, stands not in words but in power : and I hope to be forgiven, even in a book of morality, if I express the conviction that none can fulfil their requisitions — < that none indeed can appreciate them — without some partici-" pation in this " power." I say he cannot appreciate them. Neither the morals nor the religion of Christianity can be adequately estimated by the man who sits down to the New Testament, with no other preparation than that which is ne- cessary in sitting down to Euclid or Newton. There must 44 PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAT I. be some preparation of heart as well as integrity of under- standing — or, as the appropriate language of the volume itself would express it, it is necessary that we should become, in some degree, the " sheep" of Christ before we can accurately " know his voice." There is one clear and distinct ground upon which we may limit the application of a precept that is couched in absolute language — the unlawfulness, in any given conjuncture, of obey- ing it. " Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man."* This, literally, is an unconditional command. But if we were to obey it unconditionally, we should sometimes comply with human, in opposition to divine laws. In such cases then, the obligation is clearly suspended ; and this distinction, the first teachers of Christianity recognized in their own practice. When an " ordinance of man" required them to forbear the promulgation of the new religion, they refused obedience; and urged the befitting expostulation — " Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye."t So, too, with the filial relationship : " Children obey your parents in all things. "J But a parent may require his child to lie or steal ; and therefore when a parent requires obedience in such things his authority ceases, and the obliga- tion to obedience is taken away by the moral law itself. The precept, so far as the present ground of exception applies, is virtually this : Obey your parents in all things, unless disobe- dience is required by the will of God. Or the subject might be illustrated thus : The Author of Christianity reprobates those v/ho love father or mother more than himself. The pa- ramount love to God is to be manifested by obedience. § So, then, we are to obey the commands of God in preference to hose of our parents. " All human authority ceases at the point where obedience becomes criminal." || Of some precepts, it is evident that they were designed to be understood conditionally. " When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret."^ This precept is conditional. I doubt not that it is consistent with his will .that the greater number of the supplications which man offers at his throne shall be offered in secret ; yet, that the precept does not ex- clude the exercise of public prayer, is evident from this con- sideration, if from no other, that Christ and his apostles them- selves practised it. » 1 Pet. ii. 13. t Acts iv. 19. t Col. iii. 20. § If ye love me, ye will keep my commandments. — ^John xiv 15. II Mor. and Pol. Phil. IT Matt. vi. 6. CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAN DTSPENSATTONS. 45 Some precepts are figurative, and describe the spirit and temper that should govern us, rather than the particular ac- tions that we should perform. Of this there is an example in, " Whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain."* In promulgating some precepts, a principal object appears to have been, to supply sanctions. Thus in the case of Civil Obedience : we are to obey because the Deity autho- rizes the institution of Civil Government — because the magis- trate is the minister of God for good ; and, accordingly, we are to obey not from considerations of necessity only, but of duty ; " not only for wrath, but for conscience sake."t One pre- cept, if we accept it literally, would enjoin us to " hate" our parents ; and this acceptation, Milton appears actually to have adopted. One would enjoin us to accumulate no property : " Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth. "J Such rules are seldom mistaken in practice ; and, it may be observed, that this is an indication of their practical wisdom, and their practical adaptation to the needs of man. It is not an easy thing to pronounce, as occasions arise, a large number of mo- ral precepts in unconditional language, and yet to secure them from the probability of even great misconstructions. Let the reader make the experiment. — Occasionally, but it is only occasionally, a sincere Christian, in his anxiety to conform to the moral law, accepts such precepts in a more literal sense than that in which they appear to have been designed to be applied. I once saw a book that endeavoured to prove the unlawfulness of accumulating any property ; upon the autho- rity, primarily, of this last quoted precept. The principle upon which the writer proceeded was just and right — ^that it is necessary to conform, unconditionally, to the expressed Will of God. The defect was in the criticism ; that is to say, in ascertaining what that Will did actually require. Another obviously legitimate ground of limiting the appli- cation of absolute precepts, is afforded us in just biblical criti- cism. Not that critical disquisitions are often necessary. to the upright man who seeks for the knowledge of his duties. God has not left the knowledge of his moral law so remote from the sincere seekers of his will. But in deducing public rules as authoritative upon mankind, it is needful to take into account those considerations which criticism supplies. The construction of the original languages and their peculiar phraseology, the habits, manners, and prevailing opinions of the times, and the circumstances under which a precept was • Matt. V. 41. t Rom. xiii. 5. \ Matt. vi. 19. 46 PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAT I. delivered, are evidently amongst these considerations. And literary criticism is so much the more needed, because the great majority of mankind have access to Scripture only through the medium of translations. But in applying all these limitations to the absolute precepts of Scripture, it is to be remembered that we are not subjecting their authority to inferior principles. We are not violating the principle upon which these essays proceed, that the expres- sion of the Divine Will is our ultimate law. We are only ascertaining what that expression is. If, after just and author- ized examination, any precept should still appear to stand imperative in its absolute form, we accept it as obligatory in that form. Many such precepts there are ; and being such, we allow no considerations of convenience, nor of expediency, nor considerations of any other kind, to dispense with their authority. One great use of such inquiries as these, is to vindicate to the apprehensions of men the authority of the precepts them- selves. It is very likely to happen, and to some negligent enquirers it does happen, that seeing a precept couched in unconditional language, which yet cannot be unconditionally obeyed, they call in question its general obligation. Their minds fix upon the idea of some consequences which would result from a literal obedience, and feeling assured that those consequences ought not to be undertaken, they set aside the precept itself. They are at little pains to enquire what the proper requisitions of the precept are — glad, perhaps, of a specious excuse for not regarding it at all. The careless reader, perceiving that a literal compliance with the precept CO give the cloak to him who takes a coat, would be neither proper nor right, rejects the whole precept of which it form? an illustration ; and in doing this, rejects one of the mos* beautiful, and important, and sacred requisitions of the Chri? tiau law.* There are two modes in which moral obligations are ii** posed in Scripture — by particular precepts, and by gener?».' rules. The one prescribes a duty upon one subject, the othe^ upon very many. The applicability of general rules is nearly similar to that of what is usually called the spirit of the gos pel, the spirit of the moral law : which spirit is of very wido embrace in its application to the purposes of life. " In esti mating the value of a moral rule, we are to have regard not • Matt V. 3a CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS.' ^ 47 only to the particular duty, but the general spirit ; not only to what it directs us to do, but to the character which a com- pliance with its direction is likely to form in us."* In this manner, some particular precepts become, in fact, general rules ; and the duty that results from these rules, from this spirit, is as obligatory as that which is imposed by a specific in- junction. Christianity requires us to maintain universal benev- olence towards mankind ; and he who, in his conduct towards another, disregards this benevolence, is as truly and some- times as flagrantly a violator of the moral law, as if he had transgressed the command, " Thou shalt not steal." This doctrine is indeed recommended by a degree of utility that makes its adoption almost a necessity; because no number of specific precepts would be sufficient for the purposes of moral instruction : so that, if we were destitute of this species of general rules, we should frequently be destitute, so far as external precepts are concerned, of any. It appears by a note to the work which has just been cited, that in the Mussulman code, which proceeds upon the system of a precise rule for a precise question, there have been promulgated seventy-five thousand precepts. I regard the wide practical applicability of some of the Christian precepts as an argument of great wisdom. They impose many duties in few words ; or rather, they convey a great mass of moral instruction within a sen- tence that all may remember and that few can mistake. " All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them,"t is of greater utility in the practice of life, and is applicable to more circumstances, than a hundred rules which presented the exact degree of kindness or assistance that should be afforded in prescribed cases. The Mosaic law, rightly regarded, conveyed many clear expositions of human duty ; yet the quibbling and captious scribes of old found, in the literalities of that law, more plausible grounds for evading its duties, than can be found in the precepts of the Christian Scriptures. There are a few precepts of which the application is so ex- tensive in human affairs, that I would, in conformity with some of the preceding remarks, briefly enquire into their prac- tical obligation. Of these, that which has just been quoted for another purpose, " All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them,"J is perhaps cited and recommended more frequently than any other. The * Evidences of Christianity : p. 2, c. 2. t Matt. vii. 12. } Ibid. 48 PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAT I. difficulty of applying this precept has induced some to reject it as containing a moral maxim which is not sound : but per- haps it will be found, that the deficiency is not in the rule but in the non-applicability of the cases to which it has often been applied. It is not applicable when the act which another would that ice should do to him, is in itself unlawful or adverse to some other portion of the Moral Law. If I seize a thief in the act of picking a pocket, he undoubtedly " would" that I should let him go; and I, if our situations were exchanged, should wish it too. But I am not therefore to release him ; because, since it is a Christian obligation upon the magistrate to punish offenders, the obligation descends to me to secure them for punishment. Besides, in every such case I must do as I would be done unto with respect to all parties concerned — ■ the public as well as the thief. The precept, again, is not applicable when the desire of the second party is such as a Christian cannot lawfully indulge. An idle and profligate man asks me to give him money. It would be wrong to in- dulge such a man's desire, and therefore the precept does not apply. _ , . . ^ The reader will perhaps say ; that a person's duties in such cases are sufficiently obvious without the gravity of illustra- don. Well — but are the principles upon which the duties are ascertained thus obvious ? This is the important point. In he affiiirs of life, many cases arise in which a person has to refer to such principles as these, and in which, if he does not apply the right principles, he will transgress the Christian law. The law appears to be in effect this. Do as you would be done unto, except in those instances in which to act other- wise is permitted bi/ Christianity. Inferior grounds of limi- tation are often applied ; and they are always wrong ; because they always subject the Moral Law to suspension by inferior authorities. To do this, is to reject the authority of the Di- vine Will, and to place this beautiful expression of that Will at the mercy of every man's inclination. " Whether ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."* I have heard of the members of some dinner club who had been recommended to consider this pre- cept, and who, in their discussions over the bottle, thought perhaps that they were arguing soundly when they held lan- guage like this : " Am I, in lifting this glass to my mouth, to do it for the purpose of bringing glory to God ? I^4hat to be my motive in buying a horse or shooting a pheasant ?" From « 1 Cor. X. 31. CHAP. V,] CHRISTIAN DISPEL ATIONS. 49 such moralists much sagacity of discrimination was not to be expected ; and these questions delighted and probably con- vinced the club. The mistake of these persons, and perhaps of some others, is, that they misunderstand the rule. The promotion of the Divine glory is not to be the motive and pur- pose of all our actions, but, having actions to perform, we are so to perform them that this glory shall be advanced. The pi ecept is in effect, Let your actions and the motives of them ho such, that others shall have reason to nonour God :* — and a precept like this is a very sensitive test of the purity of our conduct. I know not whether there is a single rule of Chris- tianity of which the use is so constant and the application so universal. To do as we would be done by, refers to relative duties ; Not to do evil that good may come, refers to particular circumstances : but. To do all things so that the Deity may be honoured, refers to almost every action of a man's life . Happily the Divine glory is thus promoted by some men even in trifling aflfairs — almost whether they eat or drink, or whatsoever thing they do. There is, in truth, scarcely a more efficacious means of honouring the Deity, than by observing a constant Chris- tian manner of conducting our intercourse with men. He who habitually maintains his allegiance to religion and to purity, who is moderate and chastised in all his pursuits, and who always makes the prospects of the future predominate over the temptations of the present, is one of the most efficacious recommenders of goodness — one of the most impressive preachers of righteousness," — and by consequence, one of the most efficient promoters of the glory of God. ^ By a part of Paul's Epistle to the Romans, it appears that he and his coadjutors had been reported to hold the doctrine, that it is lawful "to do evil that good may come."t This re- port he declares is slanderous ; and expresses his reprobation of those who act upon the doctrine, by the short and emphatic declaration — their condemnation is just. This is not critically a prohibition, but it is a prohibition in eflect ; and the manner in which the doctrine is reprobated, induces the belief that it was so flagitious that it needed very little enquiry or thought : in the writer's mind the transition is immediate, from the idea of the doctrine to the punishment of those who adopt it. Now the " evil" which is thus prohibited, is, any thing and all things discordant with the divine will ; so that the unso- phisticated meaning of the rule is, that nothing which is con- * " Let your light so shine before men that they may see youi good ^orks, and glorify your father which is in heaven." — Matt, v 16. t Rom. iii. 8. 60 PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, ANI> [eSSAT J. trary to the Christian law may be done for the sake of attaining a beneficial end. Perhaps the breach of no moral rule is pro- ductive of more mischief than of this . Tliat ' '' the end justifies the means," is a maxim which many, who condemn it as a maxim, adopt in their practice : and in political affairs it is not only habitually adopted, but is indiretutly, if not openly, defended as right. If a senator were to object to some mea- sure of apparent public expediency, that it was not consistent with the moral law, he would probably be laughed at as a fanatic or a fool : yet perhaps some who are flippant with this charge of fanaticism and folly may be in perplexity for a proof. If the expressed will of God is our paramount law, no proof can be brought ; and in truth it is not often that it is candidly attempted. I have not beeoi amongst the least diligent enqui- rers into the moral reasonings of men, but honest and manly reasoning against this portion of Scripture I have never found. Of the rule, " not to do evil that good may came," Dr. Paley says, that it " is, for the most part, a salutary caution." A person might as v/ell say that the rule " not to commit mur- der" is a salutary caution. There is no caution in the matter, but an imperative law. But he proceeds : — " Strictly speak- ing, that cannot be evil from which good comes."* Now let the reader consider : — Paul says, You may not do evil that good may come : Ay, hut, says the philosopher, if good does come, the acts that bring it about are not evil. What the apostle would have said of such a reasoner, I vdll not trust my pen to suppose, "^rhe reader will perceive the foundation of this reasoning. It assumes that good and evil are not to be estimated by the expressions of the Will of God, but by the effects of actions. The question is clearly fundamental. If expediency be the ultimate test of rectitude, Dr. Paley is right ; if the expressions of the Di\'ine Will are the ultimate test, he is wrong. You must sacrifice the one authority or the other. If this Will is the greater, consequences are not : if consequences are the greater, this Will is not. But this question is not now to be discussed : it may however be ob- served that the interpretation which the rule has been thus made to bear, appears to be contradicted by the terms of the rule itself. The rule of Christianity is, evil may not be com- mitted for the purpose of good : the rule of the philosophy is, .Evil may not be committed, except for the purpose of good. Are these precepts identical ? Is there not a fundamental variance, an absolute contrariety between them ? Christianity » Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 2, c. a CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS. 61 does not speak of evil and good as contingent, but as fixed qualities. You cannot convert the one into the other by dis- quisitions about expediency. In morals, there is no philoso- pher's stone that can convert evil into good with a touch. Our labours, so long as the authority of the moral law is acknowledged, will end like those of the physical alchymist : after all our efforts at transmutation, lead will not become gold — evil will not become good. However, there is one subject of satisfaction in considering such reasonings as these. They prove, negatively, the truth which they assail ; for that against which nothing but sophistry can be urged, is undoubtedly true. The simple truth is, that if evil may be done for the sake of good, all the precepts of Scripture which define or prohibit evil are laws no longer ; for that cannot in any rational use of language be called a law in respect of those to whom it is directed, if they are at liberty to neglect it when they think fit. These precepts may be advices, recommendations, " salutary cautions" but they are not laws. They may suggest hints, but they do not impose duties. With respect to the legitimate grounds of exceptions or limitation in the application of this rule, there appear to be few or none. The only question is. What actions are evil ? Which question is to be determined, ultimately, by the Will of God. BENEVOLENCE AS IT IS PROPOSED IN THE CHRISTIAN SCRi:^RES. In enquiring into the great principles of that moral system which the Christian revelation institutes, we discover one remarkable characteristic, one pervading peculiarity by which it is distinguished from every other — the paramount emphasis v/hich it lays upon the exercise of pure Benevolence. It will be found that this preference of " Love" is wise as it is un- exampled, and that no other general principle would effect, with any approach to the same completeness, the best and highest purposes of morality. How easy soever it be for us, to whom the character and obligations of this benevolence are comparatively familiar, to perceive the wisdom of placing it at the foundation of the Moral Law, we are indebted for the capacity not to our own sagaciousness, but to light which has been communicated from heaven. That schoolmaster the law of Moses never taught, and the speculations of philosophy never discovered, that Love was the fulfilment of the Moral Law. Eighteen hundred years ago this doctrine was a new commandment. 52r PATRIARCHAL, MOSAIC, AND [eSSAY I. Love is made the test of the validity of our claims to the Christian character — " By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples."* Again, " — Love one another. He that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Thou shalt not covet ; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour ; therefore Love is the fulfilling of the law."t It is not therefore surprising that after an enu- meration, in another place, of various duties, the same digni- fied apostle says, " Above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.^X The inculcation of this Benevolence is as frequent in the Christian Scriptures as its practical utility is great. He who would look through the volume will find that no topic is so frequently introduced, no obligations so emphatically enforced, no virtue to which the approbation of God is so specially promised. It is the theme of all the " apostolic exhortations, that with which their mo- rality begins and ends, from which all their details and enu- merations set out and into which they return,"^ " He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him."l| More emphatical language cannot be employed. It exalts to the utmost the character of the virtue, and, in effect, promises its possessor the utmost favour and felicity. If then, of Faith, Hope, and Love, Love be the greatest ; if it be by the test of love that our pretensions to Christianity are to be tried ; if all the relative duties of morality are embraced in one word, and that word is Love ; it is obviously needful that, in a book like this, the requisitions of Benevolence should be habitually regarded in the prosecution of its enquiries. And accordingly the reader will sometimes be invited to sacrifice inferior con- siderations to these requisitions, and to give to the law of Love that paramount station in which it has been placed by the authority of God. It is certain that almost every offence against the relative duties, has its origin, if not in the malevolent propensities, at least in those propensities which are incongruous with love. I know not whether it is possible to disregard any one obli- gation that respects the intercourse of man with man, without violating this great Christian law. This universal applica- bility may easily be illustrated by referring to the obligations of Justice, obligations which, in civilized communities, are * J«hn xiii. 35. t Rom. xiii. 9. t Col. iii. 14. 6 Evid. Christianitv. d. 2. c. 2. || 1 John iv. IG. CHAP, v.] CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS. 53 called into operation more frequently than almost any other He who estimates the obligations of justice by a reference to that Benevolence which Christianity prescribes, will form to himself a much more pure and perfect standard than he who refers to the law of the land, to the apprehension of exposure, or to the desire of reputation. There are many ways in which a man can be unjust without censure from the public, and without violating the laws ; but there is no way in which he can be unjust without disregarding Christian benevolence. It is an universal and very sensitive test. He who does re- gard it, who uniformly considers whether his conduct towards another is consonant with pure good will, cannot be volun- tarily unjust ; nor can he who commits injustice do it without the consciousness, if he will reflect, that he is violating the law of Love. That integrity which is founded upon Love, when compared with that which has any other basis, is recom- mended by its honour and dignity as well as by its rectitude. It is more worthy the man as well as the Christian, more beautiful in the eye of infidelity as well as of religion. It were easy, if it were necessary, to show in what manner the law of Benevolence applies to other relative duties, and in what manner, when applied, it purifies and exalts the ful- filment of them. But our present business is with principles rather than with their specific application. It is obvious that the obligations of this Benevolence are not merely prohibitory — directing us to avoid " working ill" to another, but mandatory — requiring us to do him good. That benevolence which is manifested only by doing no evil, is in- deed of a very questionable kind. To abstain from injustice, to abstain from violence, to abstain from slander, is compatible with an extreme deficiency of love. There are many who are neither slanderous, nor ferocious, nor unjust, who have yet very little regard for the benevolence of the gospel. In the illustrations therefore of the obligations of morality, whether ' private or political, it will sometimes become our business to^ state, what this Benevolence requires as well as what it for- bids. The legislator whose laws are contrived only for the detection and punishment of offenders, fulfils but half his duty : if he would conform to the Christian standard, he must pro- vide also for their reformation. 5* 54 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAY I CHAPTER VI. THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION OF THE WILL OF GOD Conscience — Its nature — Its authority — Review of opinions respecting a moral sense — Bishop Butler— Lord Bacon — Lord Shaftesbury — Watts- Voltaire — Locke — Southey — Adam Smith — Paley — Rousseau — Milton — ^Judge Hale — Marcus Antoninus — Epictetus — Seneca — Paul — That every human being possesses a moral law — Pagans — Gradations of light — Prophecy — The immediate communication of the Divine Will perpetual — Of national vices : Infanticide : Duelling — Of savage life. The reader is solicited to approach this subject with that mental seriousness which its nature requires. Whatever be his opinions upon the subject, whether he believes in the reality of such communication or not, he ought not even to think respecting it but with feelings of seriousness. In endeavouring to investigate this reality, it becomes espe- cially needful to distinguish the communication of the Will of God from those mental phenomena with which it has very commonly been intermingled and confounded. The want of this distinction has occasioned a confusion which has been greatly injurious to the cause of truth. It has occasioned great obscurity of opinion respecting divine instruction ; and by associating error with truth, has frequently induced scep- ticism respecting the truth itself. — When an intelligent person perceives that infallible truth or divine authority is described as belonging to the dictates of " Conscience," and when he perceives, as he must perceive, that these dictates are various and sometimes contradictory ; he is in danger of concluding that no unerring and no divine guidance is accorded to man. Upon this serious subject it is therefore peculiarly neces- sary to endeavour to attain distinct ideas, and to employ those words only which convey distinct ideas to other men. The first section of the present chapter will accordingly be devoted to some brief observations respecting the Conscience, its na- ture, and its authority; by which it is hoped the reader will see sufficient reason to distinguish its dictates from that higher- guidance, respecting which it is the object of the present chapter to enquire. Fot a kindred' purpose, it appears requisite to offer a short review of popular and philosophical opinions respecting a Moral Sense. These opinions will be found to have been frequently expressed in great indistinctness and ambiguity of language. The purpose of the writer in referring to these CH\P. VI.] or THE WILL OF tJOD, ' 55 opinions, is to enquire whether they do not generally involve a recognition-:— obscurely perhaps, but still a recognition — of the principle, that God communicates his will to the mind. If they do this, and if they do it without design or conscious- ness, no trifling testimony is afforded to the truth of the prin- ciple : for how should this principle thus secretly recommend itself to the minds pf men, except by the influence of its own evidence ? SECTION I. CONSCIENCE, ITS NATURE AND AUTHORITY. In the attempt to attack distinct notions to the term " Con- science," we have to request the reader not to estimate the accuracy of our observations by the notions which he may have habitually connected with the word. Our disquisition is not about terms but truths. If the observations are in them- selves just, our principal object is attained. The secondary object, that of connecting truth v/ith appropriate terms, is only «o far attainable by a writer, as shall be attained by an uni- form employment of words in determinate senses in his own practice. Men possess notions of right and wrong ; they possess a belief that, under given circumstances, they ought to do one thing or to forbear another. This belief I would call a con- scientious belief. And when such a belief exists in a man's mind in reference to a number of actions, I would call the sum or aggregate of his notions respecting what is right and wrong, his Conscience, To possess notions of right and wrong in human conduct — to be convinced that we ougkj. to do or to forbear an action — implies and supposes a sense of obligation existent in the mind, A man who feels that it is wrong for him to do a thing, possesses a sense of obligation to refrain., Into the origin of this sense of obligation, or how it is induced into the mind, we do not enquire : it is sufficient for our purposfe that it exists ; and there is no reason to doubt that its existence is consequent of the will of God. In most men — perhaps in all — this sense of obligation re- fers, with greater or less distinctness, to the will of a supe- rior being. The impression, however obscure, is, in gene 56 THE IMMEDIATi. COMMUNICATION [eSSAT I. ral, fundamei»rfally this: I must do so or so, because God requires it. It is found that this sense of obhgation is sometimes con- nected, in the minds of separate individuals, with different actions. One man thinks he ought to do a thing from which another thinks he ought »cr forbear. Upon the great questions of morality there is indeed, in general, a congruity of human judgment ; yet subjects do aiise respecting which one man's conscience dictates an act different from that which is dic- tated by another's. It is not therefore essential to a con- scientious judgment of right and wrong, that that judgment should be in strict accordance with the Moral Law. Some men's consciences dictate that which the Moral Law does not enjoin ; and this law enjoins some points which are not enforced by every man's conscience. This is precisely the result which, from the nature of the case, it is reasonable to expect. Of these judgments respecting what is right, with which the sense of obligation becomes from time to time con- nected, some are induced by the instructions or example of others ; some by our own reflection or enquiry ; some per- haps from the written law of revelation ; and some, as we have cause to conclude^ from the direct intimations of the Di- vine Will. It is manifest that if the sense of obligation is sometimes connected with subjects that are proposeid to us merely by the instruction of others, or if the connexion results from the power of association and habit, or from the fallible investiga- tions of our own minds — ^that sense of obligation will be con- nected, in different individuals, with different subjects. So that it may sometimes happen that a nian can say, I con- scientiously think I ought to do a certain action, and yet that his neighbour can say, I conscientiously think the con- trary. " With respect to particular actions, opinion deter- mines whether they are good or ill ; and Conscience approves, or disapproves, in consequence of this determination, whether it be in favour of truth or falsehood."* Such considerations enable us to account for the diversity of the dictates of the conscience in individuals respectively. A person is brought up amongst Catholics, and is taught from his childhood that flesh ought not to be eaten in Lent. The arguments of those around him, or perhaps their authority, satisfy him that what he is taught is truth. The sense of obli- gation thus becomes connected with a refusal to eat flesh in >* Adventurer; No. 91 CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. 57 Lent ; and thenceforth he says that the abstinence is dictated by his conscience. A Protestant youth is taught the con- trary. Argument or authority satisfies him that flesh may lawfully be eaten every day in the year. His sense of obli- gation therefore is not connected with the abstinence ; and thenceforth he says that eating flesh in Lent does not violate his conscience. And so of a multitude of other questions. When therefore a person says, my conscience dictates to me that I ought to perform such an action, he means — or in the use of such language he ought to mean — that the sense of obligation which subsists in his mind is connected with that action ; that, so far as his judgment is enlightened, it is a requisition of the law of God. But not all our opinions respecting morality and religion are derived from education or reasoning. He who. finds in Scripture the precept, " Thou ^halt love thy neighbour as thy- self," derives an opinion respecting the duty of loving others from the discovery of this expression of the Will of God. His sense- of obligation is connected with benevolence to- wards others in consequence of this discovery; or, in other words, his understanding has been informed by the Moral Law, and a new duty is added to those which are dictated by his conscience. Thus it is that Scripture, by informing the judgment, extends the jurisdiction of conscience ; and it is hence, in part, that in those who seriously study the Scrip- tures, the conscience appears so much more vigilant and operative than in inany who do not possess, or do not regard them. Many of the mistakes which education introduces, many of the fallacies to which our own speculations lead us, are corrected by this law. In the case of our Catholic, if a reference to Scripture should convince him that the judgment he has formed respecting abstinence from flesh is not founded on the Law of God, the sense of obligation becomes detached from its subject; and thenceforth his conscience ceases to dictate that he should abstain from flesh in Lent. Yet Scrip- ture does not decide every question respecting human duty, and in some instances individuals judge differently of the de- cisions which Scripture gives. This, again, occasions some diversity in the dictates of the Conscience ; it occasions the sense of obligation to become connected with dissimilar, and possibly incompatible, actions. But another portion of men's judgments respecting moral affairs is derived from immediate intimations of the Divine Will. '(This we must be allowed for the present to assume.) These intimations inform sometimes the judgment ; correct 58 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAY I. its mistakes ; and increase and give distinctness to our know- ledge — thus operating, as the Scriptures operate, to connect the sense of obligation more accurately with those actions which are conformable with the Will of God. It does not, however, follow, by any sort of necessity, that this higher in- struction must correct all the mistakes of the judgment ; that because it imparts some light, that light must be perfect day ; that because it communicates some moral or religious truth, it must communicate all the truths of religion and morality. Nor, again, does it follow that individuals must each receive the same access of knowledge. It is evidently as possible that it should be communicated in different degrees to dif- ferent individuals, as that it should be communicated at all. For which plain reasons we are still to expect, what in fact we find, that although the judgment receives light from a superhuman intelligence, the degree of that light varies in in- dividuals ; and that the sense of obligation is connected with fewer subjects, and attended with less accuracy, in the minds of some men than of others. With respect to the authority which properly belongs to Conscience as a director of individual conduct, it appears manifest, ahke from reason and from Scripture, that it is great. When a man believes, upon due deliberation, that a certain action is right, that action is right to him. And this is true, \whether the action be or be not required of mankind by the Moral Law.* The fact that in his mind the sense of obligation attaches to the act, and that he has duly deliberated upon the accuracy of his judgment, makes the dictate of his Conscience .upon that subject an authoritativa dictate. The individual is to be held guilty if he violates his Conscience — if he does one thing, whilst his sense of obligation is directed to its- con- trary. Nor, if his judgment should not be accurately informed, if his sense of obligation should not be connected with a proper subject, is the guilt of violating his Conscience taken away. Were it otherwise, a person might be held virtuous for acting in opposition to his apprehensions of duty ; or guilty, for doing what he believed to be right. " It is happy for us that our title to the character of virtuous beings, depends not upon the justness of our opinions or the constant objective rectitude of all we do, but upon the conformity of our actions to the sin- cere convictions of our minds. "f Dr. Fumeaux says, " To secure the favour of God and the rewards of true religion, we * " By Conscience all men are restrained from intentional ill — it infal- libly directs us to avoid guilt, but is not intended to secure us from error." —Advent. No. 91. t Dr. Price. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. 59 must follow our own consciences and judgments according to the best light we can attain."* And I am especially disposed to add the testimony of Sir William Temple, because he re- cognizes the doctrine which has just been advanced, that our judgments are enlightened by superhuman agency. " The way to our future happiness must bo left, at last, to the ifn- pressions made upon every marCs belief and conscience either by natural or supernatural arguments and means."! — Accord- ingly there appears no reason to doubt that some will stand convicted in the sight of the Omniscient Judge, for actions which his Moral Law has not forbidden ; and that some may be uncondemned for actions which that law does not allow.. The distinction here is the same as that to which we have before had occasion to allude, between the desert of the agent and the quality of the act. Of this distinction an illustration is contained in Isaiah x. It was the divine will that a cer- tain specific course of action should be pursued in punishing^ the Israelites, For the performance of this, the king of As- syria was employed : — " I will give him a charge to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them downi like the mire of the streets." This charge the Assyrian monarch ful- filled ; he did the will of God ; but then his intention was , criminal ; he " meant not so :" and therefore, when the " whofe work" is performed, " I will punish," says the Almighty, " the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks." But it was said that these principles respecting the author- ity of Conscience were recognized in Scripture. " One be- lieveth that he may eat all things : another who is weak eateth herbs. One man esteemeth one day above another : another esteemeth every day alike." Here, then, are differences, nay, contrarieties of conscientious judgments. And what are the parties directed severally to do ? — " Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind ;" that is, let the full persua- sion of his own mind be every man's rule of action. The situation of these parties was, that one perceived the truth upon the subject, and the other did not ; that in one the sense of obligation was connected with an accmrate, in the other with an inaccurate, opinion. Thus, again : — " / know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing un- clean of itself ;" therefore, absolutely speaking, it is lawful to eat all things ; " but to him that esteemeth any thing to be un- clean, to him it is unclean." The question is not, whether • Essay on .Toleration, p. 8. t Works : v. 1. p. 55. f. 1740. GO THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAY I his judgment was correct, but what that judgment actually was. To the doubter, the uncleanness, that is, the sin of eat- ing, was certain, though the act was right. Again : "All things indeed are pure ; but it is evil for that man who eateth with offence." And, again, as a general rule : " He that doubteth is condemned if he eat, because he eateth not of faith ; for whatsoever is not of faith is sin,"* And here we possess a sufficient answer to those who affect to make light of the authority of Conscience, and ex- claim, " Every man pleads his conscientious opinions, and that he is bound in conscience to do this or that ; and yet his neighbour makes the same plea and urges the same obligation to do just the contrary. But what then? These persons' judgments differed : that we might expect, for they are falli- ble ; but their sense of obligation was, in each case, really attached to its subject, and was in each case authoritative. One observation remains ; that although a man ought to make his conduct conform to his conscience, yet he may sometimes justly be held crirninal for the errors of his opinion. Men often judge amis> respecting their duties in consequence of their own faults : some take little pains to ascertain the truth ; some voluntarily exclude knowledge ; and most men would possess more accurate perceptions of the Moral Law if^ they sufficiently endeavoured to obtain them. And, there- fore, although a man may not be punished for a given act which he ignorantly supposes to be lawful, he may be pun- ished -for that ignorance in which his supposition originates. Which consideration may perhaps account for the expression, that he who ignorantly failed to do his master's will " shall be beaten with few stripes." There is a degree of wicked- ness, to the agents of which God at length " sends strong de- lusion" that they may " believe a lie." In this state of strong delusion they perhaps may, without violating any sense of obligation, do many wicked actions. The principles which have been here delivered would lead us to suppose that the punishment which awaits such men will have respect rathei to that intensity of wickedness of which delusion was the consequence, than to those particular acts which they might ignorantly commit under the influence of the delusion itself. This observation is offered to the reader because some writers have obscured the present subject by speculating upon the moral deserts of those desperately bad men, who occasionally have committed atrocious acts under the notion that they were doing right. * Rom. xiv. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. 61 Let us then, when we direct our serious enquiry to the Immediate Communication of the Divine Will, carefully dis- tinguish that Communication from the dictates of the con- science. They are separate and distinct considerations. It is obvious that those positions which some persons advance'; — " Conscience is our infallible guide," — " Conscience is the voice of the Deity," &lc., are wholly improper and inadmissi- ble. The term may indeed have been employed synonymously for the voice of God : but this ought never to be done. It is to induce confusion of language respecting a subject which ought always to be distinctly exhibited; and the necessity for avoiding ambiguity is so much the greater, as the conse- quences of that ambiguity are more serious : it is obvious that, on these subjects, inaccuracy of language gives rise to serious error of opinion. , REVIEW OF OPINIONS RESPECTING A MORAL SfeNSE. The purpose for which this brief review is offered to the reader, is explained in very few words. It is to enquire, by a reference to the written opinions of rdany persons, whether they do not agree in asserting that our Cre£(,tor communicated some portions of his Moral Law immediately to the humaii mind. These opinions are frequently delivered, as the reader will presently discover, in great ambiguity of language ; fbul in the midst of this ambiguity there appears to exist one per- vading truth — a truth in testimony to which these opinions are not the less satisfactory because, in some instances, the testimony is undesigned. The reader is requested to observe, as he passes on, whether many of the difficulties which en- quirers have found or made, are not solved by the supposition of a divine communication, and whether they can be solved by any other. " The Author of nature has much better furnished us for a virtuous conduct than our moralists seem to imagine, by al- most as quick and powerful instructions as we have for the preservation of our bodies."* " It is manifest, great part of common language and of common behaviour over the world, is formed upon the sup- position of a moral faculty, whether called conscience, moral reason, moral sense, or divine reason ; whether considered as a sentiment of the understanding, or as a perception of the heart, or, which seems the truth, as including both."t Is it * Dr. Hutcheion : Enquiry concerning Moral Good and Evil, t Bishop Butler : Enquiry on Virtue. 6 62 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAY 1. not remarkable that for a " faculty" so well known " over the world," even a name has not been found, and that a Christian bishop accumulates a multiplicity of ambiguous epithets to explain his meaning ? Bishop Butler says again of Conscience, " To preside and govern, from the very economy and consti- tution of man, belongs to it. This faculty was placed within to be our proper governor, to direct and regulate all undue principles, passions, and motives of action. — It carries its own authority with it, that it is our natural guide, the guide assigned us by the Author of our nature." Would it have been unreasonable to conclude, that there was at least some connexion between this reprover of " all undue principles, passions, and motives," and that law of which the New Tes- tament speaks, " All things that are reproved are made mani- fest by the light ?"* Blair says, " Conscience is felt to act as the delegate of an invisible Ruler ;" — " Conscience is the guide, or the enlight- ening or directing principle of our conduct."! In this in- stance, as in many others, Conscience appears to be used in an indeterminate sense. Conscience is not an enlightening principle, but a principle which is enlightened. It is not a legislator, but a repository of statutes. Yet the reader will perceive the fundamental truth, that man is in fact illuminated, and illuminated by an invisible Ruler. In the thirteenth ser- mon there is an expression more distinct : " God has invested Conscience with authority to promulgate his laws." It is obvious that the Divine Being must have communicated his laws, before they could have been promulgated by Conscience. In accordance with which the author says in another place, *' Under the tuition of God let us put ourselves." — " A Hea- venly Conductor vouchsafes his aid." — " Divine light de- scends to guide our steps. "J It were to be wished that such sentiments were not obscured by propositions like these : " A sense of right and wrong in conduct, or of moral good and evil, belongs to human nature^ — " Such sentiments are coeval ivith human nature ; for they are the remains of a law which was originally written in our heart. "^ I do not know whether the reader will be able to perceive with distinctness the ideas of Lord Bacon and of Dr. Rush in the following quotations, but I think he will perceive that they involve a recognition — obscure and indeterminate, but still a recognition— of the doctrine, that the Deity communi- cates his laws to the minds of men. Dr. Rush says, " It • Eph. V. 13. t Sermon*. X Sermon 7. § Sermon 13. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. 63 would seem as if the Supreme Being had preserved the Moral Faculty in man from the ruins of his fall, on purpose to guide him back again to paradise ; and at the same time had consti- tuted the Conscience, both in man and fallen spirits, a kind of royalty in his moral empire, on purpose to show his property in all intelligent creatures, and their original resemblance to himself." And Lord Bacon says, " The light of nature not only shines upon the human mind through the medium of a ra- tional faculty, but by an internal instinct according to the law of conscience, which is a sparkle of the purity of man's first estate." " The faculties of our minds are so formed by nature, that as soon as we begin to reason, we may also begin, in some measure to distinguish good from evil." — " We prefer virtue to vice on account of the seeds planted in us."* The following is not the less worthy notice because it is from the pen of Lord Shaftesbury : " Sense of right and wrong, being as natural to us as natural affection itself, and being a first principle in our constitution and make, there is no speculation, opinion, persuasion, or belief, which is capa- ble, immediately or directly, to exclude or destroy it."t Sen- timents such as these are very commonly expressed ; and what do they imply ? If sense of right and wrong is natural to us, it is because He who created us has placed it in our minds. The conclusion too is inevitable, that this sense must indicate the Divine Law by which right and wrong are discriminated. Now we do not say that these sentiments are absolutely just, or that a sense of right and wrong is strictly "natural" to man, but we say that the sentiments involve the supposition of some mode of Divine Guidance — some mode in which the Moral Law of God, or a part of it, is communicated by him to mankind. And if this be indeed true, it may surely, with all reason, be asked, why we should not assent to the reality of that mode of communication, of which, as we shall hereafter see, Christianity asserts the existence ? " The first principles of morals are the immediate dictates of the moral faculty." — " By the moral faculty, or conscience, solely, we have the original conception of right and wrong." ^— " It is evident that this principle has, from its nature, au- thority to direct and determine with regard to our conduct ; to judge, to acquit or condemn, and even to punish ; an author- ity which belongs to no other principle of the human mind." • John Le Clerc. t Characteristics. 64 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAY t. — " The Supreme Being has given us this light within to direct our moral conduct." — " It is the candle of the Ivord, set up within us to guide our steps."* This is almost the language of Christianity, " That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."! I do not mean to affirm that the author of the essays speaks exclusively of the same Divine Guidance as the apostle ; but surely, if Conscience operates as such a " light within," as " the candle of the Lord," it can require no reasoning to convince us that it is illuminated from heaven. The indistinctness of notions _ which such language exhibits, appears to arise from inaccu- rate views of the nature of Conscience. The writer does not distinguish between the recipient and the source ; between the enlightened principle and the enlightening beam. The apostle speaks only of the last ; the uninspired enquirer speaks, without discrimination, of both ; — and hence the am- biguity. Dr. Beattie appears to maintain the same general principle, the same essential truth, under other phraseology. Common sense, he says, is " that power of the mind which perceives truth or commands belief by an instantaneous, instinctive, and irresistible impulse, neither derived from education nor from habit, but from nature.''^ — " Every man may find the evidence of moral science in his own breast." An " instinctive" per- ception of truth derived from nature, must necessarily be tan- ^tamount to a power of perception imparted by the Deity. I " Whatsoever nature does, God does," says Seneca : and Dr I Beattie himself explains his own meaning — " The dictates l^of nature, that is, the voice of God."J We have no concern with the justness of Beattie's philosophy, intellectual or moral, but the reader will perceive the recognition of the truth, or of something like the truth, to which we have so often referred. " What is the power within us that perceives the distinc- tions of right and wrong 1 My answer is. The Understanding." — " Of every thought, sentiment, and subject, the Understand- ing is the natural and ultimate judge." This is the language of Dr. Price, but he does not seem wholly satisfied with his own definition. He says, " The truth seems to be, that in contemplating the actions of moral agents, we have both a perception of the understanding, and a feeling of the heart." And again, " It is to intuition that we owe our moral ideas." He speaks too of "the virtuous principle," — "the inward spring of virtue ; and says, " Goodness is the power of re- * Dr. Reid : Essays on the Powers of the Human Mind, Essay 3. c. 8. &,c. t John L 9. X Essay on Truth. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. 65 fleclion, raised to its due seat of direction and sovereignty m the mind." These various expressions do not appear to re- present very distinct notions, but after the " Understanding" has been stated to be the ultimate judge, we are presented with the idea of Conscience, and then we perceive in Dr. Price's language, that which we find in the language of so many others, " Whatever our Consciences dictate to us, that //e, (the Deity,) commands more evidently and undeniably, than if by a voice from heaven we had been called upon to do it.''''* Dr. Watts says that the mind " contains in it the plain and general principles of morality, not explicitly as propositions, but only as native principles, by which it judges, and cannot but judge, virtue to be fit and vice unfit."! And Dr. Cudworth : " The anticipations of morality do not spring merely from notional ideas, or from certain rules or propositions arbitrarily printed upon the soul as upon a book, but from some other more inward and vital principle in intel- lectual beings as such, whereby they have a natural determi- nation in them to do some things and to avoid others. "J Voltaire in his Commentary on Beccaria§ says, " I call natural laws those which nature dictates, in all ages, to all m£n, for the maintenance of that Justice which she, (say what they will of her,) hath implanted in our hearts." " And this law is that innate sense of right and wrong, of virtue and vice, which every man carries in his own bosom." — " These impressions, operating on the mind of man, be- speak a law written on his hearth"" — " This secret sense of right and wrong, for wise purposes so deeply implanted by our Creator on the human mind, has the nature, force, and effect of a law."|i Locke : " The Divine law, that law which God has set to the actions of men, whether promulgated to them by the light of nature or the voice of revelation, is the measure of sin and duty. That God has given a rule whereby men should gov- ern themselves, I think there is nobody so brutish as to deny."T[ The reader should remark, that revelation and " the light of nature" are here represented as being jointly and equally the law of God. " Actions, then, instead of being tried by the eternal stand- ard of right and wrong, on which the unsophisticated heart unerringly pronounces, were judged by the rules of a perni- * Review of Principal Questions in Morals. t Philosophical Essays. X Eternal and Immutable Morality. ij Crimes and Punishments, Com. c. 14. II Dr. Shepherd's Discourse on Future Existence. H Essay, b. 2, c. 28. 6* 66 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAY I. cious casuistry."* This may not be absolutely true ; but there must be some truth which it is like, or such a proposi- tion would not be advanced. Who ever thought of attribu- ting to the unsophisticated heart the power of unerringly pronouncing on questions o{ prudence ? Yet questions of right and wrong are not, in their own nature, more easily solved than those of prudence. " Boys do not listen to sermons. They need not be told what is right ; like men, they all know their duty sujjiciently ; the grand difficulty is to practise it."t Neither may this be true ; and it is not true. But upon what species of knowledge would any writer think of affirming that boys need not be in- structed, except upon the single species, the knowledge of duty ? And hov/ should they know this without instruction, unless their Creator has taught them ? Dr. Rush exhibits the same views in a more determinate form : " Happily for the human race, the intimations of duty and the road to happiness are not left to the slow operations or doubtful inductions of reason. It is worthy of notice, that while second thoughts are best in matters of judgment, first thoughts are always to be preferred in matters that relate to morality .''''X Adam Smith : " It is altogether absurd and unintelligible, to suppose that the first perceptions of right and wrong can be derived from reason. These first perceptions cannot be the object of reason, but of immediate sense and deling." — " Though man has been rendered the immediate judge of man- kind, an appeal lies from his senteiice to a much higher tri- bunal, to the tribunal of their own Consciences, to that of the man within the breast, the great judge and arbiter of their conduct." In some cases in which censure is violently poured upon us, the judgments of the man within, are, however, much shaken in the steadiness and firmness of their decision. " In such cases, this demigod within the breast appears, like the demigods of the poets, though partly of immortal, yet, partly, too, of mortal extraction." Our moral faculties " were set up within us to be the supreme arbiters of all our actions." " The rules which they prescribe are to be regarded as the com- mands and laws of the Deity, promulgated by those' vice- gerents which he has thus set up within us." " Some ques- tions must be left altogether to the decision of the man within the breast." And let the reader mark w^hat follows : " If we " listen with diligent and reverential attention to what he sug- * Dr. Southey : Book of the Church, xi. 10. t West. Rev. No. 1. t Influence of Physical Causes on the Moral Faculty. CHAP VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD, 67 gests to US, his voice will never deceive us. We shall stand in no need of casuistic rules to direct our conduct." How wonderful that such a man, who uses almost the language of Scripture, appears not even to have thought of the truth — • " the Anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you!" for he does not appear to have thought of it. He intimates that this vice- gerent of God, this undeceiving teacher to whom we are to listen with reverential attention, is some " contrivance or mechanism within ;" and says that to examine what contriv- ance or mechanism it is, " is a mere matter of philosophical curiosity."* A matter of philosophical curiosity, Dr. Paley seems to have thought a kindred enquiry to be. He discusses the question, whether there is such a thing as a Moral Sense or not ; and thus sums up the argument : " Upon the whole it seems to me, either that there exist no such instincts as compose what is called the moral sense, or that they are not now to be dis- tinguished from prejudices and habits." — " This celebrated question therefore becomes, in our system, a question of pure curiosity ; and as such, we dismiss it to the determination of those who are more inquisitive than we are concerned to be, about the natural history and constitution of the human spe- cies."! But in another work, a work in which he did not bind himself to the support of a philosophical system, he holds other language : " Conscience, our own Conscience, is to be our guide in all things." " It is through the whisperings of Conscience that the Spirit speaks. If men are wilfully deaf to their Consciences they cannot hear the Spirit. If, hearing, if being compelled to hear the remonstrances of Conscience, they nevertheless decide and resolve and determine to go against them, then they grieve, then they defy, then they do despite to, the Spirit of God." " Is it superstition 1 Is it not on the contrary a just and reasonable piety to implore of God the guidance of his Holy Spirit, when we have any thing of great importance to decide upon or undertake ?" — " It being confessed that we cannot ordinarily distinguish, at the time, the suggestions of the Spirit from the operations of our minds, it may be asked, How are we to listen to them 1 The answer is, by attending, universally, to the admonitions within us. "J The tendency of these quotations to enforce our general ar- gument, is plain and powerful. But the reader should notice here another and a very interesting consideration. Paley * Theory of Mor. Sent. t Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 1, c. 5. t Sermons. 68 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION. [-ESSAY I. says, " Our own Conscience is to be our guide in all things.''^ — We are to attend universally/ to the admonitions within us. Now he writes a book of moral philosophy, that is, a book that shall " teach men their duty and the reasons of it," and from this book he absolutely excludes this law which men should universally obey, this law which should be their " guide in all things." " Conscience, Conscience," exclaims Rousseau in his Pen- sees, " Divine Instinct, Immortal and Heavenly Voice, sure Guide of a being ignorant and limited but intelligent and free, infallible Judge of good and evil, by which man is made like unto God!" Here are attributes which, if they be justly assigned, certainly cannot belong to humanity ; or if they do belong to humanity, an apostle certainly could not be accurate when he said that in us, that is in our flesh, " dwelleth no good thingP Another observation of Rousseau's is worth transcrib- ing : " Our own conscience is the most enlightened philo- sopher. There is no need to be acquainted with Tully's Offices to make a man of probity ; and perhaps the most vir- tuous woman in the world is the least acquainted with the de finition of virtue." "And I will place within them as a guide, My Umpire, Conscience ; whom if they will near Light after light, well used, they shall attain."* This is the language of Milton ; and we have thus his tes- timony added to the many, that God has placed within us an Umpire which shall pronounce. His own laws in our hearts. Thus in his " Christian Doctrine" more clearly : " They can lay claim to nothing more than human powers, assisted by that spiritual illumination which is common to ally] Judge Hale : " Any man that sincerely and truly fears Al- mighty God, and calls and relies upon him for his direction, has it as really as a son has the counsel and direction of his father ; and though the voice be not audible nor discernible by sense, yet it is equally as real as if a man heard a voice saying, " This is the way, walk in it." The sentiments of the ancient philosophers, &c., should not be forgotten, and the rather because their language is fre- quently much more distinct and satisfactory than that of the refined enquirers of the present day. Marcus Antoninus : " He who is well disposed will do every thing dictated by the divinity — a particle or portion of Himself, which God has given to each as a guide and a leader. "\ * Par. Lost, iii. 194. t P. 81. \ Lib. 5, Sect. 27. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. ' 69 Aristotle : " The mind of man hath a near affinity to God : there is a divine ruler in him" — Phitarch : " The light of truth is a law, not written in tables or books but dwelling in the mind, always as a living rule which never permits the soul to be destitute of an interior guide." — Hieron says that the universal light, shining in the Conscience, is " a domestic God, a God within the hearts and souls of men." — Epictetus : 1" God has assigned to each man a director, his own good ge- nius, a guardian whose vigilance no slumbers interrupt, and whom no false reasonings can deceive. So that when you have shut your door, say not that you are alone, for your God is within. — What need have you of outward light to discover what is done, or to light to good actions, who have God or that genius or divine principle for your light ?"* Such citations might be greatly multiplied ; but one more must suffice. Sen- eca says, " We find felicity — in a pure and untainted mind, which if it were not holy were not fit to entertain the Deity.'''' How like the words of an apostle ! — " If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy ; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are."t The philosopher again : •' There is a holy spirit in us ;"J and again the apostle : " Know ye not that" the " Spirit of God dwelleth in you ?"§ Now respecting the various opinions which have been laid before the reader, there is one observation that will generally apply — that they unite in assigning certain important attributes or operations to some principle or power existent in the hu- man mind. They affirm that this principle or power possesses wisdom to direct us aright— that its directions are given in- stantaneously as the individual needs them — ^that it is insepa- rably attended with unquestionable authority to command. That such a principle or power does, therefore, actually exist, can need little further proof; for a concurrent judgment upon a question of personal experience cannot surely be incorrect. To say that individuals express their notions of this principle or power by various phraseology, that they attribute to it dif- ferent degrees of superhuman intelligence, or that they refer for its origin to contradictory causes, does not affect the gen- eral argument. The great point for our attention is, not the designation or the supposed origin of this guide, but its attri- butes ; and these attributes appear to be divine. * Lib. 1, c. 14. t 1 Cor. iii. 17. - t De Benef. c. 17, &c. § 1 Cor. iii. 16. 70 THB IMMEDIATE COMMUXICATION [eSSAT I. THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION OF THE WILL OP GOD. I. That every reasonable human being is a moral agent^ — that is, that every such human being is responsible to- God, no one perhaps denies. There can be no responsibility where there is no knowledge : " Where there is no law there is no transgression." So then every human being possesses, or is furnished with, moral knowledge and a moral law. " If we admit that mankind, without an outward revelation, are never- theless sinners, we must also admit that mankind, without siich a revelation, are nevertheless in possession of the law of God."* Whence then do they obtain it ? — a question to which but one answer can be given ; from the Creator himself. It ap- pears therefore to be almost demonstratively shown, that God does communicate his will immediately to the minds of those who have no access to the external expression of it. It is always to be remembered that, as the majority of mankind do not possess the written communication of the will of God, the question, as it respects them, is between an Immediate Com- munication and none ; between such a communication, and the denial of their responsibility in a future state ; between such a communication, and the reducing them to the condition of the beasts that perish. II. No one perhaps will imagine that this argument is con- fined to countries which the external light oLChristianity has not reached. " Whoever expects to find in the Scriptures a specific direction for every moral doubt that arises, looks for more than he will meet with ;"t so that even in Christian countries there exists some portion of that necessity for other guidance, which has been seen to exist in respect to pagans. Thus Adam Smith says that there are some questions which it " is perhaps altogether impossible to determine by any pre- cise rules," and that they " must be left altogether to the de- cision of the man within the breast." — But, indeed, when we spaak of living in Christian countries, and of having access to the external revelation, we are likely to mislead ourselves with respect to the actual condition of " Christian" people. Persons talk of possessing the Bible, as if every one who lived in a protestant country had a Bible in his pocket and could read it. But there are thousands, perhaps millions, in Christian and in protestant countries, who know very little of * Gurney: Essays on Christianity, p. 516. t Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 1, c. 4. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OF GOD. 71 what Christianity enjoins. They probably do not possess the Scriptures, or if they do, probably cannot read them. What they do know they learn from others — from others who may be little solicitous to teach them, or to teach them aright. Such persons therefore are, to a considerable extent, practi- cally in the same situation as those who have not heard of Christianity, and there is therefore to them a corresponding need of a direct communication of knowledge from heaven. But if we see the need of such knowledge extending itself thus far, who will call in question the doctrine, that it is im- parted to the whole human race ? These are offered as considerations involving an antecedent probability of the truth of our argument. The reader is not required to give his assent to it as to a dogma of which he can discover neither the reason nor the object. Here is pro- bability very strong ; here is usefulness very manifest, and very great ; — so that the mind may reasonably be open to the recep- tion of evidence, whatever Truth that evidence shall establish. If the written revelation were silent respecting the imme- diate communication of the Divine Will, that silence might perhaps rightly be regarded as conclusive evidence that it is not conveyed ; because it is so intimately connected with the purposes to which that revelation is directed, that scarcely any other explanation could be given of its silence than that " the communication did not exist. That the Scriptures declare that God has communicated light and knowledge to some men by the immediate exertion of his own agency, admits not of dispute : but this it is obvious is not sufficient for our purpose ; and it is in the belief that they declare that God imparts some knowledge to all men, that we thus appeal to their testimony. .., Now here the reader should especially observe, that where the Christian Scriptures speak of the existence and influence of the Divine Spirit on the mind, they commonly speak of its higher operations ; not of its office as a moral guide, but as a purifier, and sanctifier, and comforter of the soul. They speak of it in reference to its sacred and awful operations in connexion with human salvation : and thus it happens that very many citations which, if we were writing an essay on religion, would be perfectly appropriate, do not possess that distinct and palpable application to an argument, which goes no further than to affirm that it is a moral guide. And yet it may most reasonably be remarked, that if it has pleased the Universal Parent thus, and for these awful purposes, to visit the minds of those who are obedie v. t his power — he will 72 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [esSAY I. not suffer them to be destitute of a moral guidance. The less must be supposed to be involved in the greater. Our argument does not respect the degrees of illumination which may be possessed, respectively, by individuals,* or in different ages of the world. There were motives, easily con- ceived, for imparting a greater degree of light and of power at the introduction of Christianity than in the present day ; accordingly there are many expressions in the New Testa- ment which speak of high degrees of light and power, and which, however they may affirm the general existence of a Divine Guidance, are not descriptive of the general nor of the present condition of mankind. Nevertheless, if the records of Christianity, in describing these greater " gifts," inform us that a gift, similar in its nature but without specification of its amount, is imparted to all men, it is sufficient. Although it is one thing for the Creator to impart a general capacity to distinguish right from wrong, and another to impart miraculous power ; one thing to inform his accountable creature that lying is evil, and another to enable him to cure a leprosy ; yet this affords no reason to deny that the nature of the gift is not the same, or that both are not divine. " The degree of light may vary according as one man has a greater measure than ano- ther. But the light of an apostle is not one thing and the light of the heathen another thing, distinct in principle. They differ only in degree of power, distinctness, and splen- dour of manifestation."! So early as Gen. vi. there is a distinct declaration of the moral operation of the Deity on the human mind ; not upon the pious and the good, but upon those who were desperately wicked, so that even " every imagination of the thoughts of their heart was only evil continually." — " My spirit shall not always strive with man." Upon this passage a good and in- telligent man writes thus ; " Surely, if His spirit had striven with them until that time, until they were so desperately wicked, and wholly corrupted, that not only some, but every imagination of their hearts was evil, yes, only evil, and that * I am disposed to offer a simple testimony to what I believe to be a truth ; that even in the present day, the divine illumination and power is Bometimes imparted to individuals in a degree much greater than is neces- sary for the purposes of mere moral direction ; that on subjects connected with their own personal condition or that of others, light is sometimes imparted in greater brightness and splendour than is ordinarily enjoyed by mankind, or than is necessary for our ordinary direction in life. t Hancock : Essay on Instinct, &c., p. 2, c. 7, s. 1. I take this oppor- timity of acknowledging the obligations I am under to this work, for many of the " Opinions" which are cited in the last section. CRAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OP GOD. 73 continually, we may well believe the express Scripture asser- tion, that * a manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.' "* Respecting some of the prophetical passages in the He- brew Scriptures, it may be observed that there appears a want of complete adaptation to the immediate purpose of our argument, because they speak of that, prospectively, which our argument assumes to be true retrospectively also. " After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts ;"t from which the reader may possibly conclude that before those days no such inter- nal law was imparted. Yet the preceding paragraph might assure him of the contrary, and that the prophet indicated an increase rather than a commencement of internal guidance. Under any supposition it does not affect the argument as it respects the present condition of the human race ; for the pro- phecy is twice quoted in the Christian Scriptures, and is ex- pressly stated to be fulfilled. Once the prophecy is quoted almost at length, and in the other instance the important clause is retained, " I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them."J " And all thy children," says Isaiah, " shall be taught of the Lord." Christ himself quotes this passage in illustrating the nature of his own religion : " It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God."§ " Thine eyes shall see thy teachers : and thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying. This is the way, walk ye in it ; when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to theleft."|| The Christian Scriptures, if they be not more explicit, are more abundant in their testimony. Paul addresses the ^^ foolish Galatians" The reader should observe their character ; for some Christians who acknowledge the Divine influence on the minds of eminently good men, are disposed to question it in reference to others. These foolish Galatians had turned again to " weak and beggarly elements," and their dignified instructor was afraid of them, lest he had bestowed upon them labour in vain. Nevertheless, to them he makes the solemn declaration, " God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts. "TT John writes a General Epistle, an epistle which was ad- dressed, of course, to a great variety of characters, of whom some, it is probable, possessed little more of the new religion • Job Spoil's Journal, c. 1. t Jer. xxxi.33, X Heb. viii. 10 ; and x. 16. i) John vi. 45. II Isa. xxx. 20, 21. IT Gal. iy. p. 7 74 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION [eSSAT I. than the name. The apostle writes — " Hereby we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given us."* The solemn declarations which follow are addressed to large numbers of recent converts^ of converts whom the writer had been severely reproving for improprieties of conduct, for unchristian contentions, and even for the greater faults : " Ye are the^ temple of the living God, as God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them." — " What, know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you t";t " Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you ? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy ; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are. "J And with respect to the moral operations of this sacred power : — " As touching brotherly love, ye need not that I write Unto you : for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another ;"<^ that is, taught a duty of morality . Thus also :— " The Grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodli- ness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world ;^'[1 or in other words, teach- ing all men moral laws — -laws both mandatory and prohibitory, teaching both what to do and what to avoid. And very distinctly : — "The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal."T[ " A Light to lighten the Gentiles."** " I am the Light of the world."tt " The true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."tt " When the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these having not the law are a law unto themselves, which show the work of the law writ- ten in their hearts. "'^^ — written, it may be asked by whom but by that Being who said, " I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts ?"i||| To such evidence from the written revelation, I know of no other objection which can be urged than the supposition that this Divine instruction, though existing eighteen hundred years ago, does not exist now. To which it appears sufii- cient to reply, that it existed not only eighteen hundred years ago, but before the period of tlie Deluge ; and that the terms in which the Scriptures speak of it are incompatible with the * 1 John iii. 24. t 1 Cor. vi. 19. M Cor. iii. 16. § 1 Thess. iv. 9. II Tit. ii. 11, 12. IT 1 Cor. xii. 7. ** Luke ii. 32. +t John viii. 12. X\ John i. 9. §§ Rom. ii. 14. |||| Jer. xxxi. 33. CHAP. VI.] THE WILL OF GOD. 75 supposition of a temporary duration : " all taught of God :" " in you all :" " hath appeared unto all men :" " given to every man :" " every man that cometh into the world." Besides, there is not the most remote indication in the Christian Scrip- tures that this instruction would not be perpetual ; and their silence on such a subject, a subject involving the most sacred privileges of our race, must surely be regarded as positive evidence that this instruction would be accorded to us for ever. How clear soever appears to be the evidence of reason, that man, being universally a moral and accountable agent, must be possessed, universally, of a moral law ; and how dis- tinct soever the testimony of revelation, that he does univer- sally possess it — objections are still urged against its existence. Of these, perhaps the most popular are those which are founded upon the varying dictates of the " Conscience." If the view which we have taken of the nature and operations of the conscience be just, these objections will have little weight. That the ilictates of the conscience should vary in individuals respectively, is precisely what, from the circum- stances of the case, is to be expected ; but this variation does not impeach the existence of that purer ray which, whether in less or greater brightness, irradiates the heart of man. I am, however, disposed here to notice the objections* that may be founded upon national derelictions of portions of the Moral Law. " There is," says Locke, " scarce that principle of morality to be named, or rule of virtue to be thought on, which is not somewhere or other slighted and condemned by the general fashion of whole societies of men, governed by practical opinions and rules of living quite opposite to others." — And Paley : " There is scarcely a single vice which, in some age or country of the world, has not been countenanced by public opinion : in one country it is esteemed an office of piety in children to sustain their aged parents, in another to dispatch them out of the way : suicide in one age of the world has been heroism, in another felony ; theft which is punished by most laws, by the laws of Sparta was not un- frequently rewarded : you shall hear duelling alternately re- probated and applauded according to the sex, age, or station of the person you converse with : the forgiveness of injuries and insults is accounted by one sort of people magnanimity, hy another, meanness."! * Not urged specifically, perhaps, agaiust the Divine Guidance ; but ihey will equally afford an illustration of the truth, t Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 1. c. 5. 76 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATIOPT [esSAT I. • ^ Upon all which 1 observe, that to whatever purpose thes© reasoninsrs are directed, they are defective in an essential point. They show us indeed what the external actions of men have been, but give no proof that these actions were con- formable with the secret internal judgment : and this last is the only important point. That a rule of virtue is " slighted and condemned by the general fashion^^ is no sort of evidence that those who joined in this general fashion did not still know that it was a rule of virtue. There are many duties which, in the present day, are slighted by the general fashion, and yet no man will stand up and say that they are not duties. " There is scarcely a single vice which has not been coun- I ' tenanced by public opinion ;" but where is the proof that il has been approved by private and secret judgment ? There is a great deal of difference between those sentiments which men seem to entertain respecting their duties when they give expression to "public opinion," and when they rest their heads on their pillows in calm reflection. " Suicide in one age of the world has been heroism, in another felony ;" but it is not every action which a man says is heroic, that he be- lieves is right. " Forgiveness of injuries and insults is ac-" counted by one sort of people magnanimity, by another, mean- ness ;" and yet they who thus vulgarly employ the word meanness, do not imagine that forbearance and placability are really wrong. I have met with an example which serves to confirm me in the judgment, that public notions or rather public actions are a very equivocal evidence of the real sentiments of man- kind. " Can there be greater barbarity than to hurt an in- fant? Its helplessness, its innocence, its amiableness, call forth the compassion even of an enemy. — What then should we imagine must be the heart of a parent who would injure that weakness which a furious enemy is afraid to violate ? Yet the exposition, that is, the murder of new-bom infants, was a practice allowed of in almost all the States of Greece, even among the polite and civilized Athenians." This seems a strong case against us. But what were the grounds upon which this atrocity was defended ? — " Philosophers, instead of censuring, supported the horrible abuse, by far-fetched considerations of public utility."* By far-fetched considerations of public utility ! Why had they recourse to such arguments as these ? Because they found that the custom could not be reconciled with direct and * Theory Mor. Sent p. 5, c. 2. CHAP. VI.] OF THE WILL OP GOD. 77 acknowledged rules of virtue : because they felt and knew that it was wrong. The very circumstance that- they had recourse to "far-fetched arguments," is evidence that they were conscious that clearer and more immediate arguments were against them. They knew that infanticide was an im- moral act. I attach some importance to the indications which this class of reasoning affords of the comparative uniformity of human opinion, even when it is nominally discordant. One other illustration maybe oifered from more private life. Bos- well in his Life of Johnson, says that he proposed the ques- tion to the moralist, " Whether duelling was contrary to the laws of Christianity V Let the reader notice the essence of the reply : " Sir, as men become in a high degree refined, various causes of offence arise which are considered to be of such importance that life must be staked to atone for them, though in reality they are not so. In a state of highly pol- ished society, an affront is held to be a serious injury. It must therefore be resented, or rather a duel must be fought upon it, as men have agreed to banish from their society one who puts up with an affront without fighting a duel. Now, Sir, it is never unlawful to fight in self-defence. He then who fights a duel, does not fight from passion against his an- tagonist, but out of self-defence, to avert the stigma of the world, and to prevent himself from being driven from society. — While such notions prevail, no doubt a man may lawfully fight a duel." The question was, the consistency of duelling with the laws of Christianity ; and there is not a word about Christianity in the reply. Why ? Because its laws can never be shown to allow duelling; and Johnson doubtless knew this. Accordingly, like the philosophers who tried to justify the kindred crime of infanticide, he had recourse to "far- fetched considerations," — to the high polish of society— -to the stigma of the world — to the notions that prevail. Now, whilst the readers of Boswell commonly think they have Johnson's authority in favour of duelling, I think they have his authority against it. I think that the mode in which he justified duelling, evinced his consciousness that it was not compatible with the Moral Law. And thus it is, that with respect to Public Opinions, and general fashions, and thence descending to private life, we shall find that men very usually know the requisitions of the Moral Law better than they seem to know them ; and that ^e who estimates the moral knowledge of societies or indi- 78 THE IMMEDIATE COMMUNICATION ' [eSSAT I. viduals by their common language, refers to an uncertain and fallacious standard. After all, the uniformity of human opinion respecting the great laws of morality is very remarkable. Sir James Mack- intosh speaks of Grotius, who had cited poets, orators, his- torians, &c., and says, ^" He quotes them as witnesses, whose conspiring testimony, mightily strengthened and confirmed by their discordance on almost every other subject, is a conclu- sive proof of the unanimity of the whole human race, on the great rules of duty and fundamental principles of morals."* From poets and orators we may turn to sav2(!ge life. In 1683, that is, soon after the colonization of Pennsylvania, the founder of the colony held a " council and consultation" with some of the Indians. In the course of the interview it ap- peared that these savages believed in a state of future retribu- tion ; and they described their simple ideas of the respective states of the good and bad. The vices that they enumerated as those which would consign them to punishment, are remark- able, inasmuch as they so nearly correspond to similar enu- merations in the Christian Scriptures. They were " theft, swearing, lying, whoring, murder, and the like ;"t and the New Testament affirms that those who are guilty of adultery, fornication, lying, theft, murder, &c., shall not inherit the kingdom of God. The same writer having on his travels met with some Indians, stopped and gave them some good and serious advices. " They wept," says he, " and tears ran down their naked bodies. They smote their hands upon their breasts and said, ' The Good Man here told them what I said was all good.' "J . But reasonings such as these are in reality not necessary to the support of the truth of the Immediate Communication of the Will of God ; because if the variations in men's no- tions of right and wrong were greater than they are, they would not impeach the existence of that communication. In the first place, we never affirm that the Deity communicates all his law to every man : and in the second place, it is suffi- ciently certain that multitudes know his laws, and yet neglect to fulfil them. If, in conclusion, it should be asked, what assistance can be yielded, in the investigation of publicly authorized rules of virtue, by the discussions of the present chapter ? we an- swer, Very little. But when it is asked, Of what impor- * Disc, on Study of Law of Nature and Nations. t John Richardson's Life. I Ibid. CHAP. VT.] OF THE LAW OF GOD. - 79 tance are they as iilustratmg the Principles of Morality ? we answer, Very much. If there be two sources from which it has pleased God to enable mankind to know his Will — a law \vTitten externally, and a law communicated to the heart — it is evident that both must "be regarded as Principles of Mo- rality, and that, in a work like the present, both should be illustrated as such. It is incidental to the latter mode of> moral guidance, that it is little adapted to the formation of ex- ternal rules ; but it is of high and solemn impartance to our species for the secret direction of the individual man. ESSAY I. PART II. SUBORDINATE MEANS OF DISCOVERING THE DIVINE WILL. CHAPTER I. THE LAW OF THE LAND. Its authority — Limits to its authority — Morality sometimes prohibits what the law permits. The authority of civil government as a director of indi vidual conduct, is explicitly asserted in the Christian Scrip- tures : — ^" Be subject to principalities and powers, — Obey ma- gistrates,'"* — " Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake : whether it be to the king, as supreme ; or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well."t By this general sanction of civil government, a multitude of questions respecting human duty are at once decided. In ordinary cases, he upon whom the magistrate imposes a law, needs not to seek for knowledge of his duty upon the subject from a higher source. The divine will is sufficiently indi- cated by the fact that the magistrate commands. Obedience to the Law is obedience to the expressed will of God. He who, in the payment of a tax to support the just exercise of government, conforms to the Law of the Land, as truly obeys the divine will, as if the Deity had regulated questions of taxation, by express rules. In thus founding the authority of civil government upon the precepts of revelation, we refer to the ultimate, and for that reason to the most proper sanction. Not, indeed, that if reve- lation had been silent, the obligation of obedience might not laave been deduced from other considerations. The utility of * Tit. lii. 1. 1 1 Pet. ii. 13. CHAP. I.] THE LAW OF THE LAND. 81 government — its tendency to promote the order and happiness of society — powerfully recommend its authority ; so power- fully, indeed, that it is probable that the worst government which ev^er existed, was incomparably better than none ; and we shall hereafter have occasion to see that considerations of Utility involve actual moral obligation. The purity and practical excellence of the motives to civil obedience which are proposed in the Christian Scriptures, are especially worthy of regard. " Submit ybr the Lord's sake." " Be subject, not only for wrath, but for conscience' sake." Submission for wrath's sake, that is, from fear of penalty, im- plies a very inferior motive to submission upon grounds of principle and duty ; and as to practical excellence, who can- not perceive that he who regulates his obedience by the mo- tives of Christianity, acts more worthily, and honourably, and consistently, than he who is influenced only by fear of pen- alties ? The man who obeys the laws for conscience' sake, will obey always ; alike when disobedience would be unpun- ished and unknown, as when it would be detected the next hour. The magistrate has a security for such a man's fidel- ity, which no other motive can supply. A smuggler will im- port his kegs if there is no danger of a seizure — a Christian will not buy the brandy though no one knows it but himself. It is to be observed, that the obligation of civil obedience is enforced, whether the particular command of the law is iu itself sanctioned by morality or not. Antecedently to the existence of the law of the magistrate respecting the impor- tation of brandy, it was of no consequence in the view of morality whether brandy was imported or not ; but the prohi- bition of the magistrate involves a moral obligation to refrain. Other doctrine has been held ; and it has been asserted, that unless the particular law is enforced by morality, it does not become obligatory by the command of the state.* But if this were true — if no law was obligatory that was not previously enjoined by morality, no moral obligation would result from the law of the land. Such a question is surely set at rest by, " Submit yourselves to every ordinance of manP But the authority of civil government is a subordinate au- thority. If, from any cause, the magistrate enjoins that which is prohibited by the Moral Law, the duty of obedience is withdrawn. " AH human authority ceases at the point where obedience becomes criminal." The reason is simple ; that when the magistrate enjoins what is criminal, he has ex- * See Godwin's Political Justice. 82 THE LAW OF THE LAND. [eSSAY I. ceeded his power : " the minister of God " has gone beyond his commission. There is, in our day, no such thing as a moral plenipotentiary. Upon these principles, the first teachers of Christianity acted when the rulers " called them, and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. — " Whether," they replied, " it be right in the sight of God, to hearken unto you more than unto God, jij^dge ye."* They accordingly " en- tered into the temple early in the morning and taught :" and when, subsequently, they were again brought before the coun oil and interrogated, they replied, " We ought to obey God rather than men ;" and notwithstanding the renewed command of the council, " daily in the temple and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ. "f — Nor let any one suppose that there is any thing religious in the motives of the apostles, which involved a peculiar obligation upon them to refuse obedience : we have already seen that the ob- ligation to conform to religious duty and to moral duty, is one. To disobey the civil magistrate is however not a light thing. When the Christian conceives that the requisitions of gov- ernment and of a higher law are conflicting, it is needful that he exercise a strict scrutiny into the principles of his con- duct. But if, upon such scrutiny, the contrariety of requisi- tions appears real, no room is left for doubt respecting his tluty, or for hesitation in performing it. With the considera- tion of consequences he has then no concern : whatever they may be, his path is plain before him. - It is sufficiently evident that these doctrines respect non- compliance only. It is one thing not to comply with laws, and another to resist those who make or enforce them. He who thinks the payment of tithes unchristian, ought to decline to pay them; but he would act upon strange principles of morality, if, when an oflicer came to distrain upon his pro- perty, he forcibly resisted his authority .;{ If there are cases in which the positive injunctions of the law may be disobeyed, it is manifest that the mere permission ;of the law^tb do a given action, conveys no sufficient au- thority to perform it. There are, perhaps, no disquisitions, connected with the present subject, which are of greater prac- tical utility than those which show, that not every thing whicli is legally right is morally right; that a man may be entitled * Acts iv. 18. t Acts V. 29, 42. X Wa^ speak here of private obligations only. Respecting the political obligatrons which result from the authority of civil government, some ob- servations will be found in the chapter on Civil Obedience. Ess. iii. c. v< CHAP. I.] THE LAW OF THE LAND 83 by law to privileges which morality forbids him .o exercise, or to possessions which morality forbids him to enjoy. As to the possession, for example, of property : the gen- eral foundation of the right to property is the Law of the Land. But as the Law of the Land is itself subordinate, it is manifest that the right to property must be subordinate also, and. must be held in subjection to the Moral Law. A man who has a wife and two sons, and who is worth fifteen hun- dred pounds, dies without a will. The widow possesses no separate property, but the sons have received from another quarter ten thousand pounds a-piece. Now, of the fifteen hundred pounds which the intestate left, the law assigns five hundred to the mother, and five hundred to each son. Are these sons morally permitted to take each his five hundred pounds, and to leave their parent with only five hundred for her support ? Every man I hope will answer, No : and the reason is this ; that the Moral Law, which is superior to the Law of the Land, forbids them to avail themselves of their legal rights. The Moral Law requires justice and benevo- lence, and a due consideration for the wants and necessities of others ; and if justice and benevolence would be violated by availing ourselves of legal permissions, those permissions are not sufficient authorities to direct our conduct. It has been laid down, that " so long as we keep within the design and intention of a law, that law will justify us, inforcr conscienti(B as in foro hurnano, whatever be the equity or ex-, pediency of the law itself."* From the example which has been ofiered, I think it sufficiently appears that this maxim is utterly unsound : at any rate, its unsoundness will appear from a brief historical fact. During the Revolutionaiy war in Amer- ica, the Virginian Legislature passed a law, by which " it was enacted, that all merchants and pfanters^in Virginia who owed money to British merchants, should be exonerated from their debts, if they paid the money due into the public trea- sury instead of sending it to Great Britain ; and.all such as stood indebted, were invited to come forward and give 4heir money, in this manner, towards the support of the contest in which America was then engaged." Now, according to the ' principles of Paley, these Virginian planters would have been justified, in foro conscientim, in defrauding the British mer- chants of the money which was their due. It is quite clear that the " design and intention of the law" was to allow the fraud — ^the planters were even invited to commit it ; and yet * Mor. and Pol. PhiL b. iii. p. 1, c. 4. 84 THE LAW OF THE LAND. [eSSA /. the heart of every reader will tell him, that to have availed themselves of the legal permission, would have been an act of flagitious dishonesty. The conclusion is therefore distinct — ^that legal decisions respecting property, are not always a sufficient warrant for individual conduct. To the extreme disgrace of these planters it should be told, that although at first, when they would have gained little by the fraud, few of them paid their debts into the treasury, yet afterwards many large sums were paid. The Legislature offered to take the American paper money : and as this paper money, in conse- quence of its depreciation, was not worth a hundredth part of its value in specie, the planters, in thus paying their debts to their own government, paid but one pound instead of a hun- dred, and kept the remaining ninety-nine in their own pock- ets ! Profligate as these planters and as this Legislature were, it is pleasant for the sake of America to add, that in 1796, after the Supreme Court of the United States had been erected, the British merchants brought the affair before it ; and the judges directed that every one of these debts should again be paid to the rightful creditors. It might be almost imagined that the moral philosopher designed to justify such conduct as that of the planters. He says, when a man " refuses to pay a debt of the reality of which he is conscious, he cannot plead the intention of the statute, unless he could show that the law intended to inter- pose its supreme authority to acquit men of debts of tlie ex- istence and justice of which they were themselves sensible."* Now the planters could show that this was the intention of the law, and yet they were not justified in availing themselvea of it. The error of the moralist is founded in the assumption, that there is " supreme authority" in the law. Make that au- thority, as it really is, subordinate ^ smd the error and the falla- cious rule which is founded upon it, will be alike corrected. In applying to the Law of the Land as a moral guide, it is of importance to distinguish its intention from its letter. The intention is not, indeed, as we have seen, a final considera- tion, but the design of a legislature is evidently of greater ^ import, and consequent obligation, than the literal interpreta- tion of the words in which that design is proposed to be ex- pressed. The want of a sufficient attention to this simple rule, occasions many snares to private virtue, and the com- mission of much practical injustice. In consequence, partly of the inadequacy of all language, and partly of the inability * Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 3, p. 1, c. 4. CHAP. II.] THE LAW OF NATURB. 85 of those who frame laws, accurately to provide for cases which subsequently arise, it happens that the literal applica- tion of a law, sometimes frustrates the intention of the legis- lator, and violates the obligations of justice. Whatever be the cause, it is found in practice, that courts of law usually re- gard the letter of a statute rather than its general intention ; and hence it happens that many duties devolve upon individ- uals in the application of the laws in their own affairs. If legal courts usually decide by the letter, and if decision by the letter often defeats the objects of the legislator and the claims of justice, how shall these claims be satisfied except by the conscientious and forbearing integrity of private men ? Of the cases in which this integrity should be brought into exercise, several examples will be offered in the early part of the next Essay. CHAPTER 11. THE LAW OF NATURE. Its authority — Limits to its authority — Obligations resulting from the Rights of Nature — Incorrect ideas attached to the word Nature. We here use the term, the Law of Nature, as a convenient title under which to advert to the authority, in moral affairs, of what are called Natural Instincts and Natural rights. " They who rank Pity among the original impulses of our nature, rightly contend that when this principle prompts us to the relief of human misery, it indicates the divine intention and our duty. Indeed, the same conclusion is deducibie from the existence of the passion, whatever account be given of its origin. Whether it be an instinct or a habit, it is in fact a property of our nature which God appointed."* I should reason similarly respecting Natural Rights — the right to life — to personal liberty — to a share of the productions of the earth. The fact that life is given us by our Creator — • that our personal powers and mental dispositions are adapted by Him to personal liberty — and that He has constituted our bodies so as to need the productions of the earth, are satis- factory indications of the Divine Will, and of human duty. So that we conclude the general proposition is true — that * Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 3, p. Sfc. 5. 8 S6 THE LAW OF NATURE. [eSSAY I. a regard to the Law of Nature, in estimating human duty, is accordant with the Will of God. There is little necessity for formally insisting on the authority of the Law of Nature, because few are disposed to dispute that authority, at least when their own interests are served by appealing to it. If this authority were questioned, perhaps it might be said that the expression of the Divine Will tacitly sanctions it, because that expression is addressed to us under the supposition that our constitution is such as it is; and because some of the Divine precepts appear to specify a point at which the autho- rity of the Law of Nature stops. To say that a rule is only in some cases wrong, is to say, that in many it is right: to which may be added the consideration, that the tendency of the Law of Nature is manifestly beneficial. No man ques- tions that the " original impulses of our nature" tend power- fully to the well-being of the species. In speaking of the Instincts of Nature, we enter into no ' curious definitions of what constitutes an instinct. Whether ani/ of our passions or emotions be properly instinctive, or the efiect of association, is of little consequence to the purpose, so long as they actually subsist in the human economy, and so long as we have reason to believe that their subsistence there is in accordance with the Divine Will. .But the authority of the Law of Nature, like every other authority, i.s subordinate to that of the Moral Law. This i indeed is sufficiently indicated by those reasonings which 'Ishow the universal supremacy of that law. Ye>^t maybe of advantage to remember such expressions as these : " Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But fear him which, after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell."* This appears distinctly to place an instinct of nature in subordination to the Moral Law. The "fear of them that kill the body," results from the in- stinct of self-preservation ; and by this instinct we are not to be guided when the Divine Will requires us to repress its ' voice. ParentaL affection has been classed amongst the instincts.f The declaration, " He that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of me,"| clearly subjects this instinct to the higher authority of the Divine Will ; for the " love" of God is to be manifested by obedience to his law. Another declaration to the same import subjects also the instinct of self-preservation : " If a man hate not (that is by comparison) * Luke xii. 4. + Dr. Price. J Matt. x. 37. CHAP. II.] THE LAW OF NATURE. 87 his own life also, he cannot be my disciple."* And here it is remarkable, that these affection^ or instincts are adduced for the purpose of inculcating their subordination to the Moral Law. Upon one of the most powerful instincts of nature, the re- straints of revelation are emphatically laid. Its operation is restricted, not to a few of its possible objects, but exclusively to one ; and to that one upon an express and specified condi- tion.f The propriety of holding the natural impulses in subjection to a higher law, appears to be asserted in this language of Dugald Stewart : " The dictates of reason and conscience inform us, in language which it is impossible to mistake, that it is sometimes a duty to check the most amiable and pleasing emotions of the heart ; to withdraw, for example, from the sight of those distresses which stronger claims forbid us to relieve, and to deny ourselves that exquisite luxury which arises from the exercise of humanity." Even that morality which is not founded upon religion, recommends the same truth. Godwin says, that if Fenelon were in his palace, and ; it took fire, and it so happened that the life either of himself or of his chambermaid must be sacrificed, it would be the duty of the woman to repress the instinct of self-preservation, and' sacrifice hers — because Fenelon would do more good in the world. J If the morality of scepticism inculcates this subjugation of our instincts to indeterminate views of advan- tage, much more does the morality of the New Testament teach us to subject them to the determinate Will of God. It is upon these principles that some of the most noble examples of human excellence have been exhibited — those of men who have died for the testimony of a good conscience. If the strongest of our instincts — if that instinct, excited to its utmost vigour by the apprehension of a dreadful death, might be of weight to suspend the obligation of the Moral Law, it surely might have been suspended in the case of those who thus proved their fidelity. Yet, obvious as is the propriety and the duty of thus pre- ferring the Divine Law before all, the dictates or the rights of nature are continually urged as of paramount obligation. Many persons appear to th^nk that if a given action is dicta- ted by the law of nature, it is quite sufficient. Respecting the instinct of self-preservation, especially, they appear to conclude that to whatever that instinct prompts, it is lawful « Luke xiv. 26. t See Matt. iv. 9. 1 Cor. vi. 9. vii. 1 , 2. Gal. v. 19, dtc. } Political Justice. 88 THE LAW OF NATURE. [eSSAY I. to conform to its voice. They do not surely reflect upon the monstrousness of their opinions : they do not surely consider that they are absolutely superseding the Moral Law of God, and superseding it upon considerations resulting merely from the animal part of our constitution. The Divine Laws re- spect the whole human economy — our prospects in another world as well as our existence in the present. Some men, again, speak of our rights in a state of nature, as if to be in a state of nature was to be without the jurisdic- tion of the Moral Law. But if man be a moral and responsi- ble agent, that law applies every where ; to a state of nature as truly as to every other state. If some other human being had been left with Selkirk or Juan Fernandez, and if that other seized an animal which Selkirk had ensnared, would Selkirk have been justified in asserting his natural right to the animal by whatever means ? It is very possible that no means would have availed to procure the restoration of the rabbit or the bird short of killing the oflTender. Might Selkirk kill the man in assertion of his natural rights ? Every one answers, No — because the unsophisticated dictates in every man's mind assure us that the rights of natur^ are subordinate to higher laws. ' Situations similar to those of a state of nature sometimes arise in society ;* as where money is demanded, or violence is committed by one person on another, where no third per- son can be called in to assistance. The injured party, in such a case, cannot go to every length in his own cause by virtue of the law of nature : he can go only so far as the Moral Law allows. These considerations will be found pe- culiarly applicable to the rights of self-defence ; and it is pleasant to find these doctrines supported by that sceptical morality to which we just now referred. The author of Po- litical Justice maintains that man possesses 7io rights ; that is, no absolute rights — none, of which the just exercise is not conditional upon the permission of a higher rule. That rule, . with him, is " Justice" — with us it is the law of God ; but the rea,soning is the same in kind. / Nevertheless, the natural rights of man ought to possess extensive application both in private and political affairs. If it were sufficiently remembered, that these rights are abstract- edly possessed in equality by all men, we shbuld find many imperative claims upon us with which we do not now com- ply. The artificial distinctions of society induce forgetful- * See Locke on Gov. b. ii. c. 7. CHAP II.] THE LAW OF NATURE. 89 ness of the circumstance that we are all brethren : not that I would countenance the speculations of those who think that all men should be now practically equal ; but that these dis- tinctions are such, that the general rights of nature are inva- ded in a degree which nothing can justify. There are natu- ral claims of the poor upon the rich, of dependents upon their superiors, which are very commonly forgotten : there are end- less acts of superciliousness, and unkindness, and oppression, in private life, which the Law of Nature emphatically con- demns. When, sometimes, I see a man of fortune speaking in terms of supercilious command to his servant, I feel that he needs to go and learn some lessons of the Law of Nature. I feel that he has forgotten what he is, and what he is not, and what his brother is : he has forgotten that by nature he and his servant are in strictness equal ; and that although, by the permission of Providence, a various allotment is assigned to them now, he should regard every one with that considera- tion and respect which is due to a man and a brother. And when to these considerations are added those which result from the contemplation of our relationship to God — ^that we are the common objects of his bounty and his goodness, and that we are heirs to a common salvation, we are presented with such motives to pay attention to the rights of nature, as constitute an imperative obligation. The political duties which result from the Law of Nature, it is not our present business to investigate ; but it may be observed here, that a very limited appeal to facts -is sufficient to evince, that by many political institutions the Rights of Nature have been grievously sacrificed ; and that if those Rights had been sufficiently regarded, many of these vicious institutions would never have been exhibited in the world. It appears worth while at the conclusion of this chapter to remark, that a person, when he speaks of " Nature," should know distinctly what he means. The word carries with it a sort of indeterminate authority ; and he who uses it amiss, may connect that authority with rules or actions which are little entitled to it. There are few senses in which the word is used, that do not refer, however obscurely, to God ; and it is for that reason that the notion of authority is connected with the word. " The very name of nature implies, that it must owe its birth to some prior agent, or, to speak properly, signifies in itself nothing."* Yet, unmeaning as the term is, * Milton : Christian Doct. p. 14. 8* 90 THE LAW OF NATURE. [eSSAY I. it is one of wliich many persons are very fond ; — whether it be that their notions are really indistinct, or that some pur- poses are answered by referring to the obscurity of nature rather than to God. " Nature has decorated the earth with beauty and magnificence," — " Nature has furnished us with joints and limbs," — are phrases sufficiently unmeaning ; and yet I know not that they are likely to do any other harm than to give currency to the common fiction. But when it is said, that " Nature teaches us to adhere to truth," — " Nature con- demns us for dishonesty or deceit," — " Men are taught by nature that they are responsible beings," — there is consider- able danger that we have both fallacious and injurious notions of the authority which thus teaches or condemns us. Upon this subject it were well to take the advice of Boyle : "Na- ture," he says, " is sometimes, indeed commonly, taken for a kind of semi-deity. In this sense it is bgst not to use it at all."* It is dangerous to induce confusion into our ideas respecting our relationship with God. A law of nature is a very imposing phrase ; and it might be supposed, from the language of some persons, that nature was an independent legislatress, who had sat and framed laws for the government of mankind. Nature is nothing; yet it would seem that men do sometimes practically imagine, that a " law of nature" possesses proper and independent authority ; and it may be suspected that with some the notion is so palpable and strong, that they set up the authority of " the law of nature" without reference to the will of God, or perhaps in opposition to it. Even if notions like these float in the mind only with vapoury indistinctness, a correspondent indistinctness of moral notions is likely to ensue. Everyman should make to himself the rule, never to employ the word Nature when he speaks of ultimate moral authority. A law possesses no authority ; the authority rests only in the legis- lator : and as nature makes no laws, a law of nature involves no obligation but that which is imposed by the Divine Will. * Free Inquir}' into the vulgarly received Notions of Nature. CHAP. III.] UTILITY. 91 CHAPTER III. UTILITY. Obligations resulting from Expediency ^Limits to these obligations. That in estimating our duties in life we ought to pay re- gard to what is useful and beneficial — ^to what is likely to promote the welfare of ourselves and of others — can need little argument to prove. Yet, if it v/ere required, it may be easily shown that this regard to Utility is recommended or enforced in the expression of the Divine Will. That Will requires the exercise of pure and universal benevolence ; — which benevolence is exercised in consulting the interests, the wel- fare, and the happiness of mankind. The dictates of Utility, therefore, are frequently no other than the dictates of benevo- lence. Or, if we derive the obligations of Utility from considera- tions connected with our reason, they do not appear much less distinct. To say that to consult Utility is right, is almost the same as to say, it is right to exercise our understandings. The daily and hourly use of reason is to discover what is fit to be done ; that is, what is useful and expedient : and since it is manifest that the Creator, in endowing us with the faculty, designed that we should exercise it, it is obvious that in this view also a reference to expediency is consistent with the Divine Will. When (higher laws being silent) a man judges that of two alternatives one is dictated by greater utility, that dictate con- stitutes an obligation upon him to prefer it. I should not hold a landowner innocent, who knowingly persisted in adopting a bad mode of raising corn ; nor should I hold the person inno- cent who opposed an improvement in shipbuilding, or who obstructed the formation of a turnpike road that would benefit the public. These are questions, not of prudence merely, but of morals also. Obligations resulting from Utility possess great extent of application to political affairs. There are, indeed, some public concerns in which the Moral Law, antecedently, decides no- thing. Whether a duty shall be imposed, or a charter granted, or a treaty signed, are questions which are perhaps to be de- tei-mined by expediency alone : but when a public man is of the judgment that any given measure will tend to the general good, he is immoral if he opposes that measure. The imrao- ^ V ^ 92 UTILITY. [essay I. rality may indeed oe made out by a somewhat different pro- cess : — such a man violates those duties of benevolence which religion imposes : he probably disregards, too, his sense of obligation ; for if he be of the judgment that a given measure will tend to the general good, conscience will scarcely be si- lent in whispering that he ought not to oppose it. It is sufficiently evident, upon the . principles which have hitherto been advanced, that considerations of utility are only so far obligatory as they are in accordance with the Moral Law. Pursuing, however, the method which has been adopted in the two last chapters, it may be observed, that this subserviency of Utility to the Divine Will, appears to be re- quired by the written revelation. That habitual preference of futurity to the present time, which Scripture exhibits, in- dicates that our interests here should be held in subordination to our interests hereafter : and as these higher interests are to be consulted hy the means which revelation prescribes, it is manifest that those means are to be pursued, whatever we may suppose to be their effects upon the present welfare of ourselves or of other men. " If in this life only we have hope in God, then are we of all men most miserable." It certainly is not, in the usual sense of the word, expedient to be most miserable. And why did they thus sacrifice expediency? Because the communicated Will of God required that course of life by which human interests were apparently sacrificed. It will be perceived that these considerations result from the truth, (too little regarded in talking of " Expediency" and *' General Benevolence") that Utility, as it respects mankind, cannot be properly consulted without taking into account our interests in futurity. " Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," is a maxim of which all would approve if we had no concerns with another life. That which might be very expe- dient if death were annihilation, may be very inexpedient now. " If ye say. We will not dwell in this land, neither obey the voice of the Lord your God, saying, No ; but we will go into the land of Egypt, where we shall see no war ;''^ ^^ nor have hunger of bread ; and there will we dwell ; it shall come to pass, that the sword, which ye feared, shall overtake you there in the land of Egypt ; and the famine, whereof ye were afraid, shall follow close after you in Egypt ; and there ye shall die."* — " We will burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and pour out drink-offerings unto her ; for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil. But since we left * Jer. xliL CHAP. III.] UTTLITT. 93 off, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword, and by the famine." — Therefore, " I will watch over them for evil, and not for good."* These reasoners ar- gued upon the principle of making expediency the paramount law ; and it may be greatly doubted whether those who argue upon that principle now, have better foundation for their rea- soning than those of old. Here was the prospect of advan- tage founded, as they thought, upon experience. One course of action had led (so they reasoned) to war and famine, and another to plenty, and health, and general well-being: yet still our Universal Lawgiver required them to disregard all these conclusions of expediency, and simply to conform to His will. After all, the general experience is, that what is most ex- pedient with respect to another world, is most expedient with respect to the present. There may be cases, and there have been, in which the Divine Will may require an absolute re- nunciation of our present interests ; as the martyr who main- tains his fidelity, sacrifices all possibility of advantage now. But these are unusual cases ; and the experience of the con- trary is so general, that the truth has been reduced to a pro- verb. Perhaps in nineteen cases out of twenty, he best con- sults his present welfare, who endeavours to secure it in another world. " By the wise contrivance of the Author of nature, virtue is upon all ordinary occasions, even with regard to this life, real wisdom, and the surest and readiest means of obtaining both safety and advantage."! Were it however otherwise, the truth of our principles would not be shaken. Men's happiness, and especially the happiness of good men, does not consist merely in external things. The promise of a hundred fold in this present life may still be fulfilled in mental felicity; and if it could not be, who is the man that would exclude from his computations the prospect, in the world to come, of life everlasting ? In the endeavour to produce the greatest sum of happiness, or which is the same thing, in applying the dictates of Utility to our conduct in life, there is one species of utility that is deplorably disregarded both in private and public affairs — that which respects the religious and moral welfare of mankind. If you hear a politician expatiating upon the good tendency of a measure, he tells you how greatly it will promote the in- terests of commerce, or how it will enrich a colony, or how it will propitiate a powerful party, or how it will injure a na- • Jer. xliv. t Dr. Smith: Theor. Mor. Sent 94 UTILITY. [essay I. tion whom he dreads ; but you hear probably not one word of enquiry whether it will corrupt the character of those who execute the measure, or whether it will introduce vices into the colony, or whether it will present new temptations to the virtue of the public. And yet these considerations are per- haps by far the most important in the view even of enlight- ened expediency ; for it is a desperate game to endeavour to benefit a people by means which may diminish their virtue. Even such a politician would probably assent to the unapplied proposition, "the virtue of a people is the best security for their welfare." It is the same in private life. You hear a parent who proposes to change his place of residence, or to engage in a new profession or pursuit, discussing the compara- tive conveniences of the proposed situation, the prospect of profit in the new profession, the pleasures which will result from the new pursuit ; but you hear probably not one word of enquiry whether the change of residence will deprive his family of virtuous and beneficial society which will not be replaced — whether the contemplated profession will not tempt his own virtue or diminish his usefulness — or whether his children will not be exposed to circumstances that v/ill proba- bly taint the purity of their minds. And yet this parent will acknowledge, in general terms, that " nothing can compensate for the loss of religious and moral character." Such persons surely make very inaccurate computations of Expediency. As to the actual conduct of political aflairs, men frequently legislate as if there was no such thing as religion or morality in the world ; or as if, at any rate, religion and morality had no concern with aflfairs of state. I believe that a sort of shame (a false and vulgar shame no doubt) would be felt by many members of senates, in directly opposing religious or moral considerations to prospects of advantage. In our own country, those who are most willing to do this receive, from vulgar persons, a name of contempt for their absurdity ! How inveterate must be the impurity of a system, which teaches m6n to regard as ridiculous that system which only is sound ! CHAP. IV.] THE LAW OF NATIONS. 95 CHAPTER IV. THE LAW OF NATIONS— THE LAW OF HONOUR. Although the subjects of this chapter can scarcely be regarded as con- stituting rules of life, yet we are induced briefly to notice them in the present Essay, partly, on account of the importance of the affairs which they regulate, and partly, because they will afford satisfactory illustra- tion of the principles of Morality. SECTION L THE LAW OP NATIONS. Obligations and authority of the Law of Nations — Its abuses, and the limits of its authority — Treaties. The Law of Nations, so far as it is founded upon the prin- ciples of morality, partakes of that authority which those prin- ciples possess ; so far as it is founded merely upon the mutual conventions of states, it possesses that authority over the contracting parties which results from the rule, that men ought to abide by their engagements. The principal considerations which present themselves upon the subject, appear to be these : 1 — That the Law of Nations is binding upon those states who knowingly allow themselves to be regarded as parties to it: 2 — That it is wholly nugatory with respect to those states which are not parties to it : 3 — That it is of no force in opposition to the Moral Law : I. The obligation of the Law of Nations upon those who join in the convention, is plain — ^that is, it rests, generally, upon all civilized communities which have intercourse with one another. A tacit engagement only is, from the circum- stances of the case, to be expected ; and if any state did not choose to conform to the Law of Nations, it should publicly express its dissent. The Law of Nations is not wont to tighten the bonds of morality ; so that probably most of its positive requisitions are enforced by the Moral Law: and this consideration should operate as an inducement to a con- scientious fulfilment of these requisitions. In time of war, the Law of Nations prohibits poisoning and assassination, and it is manifestly imperative upon every state to forbear them ; 96 THE LAW OF NATIONS. [eSSAT I. biit whilst morality thus enforces many of the requisitions of the Law of Nations, that law frequently stops short, instead of following on to whither morality would conduct it. This distinction between assassination and some other modes of destruction that are practised in war, is not perhaps very accurately founded in considerations of morality : neverthe- less, since the distinction is made, let it be made, and let it by all means be regarded. Men need not add arsenic and the private dagger to those modes of human destruction which war allows. The obligation to avoid private murder is clear, even though it were shown that the obligation extends much further. Whatever be the reasonableness of the distinction, and of the rule that is founded upon it, it is perfidious to vio- late that rule. So it is with those maxims of the Law of Nations which require that prisoners should not be enslaved, and that the persons of ambassadors should be respected. Not that I think the man who sat down, with only the principles of morality before him, would easily be able to show, from those principles, that the slavery was wrong whilst other things which the Law of Nations allows are right — ^but that, as these principles actually enforce the maxims, as the observ- ance of them is agreed on by civilized states, and as they tend to diminish the evils of war, it is imperative on states to observe them. Incoherent and inconsistent as the Law of Nations is, when it is examined by the Moral Law, it is plea- sant to contemplate the good tendency of some of its requisi- tions. In 1702, previous to the declaration of war by this country, a number of the anticipated " enemy's" ships had been seized and detained. When the declaration was made, these vessels were released, " in pursuance," as the procla- mation stated, "of the Law of Nations." Some of these vessels were perhaps shortly after captured, and irrecoverably lost to their owners : yet though it might perplex the Chris- tian moralist to show that the release was right and that the capture was right too, still he may rejoice that men conform, even in part, to the purity of virtue. Attempts to deduce the maxims of international law as they now obtain, from principles of morality, will always be vain. Grotius seems as if he would countenance the attempt when he says, " Some writers have advanced a doctrine which can never be admitted, maintaining that the Law of Nations au- thorizes one power to commence hostilities against another, whose increasing greatness awakens her alarms. As a mat- ter of expediency," says Grotius, " such a measure may be CHAP. IV.] THE LAW OF NATIONS. 97 adopted ; but the principles of justice can never be advanced in its favour."* Alas ! if principles of justice are to decide what the Law of Nations shall authorize, it will be needful to establish a new code to-morrow, A great part of the code arises out of the conduct of war ; and the usual practices of war are so foreign to principles of justice and morality, that it is to no purpose to attempt to found the code upon them. Nevertheless, let those who refer to the Law of Nations, introduce morality by all possible means ; and if they think they cannot appeal to it always, let them appeal to it where they can. If they cannot persuade themselves to avoid hos- tilities when some injury is committed by another nation, let them avoid them when " another nation's greatness merely awakens their alarms." IL That the Law of Nations is wholly nugatory with respect to those states which are not parties to it, is a tru,th which, however sound, has been too little regarded in the conduct of civilized nations. The state whose subjects dis- cover and take possession of an uninhabited island, is entitled by the Law of Nations quietly to possess it. And it ought auietly to possess it : not that in the view of reason or of mo- lality, the circumstance of an Englishman's first visiting the shores of a country, gives any very intelligible right to the King of England to possess it rather than any other prince, but that, such a rule having been agreed upon it, it ought to be observed ; but by whom ? By those who are parties to the agreement. For which reason, the discoverer possesses no sufficient claim to oppose his right to that of a people who were not parties to it. So that he who, upon pretence of discovery, should forcibly exclude from a large extent of ter- ritory a people who knew nothing of European politics, and who in the view of reason possessed an equal or a greater right, undoubtedly violates the obligations of morality. It may serve to dispel the obscurity in which habit and self-in- terest wrap our perceptions, to consider, that amongst the states which were nearest to the newly-discovered land, a law of nations might exist which required that such land should be equally divided amongst them. Whose law of na- tions ought to prevail ? That of European states, or that of states in the Pacific or South Sea ? How happens it that the En- glishman possesses a sounder right to exclude all other nations, than surrounding nations possess to partition it amongst them ? Unhappily, our law of nations goes n^iuch further ; and by * Riffhts of War and Peace. y 98 THE LAW OF NATIOXS. [eSSAT 1. a monstrous abuse of power^ has acted upon the same doc- trine with respect to inhabited countries; for when these have been discovered, the law of nations has talked, with perfect c(X>lness, of setting up a standard, and thenceforth assigning the territory to the nation whose subjects set it up ; as if the previous inhabitants possessed no other claim or right than the bears and wolves. It has been asked (and asked with great reason,) what we should say to a canoe-full of Indians who should discover England, and take possession of it in the name of their chief? Civilized states appear to have acted upon the maxim, that no people possess political rights but those who are par- ties to the law of nations; and accordingly the history of European settlements has been, so far as- the aborigines were concerned, too much a history of outrage, and treachery, and blood. Penn acted upon sounder principles : he perfectly well knew that neither an established practice, nor the Law of Nations, could impart a right to a country which was justly possessed by fonner inhabitants; and therefore, although Charles II. "granted" him Pennsylvania, he did not imagine that the gift of a man in London, could justify him in taking possession of a distant country without the occupiers' consent. What was " granted" therefore by his sovereign, he purchased of the owners ; and the sellers were satisfied with their bar- gain and with him. The experience of Pennsylvania has shown that integrity is politic as well as right. When nations shall possess gi-eater expansion of knowledge, and exercise greater purity of virtue, it will be found that many of the principles which regulate international intercourse, are fool- ish as well as vicious ; that whilst they disregard the interests ' of morality they sacrifice their own. III. Respecting the third consideration, that the Law of Nations is of no force in opposition to the Moral Law, little needs to be said here. It is evident that, upon whatever foundation the Law of Nations rests, its authority is subordi- nate to that of the Will of God. When, therefore, we say that amongst civilized states, when an island is discovered by one state, other states are bound to refrain, it is not identical with saying that the discoverer is at liberty to keep posses- sion by whatever means. The mode of asserting all rights is to be regulated in subordination to the Moral Law. Dupli- city, and fraud, and violence, and bloodshed, may perhaps sometimes be the only means of availing ourselves of the rights which the Law of Nations grants : but it were a con- CHAP. IV.] THE LAW OF NATIONS. 99 fused species of morality which should allow the commission of all this, because it is consistent with the Law of Nations. A kindred remark applies to the obligation of treaties. Treaties do not oblige us to do what is morally wrong. A treaty is a string of engagements ; but those engagements are no more exempt from the jurisdiction of the Moral Law, than the promise of a man to assassinate another. Does such a promise morally bind the ruffian ? No : and for this reason, and for no other, that the performance is unlawful. And so it is with treaties. Two nations enter into a treaty of offensive and defensive alliance. Subsequently one of them engages in an unjust and profligate war. Does the treaty morally bind the other nation to abet the profligacy and injustice ? No : if it did, any man might make any action lawful to him- self by previously engaging to do it. No doubt such a nation and such a ruffian have done wrong ; but their offence con- sisted in making the engagement, not in breaking it. Even if ordinary wars were defensible, treaties of offensive alliance that are unconditional with respect to time or objects, can never be justified. The state, however, which, in the pursuit of a temporary policy, has been weak enough, or vicious enough to make them, should not hesitate to refuse fulfilment, when the act of fulfilment is incompatible with the Moral Law. Such a state should decline to perform the treaty, and retire with shame — with shame, not that it has violated its engagements, but that it was ever so vicious as to make them. SECTION II ^ THE LAW OF HONOUR. Authority of the Law of Honour — Its character. The Law of Honour consists of a set of maxims, written or understood, by which persons of a certain class agree to regulate, or are expected to regulate, their conduct. It is evident that the obligation of the Law of Honour, as such, results exclusively from the agreement, tacit or expressed, of the parties concerned. It binds them because they have agreed to be bound, and for no other reason. He who does not choose to be ranked amongst the subjects of the Law of Hon- our, is under no obligation to obey its rules. These rules 100 THE LAW OF HONOUR. [eSSAY I. are precisely upon the same footing as the laws of free-ma- sonry, or the regulations of a reading-room. He who does not choose to subscribe to the room, or to promise conformity to masonic laws, is under no obligation to regard the rules of either. For which reason, it is very remarkable that at the com- mencement of his Moral Philosophy, Dr. Paley says, The rules of life " are, the Law of Honour, the Law of the Land, and the Scriptures." It were strange indeed, if that were a rule of life which every man is at liberty to disregard if he pleases ; and which, in point of fact, nine persons out of ten do disregard without blame. Who would think of taxing the writer of these pages with violating a " rule of life," because he pays no attention to the Law of Honour ? *' The Scrip- tures" communicate the Will of God ; " the Law of the Land" is enforced by that Will ; but where is the sanction of the Law of Honour ? — It is so much the more remarkable that this law should have been thus formally proposed as a rule of life, because, in the same work, it is described as " unau- thorized." How can a set of unauthorized maxims compose a rule of life ? But further : the author says that the Law of Honour is a " capricious rule, which abhors deceit, yet ap- plauds the address of a successful intrigue" — And further still : " it allows of fornication, adultery, drunkenness, prodi- gality, duelling, and of revenge in the extreme." Surely then it cannot, with any propriety of language, be called a rule of life. Placing, then, the obligation of the Law of Honour, as such, upon that which appears to be its proper basis — ^the duty to perform our lawful engagements — it may be concluded, that when a man goes to a gaming-house or a race-course, and loses his money by betting or playing, he is morally bound to pay : not because morality adjusts the rules of the billiard room or the turf, not because the Law of the Land sanctions the stake, but because the party previously promised to pay it. Nor would it affect this obligation, to allege that the stake was itself both illegal and immoral. So it was ; but the payment is not. The payment of such a debt involves no breach of the Moral Law. The guilt consists not in pay- ing the money, but in staking it. Nevertheless, there may be prior claims upon a man's property which he ought first to pay. Such are those of lawful creditors. The practice of* paying debts of honour with promptitude, and of delaying the payment of other debts, argues confusion or depravity of prin- ciple. It is not honour, in any virtuous and rational sense iAP. IV.] THE LAW OF HONOUR. 101 tft the word, which induces men to pay debts of honour in- stantly. Real honour would induce them to pay their lawfu debts first : and indeed it may be suspected that the motive to the prompt payment of gaming debts, is usually no other than the desire to preserve a fair name with the world. In- tegTity of principle has often so little to do with it, that this principle is sacrificed in order to pay them. With respect to those maxims of the Law of Honour which require conduct that the Moral Law forbids, it is quite mani- fest that they are utterly indefensible. " If unauthorized laws of honour be allowed to create exceptions to divine prohibi- tions, there is an end of all morality as founded in the Will of the Deity, and the obligation of every duty may at one time or other be discharged."* These observations apply to those foolish maxims of honour which relate to duelling. These maxims can never justify the individual in disregarding the obligations of morality. He who acts upon them acts ty2cA:e£?/y; unless indeed he be so little informed of the requisi- tions of morality, that he does not, upon this subject, perceive the distinction between right and wrong. The man of honour therefore should pay a gambling debt, but he should not send a challenge or accept it. The one is permitted by the Moral Law, the other is forbidden. Whatever advantages may result from the Law of Honour, it is, as a system, both contemptible and bad. Even its ad- vantages are of an ambiguous kind ; for although it may prompt to rectitude of conduct, that conduct is not founded upon rectitude of principle. The motive is not so good as the act. And as to many of its particular rules, both positive and ne- gative, they are the proper subject of reprobation and abhor- rence. We ought to reprobate and abhor a system which enjoins the ferocious practice of challenges and duels, and which allows many of the most flagitious and degrading vices that infest the world. The practical effects of the Law of Honour are probably greater and worse than we are accustomed to suppose. Men learn by the power of association, to imagine that that is law- ful which their maxims of conduct do not condemn. A set of rules which inculcates some actions that are right, and per- mits others that are wrong, practically acts as a sanction to the wrong. The code which attaches disgrace to falsehood, but none to drunkenness or adultery, operates as a sanction to drunkenness and adultery. Does not ex- * Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. iii. c. 9. 9* 10!S THE LAW OF HONOUR. [eSSAY I. perience verify these conclusions of reason ? Is it not true that men and women of honour indulge, with the less hesita- tion, in some vices, in consequence of the tacit permission of the Law of Honour ? What then is to be done but to repro- bate the system as a whole ? In this reprobation the man of sense may unite with the man of virtue ; for assuredly the system is contemptible in the view of intellect, as well as hateful in the view of purity. ESSAY II PRIVATE EIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS. The dhrfewn whicli has tsommonly "been made of the private obligations "of man, into those which respect himself, his neighbour, and his Creator, does not appear to be attended with any considerable advantages. These several obligations are indeed so involved the one with the other, that there are few personal duties which are not also in some degree relative, and there are no duties, either relative or personal, which may not be re- garded as duties to God. The suicide's or the drunkard's vice injures his family or his friends : for every offence against morality is an injury to ourselves, and a violation of the duties which we owe to Him whose law is the foundaticm of morality. Neglecting, therefore, these miauter dis- tinctions, we observe those only which separate the Private firGm the Po- litical Ob%ati«as «f Mankind. CHAPTER L RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS, Factitious semblances of devotion — Religious cwtversation — Sabbatical institutions — Non-sanctity of days — ^^Of temporal employments : Trav- €llmg: Stage-coaches: ** Sunday papers :" Amusements — Holydays — Ceremonial institutions and devotional formularies — Utility of forms — Forms of prayer — Extempore prayer — Scepticism — Motives to Scepti- Of the two classes of Religious Obligations — ^that which respects the exercise of piety towards God, and that which respects visible testimonials of our reverence and devotion, the business of a work like this is principally with the latter. Yet at the risk of being charged with deviating from this proper business, I would adventure a few paragraphs respect- ing devotion of mind. That the worship of our Father who is in heaven consists, not in assembling with others at an appointed place and hour ; not in joining in the rituals of a Christian church, or in per- forming ceremonies, or in participating of sacraments,* all men will agree ; because all men know that these things may * It is to be regretted that this word, of wbich the origin is so excep- tionable, should be used to designate what are regarded as solemn acts of religioo. 104 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [eSSAT U. be done whilst the mind is wholly intent upon other affairs, and even without any belief in the existence of God. " Two attendances upon public worship is a form complied with by thousands who never kept a Sabbath in their lives."* Devo- tion, it is evident, is an operation of the mind ; the sincere aspiration of a dependent and grateful being to Him who has all power both in heaven and in earth : and as the exercise of devotion is not necessarily dependent upon external circum- stances, it may be maintained in solitude or in society, in the place appropriated to Avorship or in the field, in the hour of business or of quietude and rest. Even under a less spirit- ual dispensation of old, a good man " worshipped, leaning upon the top of his staff." Now it is to be feared that some persons, who acknowledge that devotion is a mental exercise, impose upon themselves some feelings as devotional which are wholly foreign to the worship of God. There is a sort of spurious devotion — feel- ings, having the resemblance of worship, but not possessing its nature, and not producing its effects. " Devotion," says Blair, "is a powerful principle, which penetrates the soul, which purifies the affections from debasing attachments, and by a fixed and steady regard to God, subdues every sinful passion, and forms the inclinations to piety and virtue. 'f To purify the affections and subdue the passions, is a serious operation : it implies a sacrifice of inclination ; a subjugation of the will. This mental operation many persons are not willing to undergo : and it is not therefore wonderful that some persons are willing to satisfy themselves with the ex- ercise of a species of devotion that shall be attained at less cost. A person goes to an oratorio of sacred music. The ma- jestic flow of harmony, the exalted subjects of the hymns or anthems, the full and rapt assembly, excite, and warm, and agitate his mind ; sympathy becomes powerful ; he feels the stirring of unwonted emotions ; weeps, perhaps, or exults ; and when he leaves the assembly, persuades himself that he has Deen worshipping and glorifying God. There are some preachers with whom it appears to be an object of much solicitude, to excite the hearer to a warm and impassioned state of feeling. By ardent declamation or pas- sionate displays of the hopes and terrors of religion, they arouse and alarm his imagination. The hearer, who desires perhaps to experience the ardours of religion, cultivates the * Cowper's Letters. t Sermons, No. 10. CHAP. I.} RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 105 glowing sensations, abandons his mind to the impulse of feel- ing, and at length goes home in complacency with his reli- gious sensibility, and glads himself with having felt the fer- vours of devotion. Kindred illusion may be the result of calmer causes. The lofty and silent aisle of an ancient cathedral, the venerable ruins of some once honoured abbey, the boundless expanse of the heaven of stars, the calm immensity of the still ocean, or the majesty and terror of a tempest, sometimes suffuses the mind with a sort of reverence and awe ; a sort of "philo- sophic transport-," which a person would willingly hope is devotion of the heart. It might be sufficient to assure us of the spuriousness of these semblances of religious feeling, to consider that emo- tions very similar in their nature are often excited by subjects which have no connection with religion. I know not whe- ther the affecting scenes of the drama and of fictitious story, want much but association with ideas of religion to make them as devotional as those which have been noticed : and if, on the other hand, the feelings of him who attends an oratorio were excited by a military band, he would think not of the Deity or of heaven, but of armies and conquests. Nor should it be forgotten, that persons who have habitually little pretension to religion, are perhaps as capable of this fac- titious devotion as those in whom religion is constantly influ- ential ; and surely it is not to be imagined, that those who rarely direct reverend thoughts to their Creator, can suddenly adore Him for an hour and then forget him again, until some new excitement again arouses their raptures, to be again for- gotten. To religious feelings as to other things, the truth applies — ■ " By their fruits ye shall know them." If these feelings do not tend to "purify the affections from debasing attach- ments ;" if they do not tend to " form the inclinations to piety and virtue," they certainly are not devotional. Upon him whose mind is really prostrated in the presence of his God, the legitimate effect is, that he should be impressed with a more sensible consciousness of the Divine presence ; that he should deviate with less facility from the path of duty ; that his desires and thoughts should be reduced to Christian sub- jugation ; that he should feel an influential addition to his dispositions to goodness ; and that his affections should be expanded towards his fellow men. He who rises from the sensibilities of seeming devotion, and finds, that effects such as these are not produced in his mind, may rest assured that, 106 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [eSSAY II. in whatever he has been employed, it has not been in the pure worship of that God who is a spirit. To the real pros- tration of the soul in the Divine presence, it is necessary that the mind should be still : — " Be still and know that I am God." Such devotion is sufficient for the whole mind; it needs not — perhaps in its purest state it admits not— the in- trusion of external things. And when the soul is thus per* mitted to enter as it were into the sanctuary of God ; when it is humble in his presence ; when all its desires are involved in the one desire of devotedness to him ; then is the hour of acceptable worship — then the petition of the soul is prayer — then is its gratitude thanksgiving — then is its oblation praise. That such devotion, when such is attainable, will have a powerful tendency to produce obedience to the Moral Law, may justly be expected : and here indeed is the true connex- ion of the subject of these remarks with the general object of the present essays. Without real and efficient piety of mind, we are not to expect a consistent observance of the Moral Law. That law requires, sometimes, sacrifices of in- clination and of interest, and a general subjugation of the passions, which religion, and religion only, can capacitate and induce us to make. I recommend not enthusiasm or fanaticism, but that sincere and reverent application of the soul to its Creator, which alone is likely to give either distinctness to our perceptions of his will, or efficiency to our motives to fulfil it. A few sentences will be indulged to me here respecting Religious Conversation. I believe both that the proposition is true, and that it is expedient to set it down — that religious conversation is one of the banes of the religious world. There are many who are really attached to religion, and who sometimes feel its power, but who allow their better feelings to evaporate in an ebullition of words. They forget how much religion is an affiiir of the mind and how little of the tongue : they forget how possible it is to live under its power without talking of it to their friends ; and some, it is to be feared, may forget how possible it is to talk without feeling its influence. Not that the good man's piety is to live in his breast like an anchorite in his cell. The evil does not con- sist in speaking of religion, but in speaking too much ; not in manifesting our allegiance to God ; not in encouraging by exhortation, and amending by our advice ; not in placing the light upon a candlestick — but in making religion a common topic of discourse. Of all species of well intended religious CHAP. I.] RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 107 cDnversalion, that perhaps is the most exceptionable which consists in narrating our own religious feelings. Many thus in- trude upon that religious quietude which is peculiarly favour- able to the Christian character. The habit of communicating " experiences" I believe to be very prejudicial to the mind. It may sometimes be right to do this : in the great majority of instances I believe it is not beneficial, and not right. Men thus dissipate religious impressions, and therefore diminish their effects. Such observation as I have been enabled to make, has sufficed to convince me that, where the religious character is solid, there is but little religious talk ; and that, where there is much talk, the religious character is superficial, and, like other superficial things, is easily de- stroyed. And if these be the attendants, and in part the consequences of general religious conversation, how pecu- liarly dangerous must that conversation be, which exposes those impressions that perhaps were designed exclusively for ourselves, and the use of which maybe frustrated by communi- cating them to others. Our solicitude should be directed to the invigoration of the religious character in our own minds ; and we should be anxious that the plant of piety, if it had fewer branches might have a deeper root. SABBATICAL INSTITUTIONS. " Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is."* The divinely authorized institu- tion of Moses respecting a weekly Sabbath, and the practice of the first teachers of Christianity, constitute a sufficient re- commendation to set apart certain times for the exercise of public worship, even were there no injunctions such as that which is placed at the head of this paragraph. It is, besides, manifestly proper, that beings who are dependent upon God for all things, and especially for their hopes of immortality, should devote a portion of their time to the expression of their gi'atitude, and submission, and reverence. Community of dependence and of hope dictates the propriety of united worship ; and worship to be united, must be performed at times previously fixed. From the duty of observing the Hebrew Sabbath, we are suf- ficiently exempted by the fact, that it was actually not observed by the apostles of Christ. The early Christians met, not on the last day of the week, but on the first. Whatever reason may be assigned as a motive for this rejection of the ancient * Heb. X. 5. 108 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [ESSAT II, Sabbath, I think it will tend to discountenance the observance of any day, as such : for if that day did not possess perpetual sanctity, what day does possess it 1 And with respect to the general tenor of the Christian Scriptures as to the sanctity of particular days, it is I think manifestly adverse to the opinion that one day is obligatory, rather than another. " Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new- moon or of the Sabbath-days ; which are a shadow of things to come ; but the body is of Christ."* Although this " Sab- bath-day" was that of the Jews, yet the passage indicates the writer's sentiments, generally, respecting the sanctity of spe- cific days : he classes them with matters which all agree to be unimportant ; — with meats, and drinks, and new-moons ; and pronounces them to be alike ^^ shadows ^ That strong passage addressed to the Christians of Galatia is of the same import : " How turn ye again to the weak and beggarly ele- ments whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage ? Ye ob- serve days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain."t That which, in writing to the Christians of Colosse, the apostle called " shadows," he now, in writing to those of Galatia, calls " beggarly elements." The obvious tendency is to discredit the observance of particular times ; and if he designed to ex^ cept the first day of the week, it is not probable that he would have failed to except it. Nevertheless, the question whether we are obliged to ob- serve the first day of the week because it is the first, is one point — whether we ought to devote it to religious exercises, seeing that it is actually set apart for the purpose, is another. The early Christians met on that day, and their example has been followed in succeeding times ; but if for any si^cient reason, (and such reasons, however unlikely to arise, are yet conceivable,) the Christian world should fix upon another day of the week instead of the first, I perceive no grounds upon which the arrangement could be objected to. As there is no sanctity in any day, and no obligation to appropriate one day rather than another, that which is actually fixed upon is the best and the right one. Bearing in mind, then, that it is right to devote some portion of our time to religious exer- cises, and that no objection exists to the day which is actually appropriated, the duty seems very obvious — so to employ it. Cessation from labour on the first day of the week, is no- * Col. ii. 16, 17. In Rom. xiv. 5, 6, there is a parallel passage, t Gal iv. 10, 11. CHAP. I.] RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 109 ■where enjoined in the Christian Scriptures. Upon this sub- ject, the principles on which a person should regulate his conduct appear to be these : He should reflect that the whole of the day is not too large a portion of our time to devote to public worship, to religious recollectedness, and sedateness of mind ; and therefore that occupations which would inter- fere with this sedateness and recollectedness, or with public worship, ought to be forebome. Even if he supposed that the devoting of the whole of the day was not necessary for himself, he should reflect, that since a considerable part of mankind are obliged, from various causes, to attend to matters unconnected with religion during a part of the day, and that one set attends to them during one part and another during another — the whole of the day is necessary for the commu- nity, even though it were not for each individual : and if eveiy individual should attend to his ordinary affairs during that portion of the day which he deemed superabundant, the consequence might soon be that the day would not be devoted to religion at all. These views will enable the reader to judge in what man- ner we should decide questions respecting attention to tem- poral affairs on particular occasions. The day is not sacred, therefore business is not necessarily sinful ; the day ought to be devoted to religion, therefore other concerns which are not necessary are generally, wrong. The remonstrance, " Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath-day ?" sufficiently indicates that, when reasonable calls are made upon us, we are at liberty to attend to them. Of the reasonableness of these calls every maij must endeavour to judge for himself. A tradesman ought, as a general rule, to refuse to buy or sell goods. If I sold clothing, I would furnish a surtout to a man who was suddenly summoned on a journey, but not to a man who could call the next morning. Were I a builder, I would prop a falling w^all, but not proceed in the erection of a house. Were I a lawyer, I would deliver an opinion to an applicant to whom the delay of a day would be a serious injury, but not to save him the expense of an extra night's lodging by waiting. I once saw with pleasure on the sign-board of a public-house a notice, that " none but travellers could be fur- nished with liquor on a Sunday." The medical profession, and those who sell medicine, are differently situated ; yet it is not to be doubted that both, and especially the latter, might devote a smaller portion of the day to their secular employ- ments, if earnestness in religious concerns were as great as 10 110 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [fiSSAY 11. the opportunities to attend to them. Some physicians in ex- tensive practice, attend almost as regularly on public worship as any of their neighbours. Excursions of pleasure on this day are rarely defensible : they do not comport with the pur- poses to which the day is appropriated. To attempt specific rules upon such a subject were, however, vain. Not every thing which partakes of relaxation is unallowable. A walk in the country may be proper and right, when a party to a watering place would be improper and wrong.* There will be little difficulty in determining what it is allowable to do and what it is not, if the enquiry be not, how much secularity does religion allow? but, how much can I, without a neglect of duty, avoid ? The habit which obtains with many persons of travelling on this day, is peculiarly indefensible ; because it not only keeps the traveller from his church or meeting, but keeps away his servants, or the postmen on the road, and ostlers, and cooks, and waiters. All these may be detained, from public worship by one man's journey of fifty miles. Such a man incurs some responsibility. The plea of " saving time" is not remote from irreverence ; for if it has any meaning it is this, that our time is of more value when employed in busi- ness, than when employed in the worship of God. It is dis- creditable to this country that the number of carriages which traverse it on this day is so great. The evil may rightly and perhaps easily be regulated by the Legislature. You talk of difficulties : — ^you would have talked of many more, if it were now, for the first time, proposed to shut up the General Post- Office one day in seven. We should have heard of parents dying before their children could hear of their danger: of bills dishonoured and merchants discredited for want of a post ; and of a multitude of other inconveniences which busy anticipation would have discovered. Yet the General Post- Office is shut ; and where is the evil ? The journeys of stage coaches may be greatly diminished in number ; and though twenty difficulties may be predicted, none would happen but such as were easily borne. An increase of the duty per mile on those coaches which travelled every day, might perhaps * The scrupulousness of the " Puritans" in the reign of Charles I., and the laxity of Laud, whose ordinances enjoined sports after the hours of public worship, were both really, though perhaps not equally, improper. The Puritans attached sanctity to the day ; and Laud did not consider, or did not regard the consideration, that his sports would not only discredit the notion of sanctity, but preclude that recoUectedness of mind which ought to be maintained throughout the whole day. CHAP. I.] RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. HI effect the object. Probably not less than forty persons are employed on temporal affairs, in consequence of an ordinary stage coach journey of a hundred miles.* A similar regulation would be desirable with respect to " Sunday Papers." The ordinary contents of a newspaper are little accordant with religious sobriety and abstraction from the world. News of armies, and of funds and markets, of political contests and party animosities, of robberies and trials, of sporting, and boxing, and the stage ; with merriment, and scandal, and advertisements— are sufficiently ill adapted to the cultivation of religiousness of mind. An additional two- pence on the stamp-duty would perhaps remedy the evil. Private, and especially public amusements on this day, are clearly wrong. It is remarkable that they appear least will- ing to dispense with their amusements on this day, who pur- sue them on every other : and the observation affords one illustration amongst the many of the pitiable effects of what is called — though it is only called — a life of pleasure. Upon every kind and mode of negligence respecting these religious obligations, the question is not simply, whether the individual himself sustains moral injury, but also whether he occasions injury to those around him. The example is mis- chievous 1 Even supposing that a man may feel devotion in his counting house, or at the tavern, or over a pack of cards, his neighbours who know where he is, or his family who see what he is doing, are encouraged to follow his example, with- out any idea of carrying their religion with them. "My neighbour amuses himself — ^my father attends to his ledgers — and why may not I ?" — So that, if such things were not intrinsically unlawful, they would be wrong because they are inexpedient. Some things might be done without blame by the lone tenant of a wild^ which involve positive guilt in a man in society. Holydays, such as those which are distinguished by the names of Christmas-day and Good-Friday, possess no sanction from Scripture : they are of human institution. If any re- ligious community thinks it is desirable to devote more than fifty-two days in the year to the purposes of religion, it is un- questionably right that they should devote them ; and it is amongst the good institutions of several Christian communi- ties, that they do weekly appropriate some additional hours * There is reason to believe that to the numerous class of coachmen, waiters, &c., the alteration would be most acceptable. I have been told \>y an intelUgent coachman, that they would gladly unite in a request to their employers if it were likely to avail. 113 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [ESSAY II. to these purposes. The observance of the days in question is however of another kind : here, the observance refers to the day as such; and I know not how the censure can be avoided which was directed to those Galatians who " observed days, and months, and times, and years." Whatever may be the sentiments of enhghtened men, those who are not enUght- ened are Ukely to regard such days as sacred in themselves. This is turning to beggarly elements : this partakes of the character of superstition ; and superstition of every kind and in every degree, is incongruous with that " glorious liberty" which Christianity describes, and to which it would conduct us. CEREMONIAL INSTITUTIONS AND DEVOTIONAL FORMULARIES. If God have made known his will that any given ceremony shall be performed in his church, that expression is sufficient ; we do not then enquire into the reasonableness of the cere- mony, nor into its utility. There is nothing in the act of sprinkling water in an infant's face, or of immersing the person of an adult, which recommends it to the view of reason, any more than twenty other acts which might be performed : yet, if it be clear that such an act is required by the Divine Will, all further controversy is at an end. It is not the business, any more than it is the desire, of the writer here to enquire whether the Deity has thus expressed his will respecting any of the rites which are adopted in some Christian churches ; yet the reader should carefully bear in mind what it is that constitutes the obligation of a rite or ceremony, and what does not. Setting utility aside, the obligation must be con- stituted by an expression of the Divine Will ; and he who en- quires into the obligation of these things, should reflect that they acquire a sort of adventitious sanctity from the power of association. Being connected from early life with his ideas of religion, he learns to attach to them the authority which he at- taches to religion itself; and thus perhaps he scarcely knows, be- cause he does not enquire, whether a given institution is found- ed upon the law of God, or introduced by the authority of men. Of some ceremonies or rites, and of almost all formularies and other appendages of public worship, it is acknowledged that they possess no proper sanction from the Will of God. Supposing the written expression of that will to contain no- thing by which we can judge either of their propriety or im- propriety, the standard to which they are to be referred is that of fjtility alone. CHAP. I.] RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 113 Now, it is highly probable that benefits result from these adjuncts of religion, because, in the present state of mankind, it may be expected that some persons are impressed with useful sentiments respecting religion through the intervention of these adjuncts, who might otherwise scarcely regard religion at all : it is probable that many are induced to attend upon public worship by the attraction of its appendages, who would otherwise stay away. Simply to be present at the font or the communion table, may be a means of inducing many religious considerations into the mind. And as to those who are at- tracted to public worship by its accompaniments, they may at least be in the way of religious benefit. One goes to hear the singing, and one the organ, and one to see the paintings or the architecture ; a still larger number go because they are sure to find some occupation for their thoughts ; some prayers or other offices of devotion, something to hear, and see, and do. " The transitions from one office of devotion to another, from confession to prayer, from prayer to thanksgiving, froiri thanksgiving to 'hearing of the word,' are contrived, like scenes in the drama, to supply the mind with a succession of diversified engagements."* These diversified engagements, I say, attract some who would not otherwise attend ; and it is better that they should go from imperfect motives than that they should not go at all. It must, however, be confessed, that the groundwork of this species of utility is similar to that which has been urged in favour of the use of images by the Romish Church. " Idols," say they, " are laymen's books ; and a great means to stir up pious thoughts and devotion in the learnedest."t Indeed, if it is once admitted that the prospect of advantage is a sufficient reason for introducing objects ad- dressed to the senses into the public offices of worship, it is not easy to define where we shall stop. If we may have magnificent architecture, and music, and chanting, and paint- ings ; why may we not have the yet more imposing pomp of the Catholic worship 1 I do not say that this pomp is useful and right, but that the principle on which such things are in- troduced into the worship of God furnishes no satisfactory means of deciding what amount of external observances should be introduced, and what should not. If figures on canvass are lawful because they are useful, why is not a figure in mar- ble or in wood ? Why may we not have images by way of lavmen's books, and of stirring up pious thoughts and devotion ? But it is to be apprehended of such things, or of " contri- * Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 5, c. 5. t Miltou's Prose Works, v. 4. p. 266. 10* il4 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [eSSAY II. vances like scenes in a drama," that they have much less ten- dency to promote devotion than some men may suppose. No doubt they may possess an imposing effect, they may power- fully interest and affect the imagination ; but does not tliis partake too much of that factitious devotion of which we speak ? Is it certain that such things have much tendency to purify the mind, and raise up within it a power that shall efficiently resist temptation ? Even if some benefits do result from the employment of these appendages of w^orship, they are not without their dan- gers and their evils. With respect to those which are ad- dressed to the senses, whether to the eye or ear, there is ob- viously a danger that like other sensible objects they will withdraw the mind from its proper business — ^the cultivation of pure religious affections towards God. And respecting the formularies of devotion, it has been said by a writer, whom none will suspect of overstating their evils, " The arrogant man, as if like the dervise in the Persian fable, he had shot his soul into the character he assumes, repeats, with complete self-application. Lord, I am not high-minded : the trifler says, / hate vain thoughts : the irreligious. Lord, how I love thy law : he who seldom prays at all, confidently repeats, All the day long I am occupied in thy statutes* These are not light con- siderations : here is insincerity and untruths ; and insincerity and untruths, it should be remembered, in the place and at the time when we profess to be humbled in the presence of God. The evils too are inseparable from the system. Wherever preconcerted formularies are introduced, there will always be some persons who join in the use of them without propriety, or sincerity or decorum. Nor are the evils much extenuated by the hope which has been suggested, that " the holy vehicle of their hypocrisy may be made that of their conversion." It is very Christian-like to indulge this hope, though I fear it is not very reasonable. Hypocrisy is itself an offence against God ; and it can scarcely be expected that any thing so immediately connected with the offence will often effect such an end. It is not, however, in the case of those who use these forms in a manner positively hypocritical, that the greatest evil and danger consists : " There is a kind of mechanical memory in the tongue, which runs over the form without any aid of the understanding, without any concurrence of the will, without any consent of the affections ; for do we not some- * More's Moral Sketches, 3d Ed. p. 429. CHAP. I.] RELIGIOirS OBLIGATIONS. 115 times implore God to hear a prayer to which we are ourselves not attending ?"* We have sufficient reason for knowing that to draw nigh to God with our lips whilst our hearts are far from him, is a serious offence in his sight ; and when it is considered how powerful is the tendency of oft-repeated words to lose their practical connexion with feelings and ideas, it is to be feared that tliis class of evils, resulting from the use of forms, is of very wide extent. Nor is it to be forgotten, that as even religious persons sometimes employ " the form with- out any aid of the understanding," so others are in danger of substituting the form for the reality, and of imagining that, if they are exemplary in the observance of the externals of de- votion, the work of religion is done. Such circumstances may reasonably make us hesitate in deciding the question of the propriety of these external things, as a question of expediency. They may reasonably make us do more than this ; for does Christianity allow us to invent a system, of which some of the consequences are so bad, for the sake of a beneficial end 1 Forms of prayer have been supposed to rest on an authority somewhat more definite than that of other religious forms. " The Lord's Prayer is a precedent, as well as a pattern, for forms of prayer. Our Lord appears, if not to have prescribed, at least to have authorized the use of fixed forms, when he complied with the request of the disciple who said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. "t If we turn to Matt, vi., where the fullest account is given of the subject, we are, I think, presented with a different view. Our Saviour, who had been instituting his more perfect laws in place of the doctrines which had been taught of old time, proceeded to the prevalent mode of giving alms, of prayings of fasting, and of laying up wealth. He first describes these modes, and then directs in what manner Christians ought to give alms, and pray and fast. Now, if it be contended that he requires us to employ that particular form of prayer which he then dictated, it must also be contended that he requires us to adopt that particular mode of giving money which he described, and those particular actions, when fasting, which he mentions. If we are obliged to use the form of prayer, we are obliged to give money in secret ; and when we fast, to put oil upon our heads. If these particular modes were not enjoined, neither is the form of prayer ; and the Scriptures contain no indication that this form was ever used at all, either * More's Moral Sketches, 3d Ed. p. 327. t Mor. and Pol. Phil. p. 3. b. 5. c. 5. 116 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [eSSAY II. by the apostles or their converts. But if the argument only asserts that fixed forms are " authorized" by the language of Christ, the question becomes a question merely of expediency. Supposing that they are authorized, they are to be employed only if they are useful. Even in this view, it may be re- marked that there is no reason to suppose, from the Christian Scriptures, that either Christ himself or his apostles ever used a fixed form. If he had designed to authorize, and therefore to recommend their adoption, is it not probable that some indications of their having been employed would be presented? But instead of this, we find that every prayer which is recorded in the volume was delivered extempore, upon the then occasion, and arising out of the then existing circumstances. Yet after all, the important question is not between precon- certed and extempore prayer as such, but whether any prayer is proper and right but that which is elicited by the influence of the Divine power. The enquiry into this solemn subject would lead us too wide from our general business. The truth, however, that " we know not what to pray for as we ought," is as truly applicable to extempore as to formal prayer. Words merely do not constitute prayer, whether they be pre- pared beforehand, or conceived at the moment they are ad- dressed. There is reason to believe that he only offers per- fectly acceptable supplications, who offers them " according to the will of God," and " of the ability which God giveth :" — and if such be indeed the truth, it is scarcely compatible either with a prescribed form of words, or with extempore prayer at prescribed times. — Yet if any Christian, in the piety of his heart, believes it to be most conducive to his religious interests to pray at stated times or in fixed forms, far be it from me- to censure this the mode of his devotion, or to as- sume that his petition will not obtain access to the Universal Lord. Finally, respecting uncommanded ceremonials and rituals of all kinds, and respecting all the appendages of public wor- ship which have been adopted as helps to devotion, there is one truth to which perhaps every good man will assent — that if religion possessed its sufficient and rightful influence, if devotion of the heart were duly maintained without these things, they would no longer be needed. He who enjoys the vigorous exercise of his limbs, is encumbered by the employ- ment of a crutch. Whether the Christian world is yet pre- pared for the relinquishment of these appendages and " helps'* — whether an equal degree of efficacious religion would be CHAP. I.] RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 117 maintained without them — are questions which I presume not to determine : but it may nevertheless be decided, that this is the state of the Christian church to which we should direct our hopes and our endeavours — and that Christianity will never possess its proper influence, and will not effect its destined objects, until the internal dedication of the heart is universally attained. To those who may sometimes be brought into contact with persons who profess scepticism respecting Christianity, and especially to those who are conscious of any tendency in their own minds to listen to the objections of these persons, it may be useful to observe, that the grounds upon which sceptics build their disbelief of Christianity, are commonly very slight. The number is comparatively few whose opin- ions are the result of any tolerable degree of investigation. They embraced sceptical notions through the means which they now take of diffusing them amongst others — not by ar- guments but jests ; not by objections to the historical evidence of Christianity, but by conceits and witticisms ; not by exam- ining the nature of religion as it was delivered by its Founder, but by exposing the conduct of those who profess it. Per- haps the seeming paradox is true, that no men are so credu- lous, that no men accept important propositions upon such slender evidence, as the majority of those #ho reject Chris- tianity. To believe that the religious opinions of almost all the civilized world are founded upon imposture, is to believe an important proposition ; a proposition which no man, who properly employs his faculties, would believe without consid- erable weight of evidence. But what is the evidence upon which the " unfledged witlings who essay their wanton efforts" against religion, usually found their notions ? Alas ! they are so far from having rejected Christianity upon the examination of its evidences that they do not know what Christianity is. To disbelieve the religion of Christianity upon grounds which shall be creditable to the understanding, involves no light task. A man must investigate and scrutinize ; he must ex- amine the credibility of testimony ; he must weigh and com- pare evidence ; he must enquire into the reality of historical facts. If, after rationally doing all this, he disbelieves in Christianity — be it so. I think him, doubtless, mistaken, but I do not think him puerile and credulous. But he who pro- fesses scepticism without any of this species of enquiry, is credulous and puerile indeed ; and such most sceptics actually are. " Concerning unbelievers and doubters of every class, 118 RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. [ESSAY II one observation may almost universally be made with truth, that they are little acquainted with the nature of the Christian religion, and still less with the evidence by which it is sup- ported."* In France, scepticism has extended itself as widely perhaps as in any country in the world, and its philosophers, forty or fifty years ago, were ranked amongst the most intelli- gent and sagacious of mankind. And upon what grounds did these men reject Christianity ? Dr. Priestley went with Lord Shelburne to France, and he says, " I had an opportu- nity of seeing and conversing with every person of eminence wherever we came :" I found " all the philosophical persons to whom I was introduced at Paris, unbelievers in Christian- ity, and even professed atheists. As I chose on all occa- sions to appear as a Christian, I was told by some of them that I was the only person they had ever met with, of whose understanding they had any opinion, who professed to believe in Christianity. But on interrogating them on the subject, I soon found that they had given no proper attention to it, and did not really know what Christianity was. This was also the case with a great part of the company that I saw at Lord Shelburne's."! If these philosophical men rejected Christi- anity in such contemptible and shameful ignorance of its na- ture and evidences, upon what grounds are we to suppose the ordinary striplings of infidelity reject it 1 How then does it happen that those who affect scepticism are so ambitious to make their scepticism known ? Because it is a short and easy road to distinction ; because it affords a cheap means of gratifying vanity. To " rise above vulgar prejudices and superstitions" — "to entertain enlarged and liberal opinions," a.re phrases of great attraction, especially to young men ; and how shall they show that they rise above vulgar prejudices, how shall they so easily manifest the en- largement of their views, as by rejecting a system which all their neighbours agree to be true ? They feel important to themselves, and that they are objects of curiosity to others : and they are objects of curiosity, not on account of their own qualities, but on account of the greatness of that which they contemn. The peasant who reviles a peasant, may revile him without an auditor, but a province will listen to him who vilifies a king. I know not that an intelligent person should be advised to reason with these puny assailants : their notions and their conduct are not the result of reasoning. What they need is the humiliation of vanity and the exposure of * Gisborne's Duties of Men. t Memoirs of Dr. Priestley. CRAP. II-I RELIGIOUS OBLIGATIONS. 119 folly. A few simple interrogations would expose their folly ; and for the purposes of humiliation, simply pass them by. The sun that shines upon them, makes them look bright and large. Let reason and truth withdraw their rays, and these seeming stars will quickly set in silence and in darkness. More contemptible motives to the profession of infidelity cannot perhaps exist, but there are some which are more de- testable. Hartley says that " the strictness and purity of the Christian religion in respect to sexual licentiousness, is pro- bably the chief thing which makes vicious men first fear and hate, and then vilify and oppose it."* Whether therefore we regard the motives which lead to scepticism, or the reasonableness of the grounds upon which it is commonly founded, there is surely much reason for an ingenuous young person to hold in contempt the jests, and pleasantries, and sophistries respecting revelation with which he may be assailed. CHAPTER n. PROPERTY. Foundation of the Right to Property — Insolvency : Perpetual obligation to pay debts: Reform of public opinion : Examples of integrity — Wills, Legatees, Heirs: Informal Wills: Intestates — Charitable Bequests — Minor's debts — A Wife's debts — Bills of Exchange — Shipment — Dis- traints — Unjust defendants — Extortion — Slaves — Privateers — Confisca- tions — Public money — Insurance — Improvements on estates — Settle- ments — Houses of infamy — Literary property — Rewards. Disquisitions respecting the Origin of Property appear to be of little use ; partly because the origin can scarcely be de- termined, and partly because, if it could be determined, the discoveiy would be little applicable to the present condition of human affairs. In whatever manner an estate was acquired two thousand years ago, it is of no consequence in enquiring who ought to possess it now. The foundation of the Right to Property is a more impor- tant point. Ordinarily, the foundation is the law of the land. Of Civil Government— which institution is sanctioned by the divine will — one of the great offices is, to regulate the distri- bution of property ; to give it, if it has the power of giving ; * Observations on Man. 120 PROPERTY. [essay II, or to decide between opposing claimants, to whom it shall be assigned. The proposition therefore, as a general rule, is sound ; — He possesses a right to property to whom the law of the land as- signs it. This however is only a general rule. It has been sufficiently seen that some legal possessions are not permitted by the Moral Law. The occasional opposition between the moral and the legal right to property, is inseparable from the principle on which law is founded — ^that of acting upon gen- eral rules. It is impossible to frame any rule, the application of which shall, in every variety of circumstances, effect the requisitions of Christian morality. A rule which in nine cases proves equitable, may prove utterly unjust in the tenth, A rule which in nine cases promotes the welfare of the citi- zen, may in the tenth outrage reason and humanity. It is evident that in the present state of legal institutions, the evils which result from laws respecting property must be prevented, if they are prevented at all, by the exercise of virtue in individuals. If the law assigns a hundred pounds tome, which every upright man perceives ought in equity to have been assigned to another, that other has no means of en- forcing his claim. Either therefore the claim of equity must be disregarded, or I must voluntarily satisfy it. There are many cases connected with the acquisition or retention of property, with which the decisions of law are not immediately connected, but respecting which it is needr ful to exercise a careful discrimination, in order to con- form to the requisitions of Christian rectitude. The whole subject is of great interest, and of extensive practical appli- cation in the intercourse of life. The reader will therefore be presented with several miscellaneous examples, in which the Moral Law appears to require greater purity of rectitude than is required by statutes, or than is ordinarily practised by mankind. Insolvency. — Why is a man obliged to pay his debts 1 It is to be hoped that the morality of few persons is lax enough to reply — Because the law compels him. But why, then, is he obliged to pay them 1 Because the Moral Law requires it. That this is the primary ground of the obligation is evi- dent ; otherwise the payment of any debt which a vi- cious or corrupt legislature resolved to cancel, would cease to be obligatory upon the debtor. The Virginian statute, which we noticed in the last Essay, would have been a sufficient justification to the planters to defraud their creditors. A man becomes insolvent and is made a bankrupt : he pays CHAP 11.] PROPERTY. 121 his creditors ten sliillings instead of twenty, and obtains his certificate. The law, therefore, discharges him from the ob- ligation to pay more. The bankrupt receives a large legacy, or he engages in business and acquires property. Being then able to pay the remainder of his debts, does the legal dis- charge exempt him from the obligation to pay them ? No : and for this reason that the legal discharge is not a moral discharge ; that as the duty to pay at all was not founded primarily on the law, the law cannot warrant him in with- holding a part. It is however said, that the creditors have reHnquished their right to the remainder by signing the certificate. But why did they accept half their demands instead of the whole 1 Because they were obliged to do it ; they could get no more. As to granting the certificate, they do it because to withhold it would be only an act of gratuitous unkindness. It would be preposterous to say that creditors relinquish their claims voluntarily ; for no one would give up his claim to twenty shillings on the receipt of ten if he could get the other ten by refusing. It might as reasonably be said that a man parts with a limb voluntarily, because, having in- curably lacerated it, he submits to an amputation. It is to be remembered, too, that the necessary relinquishment of half the demand is occasioned by the debtor himself: and it seems very manifest that when a man, by his own act, deprives another of his property, he cannot allege the consequences of that act as a justification of withholding it after restoration is in his power. The mode in which an insolvent man obtains a discharge, does not appear to afiect his subsequent duties. Composi- tions, and bankruptcies, and discharges by an insolvent act are in this respect alike. The acceptance of a part instead of the whole is not voluntary in either case ; and neithfer case exempts the debtor from the obligation to pay in full if he can. If it should be urged that when a person intrusts property to another, he knowingly undertakes the risk of that other's insol- vency, and that, if the contingent loss happens, he has no claims to justice on the other, the answer is this ; that what- ever may be thought of these claims, they are not the grounds upon which the debtor is obliged to pay. The debtor always engages to pay, and the engagement is enforced by morality ; the engagement therefore is binding, whatever risk another man may incur by relying upon it. The causes which have occasioned a person's insolvency, although they greatly affect his character, do not affect his obligations : the duty to repay 11 123 PROPERTY. [esSAV II. when he has the power, is the same whether the insolvency- were occasioned by his fault or his misfortune. Jn all cases, the reasoning that applies to the debt, applies also to the in- terest that accrues upon it ; although with respect to the ac- ceptance of both, and especially of interest, a creditor should exercise a considerate discretion. — A man who has failed of paying his debts ought always to live with frugality, and carefully to economize such money as he gains. He should reflect that he is a trustee for his creditors, and that all the needless money which he expends is not his but theirs. The amount of property which the trading part of a com- mercial nation loses by insolvency, is great enough to consti- tute a considerable national evil. The fraud, too, that is prac- tised under cover of insolvency, is doubtless the most exten- sive of all species of private robbery. The profligacy of some of these cases is well known to be extreme. He who is a bankrupt to-day, riots in the luxuries of affluence to-mor- row ; bows to the creditors whose money he is spending, and exults in the success and the impunity of his wickedness. Of such conduct we should not speak or think but with de- testation. We should no more sit at the table, or take the hand of such a man, than if we knew he had got his money last night on the highway. There is a wickedness in some bankruptcies to which the guilt of ordinary robbers approaches but at a distance. Happy, if such wickedness could not be practised with legal impunity !* Happy, if Public Opinion supplied the deficiency of the law and held the iniquity in rightful abhorrence If Perhaps nothing would tend so efficaciously to diminish the general evils of insolvency, as a sound state of public opinion respecting the obligation to pay our debts. The insolvent who, with the means of paying, retains the money in his own pocket, is, and he should be regarded as being, a dishonest man. If Public Opinion held such conduct to be of the same character as theft, probably a more powerful motive to avoid insolvency would be established than any which now exists. Who would not anxiously (and therefore, in almost all cases, successfully) struggle against insolvency, when he knew that it would be followed, if not by permanent poverty, by per- manent disgrace ? If it should be said that to act upon such a system would overwhelm an insolvent's energies, keep him m perpetual inactivity, and deprive his family of the benefit of his exertions — I answer, that the evil, supposing it to im- * See the 3d Essay. t Id. CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 123 pend, would be much less extensive than may be imagined. The calamity being foreseen, would prevent men from becom- ing insolvent ; and it is certain that the majority might have avoided insolvency by sufficient care. Besides, if a man's principles are such that he would rather sink into inactivity than exert himself in order to be just, it is not necessary to mould public opinion to his character. The question too is, not whether some men would not prefer indolence to the calls of justice, but whether the public should judge accurately res- pecting what those calls are. The state, and especially a fa- mily, might lose occasionally by this reform of opinion — and so they do by sending a man to New South Wales ; but who would think this a good reason for setting criminals at large ? And after all, much more would be gained by preventing in- solvency, than lost by the ill consequences upon the few who failed to pay their debts. It is cause of satisfaction that, respecting this rectified state of opinion, and respecting integrity of private virtue, some ex- amples are offered. There is one community of Christians which holds its members obliged to pay their debts whenever they possess the ability, without regard to the legal discharge.* By this means, there is thrown over the character of every bankrupt who possesses property, a shade which nothing but payment can dispel. The effect (in conjunction we may hope with private integrity of principle) is good — good, both in in- stituting a new motive to avoid insolvency, and in inducing some of those who do become insolvent, subsequently to pay all their debts. Of this latter effect many honourable instances might be given : two of which having fallen under my observation, I would briefly mention. — A man had become insolvent, I be- lieve in early life ; his creditors divided his property amongst them, and gave him a legal discharge. He appears to have formed the resolution to pay the remainder, if his own exer- * " Where any have injured others in their property, the greatest fru- gality should be observed by themselves and their families ; and although they may have a legal discharge from their creditors, both equity and our Christian profession demand, that none, when they have it in their power, should rest satisfied until a just restitution be made to those who have suf- fered by them." " And it is the judgment of this meeting, that monthly and other meet- ings ought not to receive collections or bequests for the use of the poor, or any other services of the Society, of persons who have fallen short in the payment of their just debts, though legally discharged by their credi- tors : for until such persons have paid the deficiency, their possessions can- not in equity be considered as their own." Official Documents of the Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends. 124 " PROPERTY. [essay II. tions should enable him to do it. He procured employment, by which however he never gained more than twenty shillings a-week ; and worked industriously and lived frugally for eigh- teen years. At the expiration of this time, he found he had accumulated enough to pay the remainder, and he sent the money to his creditors. Such a man, I think, might hope to derive, during the remainder of his life, greater satisfaction from the consciousness of integrity, than he would have de- rived from expending the money on himself. It should be told that many of his creditors, when they heard the circum- stances, declined to receive the money, or voluntarily pre- sented it to him again. One of these was my neighbour ; he had been little accustomed to exemplary virtue, and the proffered money astonished him : he talked in loud commen- dation of what to him was unheard-of integrity ; signed a re- ceipt for the amount, and sent it back as a present to the debtor. The other instance may furnish hints of a useful kind. It was the case of a female who had endeavoured to support herself by the profits of a shop. She however be- came insolvent, paid some dividend, and received a discharge. She again entered into business, and in the course of years had accumulated enough to pay the remainder of her debts. But the infirmities of age were now coming on, and the an- nual income from her savings was just sufficient for the wants of declining years. Being thus at present unable to discharge her obligations without subjecting herself to the necessity of obtaining relief from others ; she executed a will, directing that at her death the creditors should be paid the remainder of their demands : and when she died they were paid accord- ingly. Wills, Legatees, and Heirs. — The right of a person to order the distribution of his property after death, is recom- mended by its Utility ; and were this less manifest than it is, it would be sufficient for us that the right is established by civil government. It however happens in practice, that persons sometimes dis- tribute their property in a manner that is both unreasonable and unjust. This evil the law cannot easily remedy ; and con- sequently the duty of remedying it, devolves upon those to whom the property is bequeathed. If they do not prevent the injustice, it cannot be prevented. This indicates the proprie- ty, on the part of a legatee or an heir, of considering, when property devolves to him in a manner or in a proportion that appears improper, how he may exercise upright integrity, lest he should be the practical agent of injustice or oppression. CHAP. II.] PROPERTT. 125 Another cause for the exercise of this integrity consists in this circumstance : — When the right of a person to bequeath his property is admitted, it is evident that his intention ought in general to be the standard of his successor's conduct : and accordingly the law, in making enactments upon the subject, directs much of its solicitude to the means of ascertaining and of fulfilling the testator's intentions. These intentions must, according to the existing systems of Jurisprudence, be ascertained by some general rules — by a written declaration perhaps, or a declaration of a specified kind, or made in a pre- scribed form, or attested in a particular manner. But in con- sequence of this it happens, that as through accident or inad- vertency a testator does not always coitiply with these forms, the law, which adheres to its rules, frustrates his intentions, and therefore, in effect, defeats its own object in prescribing the forms. Here again the intentions of the deceased and the demands of equity cannot be fulfilled, except by the vir- tuous integrity of heirs and legatees. I. If my father, who had one son besides myself, left nine- tenths of his property to me, and only the remaining tenth to my brother, I should not think the will, however authentic, justified me in taking so large a proportion, unless I could dis- cover some reasonable motive which influenced my father's mind. If my brother already possessed a fortune and I had none ; if I were married and had a numerous family ; and he were single and unlikely to marry ; if he was incurably ex- travagant, and would probably in a few weeks or months squander his patrimony ; in these, or in such circumstances, I should think myself at liberty to appropriate my father's be- quest : otherwise I should not. Thus, if the disproportionate 'division was the effect of some unreasonable prejudice against my brother, or fondness for me ; or if it was made at the un- fair instigation of another person, or in a temporary fit of pas- sion or disgust; I could not, virtuously, enforce the will. The reason is plain. The will being unjust or extremely un- reasonable, I should be guilty of injustice or extreme unrea- sonableness in enforcing it. By the English law, the real estates of deceased persons are not available for the payment of debts of simple contract, unless they are made so by the will. The rule is, to be sure, sufficiently barbarous ; and he who intentionally forbears to make the estates available, dies, as has been properly observed with a deliberate fraud in his heart. But this fraud cannot be completed without the concurrence of a second person, the heir. He therefore is under a moral obligation lo pay such 11* 126 PROPERTY. [essay II. debts out of the real estate, notwithstanding the deficiency of the will : for if the father was fraudulent in making such a will, the son is fraudulent in taking advantage of his parent's wickedness. He may act with strict legality in keeping the ■ property, but he is condemned as dishonest by the Moral Law. II. A person bequeaths five hundred pounds to some charity — for example, to the Foundling — and directs that the money shall be laid out in land. His intention is indisputably plain : but the law, with certain motives, says, that the direc- tion to lay out the money in land makes the bequest void ; and it will not enforce the bequest. But, because the testator forgot this, can the residuary legatee honestly put the five hundred pounds into his own pocket ? Assuredly he cannot. The money is as truly the property of the Foundling as if the will had been accurately framed. The circumstance that the law will not compel him to give it up, although it may exempt him from an action, cannot exempt him from guilt. The law, either with reason or without it, prefers that an estate should descend to a brother's son rather than a sister's. Still it permits a man to leave it to his sister's son if he pleases ; and only requires that, when he wishes to do this, he shall have three witnesses to his will instead of two. The reader will remark that the object of this legal provision is, that the intention of the party shall be indisputably known. The legislature does not wish to control him in th^ disposi- tion of his property, but only to ascertain distinctly what his intention is. A will then is made, leaving an estate to a sis- ter's son, and is attested by two witnesses only. The omis- sion of the third is a matter of mere inadvertence : no doubt exists as to the person's intention or its reasonableness. Is it then consistent with integrity for the brother's son to take- advantage of the omission, and to withhold the estate from his cousin 1 I think the conscience of every man will answer, no : and if this be the fact, we need enquire no further. Upon such a subject, the concurrent dictates in the minds of men can scarcely be otherwise than true and just. But even critically, the same conclusion appears to follow. The law required three witnesses in order that the person's intention should be known. Now it is known : and therefore the very object of the law is attained. To take advantage of the omission is, in reality, to misapply the law. It is insisting upon its letter in opposition to its motives and design. Dr. Paley has decided this ques- tion otherwise, by a process of reasoning of which the basis does not appear very sound. He says that such a person has no " right" to dispose of the property, because the law con- CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. l2t ferred the right upon condition that he should have three wit- nesses, with which condition he has not complied. But sure- ly the "right"- of disposing property is recognized generalli/ by the law ; the requisition of three witnesses is not designed to confer a right, but to adjust the mode of exercising it. In- deed, Paley himself virtually gives up his own doctrine ; for he says he should hesitate in applying it, if " considerations of pity to distress, of duty to a parent, or of gratitude to a ben- efactor,"* would be disregarded by the application. Why should these considerations suspend the applicability of his doctrine ? Because Christianity requires us to attend to them — which is the very truth we are urging : we say, the per- mission of the law is not a sufficient warrant to disregard the obligations of Christianity. A man who possesses five thousand pounds, has two sons, of whom John is well provided for, and Thomas is not. With the privity of his sons he makes a will, leaving four thousand pounds to Thomas and one to John, explaining to both the rea- son of this division. A fire happens in the house and the will is burnt ; and the father, before he has the opportunity of making another, is carried off by a fever. Now the English law would assign a half of the money to each brother. If John demands his half, is he a just man ? Every one I think will perceive that he is not, and that, if he demanded it, he would violate the duties of benevolence. The law is not his sufficient rule. A person whose near relations do not stand in need of his money, adopts the children of distant relatives, with the de- clared intention or manifest design of providing for them at his death. If, under such circumstances, he dies without a will, the heir at law could not morally avail himself of his le- gal privilege, to the injury of these expectant parties. They need the money, and he does not ; which is one good reason for not seizing it ; but the intention of the deceased invested them with a right ; and so that the intention is known, it mat- ters little to the moral obligation, whether it is expressed on paper or not. Possibly some reader may say, that if an heir or legatee must always institute enquiries into the uncertain claims of others before he accepts the property of the deceased, and if he is obliged to give up his own claims whenever their's seem to preponderate, he will be involved in endless doubts and scruples, and testators will never know whether their wills * Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 3, p. 1, c 23. 12S pnovtnfr. [essat tj. I ■will be executed or not : the answer is, that no such scrupti- lousness is demanded. Hardheartedness, and extreme unrea- sonableness, and injustice, are one class of considerations ; critical scruples, and uncertain claims, are another. It may be worth a paragraph to remark, that it is to be feared some persons think too complacently of their charitable be- quests, or, what is worse, hope that it is a species of good works which will counterbalance the offence of some present irregularities of conduct. Such bequests ought not to be dis- couraged ; and yet it should be remembered, that he who gives money after his death, parts with nothing of his own. He gives it only when he cannot retain it. The man who leaves his money for the single purpose of doing good, does right : but he who hopes that it is a work of merit, should re- member that the money is given, that the privation is endured, not by himself but by his heirs. A man who has more than he needs, should dispense it whilst it is his own. Minors' Debts. — A young man under twenty-one years of age purchases articles of a tradesman, of which some are necessary and some are not. Payment for unnecessary articles cannot be enforced by the English law — ^the reason with the Legislature being this, that thoughtless youths might be prac- tised upon by designing persons, and induced to make need- less and extravagant purchases. But is the youth who pur- chases unnecessary articles with the promise to pay when he becomes of age, exempted from the obligation ? Now it is to be remembered, generally, that this obligation is not founded upon the Law of the Land, and therefore that the law cannot dispense with it. But if the tradesman has actually taken ad- vantage of the inexperience of a youth, to cajole him into debts of which he was not conscious of the amount or the im- propriety, it does not appear that he is obliged to pay them ; and for this reason, that he did not, in any proper sense of the term, come under an obligation to pay them. In other cases, the obligation remains. The circumstance that the law will not assist the creditor to recover the money, does not dispense with it. It is fit, no doubt, that these dishonourable trades- men should be punished, though the mode of punishing them is exceptionable indeed. It operates as a powerful tempta- tion to fraud in young men, and it is a bad system to discourage dishonesty in one person by tempting the probity of another, The youth, too, is of all persons the last who should profit by the punishment of the trader. He is reprehensible himself: young men who contract such debts are seldom so young or so ignorant as not to know that they are doing wrong. OHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 129 A man's wife "runs him into debt" by extravagant pur- chases which he is alike unable to prevent or to afford. Many- persons sell goods to such a woman, who are conscious of her habits and of the husband's situation, yet continue to sup- ply her extravagance, because they know the law will enable them to enforce payment from the husband. These persons act legally, but they are legally wicked. Do they act as they would desire others to act towards them ? Would one of these men wish another tradesman so to supply his own wife if she was notoriously a spendthrift ? If not, morality condemns his con- duct : and the laws, in effect, condemn it too ; for the Legislature would not have made husbands responsible for their wives' debts anymore than for their children's, but for the presumption that the wife generally buys what the husband approves. Debts of unprincipled extravagance, are not debts which the law in- tended to provide that the husband should pay. If all women contracted such debts, the Legislature would instantly alter the law. If the Legislature could have made the distinction, perhaps it would have made it ; since it did not or could not, the deficiency must be supplied by private integrity. Bills of Exchange. — The law of England provides, that if the possessor of a Bill of Exchange fails to demand pay- ment on the day on which it becomes due, he takes the re- sponsibility, in case of its eventual non-payment, from the pre- vious endorsers, and incurs it himself. This as a general rule may be just. A party may be able to pay to-day and un- able a week hence ; and if in such a case a loss arises by one man's negligence, it were manifestly unreasonable that it should be sustained by others. But if the acceptor becomes unable to pay a week or a month before the bill is due, the previous endorsers cannot in justice throw the loss upon the last possessor, even though he fails to present it on the ap- pointed day. For wAy did the law make its provision ? In or- der to secure persons from the loss of their property by the negligence of others over whom they had no control. But, in the supposed case, the loss is not occasioned by any such cause, and therefore the spirit of the law does not apply to it. You are insisting upon its literal, in opposition to its just, in- terpretation. Whether the Bill was presented on the right day or the wrong, makes no difference to the previous en- dorsers, and for such a case the law was not made. A similar rule of virtue applies to the case of giving notice of refusal to accept or to pay. If, in consequence of the want of this notice, the party is subjected to loss, he may avail himself of the legal exemption from the last possessor's claim. 130 PROPERTY. [essay II. If the want of notice made no difference in his situation, he may not. Shipments. — The same principles apply to a circumstance which not unfrequently occurs amongst men of business, and in which integrity is, I think, very commonly sacrificed to in- terest. A tradesman in Falmouth is in the habit of purchas- ing goods of merchants in London, by whom the goods are forwarded in vessels to Falmouth. Now it is a rule of law founded upon established custom, that goods when shipped are at the risk of the buyer. The law, however, requires that an account of the shipment shall be sent to the buyer by post, in order that, if he thinks proper, he may insure his goods : and in order to effect this object, the law directs, that if the account be not sent, and the vessel is wrecked, it will not enforce payment from the buyer. All this as a general rule is just. But in the actual transactions of business, goods are very frequently sent by sea by an expressed or tacit agree- ment between the parties without notice by the post. The Falmouth tradesman then is in the habit of thus conducting the matter for a series of years. He habitually orders his goods to be sent by ship, and the merchant, as habitually, with the buyer's knowledge, sends the invoice with them. Of course the buyer is not in the habit of insuring. At length a vessel is wrecked and a package is lost. When the mer- chant applies for payment, the tradesman says — " No ; you sent no invoice by post : I shall not pay you, and I know you cannot compel me by law." Now this conduct I think is con- demned by morality. The man in Falmouth does not suffer any loss in consequence of the want of notice. He would not have insured if he had received it ; and therefore the inten- tion of the Legislature in withholding its assistance from the merchant, was not to provide for such a case. Thus to take advantage of the law without regard to its intention is unjust. Besides, the custom of sending .the invoice with the goods ra- ther than by post, is for the advantage of the buyer only : — it saves him a shilling in postage. The understanding amongst men of business that the risk of loss at sea impends on buyers is so complete, that they habitually take that risk into ac- count in the profits which they demand on their goods : sellers do not ; and this again indicates the injustice of throwing the loss upon the seller when an accident happens at sea. — Yet tradesmen, I believe, rarely practise any other justice than that which the law will enforce ; as if not to be compelled by law were to be exempt from all moral obligation. It is hard- ly necessary to observe, that if the man in Falmouth was ac- CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 131 tually prevented from insuring by the want of an invoice by post, he has a claim of justice as well as of law upon the mer- chant in London. DiSTRAixVTs. — It is well known that in distraints for rent, the law allows the landlord to seize whatever goods he finds upon the premises, without enquiring to whom they belong. And this rule, like many others, is as good as a general rule can be ; since an unprincipled tenant might easily contrive to make it appear that none of the property was his own, and thus the landlord might be irremediably defrauded. Yet the landlord cannot always virtuously act upon the rule of law. A tenant who expects a distraint to-morrow, and of whose profligacy a lodger in the house has no suspicion, secretly removes his own goods in the night, and leaves the lodger's to be seized by the bailiff. The landlord ought not, as a mat- ter of course, to take these goods, and to leave a family per- haps without a table or a bed. The law indeed allows it ; but benevolence, but probity, does not. A man came to a friend of mine and proposed to take a number of his sheep to graze. My friend agreed with him, and sent the sheep. The next day these sheep were seized by the man's landlord for rent. It was an artifice precon- certed between the landlord and the tenant in order that the rent might be paid out of my friend's pocket ! Did this land- lord act justly? The reader says, "No, he deserved a prison." And yet the seizure was permitted by the law; and if morality did not possess an authority superior to law, the seizure would have been just. Now, in less flagitious in- stances, the same regard to the dictates of morality is to be maintained notwithstanding the permissions of law. — The con- trivers of this abandoned iniquity possessed the effrontery to come afterwards to the gentleman whom they had defrauded, to offer to compound the matter ; to send back the sheep which were of the value perhaps of fifty pounds, if he would give them thirty pounds in money. He refused to counte- nance such wickedness by the remotest implication, and sent them away to enjoy all their plunder. Theoretically^ perhaps no seizures are unjust when no fraud is practised by the landlord, because persons who entrust their property on the premises of another, are supposed to know the risk, and voluntarily to undertake it. But, in prac- tice, this risk is often not thought of and not known. Besides, mere justice is not the only thing which a landlord has to take into account. The authority which requires us to be just, requires us to be compassionate and kind. And here, a$ 132 PROPERTY. [essay II. in many other cases, it may be remarked, that the object of the law in allowing landlords to seize whatever they find, was to protect them from fraud, and not to facilitate the op- pression of under-tenants and others. If the first tenant has practised no fraud, it seems a violation of the intention of the law, to enforce it against those who happen to have entrusted their property in his hands. Unjust Defendants. — It does not present a very favour- able view of the state of private principle, that there are so many who refuse justice to plaintiffs unless they are com- pelled to be just by the law. It is indisputable, that a multi- tude of suits are undertaken in order to obtain property or rights which the defendant knows he ought voluntarily to give up. Such a person is certainly a dishonest man. When the verdict is given against him, I regard him in the light of a. convicted robber — differing from other robbers in the circum- stance that he is tried at Nisi prius instead of the Crown bar. For what is the difference between him who takes what is another's and him who withholds it ? This severity of cen- sure applies to some who are sued for damages. A man who, whether by design or inadvertency, has injured another, and will not compensate him unless he is legally compelled to do it, is surely unjust. Yet many of these persons seem to think that injury to property, or person, or character, entails no duty to make reparation except it be enforced. Why, the law- does not create this duty, it only compels us to fulfil it. If the minds of such persons were under the influence of in- tegrity, they would pay such debts without compulsion. — This subject is one amongst the many upon which Public Opinion needs to be aroused and to be rectified. When our estimates of moral character are adjusted to individual probity of prin- ciple, some of those who now pass in society as creditable persons, will be placed at the same point on the scale of mo- rality, as many of those who are consigned to a jail. Extortion. — It is a very common thing for a creditor who cannot obtain payment from the person who owes him money, to practise a species of extortion upon his relations or friends. The man perhaps is insolvent and unable to pay, and the creditor threatens to imprison him in order to induce his friends to pay the money rather than allow him to be immured in a jail. This is not honest. Why should a person be de- prived of his property because he has a regard for the repu- tation and comfort of another man ? It will be said that the debtor's friends pay voluntarily ; but it is only with that sort of willingness with which a traveller gives his purse to ? CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 133 footpad, rather than be violently assaulted or perhaps killed. Both the footpad and the creditor are extortioners — one ob- tains money by threatening mischief to the person, and the other by threatening pain to the mind. We do not say that their actions are equal in flagitiousness, but we say that both are criminal. — -It is said that, after the death of Sheridan, and when a number of men of rank were assembled to attend his funeral, a person elegantly dressed and stating himself to be a relation of the deceased, entered the chamber of death. He urgently entreated to be allowed to view the face of his de- parted friend, and the coffin lid was unscrewed. The stranger pulled a warrant out of his pocket and arrested the body. It was probably a concerted scheme to obtain a sum (which it is supposed was five hundred pounds) that had been owing by the deceased. The creditor doubtless expected that a number of men of fortune would be present, who would pre- fer losing five hundred pounds to suffering the remains of their friend to be consigned to the police. The extortioner was successful : it is said that Lord Sidmouth and another gentle- man paid the money. Was this creditor an honest man ? If courts of Equity had existed adapted to such cases, and the man were prosecuted, the consciences of a jury would surely have impelled them to send him to Newgate. Slaves. — If a person left me an estate in Virginia or the West Indies, with a hundred slaves, the law of the land allows me to keep possession of both ; the Moral Law does not. I should therefore hold myself imperatively obliged to give these persons their liberty. I do not say that I would manu- mit them all the next day ; but if I deferred their liberation, it ought to be for their sakes, not my own : just as if I had a thousand pounds for a minor, my motive in withholding it from him would be exclusively his own advantage. Some persons who perceive the flagitiousness of slavery, retain slaves. Much ^forbearance of thought and language should be observed towards the man, in whose mind perhaps there is a strong conflict between conscience and the difficulty or loss which might attend a regard to its dictates. I have met with a feeling and benevolent person who owned several hun- dred slaves, and who, I believe, secretly lamented his own situation. I would be slow in censuring such a man, and yet it ought not to be concealed, that if he complied with the requisitions of the Moral Law, he would at least hasten to prepare them for emancipation. To endeavour to extricate oneself from the difficulty by selling the slaves, were self-im- position. A man may as well keep them in bondage himself 12 134 PROPERTY. [essay II. as sell them to another who would keep them in it. A nar- rative has appeared in print of the conduct of a gentleman to whom a number of slaves had been bequeathed, and who acted towards them upon the principles which rectitude re- quires. He conveyed them to some other country, educated some, procured employment for others, and acted as a Chris- tian towards all. Upon similar grounds, an upright man should not accept a present of a hundred pounds from a person who had not paid his debts, nor become his legatee. If the money were not rightfully his, he cannot give it ; if it be rightfully his credit- ors' it cannot be mine. Privateers.-— Although familiarity with war occasions many obliquities in the moral notions of a people, yet the silent verdict of public opinion is, I think, against the recti- tude of privateering. It is not regarded as creditable and virtuous ; and this public disapprobation appears to be on the increase. Considerable exertion at least has been made, on the part of the American government, to abolish it. — To this private plunderer himself I do not talk of the obligations of morality; he has many lessons of virtue to learn before he will be likely to listen to such virtue as it is the object of these pages to recommend: but to him who perceives the flagitiousness of the practice, I would urge the consideration that he ought not to receive the plunder of a privateer even at second hand. If a man ought not to be the legatee of a bankrupt, he ought not to be the legatee of him who gained his money by privateering. Yet it is to be feared that many who would not fit out a privateer, would accept the money which the owners had stolen. If it be stolen, it is not theirs to give ; and what one has no right to give, another has no right to accept. During one of our wars with France, a gentleman who en- tertained such views of integrity as these was partner in a merchant vessel, and, in spite of his representations, the other owners resolved to fit her out as a privateer. They did so, and she happened to capture several vessels. This gentle- man received from time to time his share of the prizes, and laid it by ; till, at the conclusion of the war, it amounted to a considerable sum. What was to be done with the money '? He felt that, as an upright man, he could not retain the money ; and he accordingly went to France, advertised for the owners of the captured vessels, and returned to them the amount. Such conduct, instead of being a matter for good men to ad- mire, and for men of loose morality to regard as needless CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 135 scrupulosity, ought, when such circumstances arise, to be an ordinary occurrence. I do not relate the fact because I think it entitles the party to any extraordinary praise. He was honest ; and honesty was his duty. The praise, if praise be due, consists in this — that he was upright where most men would have been unjust. Similar integrity upon parallel sub- jects may often be exhibited again — ^upon privateering it can- not often be repeated ; for when the virtue of the public is great enough to make such integrity frequent, it will be great enough to frown privateering from the world. At the time of war with the Dutch, about forty years ago, an English merchant vessel captured a Dutch Indiaman. It happened that one of the owners of the merchantman was one of the Society of Friends or Quakers. This society, as it objects to war, does not permit its members to share in such a manner in the profits of war. However, this person, when he heard of the capture, insured his share of the prize. The vessel could not be brought into port, and he received of the underwriters eighteen hundred pounds. To have retained this money would have been equivalent to quitting the society, so he gave it to his friends to dispose of it as justice might appear to prescribe. The state of public affairs on the Con- tinent did not allow the trustees immediately to take any ac- tive measures to discover the owners of the captured vessel. The money, therefore, was allowed to accumulate. At the termination of the war with France, the circumstances of the case were repeatedly published in the Dutch journals, and the full amount of every claim that has been clearly made out has been paid by the trustees. Confiscations. — I do not know whether the history of confiscations aflTords any examples of persons who refused to accept the confiscated property. Yet, when it is considered under what circumstances these seizures are frequently made ■ — of revolution and civil war, and the like, when the vindic- tive passions overpower the claims of justice and humanity — ■ it cannot be doubted that the acceptance of confiscated pro- perty has sometimes been an act irreconcilable with integrity. Look, for example, at the confiscations of the French Revo- lution. The Government which at the moment held the reins, doubtless sanctioned the appropriation of the property which they seized ; and in so far the acceptance was legal. But that surely is not sufficient. Let an upright man suppose himself to be the neighbour of another, who, with his family, enjoys the comforts of a paternal estate. In the distractions of political turbulence this neighbour is carried oflf and ban- 136 PROPERTY. [essay tl. ished, and the estate is seized by order of the government. Would such a man accept this estate when the government offered it, without enquiry and consideration ? Would he sit down in the warm comforts of plenty, whilst his neighbour was wandering, destitute perhaps, in another land, and whilst his family were in sorrow and in want ? Would he not con- sider whether the confiscation was consistent with justice and rectitude — and whether, if it were right with respect to the man, it was right with respect to his children and his wife, who perhaps did not participate in his offences ? It may serve to give clearness to our perception to consider, that if Louis XVII . had been restored to the throne soon after his father's death, it is probable that many of the emigrants would have been reinstated in their possessions. Louis's restoration might have been the result of some intrigue, or of a battle. Do, then, the obligations of mankind as to enjoying the property of another, depend on such circumstances as bat- tles and intrigues ? If the returning emigrant would have rightfully repossessed his estate if the battle was successful, can the present occupier rightfully possess it if the battle is not successful ? Is the result of a political manoeuvre a pro- per rule to guide a man's conscience in retaining or giving up the houses and lands of his neighbours 1 Politicians, and those who profit by confiscations, may be little influenced by considerations like these ; but there are other men, who, I think, will perceive that they are important, and who, though confiscated property may never be offered to them, will be able to apply the principles which these considerations illustrate, to their own conduct in other affairs. It is worthy of observation that in our own countrj', " of all the persons who were enriched by the spoils of the religious houses, there was not one who suffered for his opinions dur<- ing the persecution."* How can this be accounted for, ex- cept upon the presumption that those who were so willing to accept these spoils, were not remarkable for their fidelity to religion ? Public Money. — Some writers on political affairs declaim much against sinecures and " places ;" not always remember- ing that these things may be only modes of paying, and of justly paying, the servants of the -public. It would, no doubt, be preferable that he who is rewarded for serving the public should be rewarded avowedly as such, and not by the salary of a nominal office, which is always filled whether the re- « Southey's Book of the Church, vol. 2. CHAP. 11.] PROPERTY. 137 ceiver deserves the money or not. Sucli a mode of remuner- ation would be more reasonable in itself, and more satisfac- tory to the people. However, if public men deserve the money they receive, the name by which the salary is designated is not of much concern. The great point is the desert. That this ought to be a great point with a government there can be no doubt ; and it is indeed upon governments that writers are wont to urge the obligation. But our business is with the receivers. May a person, morally, appropriate to his own use any amount of money which a government chooses to give him ? No. Then, when the public money is offered to any man, he is bound in con- science to consider whether he is in equity entitled to it or not. If, not being entitled, he accepts it, he is not an upright man. For who gives it to him ? The government ; that is, the trustee for the public. A government is in a situation not dissimilar to that of a trustee for a minor. It has no right to dispose of the public property according to its own will. Whatever it expends, except with a view to the public advan- tage, is to be regarded as so much fraud ; and it is quite mani- fest that if the government has no right to give, the private person can have no right to receive. I know of no exception to the application of these remarks, except where the public have expressly delivered up a certain amount of revenue to be applied according to the inclination of the governing power. Now, the equity of an individual's claims upon the public property must be jfounded upon his services to the public : not upon his services to a minister, not upon the partiality of a prince ; but upon services actually performed or performing for the public* The degree in which familiarity with an ill custom diminishes our estimate of its viciousness is wonder- ful. If you propose to a man to come to some understanding with a guardian, by which he shall get a hundred pounds out of a ward's estate, he starts from you with abhorrence. Yet that same man, if a minister should offer him ten times as much of the public property, puts it complacently and thank- fully into his pocket. Is this consistency ? Is it uprightness ? In estimating the recompense to which public men are entitled, let the principles by all means be liberal. Let them be well paid : but let the money be paid, not given ; let it be the discharge of a debt, not the making of a present. And were I a servant of the public, I should not assume as of * It is not necessary that these services should have been personal. The widow or son of a man who had been inadequately remunerated du- ring his Ufe, may very properly accept a competent pension from the State. 12* 138 PROPERTY. [essay II. course, that whatever remuneration the government was dis- posed to give, it would be right for me to receive. I should think myself obliged to consider for myself: and without affecting a trifling scrupulousness, I could not with integrity receive two thousand a year, if I knew that I was handsomely remunerated by one. These principles of conduct do not appear to lose their application in respect of fixed salaries or perquisites that are attached to offices. If a man cannot up- rightly take two thousand pounds when he knows he is enti- tled to but one, it cannot be made right by the circumstance that others have taken it before him, or that all take it who ac- cept the office. The income may be exorbitantly dispropor- tioned, not merely to the labour of the office, but to the total services of the individual. Nor, I think, do these principles lose their application, even when, as in this country, a sum is voted by the Legislature for the Civil List, and when it is out of this voted sum that the salaries are paid. You say — ^the representatives of the people give the individual the money. Very well — ^yet even this may be true in theory rather than in fact. But who pretends that, when the votes for the Civil List are made in the House of Commons, its members ac- tually consider whether the individuals to whom the money will be distributed are in equity entitled to it or not ? — The question is very simple at last — whether a person may vir- tuously accept the money of the public, without having ren- dered proportionate services to the public ? There have been examples of persons who have voluntarily declined to receive the whole of the sums allotted to them by the government ; and when these sums were manifestly disproportionate to the claims of the parties, or unreasonable when compared with the privations of the people, such sacrifices approve them- selves to the feelings and consciences of the public. We feel that they are just and right ; and this feeling outweighs in authority a hundred argimients by which men may attempt to defend themselves in the contrary practice. Those large salaries which are given by way of " support- ing the dignity of public functionaries," are not I think recon- cilable with propriety nor dictated by necessity. At any rate, there must be some sorrowful want of purity in political affairs, if an ambassador or a prime minister is indebted for any part of his efficiency to these dignities and splendours. If the necessity for them is not imaginary, it ought to be ; and it may be doubted whether, even now, a minister of integrity who could not afford the customary splendours of his office, would not possess as much weight in his own country and CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 139 amongst other nations, as if he were surrounded with magni- ficence. Who feels disrespect towards the great officers of the American government ? And yet their salaries are incom- parably smaller than those of some of the inferior ministers in Europe. Insurance. — It is very possible for a man to act dishon- estly every day and yet never to defraud another of a shilling. A merchant who conducts his business partly or wholly with borrowed capital, is not honest if he endangers the loss of an amount of property which, if lost, would disable him from paying his debts. He who possesses a thousand pounds of his own and borrows a thousand of some one else, cannot virtuously speculate so extensively as that, if his prospects should be disappointed, he would lose twelve hundred. The speculation is dishonest whether it succeeds or not : it is risk- ing other men's property without their consent. Under simi- lar circumstances it is unjust not to insure. Perhaps the majority of uninsured traders, if their houses and goods were burnt, would be unable to pay their creditors. The injustice consists not in the actual loss which may be inflicted, (for whether a fire happens or not, the injustice is the same,) but in endangering the infliction of the loss. There are but two ways in which, under such circumstances, the claims of rec- titude can be satisfied — one is by not endangering the property, and the other by telling its actual owner that it will be en- dangered, and leaving him to incur the risk or not as he pleases. " Those who hold the property of others are not warranted, on the principles of justice, in neglecting to inform themselves from time to time, of the real situation of their affairs."* This enforces the doctrines which we have delivered. It asserts that injustice attaches to not investigating ; and this injustice is often real whether creditors are injured or not. During the seventeenth century, when religious persecu- tion was very active, some beautiful examples of integrity were offered by its victims. It was common for officers to seize the property of conscientious and good men, and some- times to plunder them with such relentless barbarity as scarcely to leave them the common utensils of a kitchen. These per sons sometimes had the property of others on their premises , and when they heard that the officers were likely to make a seizure, industriously removed from their premises all pro- perty but their own. At one period, a number of traders in * Official Documents of the Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends : 140 PROPERTY. [essay II. the country who had made purchases in the London markets, found that their plunderers were likely to disable them from paying for their purchases, and they requested the merchants to take back, and the merchants did take back, their goods. In passing, I would remark, that the readers of mere gen- eral history only, are very imperfectly acquainted with the ex- tent to which persecution on account of religion has been practised in these kingdoms, ages since protestantism became the religion of the state. A competent acquaintance with this species of history, is of incomparable greater value than much of the matter with which historians are wont to fill their pages. Improvements on Estates. — There are some circum- stances in which the occupier of lands or houses, who has increased their value by erections or other improvements, cannot in justice be compelled to pay for the increased value if he purchases the property. A man purchases the lease of an estate, and has reason to expect from the youth and health of the " lives," that he may retain possession of it for thirty or forty years. In consequence of this expectation, he makes many additions to the buildings ; and by other modes of im- provement considerably increases the value of the estate. It however happens that in the course of two or three years all the lives drop. The landowner when the person applies to him for a new lease, demands payment for all the improve- ments. This I say is not just. It will be replied, that all parties knew and voluntarily undertook the risk : so they did, and if the event had approached to the ordinary average of such risks, the owner would act rightly in demanding the increased value. But it does not ; and this is the circum- stance which would make an upright man decline to avail himself of his advantages. Yet, if any one critically disputes the "justice" of the demand, I give up the word, and say that it is not considerate, and kind, and benevolent ; in a word, it is not Christian. It is no light calamity upon such a tenant to be obliged so unexpectedly to repurchase a lease ; and to add to this calamity a demand which the common feelings of mankind would condemn, cannot be the act of a good man. Who doubts whether, within the last fourteen years, it has not been the duty of many landowners to return a portion of their rents 1 The duty is the same in one case as in the other ; and it is founded on the same principles in both. To say that other persons would be willing to pay the present value of the property, would not affect the question of morality ; because, to sell it to another for that value when the former CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 141 tenant was desirous of repurchasing, would not diminish the unkindness to him. Settlements. — It is not an unfrequent occurrence, when a merchant or other person becomes insolvent, that the credit- ors unexpectedly find the estate is chargeable with a large settlement on the wife. There is a consideration connected with this which in a greater degree involves integrity of char- acter than perhaps is often supposed. Men in business obtain credit from others in consequence of the opinions which others form of their character and property. The latter, if it be not the greater foundation of credit, is a great one. A person lives then at the rate of a thousand a year ; he maintains a respectable establishment, and diffuses over all its parts indications of property. These appearances are relied upon by other men : they think they may safely entrust him, and they do entrust him, with goods or money ; until, when his insolvency is suddenly announced, they are sur- prised and alarmed to find that five hundred a year is settled on his wife. Now this person has induced others to confide their property to him by holding out fallacious appearances. He has in reality deceived them ; and the deception is as real, 'though it may not be as palpable, as if he had deluded them with verbal falsehoods. He has been acting a continued un- truth. Perhaps such a man will say that he never denied that the greater part of his apparent property was settled on his wife. This may be true ; but, when his neighbour came to him to lodge five or six hundred pounds in his hands ; when he was conscious that this neighbour's confidence was founded upon the belief that his apparent property was really his own ; when there was reason to apprehend, that if his neighbour had known his actual circumstances he would have hesitated in entrusting him with the money, then he does really and practically deceive his neighbour, and it is not a sufficient justification to say that he has uttered no untruth. The reader will observe that the case is very different from that of a person who conducts his business with borrowed money. This person must annually pay the income of the money to the lender. He does not expend it on his own establishment, and consequently does not hold out the same fallacious appearances. Some profligate spendthrifts take a house, buy elegant furniture, and keep a handsome equipage, in order by these appearances to deceive and defraud traders. No man doubts whether these persons act criminally. How then can he be innocent who knowingly practises a deception similar in kind though varying in degree ? 142 PROPERTY. [essay 11. Houses of Infamy. — If it were not that a want of virtue is so common amongst men, we should wonder at the cool- ness with which some persons of decent reputation are con- tent to let their houses to persons of abandoned character, and to put periodically into their pockets, the profits of in- famy. Sophisms may easily be invented to palliate the con- duct ; but nothing can make it right. Such a landlord knows perfectly to what purposes his house will be devoted, and knows that he shall receive the wages, not perhaps of his own iniquity, but still the wages of iniquity. He is almost a partaker with them in their sins. If I were to sell a man arsenic or a pistol, knowing that the buyer wanted it to com- mit murder, should I not be a bad man ? If I let a man a house, knowing that the renter wants it for purposes of wick- edness, am I an innocent man ? Not that it is to be affirmed that no one may receive ill-gotten money. A grocer may sell a pound of sugar to a woman though he knows she is upon the town. But, if we cannot specify the point at which a lawful degree of participation terminates, we can determine, respecting some degrees of participation, that they are unlaw- ful. To the majority of such offenders against the Moral Law, these arguments may be urged in vain ; there are some of whom we may indulge greater hope. Respectable public brewers are in the habit of purchasing beer houses in order that they may supply the publicans with their porter. Some of these houses are notoriously the resort of the most aban- doned of mankind ; the daily scenes of riot, and drunkenness, and of the most filthy debauchery. Yet these houses are purchased by brewers — ^perhaps there is a competition amongst them for the premises ; they put in a tenant of their own, supply him with beer, and regularly receive the profits of this excess of wickedness. Is there no such obligation as that of abstaining even from the appearance of evil ? Is there no such thing as guilt without a personal participation in it ? All pleas such as that, if one man did not supply such a house another would, are vain subterfuges. Upon such reasoning, you might rob a traveller on the road, if you knew that at the next turning a footpad was waiting to plunder him if you did not. Selling such houses to be occupied as before, would be like selling slaves because you thought it criminal to keep them in bondage. The obligation to discountenance wicked- ness rests upon him who possesses the power. " To him who knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin." To retain our virtue may in such cases cost us something; CHAP. II.] PROPERTY. 143 but he who values virtue at its worth will not think that he retains it at a dear rate. Literary Property. — Upon similar grounds there are some of the profits of the press which a good man cannot ac- cept. There are some periodical works and some newspa- pers, from which, if he were offered an annual income, he would feel himself bound to reject it. Suppose there is a newspaper which is lucrative because it gratifies a vicious taste for slander or indecency — or suppose there is a maga- zine of which the profits result from the attraction of irre- ligious or licentious articles, I would not put into my pocket, every quarter of a year, the money which was gained by vitiating mankind. In all such cases, there is one sort of ob- ligation which applies with great force, the obligation not to discourage rectitude by our example. Upon this ground, a man of virtue would hesitate even to contribute an article to such a publication, lest they who knew he was a contributor, should think they had his example to justify improprieties of their own. Rewards. — A person loses his pocket-book containing fifty pounds, and offers ten pounds to the finder if he will restore it. The finder ought not to demand the reward. It implies surely some imputation upon a man's integrity, when he accepts payment for being honest. For, for what else is he paid ? If he retains the property he is manifestly fraudu- lent. To be paid for giving it up, is to be paid for not com- mitting fraud. The loser offers the reward in order to over- power the temptation to dishonesty. To accept the reward is therefore tacitly to acknowledge that you would have been dishonest if it had not been offered. This certainly is not maintaining an integrity that is " above suspicion." It will be said that the reward is offered voluntarily. This, in proper language, is not true. Two evils are presented to the loser, of which he is compelled to choose one. If men were honest, he would not offer the reward : he would make it known that he had lost his pocket-book, and the finder, if a finder there were, would restore it. The offered ten pounds is a tax which is imposed upon him by the want of uprightness in mankind, and he who demands the money actively promotes the impo- sition. The very word reward carries with it its own repro- bation. As a reward, the man of integrity would receive no- thing. If the loser requested it, he might if he needed it, accept a donation ; but he would let it be understood that he accepted a present not that he received a debt. 144 PROPERTY. [essay II. Perhaps examples enough or more than enough, have been accumulated to illustrate this class of obligations. Many ap- peared needful, because it is a class which is deplorably neg- lected in practice. So strong is the temptation to think that we may rightfully possess whatever the law assigns to us — so in- sinuating is the notion, upon subjects of property, that whatever the law does not punish we may rightfully do, that there is little danger of supplying too many motives to habitual dis- crimination of our duties and to habitual purity of conduct. Let the reader especially remember, that the examples which are offered are not all of them selected on account of their individual importance, but rather as illustrations of the gen- eral principle. A man may meet with a hundred circumstances in life to which none of these examples are relevant, but I think he will not have much difficulty in estimating the prin- ciples which they illustrate. And this induces the observa- tion, that although several of these examples are taken from British law or British customs, they do not, on that account, lose their applicability where these laws and customs do not obtain. If this book should ever be read in a foreign land, or if it should be read in this land when public institutions or the tenor of men's conduct shall be changed, the principles of its morality will, nevertheless, be applicable to the affairs of life. CHAPTER III. INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY. Accumulation of Wealth: its proper limits — Provision for children: " Keeping up the family." That many and great evils result from that inequality of property which exists in civilized countries, is indicated by the many propositions which have been made to diminish or destroy it. We want not indeed such evidence ; for it is suf- ficiently manifest to every man who will look round upon his neighbours. We join not with those who declaim against all inequality of property : the real evil is not that it is unequal, but that it is greatly unequal ; not that one man is richer than another, but that one man is so rich as to be luxurious, or imperious, or profligate, and that another is so poor as to be CHAP III.] INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY. 145 abject and depraved, as well as to be destitute of the proper comforts of life. There are two means by which the pernicious inequality of property may be diminished ; by political institutions, and by the exertions of private men. Our present business is with the latter. To a person who possesses and expends more than he needs, there are two reasonable inducements to diminish its amount — first, to benefit others, and next to benefit his family and himself. The claims of benevolence towards others are often and earnestly urged upon the public, and for that reason they will not be repeated here. Not that there is no occasion to repeat the lesson, for it is very inadequately learnt ; but that it is of more consequence to exhibit obligations which are less frequently enforced. To insist upon diminishing the amount of a man's property ybr the sake of his family and him- self may present to some men new ideas, and to some men the doctrine may be paradoxical. Large possessions are in a great majority of instances in- jurious to the possessor — that is to say, those who hold them are generally less excellent, both as citizens and as men, than those who do not. The truth appears to be established by the concurrent judgment of mankind. Lord Bacon says — " Certainly great riches have sold more men than they have bought out. As baggage is to an army, so are riches to vir- tue. — It hindereth the march, yea and the care of it some- times loseth or disturbeth the victory." — " It is to be feared that the general tendency of rank, and especially of riches, is to withdraw the heart from spiritual exercises."* " A much looser system of morals commonly prevails in the higher than in the middling and lower orders of society."! " The middle rank contains most virtue and abilities. "J " Wealth heap'd on wealth, nor truth nor safety buys, The dangers gather as the treasures rise."§ " There is no greater calamity than that of leaving children an affluent independence. — The worst examples in the Society of Friends are generally amongst the children of the rich."|( It was an observation of Voltaire's that the English people were, like their butts of beer, froth at top, dregs at bottom — • in the middle excellent. The most rational, the Wisest, the best portion of mankind, belong to that class who " possess * More's Moral Sketches, 3rd Edit. p. 446. t Wilberforce : Pract. View. X Wollestoncroft : Rights of Women, c. 4. § Johnson : Vanity of Human Wishes. || Clarkson : Portraiture. 13 146 INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY. fESSAY 11. neither poverty nor riches." Let the reader look around him, Let him observe who are the persons that contribute most to the moral and physical amelioration of mankind ; who they are that practically and personally support our unnumbered institutions of benevolence ; who they are that exhibit the worthiest examples of intellectual exertion ; who they are to whom he would himself apply if he needed to avail himself of a manly and discriminating judgment. That they are the poor is not to be expected : we appeal to himself whether they are the rich. Who then would make his son a rich man? Who would remove his child out of that station in society which is thus peculiarly favourable to intellectual and iporal excellence ? If a man knows that wealth will in all probability be inju- rious to himself and to his children, injurious too in the most important points, the religious and moral character, it is mani- festly a point of the soundest wisdom and the truest kindness to decline to accumulate it. Upon this subject, it is admira- ble to observe with what exactness the precepts of Christian- ity are adapted to that conduct which the experience of life recommends. " The care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word :" — " choked with cares, and riches, and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection :" — ■ " How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the king- dom of God !" " They that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition." Not that riches necessarily lead to these consequences, but that such is their tendency ; a tendency so uniform and powerful that it is to be feared these are their very frequent results. Now this lan- guage of the Christian Scriptures does not contain merely statements of fact — it imposes duties ; and whatever may be the precise mode of regarding those duties, one point is per- fectly clear ; — ^that he who sets no other limit to his posses- sions or accumulations than inability or indisposition to obtain more, does not conform to the will of God. Assuredly, if any specified thing is declared by Christianity to be highly likely to obstruct our advancement in goodness, and to en danger our final felicity, against that thing, whatever it be, i is imperative upon us to guard with wakeful solicitude. And therefore, without affirming that no circumstance can justify a great accumulation of property, it may safely be con- cluded that far the greater number of those who do accumu- late it, do wrong : nor do I see any reason to be deterred from ranking the distribution of a portion of great wealth, or a CHAP. III.] INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY. 147 refusal to accumulate it, amongst the imperative duties which are imposed by the Moral Law. In truth, a man may almost discover whether such conduct is obligatory, by referring to the motives which induce him to acquire great property or to retain it. The motives are generally impure ; the desire of splendour, or the ambition of eminence, or the love of per- sonal indulgence. Are these motives fit to be brought into competition with the probable welfare, the virtue, the useful- ness, and the happiness of his family and himself? Yet such is the competition, and to such unworthy objects, duty, and reason, and affection are sacrificed. It will be said, a man should provide for his family ; and make them, if he can, independent. That he should provide for his family is true ; that he should make them independent, at any rate that he should give them an affluent independence, forms no part of his duty, and is frequently a violation of it. As it respects almost all men, he will best approve himself a wise and kind parent, who leaves to his sons so much only as may enable them, by moderate engagements, to enjoy the conveniences and comforts of life ; and to his daughters a sufficiency to possess similar comforts, but not a sufficiency to shine amongst the great, or to mingle with the votaries of expensive dissipation. If any father prefers other objects to the welfare and happiness of his children — if wisdom and kindness towards them are with him subordinate considera- tions, it is not probable that he will listen to reasonings like these. But where is the parent who dares to acknowledge this preference to his own mind ? It were idle to affect to specify any amount of property which a person ought not to exceed. The circumstances of one man may make it reasonable that he should acquire or retain much more than another who has fewer claims. Yet somewhat of a general rule may be suggested. He who is accumulating should consider why he desires more. If it really is, that he believes an addition will increase the welfare and usefulness and virtue of his family, it is probable that further accumulation may be right. If no such belief is sin- cerely entertained, it is more than probable that it is wrong. He who already possesses affluence should consider its actual existing effects. — If he employs a competent portion of it in increasing the happiness of others, if it does not produce any injurious effect upon his own mind, if it does not diminish or impair the virtues of his children, if they are grateful for their privileges rather than vain of their superiority, if they second his own endeavours to diffuse happiness around them, he may 148 INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY. [eSSAY II. remain as he is. If such effects are not produced, but in- stead of them others of an opposite tendency, he certainly has too much. — Upon this serious subject let the Christian parent be serious. If, as is proved by the experience of every day, great property usually inflicts great injuries upon those who possess it, what motive can induce a good man to lay it up for his children ? What motive will be his justifi- cation, if it tempts them from virtue ? When children are similarly situated with respect to their probable wants, there seems no reason for preferring the el- der to the younger, or sons to daughters. Since the proper object of a parent in making a division of his property, is the comfort and welfare of his children — if this object is likely to be better secured by an equal than by any other division, an equal division ought to be made. It is a common, though not a very reasonable opinion, that a son needs a larger por- tion than a daughter. To be sure, if he is to live in greater affluence than she, he does. But why should he ? There appears no motive in reason, and certainly there is none in affection, for diminishing one child's comforts to increase another's. A son too has greater opportunities of gain. A woman almost never grows rich except by legacies or mar- riage ; so that, if her father do not provide for her, it is prob- able that she will not be provided for at all. As to marriage, the opportunity is frequently not offered to a woman ; and a father if he can, should so provide for his daughter as to enable her, in single life, to live in a state of comfort not greatly inferior to her brother's. The remark that the custom of preferring sons is general, and therefore that when a couple marry the inequality is adjusted, applies only to the case of those who do marry. The number of women who do not is great ; and a parent cannot foresee his daughter's lot. Be- sides, since marriage is (and is reasonably) a great object to a woman, and is desirable both for women and for men, there appears a propriety in increasing the probability of marriage by giving to women such property as shall constitute an ad- ditional inducement to marriage in the men. I shall hardly be suspected of recommending persons to " marry for money." My meaning is this : A young man possesses five hundred a-year, and lives on a corresponding scale. He is attached to a woman who has but one hundred a year. This young man sees that if he marries, he must reduce his scale of living ; and the consideration operates (I do not say that it ought to operate) to deter him from marriage. But if the young man possessed three hundred a-year and lived accordingly, and if CHAP. III.] INEQUALITY OF PROPERTY. 149 the object of his attachment possessed three hundred a-year also, he would not be prevented from marrying her by the fear of being obliged to diminish his system of expenditure. Just complaints are made of those half-concealed blandish- ments by which some women who need " a settlement" en- deavour to procure it by marriage. Those blandishments would become more tempered with propriety, if oile great mo- tive was taken away by the possession of a competence of their own. An equal division of a father's property will be said to be incompatible with the system of primogeniture, and almost in- compatible with hereditary rank. These are not subjects for the present Essay. Whatever the reader may think of the practical value of these institutions, it is manifest that far the greater number of those who have property to bequeath, need not concern themselves with either : they may, in their own practice, contribute to diminish the general and the particular evils of unequal property. With respect to their own fami- lies, the result can hardly fail to be good. It is probable that as men advance in intellectual, and especially in moral excel- lence, the desire of " keeping up the family" will become less and less an object of solicitude. That desire is not, in its or- dinary character, recommended by any considerations which are obviously reducible from virtue or from reason. It is an affair of vanity ; and vanity, like other weaknesses and evils may be expected to diminish as sound habits of judgment prevail in the world. Perhaps it is remarkable, that the obligation not to accumu- late great property for ourselves or our children, is so little enforced by the writers on morality. None will dispute that such accumulation is both unwise and unkind. Every one acknowledges too that the general evils of the existing in- equality of property are enormously great ; yet how few in- sist upon those means by which, more than by any other pri- vate means, these evils may be diminished ! If all men de- clined to retain, or refrained from acquiring, more than is likely to be beneficial to their families and themselves, the pernicious inequality of property would quickly be diminished or destroyed. There is a motive upon the individual to do this, which some public reformations do not offer. He who contributes almost nothing to diminish the general mischiefs of extreme poverty and extreme wealth, may yet do so much benefit to his own connexions as shall greatly overpay him for the sacrifice of vanity or inclination. Perhaps it may be said that there is a claim too of justice. The wealth of a 13* 150 LITIGATION ARBITRATION. [eSSAY II. nation is a sort of common stock, of which the accumulations of one man are usually made at the expense of others. A man who has acquired a reasonable sufficiency, and who nevertheless retains his business to acquire more than a suffi- ciency, practises a sort of injustice towards another who needs his means of gain. There are always many who can- not enjoy the comforts of life, because others are improperly occupying the means by which those comforts are to be ob- tained. Is it the part of a Christian to do this ? — even aba- ting the consideration that he is injuring himself by withhold- ing comforts from another. CHAPTER IV. LITIGATION— ARBITRATION. Practice of early ChristianG — Evils of Litigation — Efficiency of Arbitration. In the third Essay,* some enquiry will be attempted, as to whether Justice may not often be administered between con- tending parties, or to public offenders, by some species of ar- bitration rather than by law ; — ^whether a gradual substitution of Equity for fixed rules of decision, is not congruous alike with philosophy and morals.^ — The present chapter, however, and that which succeeds it, proceed upon the supposition that the administration of Justice continues in its present state. The question for an individual, when he has some cause of dispute with another respecting property or rights is. By what means ought I to endeavour to adjust it ? Three modes of adjustment may be supposed to be offered : Private ar- rangement with the other party — Reference to impartial men — and Law. Private adjustment is the best mode ; arbitra- tion is good ; law is good only when it is the sole alterna- tive. The litigiousness of some of the early Christians at Cor- inth gave occasion to the energetic expostulation, " Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust and not before the saints ? Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world ? And if the world shall be * Chap. X. CHAP. IV.] LITIGATION ARBITRATION. 151 judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters 1 Know ye not that we shall judge angels ? How much more things that pertain to this life ? If then, ye have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church. I speak to your shame. Is it so that there is not a wise man among you ? No, not one that shall be able to judge between his brethren 1 But brother goeth to law with brother, and that before the unbelievers. Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you, because ye go to law one with another. Why do ye not rather take wrong ? Why do ye not rather suffer yourselves to be de- frauded ?"* Upon this, one observation is especially to be re- membered : that a great part of its pointedness of reprehen- sion is directed, not so much to litigation, as to litigation be- fore Pagans. " Brother goeth to law with brother, and that before the unbelievers." The impropriety of exposing the disagreements of Christians in Pagan courts, was manifest and great. They who had rejected the dominant religion, for a religion of which one peculiar characteristic was good will and unanimity, were especially called upon to exhibit in their conduct an illustration of its purer principles. Few things, not grossly vicious, would bring upon Christians and upon Christianity itself so much reproach as a litigiousness which could not or would not find arbitration amongst themselves. The advice of the apostle appears to have been acted upon : " The primitive church, which was always zealous to recon- cile the brethren and to procure pardon for the offender from the person oftended, did ordain, according to the epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians, that the saints or Christians should not maintain a process of law one against the other at the bar or tribunals of infidels. "f The Christian of the pre- sent day is differently circumstanced, because, though he ap- peals to the law, he does not appeal to Pagan judges ; and therefore so much of the apostle's censure as was occasioned by the Paganism of the courts, does not apply to us. To this indeed there is an exception founded upon analogy. If at the commencement of the Reformation, two of the re- formers had carried a dispute respecting property before Ro- mish courts, they would have come under some portion of that reprobation which was addressed to the Corinthians. Cer- tainly, when persons profess such a love for religious purity and excellence that they publicly withdraw from the general religion of a people, there ought to be so much purity and ex-. * 1 Cor. vi. t Ryeauf 8 Lives of the Popes, fol. 2d, »' ^ ""'^ ^ trod. p. 2. t6i LITIGATION ARBITRATION. [ESSAT II. cellence amongst them, that it would be needless to have re- course to those from whom they had separated, to adjust their disputes. The catholic of those days might reasonably have turned upon such reformers and said, " Is it so that there is not a wise man among you, no not one that shall be able to judge between his brethren ?" And if indeed, no such wise man was to be found, it might safely be concluded that their reformation was an empty name. — For the same reasons, those who, in the present times, think it right to withdraw from other protestant churches in order to maintain sounder doctrines or purer practice, cast reproach upon their own com- munity if they cannot settle their disputes amongst them- selves. Pretensions to soundness and purity are of little avail if they do not enable those who make them to repose in one another such confidence as this. Were I a Wesleyan or a Baptist, I should think it discreditable to go to law with one of my own brotherhood. But, though the apostle's prohibition of going to law ap- pears to have been founded upon the paganism of the courts, his language evidently conveys disapprobation, generally, of appeals to the law. He insists upon the propriety of adjust- ing disputes by arbitration. Christians, he says, ought not to be unworthy to judge the smallest matters ; and so emphati- cally does he insist upon the truth, that their religion ought to capacitate them to act as arbitrators, that he intimates that even a small advance in Christian excellence is sufficient for such a purpose as this : — " Set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church." It will perhaps be acknowledged that when Christianity shall possess its proper influence over us, there will be little reason to recur, for adjustment of our disagreements, to fixed rules of law. And though this influ- ence is so far short of universal prevalence, who cannot find amongst those to whom he may have access, some who are capable of deciding rightly and justly? The state of that christian country must indeed be bad, if it contains not, even in every little district, one that is able to judge between his brethren. Nevertheless, there are cases in which the christian may properly appeal to the law. He may have an antagonist who can in no other manner be induced to be just, or to act aright Under some such circumstances Paul himself pursued a simi- lar course : " I appeal unto Caesar." — " Is it lawful for you to scourge a man that is a Roman, and uncondemned ?" And when he had been illegally taken into custody he availed him- self of his legal privileges, and made the magistrates " come CHAP. IV.] LITIGATION ARBITRATION. 153 themselves and fetch him out." There are, besides, in the present condition of jurisprudence, some cases in which the rule of justice depends upon the rule of law — so that a thing is just or not just according as the law determines. In such cases, neither party, however well disposed, may be able dis- tinctly to tell what justice requires until the law informs them. Even then, however, there are better means of pro- cedure than by prosecuting suits. The parties may obtain " Opinions." Besides these considerations there are others which power- fully recormnend arbitration in preference to law. The evils of litigation, from which arbitration is in a great degree exempt, are great. Expense is an important item. A reasonable man desires of course to obtain justice as inexpensively as he can ; and the great cost of obtaining it in courts of law, is a powerful reason for preferring arbitration. Legal Injustice. — He who desires that justice should be dispensed between him and another, should sufficiently bear in mind how much injustice is inflicted by the law. We have seen in some of the preceding chapters that law is often very wide of equity ; and he who desires to secure himself from an inequitable decision, possesses a powerful motive to prefer arbitration. The technicalities of the law and the artifices of lawyers are almost innumerable. Sometimes, when a party thinks he is on the eve of obtaining a just verdict, he is sud- denly disappointed and his cause is lost by some technical defect — ^the omission of a word or the mis-spelling of a name ; matters which in no degree affect the validity of his claims. If the only advantage which arbitration offers to disagreeing parties, was exemption from these deplorable evils, it would be a substantial and sufficient argument in its favour. There is no reason to doubt, that justice would generally be adminis- tered by a reference to two or three upright and disinterested men. When facts are laid before such persons, they are sel- dom at a loss to decide what justice requires. Its principles are not so critical or remote as usually to require much labour of research to discover what they dictate. It might be con- cluded, therefore, even if experience did not confirm it, that an arbitration, if it did not decide absolutely aright, would at least come to as just a decision as can be attained by human means. But experience does confirm the conclusion. It is known that the Society of Friends never permits its members to carry disagreements with one another before courts of law. All, if they continue in the society, must submit to arbitration. 154 THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. [esSAT II. And what is the consequence ? They find, practically, that arbitration is the best mode ; that justice is in fact adminis- tered by it, administered more satisfactorily and with fewer exceptions than in legal courts. No one pretends to dispute this. Indeed if it were disputable, it may be presumed that this community would abandon the practice. 'Hiey adhere to it because it is the most Christian practice and the best. Inquietude. — The expense, the injustice, the delays and vexations which are attendant upon lawsuits, bring altogether a degree of inquietude upon the mind which greatly deducts from the enjoyment of life, and from the capacity to attend with composure to other and perhaps more important concerns. If to this we add the heart-burnings and ill-will which suits frequently occasion, a considerable sum of evil is in this re- spect presented to us : a sum of evil, be it remembered, from which arbitration is in a great degree exempt. Upon the whole, arbitration is recommended by such va- rious and powerful arguments, that when it is proposed by one of two contending parties and objected to by the other, there is reason to presume that, with that other, justice is not the paramount object of desire. CHAPTER Y. THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. Complexity of law — Professional untruths — Defences of legal practice — Effects of legal practice : Seduction : Theft : Peculation — Pleading — The duties of the profession — Effects of legal practice on the profes- sion, and on the public. If it should be asked why, in a book of general morality, the writer selects for observation the practice of a particular profession, the answer is simply this, that the practice of this particular profession peculiarly needs it. It peculiarly needs to be brought into juxtaposition with sound principles of mo- rality. Besides this, an honest comparison of the practice with the principles will afford useful illustration of the requisi- tions of virtue. That public opinion pronounces that there is, in the ordi- nary character of legal practice, much that is not reconcilable CHAP, v.] THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. 155 with rectitude, can need no proof. The public opinion could scarcely become general unless it were founded upon truth, and that it is general is evinced by the language of all ranks of men ; from that of him who writes a treatise of morality, to that of him who familiarly uses a censorious proverb. It may reasonably be concluded that when the professional conduct of a particular set of men is characterized peculiarly with sacrifices of rectitude, there must be some general and pecu- liar cause. There appears nothing in the profession, as such, to produce this effect — nothing in taking a part in the adminis- tration of justice which necessarily leads men away from the regard to justice. How then are we to account for the fact as it exists, or where shall we primarily lay the censure ? Is it the fault of the men, or of the institutions ; of the lawyers or of the law 1 Doubtless the original fault is in the law. This fault, as it respects our own country, and I suppose every other, is of two kinds ; one is necessary, and one acci- dental. First : Wherever fixed rules of deciding controver- sies between man and man, or fixed rules of administering punishment to public offenders are established — there it is in- evitable that equity will sometimes be sacrificed to rules. These rules are laws, that is, they must be uniformly, and for the most part literally applied ; and this literal application (as we have already had manifold occasion to show,) is sometimes productive of practical injustice. Since, then, the legal pro- fession employ themselves in enforcing this literal application — since they habitually exert themselves to do this with little regard to the equity of the result, they cannot fail to deserve and to obtain the character of a profession that sacrifices rec- titude. I know not that this is evitable so long as numerous and Jixed rules are adopted in the administration of justice. The second cause of the evil, as it results from the law it- self, is in its extreme complication — in the needless multipli- city of its forms, in the inextricable intricacy of its whole structure. This, which is probably by far the most efficient cause of the want of morality in legal practice, I call gratui- tous. It is not necessary to law that it should be so extremely complicated. This, the public are beginning more and more to see and to assert. Simplification has indeed been in some small degree effected by recent acts of the legislature ; and this is a sufficient evidence that it was needed. But whether needed or not, the temptation which it casts in the way of profes- sional virtue is excessively gTeat. A man takes a cause — a morally bad cause we will suppose — to a barrister. The bar- rister searches his memory or his books for some one or more 156 THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. [eSSAY II amongst the multiplicity of legal technicalities by which suc- cess may be obtained for his client. He finds them, urges them in court, shows that the opposing client cannot legally substantiate his claim, and thus inflicts upon him practical in- justice. This is primarily the fault of the law. Take away or diminish this encumbering load of technicalities, and you take away, in the same proportion, the opportunity for the profession to sacrifice equity to forms, and by consequence diminish the immorality of its practice. There can be no efficient reform amongst lawyers without a reform of the law. But whilst thus the original cause of the sacrifice of virtue amongst legal men is to be sought in legal institutions, it can- not be doubted that they are themselves chargeable with greatly adding to the evils which these institutions occasion. This is just what, in the present state of human virtue, we might expect. Lawyers familiarize to their minds the notion, that whatever is legally right is right ; and when they have once habituated themselves to sacrifice the manifest dictates of equity to law, where shall they stop ? If a material inform- ality in an instrument is to them a sufficient justification of a sacrifice of these dictates, they will soon sacrifice them be- cause a word has been mis-spelt by an attorney's clerk. When they have gone thus far, they Avill go further. The practice of disregarding rectitude in courts of justice will be- come habitual. They will go onward, from insisting upon legal technicalities to an endeavour to pervert the law, then to the giving a false colouring to facts, and then onward and still onward until witnesses are abashed and confounded, until juries are misled by impassioned appeals to their feelings, un- til deliberate untruths are solemnly averred, until, in a word, all the pitiable and degrading spectacles are exhibited which are now exhibited in legal practice. But when we say that the original cause of this unhappy system is to be found in the law itself, is it tantamount to a justification of the system ? No : if it were, it would be suffi- cient to justify any departure from rectitude — it would be sufficient to justify any crime, to be able to show that the per- petrator possessed strong temptation. Strong temptation is undoubtedly placed before the legal practitioner. This should abate our censure, but it should not cause us to be silent. We affirm that a lawyer cannot morally enforce the appli- cation of legal rules, without regard to the claims of equity in the particular case. If it has been seen, in the preceding chapters, that morality is paramoxmt to law ; if it has been seen that there are manr CHAP, v.] THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. 157 instances in which private persons are morally obliged to forego their legal pretensions, then it is equally clear that a lawyer is obliged to hold morality as paramount to law in his own practice. If one man may not urge an unjust legal pre- tension, another may not assist him in urging it. No man it may be hoped will say it is the lawyer's only business to apply the law. Men cannot so cheaply exempt themselves from the obligations of morality. Yet here the question is really suspended ; for if the business of the profession does not jus- tify a disregard of morality, it is not capable of justification. Suspended ! It is lamentable that such a question can exist. For to what does the alternative lead us ? Is a man, when he un- dertakes a client's business, at liberty to advance his interest by every method, good or bad, which the law will not punish 1 If he is, there is an end of morality. If he is not, something must limit and restrict him ; and that something is the Moral Law. Of every custom, however indefensible, some advocates offer themselves ; and some accordingly have attempted to justify the practice of the bar.* Of that particular item in the practice, which consists in uttering untruths in order to serve a client. Dr. Paley has been the defender. " There are falsehoods," says he, " which are not criminal ; as where no one is deceived, which is the case with an advocate in asserting the justice, or his belief of the justice, of his client's cause." It is plain that in support of this position one argument, and only one can be urged, and that one has been selected. " No confidence is destroyed, because none was reposed ; no prom- ise to speak the truth is violated, because none was given or understood to be given."! The defence is not very credit- able even if it were valid : it defends men from the imputation of falsehood because their falsehoods are so habitual that no one gives them credit ! But the defence is not valid. Of this the reader may satisfy himself by considering why, if no one ever believes what ad- vocates say, they continue to speak. They would not, year after year, persist in uttering untruths in our courts, without attaining an object, and knowing that they would not attain it. If no one ever in fact believed them, they would cease to assev- erate. They do not love falsehood for its own sake, and' utter it gratuitously and for nothing. The custom itself, there- fore, disproves the argument that is brought to defend it. * I speak of the bar, because that branch of the profession offers the most convenient illustration of the subject. The reasonings will gener- ally apply to other branches. t Mor. and Pol. PhU. b. 3. p. 1. c. 15. 14 15S THE MORALITY OP LEGAL PRACTICE. [eSSAY II. Whenever that defence becomes valid — ^whenever it is really true that " no confidence is reposed" in advocates, they will cease to use falsehood, for it will have lost its motive. But the real practice is to mingle falsehood and truth together, and so to involve the one with the other that the jury cannot easily separate them. The jury know that some of the pleader's statements are true, and these they believe. Now he makes other statements with the same deliberate empha- sis ; and how shall the jury know whether these are false or true 1 How shall they discover the point at which they shall begin to " repose no confidence ?" Knowing that a part is true, they cannot always know that another part is not true. That it is the pleader's design to persuade them of the truth of all he affirms, is manifest. Suppose an advocate when he rose should say, " Gentlemen, I am now going to speak the truth ;" and after narrating the facts of the case should say, " Gentlemen, I am now going to address you with fictions." Why would not an advocate do this ? Because then no con- fidence would be reposed, which is the same thing as to say that he pursues his present plan because some confidence is reposed ; and this decides the question. The decision should not be concealed — that the advocate who employs untruths in his pleadings, does really and most strictly, lie. And even if no one ever did believe an advocate, his false declarations would still be lies, because he always professes to speak the truth. This indeed is true upon the Archdea- con's own showing ; for he says, " Whoever seriously ad- dresses his discourse to another, tacitly promises to speak the truth." The case is very different from others which he pro- poses as parallel — " parables, fables, jests." In these, the speaker does noi profess to state facts. But the pleader does profess to state facts. He intends and endeavours to mislead. His untruths therefore are lies to him whether they are be- lieved or not ; just as, in vulgar life, a man whose falsehoods are so notorious that no one gives him credit, is not the less a liar than if he were believed. From one sort of legal falsehoods results one peculiar mis- chief, a mischief arising primarily out of an unhappy rule of law, but which is not on that account morally justifiable. " Decision is commanded by pleadings as by evidence, and that also to a vast extent and with a degree of certainty refu- sed to evidence. Decision is produced by pleadings as if they were true, when they are known and acknowledged to be false ; because they act as evidence and as true evidence in all cases where the opposed party cannot follow them by CHAP, v.] THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. 159 counter declarations — a consequence which may and does resuh from poverty and other causes."* This is deplorable indeed. To employ false pleadings is sufficiently unjustifi- able ; but to employ them in order that a poor man or that any man may be debarred of his rights, is abominable. But why do we say that this peculiarly is abominable ? For to what purpose is any falsehood urged at the bar but to impede or prevent the administration of justice between man and man 1 I make no pretensions to legal knowledge. Some false pleadings are legally " necessary" in order to give formality to a proceeding. In these cases the evil is attributable in a great degree to the law itself, though I presume the law is founded upon custom, which custom was introduced by law- yers. The evil therefore and the guilt lies at the door of the system of legal practice, although it may not all lie at the doors of existing practitioners. t Gisborne is another defender of legal practice, and assumes a wider ground of justification. " The standard," says he, " to which the advocate refers the cause of his client, is not the law of reason nor the law of God, but the law of the land. His peculiar and proper object is not to prove the side of the question which he maintains morally right, but legally right. The law offers its protection only on certain preliminary conditions ; it refuses to take cognizance of injuries or to en- force redress, unless the one be proved in the specific manner and the other claimed in the precise form, which it prescribes ; and consequently, whatever be the pleader's opinion of his cause, he is guilty of no breach of truth and justice in defeat- ing the pretensions of the persons whom he opposes, by evin- cing that they have not made good the terms on which alone they could be legally entitled, on which alone they could suppose themselves entitled, to success. "J There is some- thing specious in this reasoning, but what is its amount? — that if the laws of a country proceed upon such and such maxims, they exempt us from the authority of the laws of * West. Rev. No. 9. t Some of these legal falsehoods are ridiculous to the last degree. A horse is sent to a farrier to be shod. Unhappily, and to the great regret of the farrier, his man accidentally lames the horse. What then says the legal form ? That the farrier faithfully promised to shoe the horse pro- perly : but that " he, not regarding his said promise and undertaking, but contriving and fraudulently intending, craftily, and subtilely to deceive and defraud the said plaintiff, did not nor would shoe the said horse, in a skilful, careful, and proper manner, &c. !" — See the form, 2 Chitty on Pleading, p. 154. X Duties of Men. The Legal Profession 160 THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. [eSSAY II. God. We arrive at this often refuted doctrine at last. Either the acts of a legislature may suspend the obligations of mo- rality or they may not. If they may, there is an end of that morality which is founded upon the divine will : if they may not, the argument of Gisborne is a fallacy. But in truth he himself shows its fallaciousness : he says, " If a cause should present itself of an aspect so dark as to leave the advocate no reasonable doubt of its being founded in iniquity or baseness, or to justify extremely strong suspicions of its evil nature and tendency, he is bound in the sight of God to refuse all con- nexion with the business." Why is he thus bound to refuse ? Because he will otherwise violate the Moral Law : and this is the very reason why he is bound in other cases. Observe too the inconsistency : first we are told that whatever be the pleader's opinion of a cause, " he is guilty of no breach of truth and justice" in advocating it ; and afterwards, that if the cause is of an " evil nature and tendency" he may not advo- cate it ! That such reasoning does not prove what it is de- signed to prove is evident ; but it proves something else — that the practice cannot be defended. Such reasoning would not be advanced if better could be found. Let us not, how- ever seem to avail ourselves of a writer's words without re- ference to his meaning. The meaning in the present instance is clearly this — that a pleader, generally, may undertake a vicious cause ; but that if it be very vicious, he must refrain. You may abet an act of a certain shade of iniquity, but not if it be of a certain shade deeper : you may violate the Moral Law to a certain extent, but not to every extent. To him who would recommend rectitude in its purity, few reasonings are more satisfactory than such as these. They prove the truth which they assail by evincing that it cannot be disproved. Dr. Johnson tried a shorter course : " You do not know a cause to be good or bad till the judge determines it. An ar- gument that does not convince you may convince the judge to whom you urge it, and if it does convince him, why then he is right and you are wrong." This is satisfactory. It is always satisfactory to perceive that a powerful intellect can find nothing but idle sophistry to urge against the obliga- tions of virtue. One other argument is this": Eminent barris- ters, it is said, should not be too scrupulous, because clients might fear their causes would be rejected by virtuous plead- ers, and might therefore go to " needy and unprincipled chi- caners." Why, if their causes were good, virtuous pleaders would undertake them ; and if they were bad, it matters not how soon they were discountenanced. In a right state of CHA?. v.] THE MORALITY 6f tE6AL PftAOTlCfi. 161 things, the very circumstance that only an "unprincipled chicaner" would undertake a particular cause, would go far towards procuring a verdict against it. Besides, it is a very loose morality that recommends good men to do improper things lest they should be done by the bad. Seeing therefore that no tolerable defence can be adduced of the ordinary legal practice, let us consider for a moment what are its practical results. A civil action is brought into court, and evidence has been heard which satisfies every man that the plaintiff is entitled in justice to a verdict. It is, on the part of the defendant, a clear case of dishonesty. Suddenly, the pleader discovers that there is some verbal flaw in a document, some technical irregularity in the proceedings — and the plaintiff loses his cause. The public are disappointed in their expectations of justice ; the jury and the court are grieved ; and the unhappy sufferer retires, injured and wronged — without redress or hope of redress. Can this be right ? Can it be sufficient to justify a man in this conduct, to urge that such things are his business — the means by which he obtains his living? The same excuse would justify a corsair, or a troop of Ara- bian banditti which plunders the caravan. Yet indefensible, immoral, as this conduct is, it is the every day practice of the profession ; and the amount of injustice which is inflicted by this practice is enormous. The plea that such are the rules of the law is not admissible. Whatever utility we may be disposed to allow to the uniform application of the law, it will not justify such conduct as this. The integrity of the law would not have been violated, though the pleader had not pointed out the mis-spelling, for example, of a word. For a judge to refuse to allow the law to take its course after the mistake has been urged, is one thing ; for a pleader to detect and to urge it, is another. The judge may not be able to regard the equity of the case without sacrificing the uniform operation of the law. But if the inadvertency is not pointed out, that uniform operation is perfect though equity be awarded. There is no excuse for thus inflicting injustice. It is an act of pure gratuitous mischief: an act not required by law, an act condenaned by morality, an act possessing no apology but that the agent is tempted by the gains of his profession. An unhappy father seeks, in a court of justice, some re- dress for the misery which a seducer has inflicted upon his family ; a redress which, if he were successful, is deplorably inadequate, both as a recompense to the sufferers and as a punishment to the criminal. Th€ 2ase is established, and it 14* 163 THE MORALITY OP IfiOAL PRACTtCE. [essAY II, is manifest that equity and the public good require exemplary damages. What then does the pleader do ? He stands up and employs every contrivance to prevent the jury from awarding these damages. He eloquently endeavours to per- suade them that the act involved little guilt ; casts undeserved imputations upon the immediate sufferer and upon her family ; jests, and banters, and sneers, about all the evidence of the case : imputes bad motives (without truth or with it) to the prosecutor ; expatiates upon the little property (whether it be little or much) which the seducer possesses; by these and by such means he labours to prevent this injured father from obtaining any redress, to secure the criminal from all punish- ment, and to encourage in other men the crime itself. Com- passion, justice, morality, the public good, every thing is sacrificed — to what ? To that which, upon such a subject, it were a shame to mention, In the criminal courts, the same conduct is practised, and with the same indefensibility. Can it be necessary, or ought it to be necessary, to insist upon the proposition — " If it be right that offenders should be punished, it is not right to make them pass with impunity.'* If a police officer has seized a thief and carried him to prison, every one knows that it would be vicious in me to effect his escape. Yet this is the every day practice of the profession. It is their regular and con- stant endeavour to prevent justice from being administered to offenders. Is it a sufficient justification of preventing the execution of justice, of preventing that which every good citizen is desirous of promoting — to say that a man is an advocate by profession ? Is the circumstance of belonging to the legal profession a good reason for disregarding those du- ties which are obligatory upon every other man ? He who -wards off punishment from swindlers and robbers, and sends them amongst the public upon the work of fraud and plunder again, surely deserves worse of his country than many a hungry fllfti who filches a loaf or a trinket from a stall. As to employing legal artifices or the tactics of declamation in order to obtain the conviction of a prisoner whom there is reason to believe to be innocent; or aa to endeavouring to inflict upon him a punishment greater than his deserts, the wickedness is so palpable that it is wonderful that even the power of custom protects it from the reprobation of the world. In Scotland, where the criminal process is in some re- spects superior to ours, the proportion of those prisoners who escape punishment on account of " technical niceties," is very great. Of the persons acquitted in our courts, at least one CHAP, v.] THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. 163 half escape from teclmical niceties, or rules of evidence which give advantage to the prisoner, with which, in the other part of the island, they are wholly unacquainted."* Is not this a great public evil ? And if we charge that evil originally upon the law, is it warrantable, is it morale in the advocate actively to increase and extend it. The plea that it is of consequence that law should be uni- formly administered, does not suffice to justify the pleader in criminal any more than in civil courts. " A thief was caught coming out of a house in Highbury Terrace, with a watch he had stolen therein upon him. He was found guilty by the jury upon the clearest evidence of the theft ; but his counsel having discovered that he was charged in the indictment with having stolen a watch, the property of the owner of the house, whereas the watch really belonged to his daughter, the pris- oner got clear off."t The pretext of the value of an uniform operation of the law will not avail here. Suppose the coun- sel, though he did discover the watch was the daughter's, had not insisted upon the inaccuracy, no evil would have ensued. The integrity of the law would not have been violated. The act of a counsel therefore in such a case is simply and only a defeat of pubUc justice, an injury to the State, an encourage- ment to thieves ; and surely there is no reason, either in mo- rals or in common sense, why any particular class of men should be privileged thus to injure the community. The wife of a respectable tradesman in the town in which I Uve was left a widow with eight or ten children. She em- ployed a confidential person to assist in conducting the busi- ness. The business was flourishing ; and yet at the end of every year she was surprised and afflicted to find that her profits were unaccountably small. At length this confidential person was suspected of peculation. Money was marked and placed as usual under his care. It was soon missed and found upon his person ; and when the police searched his house, they found in his possession, methodically stowed away, five or six thousand pounds, the accumulated plunder of years ! This cruel and atrocious robber found no difficulty in obtaining advocates, who employed every artifice of de- fence, who had recourse to every technicality of law, to screen him from punishment and to secure for him the quiet posses- sion of his plunder. They found in the indictment some word, of which the ordinary and the legal acceptation were different ; and the indictment was quashed ! Happily, another * Remarks on the Administration of Criminal Justice in Scotland, &c. t West. Rev. No. 8, Art. 4, 164 THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. [eSSAT IT. was proof against the casuistry, and the criminal was found guilty. Will it be said that pleaders are not supposed to know, till the verdict is pronounced, whether a prisoner is guilty or not ? If this were true, it would not avail as a justification ; but, in reality, it is only a subterfuge. In this very case, after the verdict had been pronounced, after the prisoner's guilt had been ascertained, a new trial was obtained; not on account of any doubt in the evidence — that was unequivocal — ^but on account of some irregularity in passing sentence. And now the same conduct was repeated. Knowing that the prisoner was guilty, advocates still exerted their talents and eloquence to procure impunity for him, nay to reward him at the expense of public duty and of private justice. They did not succeed : the plunderer was transported ; but their want of success does not diminish the impropriety, the immorality, of their endeav- ours. If, by the trickery of law, this man had obtained an acquittal, what would have been the consequence 1 Not merely that he would have possessed, undisturbed, his plundered thousands ; not merely that he might have laughed at the family whose money he was spending ; but that a hundred or a thousand other shopmen, taking confidence from his suc- cess and his impunity, might enter upon a similar course of treachery and fraud. They might think that if the hour of detection should arrive, nothing was wanting but a sagacious advocate to protect them from punishment, and to secure their spoil. Will any man then say, as an excuse for the legal practice, that it is " usual," " customary," the " business of the profession?" It is preposterous.* It really is a dreadful consideration, that a body of men, res- pectable in the various relationships of life, should make, in consequence of the vicious maxims of a profession, these de- plorable sacrifices of rectitude. To a writer upon such a sub- ject, it is difficult to speak with that plainness which morality requires without seeming to speak illiberally of men. But it is not a question of liberality but of morals. When a barris- * Some obstacles in the way of this mode of defeating the ends of justice have been happily interposed by the admirable exertions of the late Secretary of State for the Home Department. Still such cases are applicable as illustrations of what the duties of the profession are ; and, unfortunately, opportunities in abundance remain for sacrificing the du- ties of the profession to its " business," Here, without any advertance to political opinion, it may be remarked, that one such statesman as Robert Peel is of more value to his country than a multitude of those who take office and leave it without any endeavour to ameliorate the national in- Btitutioiis. CHAP, v.] THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. 165 ter arrives at an assize town on the circuit, and tacitly pub- lishes that (abating a few, and only a few, cases) he is will- ing to take the brief of any client ; that he is ready to employ his abilities, his ingenuity, in proving that any given cause is good or that it is bad ; and when, having gone before a jury, he urges the side on which he happens to have been em- ployed, with all the earnestness of seeming integrity and truth, and bends all the faculties which God has given him in promotion of its success ; when we see all this, and remem- ber that it was the toss of a die whether he should have done exactly the contrary, I think that no expression characterizes the procedure but that of intellectual and moral prostitution. [n any other place than a court of justice, every one would say that it was prostitution : a court of justice cannot make it less. Perhaps the reader has heard of the pleader who, by some accident, mistook the side on which he was to argue, and ear- nestly contended for the opponent's cause. His distressed client at length conveyed an intimation of his mistake, and he, with forensic dexterity told the jury that hitherto he had only been anticipating the arguments of the opposing counsel, and that now he would proceed to show they were fallacious. If the reader should imagine there is peculiar indecency in this, his sentiment would be founded upon habit rather than upon reason. There is, really, very little difference between con- tending for both sides of the same cause, and contending for either side, as the earliest retainer may decide. I lately read the report of a trial in which retainers from both parties had been sent to a counsel, and when the cause was brought into court it was still undecided for whom he should appear. The scale was turned by the judgment of another counsel, and the pleader instantly appeared on behalf of the client to whom his brother had allotted him. From the mistake which is mentioned at the head of this paragraph, let clients take a ben- eficial hint. I suggest to them, if their opponent has engaged the ablest counsel, to engage him also themselves. The arrangement might easily be managed, and would be attended with manifest advantages ; clients would be sure of arraying against each other equal abilities ; justice would be promoted by preventing the triumph of the more skilful pleader over the less ; and the minds of juries might more quietly weigh the conflicting arguments, when they were all proved and all re- futed by one man. Probably it will be asked. What is a legal man to do? How shall he discriminate his duties, or know, in the present 166 THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. [esSAY 11. State of legal institutions, what extent of advocation morality allows ? These are fair questions, and he who asks them is entitled to an answer. I confess that an answer is dilEficult : and why is it difficult ? Because the whole system is un- sound. He who would rectify the ordinary legal practice, is in the situation of a physician who can scarcely prescribe with effect for a particular symptom in a patient's case, un- less he will submit to an entirely new regimen and mode of life. The conscientious lawyer is surrounded with tempta- tions and with difficulties resulting from the general system of the law ; difficulties and temptations so great that it may almost appear to be the part of a wise man to fly rather than to encounter them. There is however nothing necessarily in- cidental to the legal profession which makes it incompatible with morality. He who has the firmness to maintain his al- legiance to virtue may doubtless maintain it. Such a man would consider, that law being in general the practical stand- ard of equity, the pleader may properly illustrate and enforce it. He may assiduously examine statutes and precedents, and honourably adduce them on behalf of his client. He may distinctly and luminously exhibit his client's claims. In ex- amining his witnesses he may educe the whole truth : in ex- amining the other party's, he may endeavour to detect collu- sion, and to elicit facts which they may attempt to conceal ; in a word, he may lay before the court a just and lucid view of the whole question. But he may not quote statutes and adjudged cases which he really does not think apply to the subject, or if they do appear to apply, he may not urge them as possessing greater force or applicability than he really thinks they possess. He may not endeavour to mislead the jury by appealing to their feelings, by employing ridicule, and especially by unfounded insinuations or misrepresentation of facts. He may not endeavour to make his own witnesses af- firm more than he thinks they know, or induce them, by artful questions, to give a colouring to facts different from the co- louring of truth. He may not endeavour to conceal or discredit the truth by attempting to confuse the other witnesses, or by entrapping them into contradictions. Such as these ap- pear to be the rules which rectitude imposes in ordinary cases. There are some cases which a professional man ought not to undertake at all. This is indeed acknowledged by numbers of the profession. The obligation to reject them is of course founded upon their contrariety to virtue. How then shall a legal man know whether he ought to undertake a cause at all, but by some previous consideration of its merits 1 This must CHAP, v.] THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. 167 really be done if he would conform to the requisitions of mora- lity. There is not an alternative : and " absurd " or " imprac- ticable " as it may be pronounced to be, we do not shrink from explicitly maintaining the truth. Impracticable ! it is at any rate not impracticable to withdraw from the profession or to decline to enter it. A man is not compelled to be a lawyer : and if there are so many difficulties in the practice of profes- sional virtue, what is to be said ? Are we to say, Virtue must be sacrificed to a profession — or, The profession must be sac- rificed to Virtue ? The pleader will perhaps say that he can- not tell what the merits of a case are until they are elicited in court : but this surely would not avail to justify a disregard of morality in any other case. To defend one's self for an habitual disregard of the claims of rectitude, because we can- not tell, when we begin a course of action, whether it will in- volve a sacrifice of rectitude or not, is an ill defence indeed. At any rate, if he connects himself with a cause of questiona- ble rectitude, he needs not and he ought not to advocate it, whilst ignorant of its merits, as if he knew that it was good. He ought not to advocate it further than he thinks it is good. But if any apologist for legal practice should say, that a plead- er knows nothing or almost nothing of a brief till he is in- structed in court by a junior counsel, or that he has too many briefs to be capable of any previous enquiry about them, the answer is at hand — Refuse them. It would only add one ex- ample to the many — that Virtue cannot always be maintained without cost. It is necessary that a man should adhere to virtue ; it is not necessary that he should be overwhelmed with briefs. There is one consideration under which a pleader may as- sist a client even with a bad cause, which is, that it is pro- per to prevent the client from suffering too far. I would ac- knowledge, generally, the justice of the opposite party's claims, or, if it were a criminal case, I would acquiesce in the evi- dence which carried conviction to my mind ; but still, in both, something may remain for the pleader to do. The plaintiflT may demand a thousand pounds when only eight hundred are due, and a pleader, though he could not with integrity resist the whole demand, could resist the excess of the demand above the just amount. Or if the prosecutor urges the guilt of a prisoner and attempts to procure the infliction of an undue punishment, a pleader, though he knows the prisoner's guilt, may rightly prevent a sentence too severe. Murray the grammarian had been a barrister in America : " I do not re- collect," says he, " that I ever encouraged a client to proceed 168 THE MORALITY OF LEGAL PRACTICE. [eSSAY II. at law when I thought his cause was unjust or indefensible ; but in such cases, I believe it was my invariable practice to discourage litigation and to recommend a peaceable settlement of differences. In the retrospect of this mode of practice, I have always had great satisfaction, and I am persuaded that a different procedure would have been the source of many painful recollections." * One serious consideration remains — the effect of the im- morality of Legal Practice upon the personal character of the profession. " The lawyer who is frequently engaged in re- sisting what he strongly suspects to be just, in maintaining what he deems to be in strictness untenable, in advancing in- conclusive reasoning, and seeking after flaws in the sound re- plies of his antagonists, can be preserved by nothing short of serious and invariable solicitude, from the risk of having the distinction between moral right and wrong almost erased from his mind." f Is it indeed so ? Tremendous is the risk. Is it indeed so ? Then the custom which entails this fearful risk must infallibly be bad. Assuredly no virtuous conduct tends to erase the distinctions between right and wrong from the mind. It is by no means certain, that if a lawyer were to enter upon life with a steady determination to act upon the princi- ples of strict integrity, his experience would occasion any ex- ception to the general rule, that the path of virtue is the path of interest. The client who was conscious of the goodness of his cause, would prefer the advocate whose known maxims of conduct gave weight to every cause that he undertook. When such a man appeared before a jury, they would attend to his statements and his reasonings with that confidence which integrity only can inspire. They would not make, as they now do, perpetual deductions from his averred facts ; they would not be upon the watch, as they now are, to protect themselves from illusion, and casuistry, and misrepresentation. Such a man, I say, would have a weight of advocacy which no other qualification can supply ; and upright clients, know- ing this, would find it their interest to employ him. The ma- jority of clients, it is to be hoped, are upright. Professional success, therefore, would probably follow. And if a few such pleaders, nay if one such pleader was established, the conse- quence might be beneficial and extensive to a degree which it is not easy to compute. It might soon become necessary for other pleaders to act upon the same principles, because ^ * Mcnaoirs of Lindley Murray, p. 43. t Gisborne. CHAP. VI.] PROMISES. LIES. 169 clients would not entrust their interests to any but those whose characters would give weight to their advocacy. Thus even the profligate part of the profession might be reformed by mo- tives of interest if not from choice. Want of credit might be want of practice ; for it might eventually be almost equivalent to the loss of a cause to entrust it to a bad man. The effects would extend to the public. If none but upright men could be efficient advocates, and if upright men would not advocate vicious causes, vicious causes would not be prosecuted. But if such be the probable or even the possible results of sterling integrity, if it might be the means of reforming the practice of a large and influential profession, and of almost exterminating wicked litigation from a people — the obligation to practise this integrity is proportionately great : the amount of depend- ing good involves a corresponding amount of responsibility upon him who contributes to perpetuate the evil. CHAPTER YI. PROMISES.— LIES. Promises, — Definition of a promise — Parole — Extorted promises — John Fletcher. Lies. — Milton's definition — ^Lies in war : to robbers : to lunatics : to the sick — Hyperbole — Irony — Complimentary untruths — " Not at home" Legal documents. A Promise is a contract, differing from such contracts as a lawyer would draw up, in the circumstance that ordinarily it is not written. The motive for signing a contract is to give assurance or security to the receiver that its terms will be ful- filled. The same motive is the inducement to a promise. The general obligation of promises needs little illustration, because it is not disputed. Men are not left without the con- sciousness that what they promise, they ought to perform ; and thus thousands, who can give no philosophical account of the matter, know, with certain assurance, that if they violate their engagements they violate the law of God. Some philosophers deduce the obligation of promises from the expediency of fulfilling them. Doubtless fulfilment is ex- pedient ; but there is a shorter and a safer road to truth. To 15 170 PROMISES. LIES. [eSSAY II. promise and not to perform, is to deceive ; and deceit is pe- culiarly and especially condemned by Christianity. A lie has been defined to be " a breach of promise ;" and, since the Scriptm-es condemn lying, they condemn breaches of promise. Persons sometimes deceive others by making a promise in a sense different from that in which they know it will be understood. They hope this species of deceit is less crimi- nal than breaking their word, and wish to gain the advantage of deceiving without its guilt. They dislike the shame but perform the act. A son has abandoned his father's house, and the father promises that if he returns, he shall be received with open arms. The son returns, the father " opens his arms" to receive him, and then proceeds to treat him with rigour. This father falsifies his promise as truly as if he had specifi- cally engaged to treat him with kindness. The sense in which a promise binds a person, is the sense in which he knows it is accepted hy the other party. It is very possible to promise without speaking. Those who purchase at auctions frequently advance on the price by a sign or a nod. An auctioneer, in selling an estate says, " Nine hundred and ninety pounds are offered." He who makes the customary sign to indicate an advance of ten pounds, promises to give a thousand. — A person who brings up his children or others in the known and encouraged expectation that he will provide for them, promises to provide for them. A shipmaster promises to deliver a pipe of wine at the ac- customed port, although he may have made no written and no verbal engagement respecting it. Parole, such as is taken of military men, is of imperative obligation. The prisoner who escapes by breach of parole, ought to be regarded as the perpetrator of an aggravated crime : aggravated, since his word was accepted, as he knows, be- cause peculiar reliance was placed upon it, and since he adds to the ordinary guilt of breach of promise, that of casting sus- picion and entailing suffering upon other men. If breach of parole were general, parole would not be taken. It is one of the anomalies which are presented by the adherents to the law of honour, that they do not reject from their society the man who impeaches their respectability and his own, Avhilst they reject the man who really impeaches neither the one nor the other. — To say I am a man of honour and therefore you may rely upon my word ; and then, as soon as it is accepted, to violate that word is no ordinary deceit. An upright man never broke parole. Promises are not binding if performance is unlawful. Some- CHAP. VI.] PROMISES. LIES. 171 times men promise to commit a wicked act — even to assassina- tion ; but a man is not required to commit murder because he has promised to commit it. Thus, in the Christian Scriptures, the son who had said, " I will not" work in the vineyard, and " afterwards repented and went," is spoken of with approba- tion : his promise was not binding, because fulfilment would have been wrong. Cranmer, whose religious firmness was overcome in the prospect of the stake, recanted ; that is, he promised to abandon the protestant faith. Neither was his promise binding. To have regarded it would have been a crime. The offence both of Cranmer and of the son in the parable, consisted not in violating their promises, but in making them. Some scrupulous persons appear to attach a needless obli- gation to expressions which they employ in the form of pro^ mises. You ask a lady if she will join a party in a walk; she declines, but presently recollecting some inducement to go, she is in doubt whether her refusal does not oblige her to stay at home. Such a person should recollect, that her refu- sal does not partake of the character of a promise : there is no other party to it ; she comes under no engagement to an- other. She only expresses her present intention, which in- tention she is at liberty to alter. Many promises are conditional though the conditions are not expressed. A man says to some friends, I will dine with you at two o'clock ; but as he is preparing to go, his child meets with an accident which requires his attention. This man does not violate a promise by absenting himself, because such promises are in fact made and excepted with the tacit un- derstanding that they are subject to such conditions. No one would expect, when his friend engaged to dine with him, that he intended to bind himself to come, though he left a child unassisted with a fractured arm. Accordingly, when a per- son means to exclude such conditions he says, " I will cer- tainly do so and so if I am living and able." Yet even to seem to disregard an engagement is an evil. To an ingenuous and Christian mind there is always some- thing painful in not performing it. Of this evil the principal source is gratuitously brought upon us by the habit of using unconditional terms for conditional engagements. That which is only intention should be expressed as intention. It is bet- ter, and more becoming the condition of humanity, to say, I intend to do a thing, than, I will do a thing. The recollection of our dependency upon uncontrollable circumstances should be present with us even in littlp affairs — " Go to now, ye that 1?2 PROMISES. LIES. [ESSAy H. say, To-day or to-morrow we will go into such a city and buy and sell and get gain : whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. — Ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this or that." Not indeed that the sacred name of God is to be introduced to express the conditions of our little engagements ; but the principle should never be forgotten — ^that we know not what shall be on the morrow. Respecting the often discussed question, whether extorted promises are binding, there has been, I suspect, a general want of advertence to one important point. What is an ex- torted promise ? If by an extorted promise, is meant a pro- mise that is made involuntarily, without the concurrence of the will ; if it is the effect of any ungovernable impulse, and made without the consciousness of the party — then it is not a promise. This may happen. Fear or agitation may be so great that a person really does .not know what he says or does ; and in such a case a man's promises do not bind him any more than the promises of a man in a fit of insanity. -But if by an "extorted" promise it is only meant that very powerful inducements were held out to making it, inducements however which did not take away the power of choice — then •these promises are in strictness voluntary, and like all other voluntary engagements, they ought to be fulfilled. But perhaps fulfilment itself is unlawful. Then you may not fulfil it. The offence consists in making such engagements. It will be said, a robber threatened to take my life unless I would promise to reveal the place where my neighbour's money was deposited. Ought I not to make the promise in order to save my life 1 No. Here, in reality, is the origin of the difliculties and the doubts. To rob your neighbour is criminal; to enable an- other man to rob him is criminal too. Instead therefore of discussing the obligation of " extorted" promises, we should consider whsther such promises may lawfully be made. The prospect of saving life is one of the utmost inducements to make them, and yet, amongst those things which we are to hold subservient to our Christian fidelity, is our " own life -also." If, however, giving way to the weakness of nature, a person makes the promise, he should regulate his perform- ance by the ordinary principles. Fulfil the promise unless fulfilment be wrong : and if, in estimating the propriety of -fulfilling it, any difficulty arises, it must be charged not to the imperfection of moral principles, but to the entanglement in which we involve ourselves by having begun to deviate from rectitude. If we had not unlawfully made the promise we should have had no difficulty in ascertaining our subsequent CHAP, n.] PROMISES. LIES. 173 duty. The traveller who does not 'desert the proper road, easily finds his way ; he who once loses sight of it, has many difRculties in returning. The history of that good man John Fletcher (La Flechere) affords an example to our purpose. Fletcher had a brother, De Gons, and a nephew, a profligate youth. This youth came one day to his uncle De Gons, and holding up a pistol, declared he would instantly shoot him if he did not give him an order for five hundred crowns. De Gons in terror gave it ; and the nephew then, under the same threat, required him solemnly to promise that he would not prosecute him ; and De Gons made the promise accordingly. That is what is called an extorted promise, and an extorted gift. How, in similar circumstances, did Fletcher act ? This youth after- wards went to him, told him of the " present" which De Gons had made, and showed him the order. Fletcher suspected some fraud, and thinking it right to prevent its success, he put the order in his pocket. It was at the risk of his life. The young man instantly presented his pistol, declaring that he would fire if he did not deliver it up. Fletcher did not submit to the extortion : he told him that his life was secure under the protection of God, refused to deliver up the order, and severely remonstrated with his nephew on his profligacy. The young man was restrained and softened ; and before he left his uncle, gave him many assurances that he would amend his life. — De Gons might have been perplexed with doubts as to the obligation of his " extorted" promise : — Fletcher could have no doubts to solve. LIES. The guilt of lying, like that of many other offences, has been needlessly founded upon its ill effects. These effects constitute a good reason for adhering to truth, but they are not the greatest nor the best. " Putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour."* " Ye shall not steal, neither deal falsely, neither lie one to another."! " The law is made for unholy and profane, for murderers — for liars. "J It may afford the reader some instruction, to observe with what crimes lying is associated in Scripture — with perjury, and murder, and parricide. Not that it is necessary to suppose that the measure of guilt of these crimes is equal, but that the guilt of all is great. With respect to lying, there is no trace in these passages that its guilt is conditional upon its ef- * Eph. iv. 25. t Lev. xix. 11. X I Tim. i. 9, 10 15* 174 PROMISES. LIES. [eSSAY II. fects, or that it is not always, and for whatever purpose, pro- hibited by the Divine Will. A lie is, uttering what is not true when the speaker pro- fesses to utter truth, or when he knows it is expected by the hearer. I do not perceive that any looser definition is al- lowable, because every looser definition would permit deceit. Milton's definition, considering the general tenor of his character, was very lax. He says, " Falsehood is incurred when any one, from a dishonest motive, either perverts the truth or utters what is false to one to whom it is his duty to speak the truth P* To whom is it not our duty to speak the truth ? What constitutes duty but the will of God ? and where is it found that it is his will that we should sometimes lie ? — But another condition is proposed : In order to constitute a lie, the motive to it must be dishonest. Is not all deceit dis- honesty ; and can any one utter a lie without deceit ? A man who travels in the Arctic regions comes home and writes a narrative professedly faithful, of his adventures, and decorates it with marvellous incidents which never happened, and sto- ries of wonders which he never saw. You tell this man he has been passing lies upon the public. Oh no, he says, I had not " a dishonest motive." I only meant to make readers wonder. — Milton's mode of substantiating his doctrine, is worthy of remark. He makes many references for authority to the Hebrew Scriptures, but not one to the Christian. The reason is plain though perhaps he was not aware of it, that the purer moral system which the Christian Lawgiver introduced, did not countenance the doctrine. Another argument is so feeble that it may well be concluded no valid argument can be found. If it had been discoverable would not Milton have found it ? He says, "It is universally admitted that feints and stratagems in war, when unaccompanied by perjury or breach of faith, do not fall under the description of falsehood. — It is scarcely possible to execute any of the artifices of war, without openly uttering the greatest untruths with the indisputable intention of deceiving."! And so, because the " greatest untruths" are uttered in conducting one of the most flagitious departments of the most unchristian system in the world, we are told, in a system of Christian Doctrine, that untruths are lawful ! Paley's philosophy is yet more lax : he says that we may tell a falsehood to a person who "has no right to know the truth."}: What constitutes a right to know the truth it were not easy to determine. But if a man has no right to know * Christian Doctrine, p. 658. t Id. 659. \ Mor. and Pol. Phil, b. 3. p. 1. c. 15. CHAP. VI.] PROMISES. LIES. 175 the truth — ^withhold it ; but do not utter a lie. A man has no right to know how much property I possess. If, however, he impertinently chooses to ask, what am I to do ? Refuse t& tell him, says Christian morality. What am I to do ? Tell him it is ten times as great as it is, says the morality of Paley. To say that when a man is tempted to employ a falsehood, he is to consider the degree of " inconveniency which results from the want of confidence in such cases,"* and to employ the falsehood or not as this degree shall prescribe, is surely to trifle with morality. What is the .hope that a man will decide aright, who sets about such a calculation at such a time ? Another kind of falsehood which it is said is law- ful, is that " to a robber, to conceal your property ." A man gets into my house, and desires to know where he shall find my plate. I tell him it is in a chest in such a room, knowing that it is in a closet in another. By such a falsehood I might save my property or possibly my life ; but if the prospect of doing this be a sufficient reason for violating the Moral Law, there is no action which we may not lawfully commit. May a person, in order so to save his property or life, commit par- ricide 1 Every reader says. No. But where is the ground of the distinction ? If you may lie for the sake of such ad- vantages, why may you not kill? What makes murder un- lawful but that which makes lying unlawful too ? No man surely will say that we must make distinctions in the atrocity of such actions, and that though it is not lawful for the sake of advantage to commit an act of a certain intensity of guilt, yet is lawful to commit one of a certain gradation less. Such doctrine would be purely gratuitous and unfounded : it would be equivalent to saying that we are at liberty to disobey the Divine Laws when we think fit. The case is very simple : If I may tell a falsehood to a robber in order to save my pro- perty, I may commit parricide for the same purpose ; for ly- ing and parricide are placed together and jointly condemnedf in the revelation from God. Then we are told that we may " tell a falsehood to a mad- man for his own advantage," and this because it is beneficial. Dr. Carter may furnish an answer : he speaks of the Female Lunatic Asylum, Saltpetriere in Paris, and says, " The great object to which the views of the officers of La Saltpetriere are directed, is to gain the confidence of the patients ; and this object is generally attained by gentleness, by appearing to take an interest in their affairs, by a decision of character equally remote from the extremes of indulgence and severity, * Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 3. p. 1. c. 15. t 1 Tim. i. 9, 10. 17(J PROMISES. LIES. [eSSAY II. and by the most scrupulous observance of good faith. Upon this latter, particular stress seems to be laid by M. Pinel, who remarks 'that insane persons, like children, lose all confi- dence and all respect if you fail in your word towards them ; and they immediately set their ingenuity to work to deceive and circumvent you.' "* What then becomes of the doctrine of " telling falsehoods to madmen for their own advantage .?" It is pleasant thus to find the evidence of experience enforcing the dictates of principle, and that what morality declares to be right, facts declare to be expedient. Persons frequently employ falsehoods to a sick man who cannot recover, lest it should discompose his mind. This is called kindness, although an earnest preparation for death may be at stake upon their speaking the truth. There is a peculiar inconsistency sometimes exhibited on such occa- sions : the persons who will not discompose a sick man for the sake of his interests in futurity, will discompose him without scruple if he has not made his will. Is a bequest of more consequence to the survivor, than a hope full of immor- tality to the dying man 1 It is curious to remark how zealously persons reprobate " pious frauds ;" that is, lies for the religious benefit of the deceived party. Surely if any reason for employing false- hood be a good one, it is the prospect of effecting religious benefit. How is it then that we so freely condemn these falsehoods, whilst we contend for others which are used fot less important purposes 1 Still, not every expression that is at variance with facts is a lie, because there are some expressions in which the speaker does not pretend, and the hearer does not expect, literal truth. Of this class are hyperboles and jests, fables and tales of pro- fessed fiction: of this class too, are parables, such as are employed in the New Testament. In such cases affirmative language is used in the same terms as if the allegations were true, yet as it is known that it does not profess to narrate facts, no lie is uttered. It is the same with some kinds of irony : *' Cry aloud," said Elijah to the priests of the idol, "/or he is a god, peradventure he sleepeth." And yet, because a given untruth is not a lie, it does not therefore follow that it is innocent : for it is very possible to employ such expressions without any sufficient justification. A man who thinks he can best inculcate virtue through a fable, may write one : he who desires to discountenance an absurdity, may employ irony. Yet every one should use as little of such language * Account of the Principal Hospitals in France, &c. CHAP. VI.] PROMISES. LIES. 177 as he can, because it is frequently dangerous language. The man who familiarizes himself to a departure from literal truth, is in danger of departing from it without reason and without excuse. Some of these departures are like lies ; so much like them that both speaker and hearer may reasonably ques- tion whether they are lies or not. The lapse from untruths which can deceive no one, to those which are intended to deceive, proceeds by almost imperceptible gradations on the scale of evil : and it is not the part of wisdom to approach the verge of guilt. Nor is it to be forgotten, that language, professedly fictitious, is not always understood to be such by those who hear it. This applies especially to the case of children — that is, of mankind during that period of life in which they are acquiring some of their first notions of morale ity. The boy who hears his father using hyperboles and irony with a grave countenance, probably thinks he has his father's example for telling lies among his schoolfellows. Amongst the indefensible untruths which often are not lies, are those which factitious politeness enjoins. Such are com pliments and complimentary subscriptions, and many other untruths of expression and of action which pass currently in the world. These are, no doubt, often estimated at their value : the receiver knows that they are base coin though they shine like the good. Now, although it is not to be pre- tended that such expressions, so estimated, are lies, yet I will venture to affirm that the reader cannot set up for them any tolerable defence ; and if he cannot show that they are right he may be quite sure that they are wrong. A defence has however been attempted : " How much is happiness increased by the general adoption of a system of concerted and limited deceit ! He from whose doctrine it flows that we are to be in no case hypocrites, would, in mere manners, reduce us to a degree of barbarism beyond that of the rudest savage." We do not enter here into such questions as whether a man may smile when his friend calls upon him, though he would rather just then that he had staid away. Whatever the reader may think of these questions, the " system of deceit" which passes in the world cannot be justified by the decision. There is no fear that " a degree of barbarism beyond that of the rudest savage" would ensue, if this system were amended. The first teachers of Christianity, who will not be charged with being in " any case hypocrites," both recommended and prac- tised gentleness and courtesy.* And as to the increase of happiness which is assumed to result from this system of, * 1 Peter, ii. 1. Tit. iii. 2. 1 Peter, iii. 8 178 PROMISES. LIES. [eSSAY II. deceit, the fact is of a very questionable kind. No society I believe sufficiently discourages it ; but that society which discourages it probably as much as any other, certainly en- joys its full average of happiness. But the apology proceeds, and more seriously errs : " The employment of falsehood for the production of good, cannot be more unworthy of the Di- vine Being than the acknowledged employment of rapine and murder for the same purpose."* Is it then not perceived that to employ the wickedness of man is a very different thing from holding its agents innocent ? Some of those whose wick- edness has been thus employed, have been punished for that wickedness. Even to show that the Deity has employed falsehood for the production of good, would in no degree establish the doctrine that falsehood is right. The childish and senseless practice of requiring servants to " deny" their masters, has had many apologists — I suppose because many perceive that it is wrong. It is not always true that such a servant does not in strictness lie ; for, how well soever the folly may be understood by the gay world, some who knock at their doors have no other idea than that they may depend upon the servant's word. Of this the ser- vant is sometimes conscious, and to these persons therefore he who denies his master, lies. An uninitiated servant suffers a shock to his moral principles when he is first required to tell these falsehoods. It diminishes his previous abhorrence of lying, and otherwise deteriorates his moral character. Even if no such ill consequences resulted from this foolish custom, there is objection to it which is short, but sufficient — ■ nothing can be said in its defence. Amongst the prodigious multiplicity of falsehoods which are practised in legal processes, the system of pleading not guilty is one that appears perfectly useless. By the rule, that all who refuse to plead were presumed to be guilty, pris- oners were in some sort compelled to utter this falsehood before they could have the privilege of a trial. The law is lately relaxed ; so that a prisoner, if he chooses, may refuse to plead at all. Still, only a part of the evil is removed, for even now, to keep silent may be construed into a tacit ac- knowledgment of guilt, so that the temptation to falsehood is still exhibited. There is no other use in the custom of plead- ing guilty or not guilty, but that, if a man desires to acknow- ledge his guilt, he may have the opportunity ; and this he may have wiiiiout any custom of the sort. — It cannot be doubted that the multitude of falsehoods which obtain in legal * Edin. Rev. vol, 1, Art. Belsham's Philosophy of the Mind. CHAP. VII.] QATHS. 1?9 documents during the progress of a suit at law, have a power- ful tendency to propagate habits of mendacity. A man sells goods to the value of twenty pounds to another, and is obliged to enforce payment by law. The lawyer draws up, for the creditor, a Declaration in Assumpsit, stating that the debtor owes him forty pounds for goods sold, forty pounds for work done, forty pounds for money lent, forty pounds for money expended on his account, forty pounds for money re- ceived by the debtor for the creditor, and so on — and that, two or three hundred pounds being thus due to the creditor, he has a just demand of twenty pounds upon the debtor! These falsehoods are not one half of what an every day De- claration in Assumpsit contains. If a person refuses to give up a hundred head of cattle which a farmer has placed in his custody, the farmer declares that he " casually lost" them, and that the other party " casually found" them : and then, instead of saying he casually lost a hundred head of cattle, he declares that it was a thousand bulls, a thousand cows, a thousand oxen, and a thousand heifers !* I do not think that the habits of mendacity which such falsehoods are likely to encourage are the worst consequences of this unhappy system, but they are seriously bad. No man who considers the influence of habit upon the mind, can doubt that an ingen- uous abhorrence of lying is likely to be diminished by famil- iarity with these extravagant falsehoods. CHAPTER YII. OATHS. THEIR MORAL CHARACTER— THEIR EFFICACY AS SECURITIES OF VERACITY— THEIR EFFECBTS. A curse — Immorality of oaths — Oaths of the ancient Jews — Milton — Paley — The High Priest's adjuration — Early Christians — InefEcacy of oaths — Motives to veracity — Religious sanctions : Public opinion ; Le- gal penalties — Oaths in Evidence: Parliamentary Evidence: Courts Martial— The United States— Effects of oaths : Falsehood— General obligations. " An oath is that whereby we call God to witness the truth of what we say, with a curse upon ourselves, either implied or expressed, should it prove false. "t * See the Form, 2, Chitty on Pleading, p. 370. t MUlon : Chris- tian Doctrine, p. 579. 180 OATHS. [essay II. A Curse. ^ — ^Now supposing the Christian Scriptures to contain no information respecting the moral character of oaths, how far is it reasonable, or prudent, or reverent, for a man to stake his salvation upon the truth of what he says ? To bring forward so tremendous an event as " everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord," in attestation of the offence perhaps of a poacher or of the claim to a field, is surely to make unwarrantably light of the most awful things. This consideration applies, even if a man is sure that he speaks the truth ; but who is, beforehand, sure of this ? Oaths in evidence, for example, are taken before the testimony is given. A person swears that he will speak the truth. Who, I ask, is sure that he will do this 1 Who is sure that the embarrass- ment of a public examination, that the ensnaring questions of counsel, that the secret influence of inclination or interest, will not occasion him to utter one inaccurate expression? Who, at any rate, is so sure of this that it is rational, or justi- fiable, specifically to stake his salvation upon his accuracy ? Thousands of honest men have been mistaken ; their allega- tions have been sincere, but untrue. And if this should be thought not a legitimate objection, let it be remembered, that few men's minds are so sternly upright, that they can answer a variety of questions upon subjects on which their feelings, and wishes, and interest are involved, without some little deduction from the truth, in speaking of matters that are against their cause, or some little overcolouring of facts in their own favour. It is a circumstance of constant occurrence, that even a well-intentioned witness adds to or deducts a little from the truth. Who then, amidst such temptation, would make, who ought to make, his hope of heaven dependent on his strict adherence to accurate veracity ? And if such considerations indicate the impropriety of swearing upon subjects which afiect the lives, and liberties, and property of others, how shall we estimate the impropriety of using these dreadful imprecations to attest the delivery of a summons for a debt of half-a-crown ! These are moral objections to the use of oaths indepen- dently of any reference to the direct Moral Law. Another objection of the same kind is this : To take an oath is to assume that the Deity will become a party in the case — that we can call upon Him, when we please, to follow up by the exercise of his Almighty power, the contracts (often the veiy insignificant contracts) which men make with men. Is it not irreverent, and for that reason inunoral, to call upon him to exercise this power in reference to subjects which are so 151 CHAP, VII.] OATHS. 1^1 significant that other men will scarcely listen with patience to their details ? The objection goes even further. A robber exacts an oath of the man whom he has plundered, that he will not attempt to pursue or prosecute him. Pursuit and prosecution are duties ; so then the oath assumes that the Deity will punish the swearer in futurity if he fulfils a duty. Confederates in a dangerous and wicked enterprise bind one another to secrecy and to mutual assistance, by oaths — assu- ming that God will become a party to their wickedness, and if they do not perpetrate it will punish them for their virtue. Upon every subject of questionable rectitude that is sanc- tioned by habit and the usages of society, a person should place himself in the independent situation of an enquirer. He should not seek for arguments to defend an existing prac- tice, but should simply enquire what our practice ought to be; One of the most powerful causes of the slow amendment of public institutions, consists in this circumstance, that most men endeavour rather to justify what exists than to consider whether it ought to exist or not. This cause operates upon the question of oaths. We therefore invite the reader, in con- sidering the citation which follows, to suppose himself to be one of the listeners at the Mount — to know nothing of the cus- toms of the present day, and to have no desire to justify them. " Ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths. But I say unto you, Swear not at all : nei- ther by heaven for it is God's throne, nor by the earth for it is his footstool, neither by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your communication be yea yea, nay nay ; for whatsoever is more than these, cometh of evil."* If a person should take a New Testament, and read these words to ten intelligent Asiatics who had never heard of them before, does any man believe that a single individual of them would think that the words did prohibit all oaths ? I lay stress upon this consideration : if ten unbiassed persons would, at the first hearing, say the prohibition was universal, we have no contemptible argument that that is the real mean- ing of the words. For to whom were the words addressed ? Not to schoolmen, of whom it was known that they would make nice distinctions and curious investigations ; not to men of learning, who were in the habit of cautiously weighing the import of words — ^but to a multitude — a mixed and mischooled * Matt. V. 33—37. 16 182 OATHS. [essay II. multitude. It was to such persons that the prohibition was addressed ; it was to such apprehensions that its form was adapted. "It. hath been said of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself." Why refer to what was said of old time ? For this reason assuredly ; to point out that the present requisi- tions were different from the former ; that what was prohibited now was different from what was prohibited before. And what was prohibited before ? Swearing falsely — Swearing and not performing. What then could be prohibited now 1 Swearing ^rwZy— Swearing, even, and performing: that is, swearing at all ; for it is manifest that if truth may not be at- tested by an oath, no oath may be taken. Of old time it was said, " Ye shall not swear by my name falsely y* " If a man swear an oath to bind his soul with a bond, he shall not break his word."t There could be no intelligible purpose in con- tradistinguishing the new precept from these, but to point out a characteristic difference ; and there is no intelligible char- acteristic difference but that which denounces all oaths. Such were the views of the early Christians. " The old law," says one of them, " is satisfied with the honest keeping of the oath, but Christ cuts off the opportunity of perjury. "| In acknowledging that this prefatory reference to the former law, is in my view absolutely conclusive of our Christian duty, I would remark as an extraordinary circumstance, that Dr. Paley, in citing the passage, omits this introduction and takes no notice of it in his argument. " I say unto you, Swear not at ally The words are abso- lute and exclusive. " Neither by heaven, nor by the earth, nor by Jerusalem, nor by thy own head." Respecting this enumeration it is said that it prohibits swearing by certain objects, but not by all objects. To which a sufficient answer is found in the parallel passage in James : " Swear not," he says ; " neither by heav- en, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath."§ Tliis mode of prohibition, by which an absolute and universal rule is first proposed and then followed by certain examples of the prohibited things, is elsewhere employed in Scripture. " Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. "|| No man supposes that this after-enumeration was designed to restrict the obligation of * Lev. xix. 12. t Numb. xxx. 2. % Basil. i) James v. 12. || Exod. xx. 3. See also xx. 4. CHAP. VII.] OATHS. 183 the law — Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Yet it were as reasonable to say that it was lawful to make idols in the form of imaginary monsters because they were not men- tioned in the enumeration, as that it is lawful to swear any given kind of oath because it is not mentioned in the enumer- ation. Upon this part of the prohibition it is curious that two contradictory opinions are advanced by the defenders of oaths. The first class of reasoners says, The prohibition allows us to swear by the Deity, but disallows swearing by inferior things. The second class says. The prohibition allows swearing by inferior things, but disallows swearing by the Deity. Of the first class is Milton. The injunction, he says, "does not prohibit us from swearing by the name of God — We are only commanded not to swear by heaven^ &c."* But here again the Scripture itself furnishes a conclusive answer. It asserts that to swear by heaven is to swear hy the Deity : " He that shall swear by heaven, sweareth by the throne of God, and by Him that sitteth thereon."! To pro- hibit swearing by heaven, is therefore to prohibit swearing by God. — Amongst the second class is Dr. Paley. He says, " On account of the relation which these things, [the heavens, the earth, &c.] bore to the Supreme Being, to swear by any of them was in effect and substance to swear by Him ; for which reason our Saviour says, Swear not at all ; that is, neither directly by God nor indirectly by anything related to him."| But if we are thus prohibited from swearing by any-thing related to Him, how happens it that Paley proceeds to justify judicial oaths ? Does not the judicial deponent swear by something related to God ? Does he not swear by something much more nearly related than the earth or our own heads ? I^s not our hope of salvation more nearly related than a member of our bodies ? — But after he has thus taken pains to show that swearing by the Almighty was especially forbidden, he enfor- ces his general argument by saying that Christ did swear by the Almighty ! He says that the high priest examined our Saviour upon oath, " by the living God ;" which oath he took. This is wonderful ; and the more wonderful because of these two arguments the one immediately follows the other. It is contended, within half a dozen lines, first that Christ forbade swearing by God, and next that he violated his own command. " But let your communication be yea yea, nay nay." This is remarkable : it is positive superadded to negative com- mands. We are told not only what we ought nt)t, but what * Christ. Doc. p. 582. t Matt, xxiii. 22. t Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 3, p. 1, c. 16. 184 OATHSi [essay ir we ought to do. It has indeed been said that the expression " your communication," fixes the meaning to apply to the or- dinary intercourse of life. But to this there is a fatal objec- tion : the whole prohibition sets out with a reference not to conversational language but to solemn declarations on solemn occasions. " Oaths, Oaths to the Lord," are placed at the head of the passage ; and it is too manifest to be insisted upon that solemn declarations, and not every-day talk, were the subject of the prohibition. " Whatsoever is more than these, cometh of evil." This is indeed most accurately true. Evil is the foundation of oaths : it is because men are bad that it is supposed oaths are needed : take away the wickedness of mankind, and we shall still have occasion for No and Yes, but we shall need nothing " more than these." And this consideration furnishes a dis- tinct motive to a good man to decline to swear. To take an oath is tacitly to acknowledge that this " evil" exists in his own mind — that with him Christianity has not effected its des- tined objects. From this investigation of the passage, it appears manifest that all swearing upon all occasions is prohibited. Yet the ordinary opinion, or rather perhaps the ordinary defence is, that the passage has no reference to judicial oaths. " We explain our Saviour's words to relate not to judicial oaths but to the practice of vain, wanton, and unauthorized swearing in common discourse." To this we have just seen that there is one conclusive answer : our Saviour distinctly and specifically mentions, as the subject of his instructions, solemn oaths. But there is another conclusive answer even upon our oppo- nents' own showing. They say first, that Christ described particular forms of oaths which might be employed, and next, that his precepts referred to wanton swearing ; that is to say, that Christ described what particular forms of wanton swearing he allowed and what he disallowed ! You cannot avoid this monstrous conclusion. If Christ spoke only of vain and wanton swearing, and if he described the modes that were lawful, he sanctioned wanton swearing provided we swear in the prescribed form. With such distinctness of evidence as to the universality of the prohibition of oaths by Jesus Christ, it is not in strictness necessary to refer to those passages in the Christian Scriptures which some persons adduce in favor of their employment. If Christ have prohibited them, nothing else can prove them to be right. Our reference to these passages will accordingly be short. CHAP. VII. J OATHS. 185 " I adjure thee by the living God that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the son of God." To those who allege that Christ, in answering to this "Thou hast said," took aii oath, a sufficient answer has already been intimated. If Christ then took an oath, he swore by the Deity, and this is precisely the very kind of oath which it is acknowledged he himself forbade. But what imaginable reason could there be for examining him upon oath? Who ever heard of calling upon a prisoner to swear that he was guilty 1 Nothing was wanted but a simple declaration that he was the Son of God. With this view the proceeding was extremely natural. Find- ing that to the less urgent solicitation he made no reply, the high priest proceeded to the more urgent. Schleusner ex- pressly remarks upon the passage that the words, I adjure, do not here mean, " I make to swear or put upon oath," but " I solemnly and in the name of God exhort and enjoin." This is evidently the natural and the only natural meaning ; just as it was the natural meaning when the evil spirit said, " I adjure thee by the living God that thou torment me not." The evil spirit surely did not administer an oath. " God is my witness that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers."* That the Almighty was wit- ness to the subject of his prayers is most true ; but to state this truth is not to swear. Neither this language nor that which is indicated below, contains the characteristics of an oath according to the definitions even of those who urge the expressions. None of them contain according to Milton's definition, " a curse upon ourselves ;" nor according to Paley's " an invocation of God!s vengeance." Similar language, but in a more emphatic form is employed in writing to the Co- rinthian converts. It appears from 2 Cor. ii. that Paul had resolved not again to go to Corinth in heaviness, lest he should make thern sorry. And to assure them why he had made this resolution he says, " I call God for a record upon my soul that to spare you I came not as yet unto Corinth." In order to show this to be an oath, it will be necessary to show that the apostle imprecated the vengeance of God if he did not speak the truth. Who can show this ? — The expression appears to me to be only an emphatical mode of saying, God is witness ; or as the expression is sometimes employed in the present day, God knows that such was my endeavour or desire. The next and the last argument is of a very exceptionable class ; it is founded upon silence. " For men verily swear * Bom. i. 9. See also 1 Thess. ii. 5. and Gal. i. 20. 16* 186 OATHS. [essay ii, by the greater, and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife."* Respecting this it is said that it " speaks of the custom of swearing judicially without any mark of cen- sure or disapprobation." Will it then be contended that what- ever an apostle mentions without reprobating, he approves ? The same apostle speaks just in the same manner of the pa- gan games ; of running a race for prizes and of " striving for the mastery." Yet who would admit the argument, that because Paul did not then censure the games, he thought them right ! The existing customs both of swearing and of the games, are adduced merely by way of illustratio7i of the writer's subject. Respecting the lawfulness of oaths, then, as determined by the Christian Scriptures, how does the balance of evidence stand ? On the one side, we have plain emphatical prohibi- tions — prohibitions, of which the distinctness is more fully proved the more they are investigated ; on the other we have -^counter precepts ? No ; it is not even pretended ; but we have examples of the use of language, of which it is saying much to say, that it is doubtful whether they are oaths or not. How, then, would the man of reason and of philosophy de- cide ? — " Many of the Christian fathers," says Grotius, " con- demned all oaths without exception."! Grotius was himself an advocate of oaths. " I say nothing of perjury," says Ter- tullian, " since swearing itself is unlawful to Christians. "| Chrysostom says, " Do not say to me, I swear for a just pur- pose ; it is no longer lawful for thee to swear either justly or unjustly. "§ "He who," says Gregory of Nysse, "has pre- cluded murder by taking away anger, and who has taken away the pollution of adultery by subduing desire, has expelled from our life the curse of perjury by forbidding us to swear ; for where there is no oath, there can be no infringement of it."|j Such is the conviction which the language of Christ conveyed to the early converts to his pure religion ; and such is the conviction which I think it would convey to us if cus- tom had not familiarized us with the evil, and if we did not read the New Testament rather to . find justifications of our practice than to discover the truth and to apply it to our con- duct. EFFICACY OF OATHS AS SECURITIES FOR VERACITY. Men naturally speak the truth unless they have some in- ducements to falsehood. When they have such inducements, * Heb. vi. 16. t Rights of War and Peace. \ De Idol. cap. 11. § In Gen. ii. Horn, xv. II In Cant. Horn. 13. CHAP. VII.] OAtHS. 187 what is it that overcomes them and still prompts them to speak the truth ? Considerations of duty, founded upon religion : The apprehension of the ill opinion of other men : The fear of legal penalties. I. It is obvious that the intervention of an oath is designed to strengthen only the first of these motives — that is, the re- ligious sanction. I say to strengthen the religious sanction. No one supposes it creates that sanction ; because people know that the sanction is felt to apply to falsehood as well as to perjury. The advantage of an oath, then, if advantage there be, is in the increased power which it gives to sentiments of duty founded upon religion. Now, it will be our endeavour to show that this increased power is small ; that, in fact, the oath, as such, adds very little to the motives to veracity. What class of men will the reader select in order to illustrate its greatest power ? Good men ? They will speak the truth whether without an oath or with it. They know that God has appended to falsehood as to perjury the threat of his displeasure and of punishment in futurity. Upon them religion possesses its rightful influence without the intervention of an oath. Bad men ? Men who care nothing for religion ? They will care nothing for it though they take an oath. Men of ambiguous character? Men on whom the sanc- tions of religion are sometimes operative and sometimes not ? Perhaps it will be said that to these the solemnity of an oath is necessary to rouse their latent apprehensions, and to bind them to veracity. But these persons do not go before a legal officer or into a court of justice as they go into a parlour or meet an acquaintance in the street. Recollection of mind is forced upon them by the circumstances of their situation. The court, and the forms of law, and the audience, and the after publicity of the evidence, fix the attention even of the careless. The man of only occasional seriousness is serious then ; and if in their hours of seriousness, such persons re- gard the sanctions of religion, they will regard them in a court of justice though without an oath. Yet it may be supposed by the reader that the solemnity of a specific imprecation of the Divine vengeance would, never- theless, frequently add stronger motives to adhere to truth. But what is the evidence of experience 1 After testimony has been given on affirmation, the parties are sometimes exa- mined on the same subject upon oath. Now Pothier says, " In forty years of practice I have only met two instances IS8 9ATBS. [essay II. where the parties, in the case of an oath offered after evidence, have been prevented by a sense of religion from persisting in their testimonies." Two instances in forty years ; and even with respect to these it is to be remembered, that one great reason why simple affirmations do not bind men is, that their obligation is artificially diminished (as we shall presently see) by the employment of oaths. To the evidence resulting from these truths I know of but one limitary consideration ; and to this the reader must attach such weight as he thinks it de- serves — that a man on whom an oath had been originally imposed might then have been bound to veracity, who would not incur the shame of having lied by refusing afterwards to confirm his falsehoods with an oath. II. The next inducement to adhere to truth is the apprehen- sion of the ill opinion of others. And this inducement, either in its direct or indirect operation, will be found to be incom- parably more powerful than that religious inducement which is applied by an oath as such. Not so much because religious sanctions are less operative than public opinion, as because public opinion applies or detaches the religious sanction. Upon this subject a serious mistake has been made ; for it has been contended that the influence of religious motives is comparatively nothing — that unless men are impelled to speak the truth by fear of disgrace or of legal penalties, they care very little for the sanctions of religion. But the truth is, that the sanctions of religion are, in a great degree, either brought into operation, or prevented from operating, by these secondary motives. Religious sanctions necessarily follow the judgments of the mind ; if a man by any means becomes convinced that a given action is wrong, the religious obliga- tion to refrain from it follows. Now, the judgments of men respecting right and wrong are very powerfully affected by public opinion. It commonly happens that that which a man has been habitually taught to think wrong, he does think wrong. Men are thus taught by public opinion. So that if the public attach disgrace to any species of mendacity or perjury, the religious sanction will commonly apply to that species. If there are instances of mendacity or perjury to which public disapprobation does not attach — to those instances the re- ligious sanction will commonly not apply, or apply but weakly. The power of public opinion in binding to veracity is there- fore twofold. It has its direct influence arising from the fear which all men feel of the disapprobation of others, and the indirect influence arising from the fact that public opinion applies the sanctions of religion. CHAP. VII.] OATHS. 189 III. Of the influence of legal penalties in binding to vera- city, little needs to be said. It is obvious that if they induce men to refrain from theft and violence, they will induce men to refrain from perjury. But it may be remarked, that the legal penalty tends to give vigour and efficiency to public opinion. He whom the law punishes as a criminal, is gen- erally regarded as a criminal by the world. Now that which we affirm is this — ^that unless public opinion or legal penalties enforce veracity, very little will be added by an oath to the motives to veracity more than would subsist in the case of simple affirmation. The observance of the Oxford statutes* is promised by the members on oath — yet no one observes them, They swear to observe them, they imprecate the Divine vengeance if they do not observe them, and yet they disregard them every day. The oath then is of no avail. An oath, as such, does not here bind men's consciences. And why? Because those sanctions by which men's consciences are bound, are not applied. The law ap- plies none : public opinion applies none : and therefore the religious sanction is weak ; too weak with most men to avail. Not that no motives founded upon religion present themselves to the mind ; for I doubt not there are good men who would refuse to take these oaths simply in consequence of religious motives : but constant experience shows that these men are comparatively few ; and if any one should say that upon them an oath is influential, we answer, that they are precisely the very persons who would be bound by their simple promises without an oath. The oaths of Jurymen afford another instance. Jurymen swear that they will give a verdict according to the evidence, and yet it is perfectly well known that they often assent to a verdict which they believe to be contrary to that evidence. They do not all coincide in the verdict which the foreman pronounces, it is indeed often impossible that they should coin- cide. This perjury is committed by multitudes ; yet what juryman cares for it, or refuses, in consequence of his oath, to deliver a verdict which he believes to be improper ? The reason that they do not care is, that the oath, as such, does not bind their consciences. It stands alone. The public do not often reprobate the violation of such oaths ; the law does not punish it ; jurymen learn to think that it is no harm to violate them ; and the resulting conclusion is, that the form of an oath cannot and does not supply the deficiency ; — It cannot and does not apply the religious sanction. * See p. 201. 1^0 OATHS. [essay II • Step a few yards from the jury box to the witness-box, and you see the difference. There public opinion interposes its power — there the punishment of perjury impends — ^there the reUgious sanction is applied — and there, consequently, men regard the truth. If the simple intervention of an oath was that which bound men to veracity, they would be bound in the jury-box as much as at ten feet off; but it is not. A custom-house oath is nugatory even to a proverb. Yet it is an oath : yet the swearer does stake his salvation upon his veracity ; and still his veracity is not secured. Why 1 Because an oath, as such, applies to the minds of most men little or no motive to veracity. They do not in fact think that their salvation is staked, necessarily, by oaths. They think it is either staked or not, according to certain other cir- cumstances quite independent of the oath itself. These cir- cumstances are not associated with custom-house oaths, and therefore they do not avail. Churchwardens' oaths are of the same kind. Upon these, Gisborne remarks — " In the succes- sive execution of the office of churchwarden, almost every man above the rank of a day labourer, in every parish in the kingdom, learns to consider the strongest sanction of truth as a nugatory form." This is not quite accurate. They do not learn to consider the strongest sanction of truth as a nugatory form, but they learn to consider oaths as a nugatory form. The real- ity is, that the sanctions of truth are not brought into operation, and that oaths, as such, do not bring them into operation. We return then to our proposition — Unless public opinion or legal penalties enforce veracity, very little is added by an oath to the motives to veracity, more than would subsist in the case of simple affirmation. It is obvious that the legislature might, if it pleased, attach the same penalties to falsehood as it now attaches to perjury ; and therefore all the motives to veracity which are furnished by the law in the case of oaths, might be equally furnished in the case of affirmation. This is in fact done by the legisla- ture in the case of the Society of Friends. It is also obvious that public opinion might be applied to af- firmation much more powerfully than it is now. The simple circumstance of disusing oaths would effect this. Even now, when the public disapprobation is excited against a man who has given false evidence in a court of justice, by what is it excited ? by his having broken his oath, or by his having given false testimony ? It is the falsehood which excites the disapprobation, much more than the circumstance that the false- hood was in spite of an oath. This public disapprobation is CHAP. VII.] OATHS. 191 founded upon the general perception of the guilt of false testi- mony and of its perniciousneas. Now if affirmation only wa9 employed, this public disapprobation would follow the lying witness, as it now follows, or nearly as it now follows, the perjured witness. Every thing but the mere oath would be the same — the fear of penalties, the fear of disgrace, the mo- tives of religion would remain ; and we have just shown how little a mere oath avails. But we have artificially diminished the public reprobation of lying by establishing oaths. The tendency of instituting oaths is manifestly to diffuse the sen- timent that there is a difference in the degree of obligation not to lie, and not to swear falsely. This difference is made, not so much by adding stronger motives to veracity by an oath, as by deducting from the motives to veracity in simple affirm- ations. Let the public opinion take its own healthful and un- obstructed course, and falsehood in evidence will quickly be regarded as a flagrant offence. Take away oaths, and the public reprobation of falsehood will immediately increase in power, and will bring with its increase an increasing efficiency in the religious sanction. The present relative estimate of lying and perjury is a very inaccurate standard by which to judge of the efficiency of oaths. We have artificially reduced the abhorrence of lying, and then say that that abhorrence is not great enough to bind men to the truth. Our reasoning then proceeds by these steps. Oaths are designed to apply a strong religious sanction : they however do not apply it unless they are seconded by the apprehension of penalties or disgrace. The apprehension of penalties and disgi'ace may be attached to falsehood, and with this appre- hension the religious sanction will also be attached to it. Therefore, all those motives which bind men to veracity may be applied to falsehood as well as to oaths. — In other words, oaths are needless. But in reality we have evidence of this needlessness from every day experience. In some of the most important of temporal affairs, an oath is never used. The Houses of Par- liament in their examinations of witnesses employ no oaths. They are convinced (and therefore they have proved) that the truth can be discovered without them. But if affirmation is thus a sufficient security for veracity in the great questions of a legislature, how can it be insufficient in the little ques- tions of private life 1 There is a strange inconsistency here. That same Parliament which declares, by its every-day prac- tice, that oaths are needless, continues, by its every-day prac- tice, to impose them ' Even more : those very m^ who 192 OATHS. [essay II. themselves take oaths as a necessary qualification for their duties as legislators, proceed to the exercise of these duties upon the mere testimony of other men ! — Peers are never re- quired to take oaths in delivering their testimony, yet no one thinks that a peer's evidence in a court of justice may not be as much depended upon as that of him v^rho swears. Why are peers in fact bound to veracity though without an oath ? Will you say that the religious sanction is more powerful upon lords than upon other men ? The supposition were ridiculous. How then does it happen ? You reply. Their honour binds them : Very well ; that is the same as to say that public opinion binds them. But then, he who says that honour, or any thing else besides pure religious sanctions, binds men to veracity, impugns the very grounds upon which oaths are defended. Oath evidence again is not required by courts-martial. But can any man assign a reason why a person who would speak the truth on affirmation before military officers, would not speak it on affirmation before a judge 1 Arbitrations too proceed often, perhaps generally, upon evidence of parole. Yet do not arbitrators discover the truth as well as courts of justice ? and if they did not, it would be little in favour of oaths, because a part of the sanction of veracity is, in the case of arbitrations, withdrawn. But we have even tried the experiment of affirmations in our own courts of justice, and tried it for some ages past. The Society of Friends uniformly give their evidence in courts of law on their words alone. No man imagines that their words do not bind them. No legal court would listen with more suspicion to a witness because he was a Quaker. Here all the motives to veracity are applied : there is the religious motive, which in such cases all but desperately bad men feel : there is the motive of public opinion : and there is the motive arising from the penalties of the law. If the same motives were applied to other men, why should they not be as effectual in securing veracity as they are upon the Quakers ? We have an example even yet more extensive. In all the courts of the United States of America, no one is obliged to take an oath. What are we to conclude ? Are the Ameri- cans so foolish a people that they persist in accepting affirm- ations knowing that they do not bind witnesses to truth ? Or, do the Americans really find that affirmations are suffi- cient ? But one answer can be given : — They find that affirm- ations are sufficient : they prove undeniably that oaths are needless. No one will imagine that virtue on the other side CHAP. VII.] OATHS. 193 the Atlantic is so much greater than on this, that while an af- firmation is sufficient for an American an oath is necessary here. So that whether we enquire into the moral lawfulness of oaths, they are not lawful ; or into their practical utility, they are of little use or of none. EFFECTS OF OATHS. There is a power and efficacy in our religion which ele- vates those who heartily accept it above that low moral state in which alone an oath can even be supposed to be of ad- vantage. The man who takes an oath, virtually declares that his word would not bind him ; and this is an admission which no good man should make — for the sake both of his own mo- ral character and of the credit of religion itself. It is the testimony even of infidelity, that " wherever men of uncom- mon energy and dignity of mind have existed, they have felt the degradation of binding their assertions with an oath."* This degradation, this descent from the proper ground on which a man of integrity should stand, illustrates the propo- sition that whatever exceeds affinnation " cometh of evil." The evil origin is so palpable that you cannot comply with the custom without feeling that you sacrifice the dignity of virtue. It is related of Solon that he said, " A good man ought to be in that estimation that he needs not an oath ; be- cause it is to be reputed a lessening of his honour if he be forced to swear."! If to take an oath lessened a pagan's honour, what must be its effect upon a Christian's purity. Oaths, at least the system of oaths which obtains in this country, tends powerfully to deprave the moral character. We have seen that they are continually violated — that men are continually referring to the most tremendous sanctions of religion with the habitual belief that those sanctions impose no practical obligation. Can this have any other tendency than to diminish the influence of religious sanctions upon other things ? If a man sets light by the divine vengeance in the jury box to-day, is he likely to give full weight to that vengeance before a magistrate to-morrow ? We cannot pre- vent the efi'ects of habit. Such things will infallibly dete- riorate the moral character, because they infallibly diminish the power of those principles upon which the moral charac- ter is founded. * Godwin : Political Justice, vol. 2. p. 633. t Stoboeua : Serm. 3. 17 194 OATH5. [eSSAT Tt, Oaths encourage falsehood. We have already seeT> that the effect of instituting oaths is to diminish the practical obligation of simple affirm-ation. The law says, You must speak the truth when you are iFpon your oasth ; which is the same thing as to say that it is less harm to violate truth when you are not on your oath. The court sometimes reminds 3 witness that he is upon oath, which is: equivalent to say- ing, If you were not, we should think less of your mendacity. The same lesson is inculcated by the assignation of penalties to perjury and not to falsehood. What is a maix to conchide, but that the law thinks light of the crime which it does nol punish ; and that since he may lie with impunity, it is not much harm to lie ? Common language bears testimony to the effect. The vulgar phrase, I will take my oath to it, clearly evinces the prevalent notion that a man may lie with less guilt when he does not take his oath. No answer can be made to this remark, unless any one can show that the extra sanction of an oath is so much added to the obligation which would other- wise attach to simple affirmation. And who can show this 1 Experience proves the contrary : " Experience bears ample testimony to the fact, that the prevalence of oaths among men (Christians not excepted) has produced a very material and a very general effect in reducing their estimate of the obliga- tion of plain truth, in its natural and simple forms."* — " There is no cause of insincerity, prevarication, and falsehood, more powerful than the practice of administering oaths in a court of justice."t Upon this subject the legislator plays a desperate game against the morality of a people. He wishes to make them speak the truth when they undertake an office or deliver evi- dence. Even supposing him to succeed, what is the cost ? That of diminishing the motives to veracity in all the affairs of life. A man may not be called upon to take an oath above two or three times in his life, but he is called upon to speak the truth every day. A few, but a few serious, words remain. The investiga- tions of this chapter are not matters to employ speculation but to influence our practice. If it be indeed true that Jesus Christ has imperatively forbidden us to employ an oath, a duty, an imperative duty is imposed upon us. It is worse than merely vain to hear his laws unless we obey them. Of him therefore who is assured of the prohibition, it is indispensably required that he should refuse an oath. There is no other means of maintaining our allegiance to * Gurney : Observations, &e. «. X. t Godwin : r. 9. p. 634. CHAP. VII.] OATHS. 195 God. Our pretensions to Christianity are at stake : for he who, knowing the Christian law, will not conform to it, is cer- tainly not a Christian. How then does it happen, that al- though persons frequently acknowledge they think oaths are forbidden, so few, when they are called upon to swear, de- cline to do it ? Alas, this offers one evidence amongst the many, of the want of uncompromising moral principles in the world — of such principles as it has been the endeavour of these pages to enforce — of such principles as would prompt us and enable us to sacrifice every thing to Christian fidelity. By what means do the persons of whom we speak suppose that the will of God respecting oaths is to be effected ? To whose practice do they look for an exemplification of the Christian standard ? Do they await some miracle by which the whole world shall be convinced, and oaths shall be abol- ished without the agency of man ? Such are not the means by which it is the pleasure of the Universal Lord to act. He effects his moral purposes by the instrumentality of faithful men. Where are these faithful men ? — But let it be : if those who are called to this fidelity refuse, theirs will be the dis- honour and the offence. But the work will eventually be done. Other and better men will assuredly arise to acquire the Christian honour and to receive the Christian reward. CHAPTER VIII. THE MORAL CHARACTER, OBLIGATIONS, AND EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS. SUBSCRIPTION TO ARTICLES OF RELIGION. Oath of Allegiance — Oath in Evidence — Perjury — Military oath — Oath against Bribery at Elections — Oath against simony — University oaths — Subscription to articles of religion — Meaning of the 39 articles literal — Refusal to subscribe. In reading the paragraphs which follow respecting several of the specific oaths which are imposed in this country, the reader should remember, that the evils with which they are attended would almost equally attend aflfiirmations in similar circumstances. Our object therefore is less to illustrate their nature as oaths, than as improper and vicious engagements. 196 MORAL CHARACTER, OBLIGATIONS, AND [eSSAY II. With respect to the interpretation of a particular oath, it is obviously to be determined by the same rule as that of pro- mises. A man must fulfil his oath in that sense in which he knows the imposer desigiis and expects him to fulfil it. And he must endeavour to ascertain what the imposer's expectation is. To take an oath in voluntary ignorance of the obligations which it is intended to impose, and to excuse ourselves for disregarding them because we *lo not know what they are, cannot surely be right. Yet it is often difficult, sometimes impossible, to discover what an oath requires. The absence of precision in the meaning of terms, the alteration of gen- eral usages whilst the forms of oaths remain the same, and the original want of explicitness of the forms themselves, throw sometimes insuperable obstacles in the M^ay of discovering, when a man takes an oath, what it is that he binds himself to do. This is manifestly a great evil : and it is chargeable primarily upon the custom of exacting oaths at all. It is in general a very difficult thing to frame an unobjectionable oath — an oaUi which shall neither be so lax as to become nugatory by easiness of evasion and uncertainty of meaning, nor so rigid as to demand in words more than the imposer wishes to exact, and thus to ensnare the consciences of those who take it. The same objections would apply to forms of affirma- tion. . The only eifectual remedy is to diminish, or, if it were possible, to abolish the custom of requiring men to promise beforehand to pursue a certain course of action. How is non- fulfilment of these engagements punished ? By fine or imprison- ment, or some other mode of penalty ? Let the penalty, let the sanction remain, without the promise or the oath. A man swears allegiance to a prince : if he becomes a traitor he is punished, not for the breach of his oath but for his treason. Can you not punish his treason without the oath ? A man swears he has not received a bribe at an election. If he does receive one you send him to prison. You could as easily send him thither if he had not sworn. You reply — ■ But, by imposing the oath we bind the swearer's conscience. Alas ! we have seen and we shall presently again see, that this plan of binding men is of little effect. There is one kind of affirmation that appears to involve absurdity. I mean that by which a man affirms that he will speak the truth. Of what use is the affirmation ? The affirmant is not bound to ve- racity more than he was before he made it. It is no greater lie to speak falsely after an affirmation than before. Oath of Allegiance. — "I do sincerely promise and swear that I will be faithful, and bear true allegiance, to his CHAP. VIII.] EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS. 197 Majesty king George." — On the propriety of exacting these poUtical oaths, we shall offer some observations in the next Essay.* At present we ask, What does the oath of alle- giance mean ? Set a hundred men each to write an exact ac- count of what the party here promises to do, and I will un- dertake to affirm that not one in the hundred will agree with any other individual. " I will be faithful ?" What is meant by being faithful ? What is the extent of the obligation, and what are its limits ? "I will bear true allegiance :" What does allegiance mean ? Is it synonymous with fidelity ? Or does it embrace a wider extent of obligation, or a narrower ? And if either, how is the extent ascertained ? — The oath w-as, 1 believe, made purposely indefinite : the old oath of allegiance was more discriminative. But no form can discriminate the duty of a citizen to his rulers — unless you make it consist of a political treatise ; and no man can write a treatise with de- finitions to which all would subscribe. The truth is, that no one knows what the oath of allegiance requires. Paley at- tempts, in six separate articles, to define its meaning : one of which definitions is, that " the oath excludes all design, at the time, of attempting to depose the reigning prince."! At the time ! Why the oath is couched in the future tense. Its express purpose is to obtain a security for future conduct. The swearer declares, not what he then designs, but what, in time to come, he will do. — Another definition is, " it permits resistance to the king when his ill behaviour or imbecility is such as to make resistance beneficial to the community."! But how or in what manner, " fidelity and true allegiance" means " resistance," casuistry only can tell. We may rest assured, that after all attempts at explanation, the meaning of the oath will be, at the least, as doubtful as before. Nor is there any remedy. The fault is not in the form, for no form can be good : but in the imposition of any oath of alle- giance. The only means of avoiding the evil is by abolish- ing the oath. Besides, what do oaths of allegiance avail in those periods of disturbance in which princes are commonly displaced ? What revolution has been prevented by oaths of allegiance ? Yet if the oath does no good, it does harm. It is always doing harm to exact promises from men, who cannot know- beforehand whether they will fulfil them. And as to the am- biguity, it is always doing harm to require men to stake their salvation upon doing — they know not what. Oath in Evideince. — "The truth, the whole truth, and » Essay III., ch 5 t Mor. and Pol. Piiil. b. 3, p. 1, c. 18. t Ibid 17* 198 MORAL CHARACTER, OBLIGATIONS, AND [eSSAY If. nothing but the truth, touching the matter in question." Is the witness to understand by this that if he truly answers all questions that are put to him, he conforms to the requisitions of the oath ? If he is, the terms of the oath are very excep- tionable ; for many a witness may give true answers to a counsel and yet not tell " the whole truth." Or does the oath bind him to give an exact narrative of every particular con- nected with the matter in question whether asked or not ? If it does, multitudes commit perjury. How then shall a wit- ness act ? Shall he commit perjury by withholding all inform- ation but that which is asked ? Or shall he be ridiculed and perhaps silenced in court for attempting to narrate all that he has sworn to disclose 1 Here again the morality of the peo- ple is injuriously affected. To take an oath to do a certain prescribed act, and then to do only just that which custom hap- pens to prescribe, is to ensnare the conscience and practically to diminish the sanctions of veracity. The evil may be avoided either by disusing all previous promises to speak the truth, or to adapt the terms of the promise (if that can be done) to the duties which the law or which custom expects. " You shall true answer make to all such questions as shall be asked of you," is the form when a person is sworn upon a voir dire ; and if this is all that the law expects when he is giving evidence, why not use the same form 1 If however, in deference to the reasonings against the use of any oaths, the oath in evidence were abolished, no difficulty could re- main : for to promise in any form to speak the truth, is, as we have seen, absurd. Whilst the oath in evidence continues to be imposed, it is not an easy task to determine in what, sense the witness should understand it. If you decide by the meaning of the legislature which imposed the oath, it appears manifest that he should tell all he knows, whether asked or not. But what, it may be asked, is the meaning of a law, but that which the authorized expounders of the law determine ? And if they habitually admit an interpretation at variance with the terms of the oath, is not their sanction an authoritative explanation of the legislature's meaning ? These are questions which I pretend not with confidence to determine. The mischiefs which result from the uncertainty, are to be charged upon the legislatures which do not remove the evil. I would, however, suggest that the meaning of a form in such cases is to be sought, not so much in the meaning of the original imposers, as in that of those who now sanction the form by permitting it to exist. This doubtless opens wide the door to extreme CHAP. VIII.] EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS. 19f licentiousness of interpretation. Nor can that door be closed. There is no other remedial measure than an alteration of the forms or an abolition of the oath. Military Oath. — ** I swear to obey the orders of the offi- cers who are set over me : So help me God." And suppose an officer orders him to do something which morality forbids — his oath then stands thus : " I swear to obey man rather than God."" The profaneness is shocking. Will any exten- uation be offered, and will it be said that the military man only swears to obey the virtuous orders oi his superior ? We deny the fact : the oath neither means nor is intended to mean any such thing. It may indeed by possibility happen that aa officer may order his inferior to do a thing which a courtr martial would not punish him for refusing to do. But if the law intends to allow such exceptions, what excuse is there for making the terms of the oath absolute ? Is it not teaching military men to swear they care not what, thus to make the terms of the oath one thing and its meaning another ? But the real truth is, that neither the law nor courts-martial allow any such limitations in the meaning of the oath as will bring it within the limits of morality, or of even a decent reverence to Him who commands morality to man. They do not intend to allow the Moral Law to be the primary rule to the soldier. They intend the contrary : and the soldier does actually sweax that, if he is ordered so to do, he will violate the law of God. Of this impiety what is the use ? Does any one imagine that a soldier obeys his superiors because he has sworn to obey them? It were ridiculous. When courts-martial in- flict a punishment, they inflict it not for perjury but for diso- bedience. I would devote two or three sentences to the observation that the military oath is sui generis. So far at least as my information extends, no other oath is imposed which promises unconditional obedience to other men ; no other oath exists by which a man binds himself to violate the laws of God. Why does the military oath thus stand alone, the explicit contemner of the obligations of morality ? — Because it belongs to a cus- tom which itself contemns morality. Because it belongs to a custom which " repeals all the principles of virtue." Because it belongs to War. — There is a lesson couched in this, which he who has ears to hear will find to be pregnant with instruction. Oath against Bribery at Elections. — " I do swear I have not received, or had, by myself or any person whatso- ever in trust for me, or for my use and benefit, directly or in- directly, any sum or sums of money ; office, place, or em- 200 MORAL CHARACTER, OBLTffATIONS, AND [eSSA? II' plo3rment ; gift or reward ; or any promise or security for anf money, office, employment, or gift, in order to give my vote at this election." This is an attempt to secure incorruptness by extreme accuracy in framing the oath. With what suc- cess, public experience tells. No bribery oath will prevent bribery. It wants efficient sanctions— punishment by the law or reprobation by the public. A man who possesses a vote in a close borough, and whose neighbours and their fathers have habitually pocketed a bribe at every election, is very little under the influence of public opinion. That public with which he is connected, does not reprobate the act, and he learns to imagine it is of little moral turpitude. As to legal penalties, they are too unfrequently inflicted or too difficult of infliction to be of much avail. Why then is this nursery of perjury continued ? Which action should we most deprecate, that of the voter who perjures himself for a ten-pound note, or that of the legislator who so tempts him to perjury by im- posing an oath which he knows will be violated ? If bribery be wrong, punish it ; but it is utterly indefensible to exact oaths which every body knows will be broken. Not indeed that any thing in the present state of the representation will prevent bribery. We may multiply oaths and denounce pen- alties without end, yet bribery will still prevail. But though bribery be inseparable from the system, perjury is not. We should abolish one of the evils if we do not or cannot abolish both. As to those endless contrivances by which electors avoid the arm of the law, and hope to avoid the guilt of perjury, they are, a» it respects guilt, all and always vain. The in- tention of the Legislature was to prevent bribery, and he who is bribed, violates his oath whether he violates its literal terms or notT The shopkeeper who sells a yard of cloth to a can- didate for twenty pounds, is just as truly bribed, and he just as truly commits a perjury, as if the candidate had said, I give you this twenty-pound note to tempt you to vote for me. I'hese men may evade legal penalties ; there is a power which they cannot evade. Oath against Simony. — The substance of the oath is, " I do swear that I have made no simonical payment for obtain- ing this ecclesiastical place : So help me God through Jesus Christ !" The patronage of livings, that is, the legal right to give a man the ecclesiastical income of a parish, may, like other property, be bought and sold. But though a person may legally sell the power of giving the income, he may not sell the income itself ; the reason it may be presumed being, CHAP. VIII.] EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS. 201 that a person who can only give the income, will be more likely to bestow it upon such a clergyman as deserves it, than if he sold it to the highest bidder. It may however be ob- served in passing, that the security for the judicious presen- tation of church preferment is extremely imperfect ; for the law, whilst it tries to take care that preferment shall be pro- perly bestowed, takes no care that the power of bestowing it shall be entrusted to proper hands. The least virtuous man or woman in a district may possess this power ; and it were vain to expect that they will be very solicitous to assign care- ful shepherds to the Christian flocks. To prevent the income from being bought and sold, the law requires the acceptor of a living to swear that he has made no simoniacal payment for it. What then is simony ? To answer this question the clergyman must have recourse to the definitions of the law. Simony is of various kinds, apd the clergyman who is under strong temptation to make some con- tract with, or payment to the patron, is manifestly in danger of making them in the fearing, doubting, hope, that they are not simoniacal. And so he makes the arrangement, hardly knowing whether he has committed simony and perjury or not. This evil is seen and acknowledged : " The oath," says a dignitary of the church, " lays a snare for the integrity of the clergy, and I do not perceive that the requiring of it, in cases of private patronage, produces any good effect sufficient to compensate for this danger." University Oaths. — The various statutes of colleges, of which every member is obliged to promise the observance on oath, are become wholly or partly obsolete ; some are need- less and absurd, some illegal, and to some, perhaps, it is im- possible to conform. Yet the oath to perform them is con- stantly taken. A man swears that he will speak, within the college, no language but Latin ; and he speaks English in it every day. He swears he will employ so many hours out of every twenty-four in disputations; and does not dispute for days or weeks together. What remains, then, for those who take these oaths to do ? To show that this is not perjury. Here is the field for casuistry ; here is the field in which in- genuity m.ay exhibit its adroitness ! in which sophistry may delight to range ! in which Duns Scotus, if he were again in the world, might rejoice to be a combatant ! — And what do Ingenuity, and Casuistry, and Sophistry do 1 Oh ! they dis- cover consolatory truths ; they discover that if the act which you promise to perform is unlawful, you may swear to perform it with an easy conscience ; they discover that there is no 202 MORAL CHARACTER, OBLIGATIONS, AND [eSSAT 11. harm in swearing to jump from Dover to Calais, because it is " impracticable ;" they discover that it is quite proper to swear to do a foolish thing because it would be " manifestly inconve- nient" and " prejudicial" to do it. — In a word, they discover so many agreeable things that if the book of Cervantes were appended to the oath, they might swear to imitate all the deeds of his hero, and yet remain quietly and innocently in a college all their lives. That nothing can be said in extenuation of those who take these oaths, cannot be affirmed ; yet that the taking them is wrong, every man who simply consults his own heart will know. Even if they were wrong upon no other ground they would be so upon this, that if men were conscientious enough to refuse to take them, the " necessity" for taking them would soon be withdrawn. No man questions that these oaths are a scandal to religion and to religious men ; no man questions that their tendency is to make the public think lightly of the obligation of an oath. They ought therefore to be abolished. It is imperative upon the legislature to abolish them, and it is imperative upon the individual, by refusing to take them, to evince to the legislature the necessity for its interference. Nothing is wanted but that private Christians should maintain Christian fidelity. If they did do this, and refused to take these oaths, the legislature would presently do its duty. It needs not to be feared that it would suffer the doors of the colleges to be locked up, because students were too consci- entious to swear falsely. Thus, although the obligation upon the legislature is manifest, it possesses some semblance of an excuse for refraining from reform, since those who are imme- diately aggrieved, and who are the immediate agents of the of- fence are so little concerned, that they do not address even a petition for interference. That some good men feel aggrieved is scarcely to be doubted : let these remember their obligations : let them remember, that compliance entails upon posterity tho evil and the offence, and sets, for the integrity of successors, a perpetual snare. It is an unhappy reflection that men endeavour rather to pacify the misgiving voice of conscience under a continuance of the evil, than exert themselves to remove it. Unschooled persons will always think that the usage is wrong. In truth, even after the licentious interpretations of the oaths have been resorted to — after it has been shown what he who takes them does not pro- mise, what imaginable security is there that he will perform that which he does promise — ^that he will even know what he promises ? None. Being himself the interpreter of the oath, CHAP. VIII.] EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS. 201 and having resolved that the oath does not mean what it says, he is at liberty to think that it means any thing ; or, which I suppose is the practical opinion, that it means nothing. If we would remove the evil we must abolish the oath. SUBSCRIPTION TO ARTICLES OF RELIGION. Bishop Clayton said, " I do not only doubt whether the compilers of the Articles, but even whether any two thinking men, ever agreed exactly in their opinion not only with re- gard to all the Articles, but even with regard to any one of them."* Such is the character of that series of propositions in which a man is required to declare his belief before he can become a minister in a Christian community. The event may easily be foreseen ; some will refuse to subscribe ; some will subscribe though it violates their consciences ; some will subscribe regardless whether it be right or wrong ; and some of course will be found to justify subscription. Of those who on moral grounds refuse to subscribe to that which they do not believe, it may be presumed that they are conscientious men — men who prefer sacrificing their interests to their duties. These are the men whom every Christian church should especially desire to retain in its communion ; and these are precisely the men whom the Articles exclude from the English church. As it respects those who perceive the impropriety of sub- scription and yet subscribe, whose consciences are wronged by the very act which introduces them into the church — the evil is manifest and great. Chillingworth declared to Sheldtn that " if he subscribed, he subscribed his own damnation," yet not long afterwards Chillingworth was induced to sub- scribe. Unhappy, that they who are about to preach virtue to others, should be initiated by a violation of the Moral Law ! With respect to those who subscribe heedlessly, and with- out regard to their belief or disbelief of the Articles— of what use is subscription 1 It is designed to operate as a test ; but what test is it to him who would set his name to the Articles if they were exactly the contrary of what they are ? If con- scientiousness keeps some men out of the church, the want of conscientiousness lets others in. The contrivance is admirably adapted to an end ; but to what end ? To the separation of the more virtuous from the less, and to the admission of the latter. A reader who was a novice in these affairs would ask, in wonder, For what purpose is subscription exacted ? If the * Confessional, 3d Edit. p. 246 204 MORAL CHARACTER, OBLIGATIONS, AND [eSSAY II. Articles are so objectionable, and if subscription is productive of so much evil, why are not the Articles revised, or why is subscription required at all ? These are reasonable questions. They involve, however, political considerations ; and in the Political Essay we hope to give such an enquirer satisfaction respecting them. And with respect to the justifications that are offered of subscribing to doctrines which are not believed, it is manifest, that they must set out with the assumption that the words of the Articles mean nothing — that we are not to seek for their meaning in their terms, but in some other quarter. It is hardly necessary to remark, that when this assumption is made, the enquirer is launched upon a boundless ocean, and though he has to make his way to a port, possesses neither compass nor helm, and can see neither sun nor star. Who can assign any limit to license of interpretation, when it is once agreed tiiat the words themselves mean nothing ? The world is all before us, and we have to seek a place of rest from Pyrrhonism wherever we can find it. We are told to go back to Queen Elizabeth's days, and to find out, if we can, what the legislature who framed the Articles meant : always premising that we are not to judge of what they meant by what they said. How is it discovered that they did not mean what they said ? By a process of most convincing argumenta- tion ; which argumentation consists in this, " It is difficult to conceive how" they could have meant it!* These are agree- able and convenient solutions ; but they are not true. . " They who contend that nothing less can justify subscrip- tion to the Thirty-nine Articles, than the actual belief of each and every separate proposition contained in them, must sup- pose that the legislature expected the consent of ten thousand men and that in perpetual succession, not to one contro- verted proposition but to many hundreds. It is difficult to conceive how this could be expected by any who observed the incurable diversity of human opinion upon all subjects shori of demonstration."! Now it appears that the Legislature ot Elizabeth actually did require uniformity of opinion upoo these controverted points. Such has been the decision ot the Judges. " One Smyth subscribed to the said Thirty-nine Articles of religion with this addition — so far forth as the same were agreeable to the word of God ; — and it was resolved by Wray, Chief Justice in the King's Bench, and all the Judges of England, that this subscription was not according to the statute of 13th Eliz. Because the statute required aa * Mor. and Pol. PbU. b. 3. p. 1. c. 22. t Id. CHAP. VIII.] EFFECTS OF PARTICULAR OATHS. 205 absolute subscription, and this subscription made it condi- tional : and that this act was made for avoiding diversity of opinions, 6fc. ; and by this addition, the party, might, by his own private opinion, take some of them to be against the Word of God, and by this means, diversity of opinions should not be avoided, which was the scope of the statute ; and the very act made, touching subscription, of none effect."* This overthrows the convenient explanations of modern times. It is agreed by those who offer these explanations, that the meaning of Elizabeth's legislature is that by which they are bound. That meaning then is declared by all the Judges of England to be, that subscribers should believe the propositions of the Articles. The modern explanations allow private opinion the liberty of thinking some of them to be *' against the Word of God." This was precisely the liberty which the legislature intended to preclude. The modern explanations affirm the Articles to be conditional, and in fact, that they impose only a few general obligations ; but uncon- ditional subscription was the very thing which the legislature required. If a person should now express the condition which Smyth, as reported by Coke, expressed, and should say^ I believe the Articles so far as they are accordant with Christian Truth — it appears that his subscription would not be accepted ; and yet this is what is done by perhaps every clerg)^man in England — with this difference only, that the reservation is secretly made and not frankly expressed. So that in reality, and according to the principles laid down by the apologists of subscription,! almost every subscriber sub- scribes falsely. -^ But what, it will be asked, is to be done ? Refuse to sub- scribe. There is no other means of maintaining your purity, and perhaps no other means of procuring an abolition of the Articles. At least this means would be effectual. We may be sure that the legislature w^ould revise or abolish them if it was found that no one would subscribe. They would not leave the pulpits empty in compliment to a barbarous relic of the days of Elizabeth. Perhaps it will be said, that al- though men of virtue refused to subscribe, the pulpits would * Coke : Instil. 4 cap. 74. p. 324. t These principles are, that the meaning of a promise or an oath is to be determined by the meaning of those who impose it. This as a general rale is true ; but I repeat the doubt whether, in the case of antiquated forms a proper standard of their meaning is not to be sought in the inten- tion of the legislatures which now perpetuate those forms. This doubt, however, in whatever way it preponderates, will not afford a justification of subscribing to forms of which the terms are notoriously disregarded. 18 206 IMMORAL AGENCV. [eSSAT II. Still be filled with unprincipled men. The effect would speed- ily be the same : the legislature would not continue to im- pose subscription for the sake of excluding from the ministry- all but bad men. Those who subscribe, therefore, bind the burden upon their own shoulders and upon the shoulders of I)osterity. The offence is great : the scandal to religion is great : and even if refusal to subscribe would not remove the evil, the question for the individual is not what may be the consequence of doing his duty, but what his duty is. We want a little more Christian fidelity: a little more of that spirit which made our forefathers prefer the stake to tamper- ing with their consciences. CHAPTER IX. IMMORAL AGENCY. PubliGation and circulation of books — Seneca — Circulating Libraries-^ Public-houses — Prosecutions — Political affairs. A GREAT portion of the moral evil in the world, is the result not so much of the intensity of individual wickedness, as of a general incompleteness in the practical virtue of all classes of men. If it were possible to take away misconduct from one half of the community and to add its amount to the remainder, it is probable that the moral character of our species would be soon benefited by the change. Now^ the ill dispo- sitions of the bad are powerfully encouraged by the want of upright examples in those who are better. A man may de- viate considerably from rectitude, and still be as good as his neighbours. From such a man, the motive to excellence which the constant presence of virtuous example supplies, is taken away. So that there is reason to believe, that if the bad were to become worse, and the reputable to become pro- portionably better, the average virtue of the world would speedily be increased. One of the modes by which the efficacy of example in re- putable persons is miserably diminished, is by what we have called Immoral Agency — ^by their being willing to encourage, at second hand, evils which they would not commit as princi- pals. Linked together as men are in society, it is frequently CHAP. IX.] IMMORAL AOKNCT. 2Q7 difficult to perform an unwarrantable action without some sort of co-operation from creditable men. This co-operation is not often, except in flagrant cases, refused ; and thus not only IS the commission of such actions facilitated, but a general relaxation is induced in the practical estimates which men form of the standard of rectitude. Since, then, so much evil attends this agency in unwarrant- able conduct, it manifestly becomes a good man to look around upon the nature of his intercourse with others, and to consider whether he is not virtually promoting evils which his judgment deprecates, or reducing the standard of moral judgment in the world. The reader would have no difficulty in perceiving that, if a strenuous opponent of the slave trade should establish a manufactor}'- of manacles, and thumbscrews, and iron collars for the slave merchants, he would be grossly inconsistent with himself. The reader would perceive too, that his labours in the cause of the abolition would be almost nullified by the viciousness of his example, and that he would generally discredit pretensions to philanthropy. Now, that which we desire the reader to do is, to apply the principles which this illustration exhibits to other and less flagrant cases. Other cases of co-operation with evil may be less flagrant than this ; but they are not, on that account, innocent. I have read, in the life of a man of great purity of character, that he refused to draw up a will or some such document because it contained a transfer of some slaves. He thought that slavery was absolutely wrong ; and therefore would not, even by the remotest implication, sanction the system by his example.* I think he exercised a sound Christian judgment; and if all who prepare such documents acted upon the same principles, I know not whether they would not so influence pubUc opinion as greatly to hasten the abolition of slavery itself. Yet where is the man who would refuse to do this, or to do things even less defensible than this 1 Publication and Circulation of Books. — It is a very common thing to hear of the evils of pernicious reading, of how it enervates the mind, or how it depraves the principles. The complaints are doubtless just. These books could not * One of the publications of this excellent man contains a paragraph much to our present purpose : " In all our concerns, it is necessary that nothing we do may carry the appearance of approbation of the works of wickedness, make the unrighteous more at ease in unrighteousness, or oc- casion the injuries committed against the oppressed to be more lightly looked over." — Considerations on the True Harmony of Mankind, c 3, by John Woolman. 208 IMMORAL AGENCY. [esSAY 11. be read, and these evils would be spared the woi'ld, if one did not write, and another did not print, and another did not sell, and another did not circulate them. Are those then, without whose agency the mischief could not ensue, to be held inno- cent in affording this agency ? Yet, loudly as we complain of the evil, and carefully as we warn our children to avoid it, how seldom do we hear public reprobation of the writers ! As to printers, and booksellers, and library keepers, we scarcely hear their offences mentioned at all. We speak not of those abandoned publications which all respectable men condemn, but of those which, pernicious as they are confessed to be, furnish reading-rooms and libraries, and are habitually sold in almost every bookseller's shop. Seneca says, " He that lends a man money to carry him to a bawdy-house, or a weapon for his revenge^ makes himself a partner of his crime." He, too, who writes or sells a book which will, in all probability, injure the reader, is accessory to the mischief which may be done ; with this aggravation, when compared with the examples of Seneca, that whilst the money would probably do mischief but to one or two persons, the book may injure a hundred or a thousand. Of the writers of injurious books, we need say no more. If the inferior agents are cen- surable, the primary agent must be more censurable. A prin- ter or a bookseller should, however, reflect, that to be not so bad as another, is a very different thing from being innocent. When we see that the owner of a press will print any work that is offered to him, with no other concern about its ten- dency than whether it will subject him to penalties from the law, we surely must perceive that he exercises but a very imperfect virtue. Is it obligatory upon us not to promote ii) principles in other men ? He does not fulfil the obligation. Is it obligatory upon us to promote rectitude by unimpeachable example ? He does not exhibit that example. If it were right for my neighbour to furnish me with the means of moral injury, it would not be wrong for me to accept and to employ them. I stand in a bookseller's shop, and observe his customers successively coming in. One orders a lexicon, and one a work of scurrilous infidelity; one Captain Cook's Voyages, and one a new licentious romance. If the bookseller takes and executes all these orders with the same willingness, I cannot but perceive that there is an inconsistency, an incom- pleteness, in his moral principles of action. Perhaps this person is so conscious of the mischievous effects of such books, that he would not allow them in the hands of his chil- CHAP. IX.] IMMORAL AGENCY. 209 dren, nor suffer them to be seen on his parlour table. But if he thus knows the evils which they inflict, can it be right for him to be the agent in diffusing them ? Such a person does not exhibit that consistency, that completeness of virtuous conduct, without which the Christian character cannot be fully exhibited. Step into the shop of this bookseller's neigh- bour, a druggist, and there, if a person asks for some arsenic, the tradesman begins to be anxious. He considers whether it is probable the buyer wants it for a proper puqiose. If he does sell it, he cautions the buyer to keep it where others cannot have acgess to it ; and, before he delivers the packet, legibly inscribes upon it Poison. One of these men sells poison to the body, and the other poison to the mind. If the anxiety and caution of the druggist is right, the indifference of the bookseller must be wrong. Add to which, that the druggist would not sell arsenic at all if it were not sometimes useful ; but to what readers can a vicious book be useful? Suppose for a moment that no printer would commit such a book to his press, and that no bookseller would sell it, the consequence would be, that nine-tenths of these manuscripts would be thrown into the fire, or rather, that they would never have been written. The inference is obvious^ and surely it is not needful again to enforce the consideration, that although your refusal might not prevent vicious books from being published, you are not therefore exempted from the obligation to refuse. A man must do his duty whether the effects of his fidelity be such as he would desire or not. Such purity of conduct might, no doubt, circumscribe a man's business, and so does purity of conduct in some other profesr sions ; but if this be a sufficient excuse for contributing to demoralize the world, if profit be a justification of a departure from rectitude, it will be easy to defend the business of a pickpocket. I know that the principles of conduct which these para- graphs recommend, lead to grave practical consequences : I know that they lead to the conclusion that the business of a printer or bookseller, as it is ordinarily conducted, is not coiir sistent with Christian uprightness. A man may carry on a business in select works ; and this, by some conscientious persons, is really done. In the present state of the press, the difficulty of obtaining a considerable business as a bookseller without circulating injurious works may frequently be great, and it is in consequence of this difficulty that we see so few booksellers amongst the Quakers. The few who do conduct the business generally reside in large towns, where the de- Itt* 210 IMMORAL AGENCY. [eSSAY 11. mand for all books is so great that a person can procure a competent income though he excludes the bad. He who is more studious to justify his conduct than to act aright may say, that if a person may sell no book that can in- jure another, he can scarcely sell any book. The answer is., that although there must be some difficulty in discrimination, though a bookseller cannot always inform himself what the precise tendency of a book is — yet there can be no difficulty in judging respecting numberless books, that their tendency is bad. If we cannot define the precise distinction between the good and the evil, we can, nevertheless, perceive the evil when it has attained to a certain extent. He who cannot distinguish day from evening can distinguish it from night. The case of the proprietors of common circulating libraries is yet more palpable ; because the majority of the books which they contain inflict injury upon their readers. How it hap- pens that persons of respectable character, and who join with others in lamenting the frivolity, and worse than frivolity, of the age, nevertheless daily and hourly contribute to the mis- chief, without any apparent consciousness of inconsistency, it is difficult to explain. A person establishes, perhaps, one of these libraries for the first time in a country town. He sup- plies the younger and less busy part of its inhabitants with a source of moral injury from which hitherto they had been exempt. The girl who, till now, possessed sober views of life, he teaches to dream of the extravagances of love ; he familiarizes her ideas with intrigue and licentiousness ; de- stroys her disposition for rational pursuits ; and prepares her, it may be, for a victim of debauchery. These evils, or such as these, he inflicts, not upon one or two, but iipon as many as he can ; and yet this person lays his head upon his pillow, as if, in all this, he was not ofi^ending against virtue or against man ! Inns, — When in passing the door of an inn I hear or see a company of intoxicated men in the " excess of riot," I cannot persuade myself that he who supplies the wine, and profits by the viciousness, is a moral man, In the private house of a person of respectability such a scene would be regarded as a scandal. It would lower his neighbour's estimate of the ex- cellence of his character. But does it then constitute a suf- ficient justification of allowing vice in our houses, that we get by it ? Does morality grant to a man an exemption from its obligations at the same time as he procures his license ? Drunkenness is immoral. If, therefore, when a person is on the eve of intoxication, the innkeeper supplies his demand for CHAP. IX.] IMMORAL AGENCV. 211 another bottle, he is accessory to the immorality. A man was lately found drowned in a stream. He had just left a public-house where he had been intoxicated during sixty hours ; and within this time the publican had supplied him (besides some spirits) with forty quarts of ale. Does any reader need to be convinced that this publican had acted crimi^ naliy ? His crime, however, was neither the greater nor the less because it had been the means of loss of life : no such accident might have happened ; but his guilt would have been the same. Probity is not the only virtue which it is good policy to practise. The innkeeper, of whom it was known that he would not supply the means of excess, would probably gain by the resort of those who approved his integrity more than he would lose by the absence of those whose excesses that integrity kept away. An inn has been conducted upon such maxims. He who is disposed to make proof of the result, might fix upon an established quantity of the different liquors, which he would not exceed. If that quantity were determi- nately fixed, the lover of excess would have no ground of complaint when he had been supplied to its amount. Such honourable and manly conduct might have an extensive effect, until it influenced the practice even of the lower resorts of intemperance. A sort of ill fame might attach to the house in which a man could become drunk ; and the maxim might be established by experience, that it was necessary to the re- spectability, and therefore generally to the success, of a pub- lic-house, that none should be seen to reel out of its doors. Prosecutions. — It is upon principles of conduct similar to those which are here recommended, that many persons are reluctant, and some refuse, to prosecute offenders when they think the penalty of the law is unwarrantably severe. This motive operates in our own country to a great extent : and it ought to operate. I should not think it right to give evidence against a man who had robbed my house, if I knew that my evidence would occasion him to be hanged. Whether the reader may think similarly, is of no consequence to the prin- ciple. The principle is, that if you think the end vicious and wrong, you are guilty of " Immoral Agency" in contributing to effect that end. Unhappily, we are much less willing to act upon this principle when our agency produces only moral evil, than when it produces physical suffering. He that would not give evidence which would "take a man's life, or even oc casion him loss or pain, would, with little hesitation, be an agent of injuring his moral principles ; and yet, perhaps the 212 IMMORAL AGENCr. [eSSAY II. evil of tlie latter case is incomparably greater than that of the former. Political Affairs. — The amount of Immoral Agency which is practised in these affairs, is very great. Look to any of the continental governments, or to any that have sub- sisted there, how few acts of misrule, of oppression, of injus- tice, and of crime, have been prevented by the want of agents of the iniquity ! I speak not of notoriously bad men : of these, bad governors can usually find enough : but I speak of men who pretend to respectability and virtue of character, and who are actually called respectable by the world. There is perhaps no class of affairs in which the agency of others is more indispensable to the accomplishment of a vicious act, than in the political. Very little — comparatively very little — of oppression and of the political vices of rulers should we see, if reputable men did not lend their agency. These evils could not be committed through the agency of merely bad men ; because the very fact that bad men only would abet them, would frequently preclude the possibility of their com- mission. It is not to be pretended that no public men possess or have possessed sufficient virtue to refuse to be the agents oi a vicious government — ^but they are few. If they were numer- ous, especially if they were as numerous as they ought to be, history, even very modern history, would have had a far other record to frame than that which now devolves to her. Can it be needful to argue upon such things ? Can it be needful to prove that, neither the commands of ministers, nor " systems of policy," nor any other circumstance, exempts a public man from the obligations of the Moral Law ? Public men often act as if they thought that to be a public man was to be brought under the jurisdiction of a new and a relaxed morality. They often act as if they thought that not to be the prime mover in political misdeeds, was to be exempt from all moral responsi- bility for those deeds. A dagger, if it could think, would think it v/as not responsible for the assassination of which it v/as the agent. A public man may be a political dagger, but he cannot, like the dagger, be irresponsible. These illustrations of Immoral Agency and of the obligation to avoid it might be multiplied, if enough had not been offered to make our sentiments, and the reasons upon which they are founded, obvious to the reader. Undoubtedly, in the present state of society, it is no easy task, upon these subjects, to wash our hands in innocency. But if we cannot avoid all agency, direct or indirect, in evil things, we can avoid much : CHAP. X.] THE INFLUENCE OF INDIVIDDALS, ETC. 213 and it will be sufficiently early to complain of the difficulty of complete purity, when we haA'e dismissed from our conduct as much impurity as we can. CHAPTER X. THE INFLUENCE OF INDIVIDUALS UPON PUBLIC NOTIONS OF MORALITY. Public notions of morality — Errors of public opinion: their efTects— Duelling' — Scottish Bench — Glory — Military virtues — Military talent- Bravery— Courage — Patriotism not the soldier's motive — Military fame — Public opinion of unchastity: In women: In men — Power of char- acter — Character in Legal men — Fame — -Faults of Great men — The Press^ — Newspapers— History : Its defects : Its power. That the influence of Public Opinion upon the practice of virtue is very great, needs no proof. Of this influence the reader has seen some remarkable illustrations in the discus- sion of the Efficacy of Oaths in binding to veracity.* There is, indeed, almost no action and no institution which Public Opinion does not affect. In moral affairs it makes men call one mode of human destruction murderous and one honour- able ; it makes the same action abominable in one individual and venial in another : in public institutions, from a village workhouse to the constitution of a state, it is powerful alike for evil or for good. If it be misdirected, it will strengthen and perpetuate corruption and abuse ; if it be directed aright, it will eventually remove corruptions and correct abuses with a power which no power can withstand. In proportion to the greatness of its power is the necessity of rectifying Public Opinion itself. To contribute to its rec- titude is to exercise exalted philanthropy — to contribute to its incorrectness is to spread wickedness and misery in the world. The purpose of the present chapter is to remark upon some of those subjects on which the Public Opinion appears to be inaccurate, and upon the consequent obligation upon individ- uals not to perpetuate that inaccuracy and its attendant evils by their conduct or their language. Of the positive part of the obligation— that which respects the active correction of common opinions little will be said. He who does not pro- • Essay 2, chap. 7. 214 INPLUENCS OF INDIVIDUALS UPON ESSAT II. mote the evil can scarcely fail of promoting the good. A man often must deliver his sentiments respecting the principles and actions of others, and if he delivers them, so as not to en- courage what is wrong, he will practically encourage what is right. It might have been presumed of a people who assent to the authority of the Moral Law, that their notions of the merit or turpitude of actions would have been conformable with the doctrines which that law delivers. Far other is the fact. The estimates of the Moral Law and of public opinion are discordant to excess. Men have practised a sort of transpo- sition with the moral precepts, and have assigned to them ar- bitrary and capricious, and therefore new and mischievous, stations on the moral scale. The order both of the vices and the virtues is greatly deranged. Suppose with respect to vices, the highest degree of repro- bation in the Moral Law to be indicated by 20, and to descend by units, as the reprobation became less severe, and suppose, in the same manner, we put 20 for the highest offence ac- cording to popular opinion, and diminish the number as it ac- counts less of the offence, we should probably be presented with some such graduation as this : Moral Public Law. Opinion. Murder 20 20 Human destruction under other \-ia n names \ Unchastity, if of Women 18 18 Unchastity, if of Men 18 2 Theft 17 17 Fraud and other modes of dis- } ,~ ^ . . honesty \^^ 6-4 or 1 Lying 17 17 Lying for particular purposes or K ~ « n to particular classes of persons \ ^ Resentment 16 6 and every inferior gradation. Profaneness 15 12 and every inferior gradation. We might make a similar statement of the virtues. This in- deed is inevitable in the case of those virtues which are the op- posites of some of these vices. Respecting others we may say • Moral Public Law. Opinion. Forbearance 16 3 and lapsing into a vice. Fortitude 16 10 Courage 14 14 Bravery 1 20 Patriotism 2 20 Placability 18 4 CHAP. X.] PUBLIC NOTIONS OP MORALITY. 215 How, it may reasonably be asked, do these strange incon- gruities arise 1 First, men practise a sort of voluntary decep- tion on themselves ; they persuade themselves to think that an offence which they desire to commit, is not so vicious as the Moral Law indicates, or as others to which they have little temptation. They persuade themselves again, that a virtue which is easily practised, is of great worth, because they thus flatter themselves with complacent notions of their excellences at a cheap rate. Virtues which are difficult they, for the same reason, depreciate. This is the dictate of interest. It is manifestly good policy to think lightly of the value of a quality which we do not choose to be at the cost of possess- ing ; and who would willingly think there was much evil in a vice which he practised every day ? — That which a man thus persuades himself to think a trivial vice or an unimpor- tant virtue, he of course speaks of as such amongst his neigh- bours. They perhaps are as much interested in propagating the delusion as he : they listen with willing ears, and cherish and proclaim the grateful falsehood. By these and by other means the public notions become influenced ; a long contin- uance of the general chicanery at length actually confounds the Public Opinion ; and when once an opinion has become a public opinion, there is no difficulty in accounting for the perpetuation of the fallacy. If sometimes the mind of an individual recurs to the purer standard, a multitude of obstacles present themselves to its practical adoption. He hopes that under the present circum- stances of society an exact obedience to the Moral Law is not required ; he tries to think that the notions of a kingdom or a continent cannot be so erroneous ; and at any rate trusts that as he deviates with millions, millions will hardly be held guilty at the bar of God. The misdirection of Public Opinion is an obstacle to the virtue even of good men. He who looks be- yond the notions of others, and founds his moral principles upon the Moral Law, yet feels that it is more difficult to con- form to that law when he is discountenanced by the general notions than if those notions supported and encouraged him. What then must the effect of such misdirection be upon those to whom acceptance in the world is the principal concern, and who, if others applaud or smile, seem to be indifferent whether their own hearts condemn them ? Now, with a participation in the evils which the misdirec- tion of public opinion occasions, every one is chargeable who speaks of moral actions according to a standard that varies from that which Christianity has exhibited. Here is th« .21ot in order to benefit his fellow citizens. The private en- ters it because he prefers a soldier's life to another, or because he has no wish but the wish for change. And having entered the army, what is the motive that induces the private or his superiors to fight ? It is that fighting is part of their business ; that is one of the conditions upon which they were hired. Patriotism is not the motive. Of those who fall in battle, is there one in a hundred who even thinks of his country's good ? He thinks perhaps of glory and of the fame of his regiment — he hopes perhaps that " Salamanca" or " Austerlitz" will henceforth be inscribed on its colours ; but rational views of his country's welfare are foreign to his mind. He has scarcely a thought about the matter. He fights in battle as a horse draws in a carriage, because he is compelled to do it, or because he has done it before ; but he probably thinks no more of his country's good than the same horse, if he were carrying corn to a granary, would think he was providing for the comforts of his master. The truth therefore is, that we give to the soldier that of which we are wont to be sufficiently sparing — a gratuitous concession of merit. If he but " fights bravely," he is a patriot and secure of his praise. To sacrifice our lives for the liberties and laws and religion of our native land, are undoubtedly high-sounding words ; but who are they that will do it ? Who is it that will sacrifice his life for his country ? Will the senator who supports a war ? Will the writer who declaims upon patriotism ? Will ^'{RW INFLXTENCe OF INDlVIDtJALS VFON [eSiSAV ft. the minister of religion who recommends the sacrifice ? Take away war and its fictions, and there is not a man of them who will do it. Will he sacrifice his life at home ? If the loss of his life in London or at York would procure just so much benefit to his country as the loss of one soldier's in the field, would he be willing to lay his head upon the block ? Is he willing, for such a contribution to his country's good, to resign himself without notice and without remembrance to the executioner 1 Alas for the fictions of war ! where is such a man ? Men will not sacrifice their lives at all unless it be in war ; and they do not sacrifice them in war from motives of patriotism. In no rational use of language, therefore, can it be said that the soldier " dies for his country." Not that there may not be or that there have not been per- sons who fight from motives of patriotism. But the occur- rence is comparatively rare. There may be physicians who qualify themselves for practice from motives of benevolence to the sick ; or lawyers who assume the gown in order to plead for the injured and oppressed ; but it is an unusual mo- tive, and so is patriotism to the soldier. And after all, even if all soldiers fought out of zeal for their country, what is the merit of Patriotism itself? I do not say that it possesses no virtue, but I affirm andliope hereafter to show, that its virtue is extravagantly overrated,* and that if every one who fought did fight for his country, he would often be actuated only by a mode of selfishness — of selfishness which sacrifices the general interests of the species to the interests of a part. Such and so low are the qualities which have obtained from deluded and deluding millions, fame, honours, glories. A prodigious structure, and almost without a base : — a struc- ture so vast, so brilliant, so attractive, that the greater portion of mankind are content to gaze in admiration, without any enquiry into its basis or any solicitude for its durability. If, however, it should be that the gorgeous temple will be able to stand only till Christian truth and light become predominant, it ^urely will be wise of those who seek a niche in its apart- ments as their paramount and final good, to pause ere they pro-.eed. If they desire a reputation that shall outlive guilt ana fiction, let them look to the basis of military fame. If this fame should one day sink into oblivion and contempt, it wiii aot be the first instance in which wide-spread glory has becik found to be a glittering bubble that has burst and been forgotten , Look at the days of chivalry. Of the ten thou- » EKsay III, c. 17. 0HAP. X.] PUBLIC NOTIONS OF MORALITY. !R2l' sand Quixotes of the middle ages, where is now the honour or the name ? Yet poets once sang their praises, and the chronicler of their achiei'ements beUeved he was recording an everlasting fame. Where are now the glories of the tour- nament ? Glories " Of which all Europe rang from side to side." Where is the champion whom princesses caressed and nobles envied ? Where are the triumphs of Scotus and Aquinas, and where are the folios that perpetuated their fame ? The glories of war have indeed outlived these ; human passions are less mutable than human follies ; but I am willing to avow the conviction, that these glories are alike destined to sink into forgetful ness, and that the time is approaching when the ap- plauses of heroism and the splendours of conquest will be remembered only as follies and iniquities that are past. Let him who seeks for fame other than that which an era of Christian purity will allow, make haste ; for every hour that he delays its acquisition will shorten its duration. This is certain if there be certainty in the promises of Heaven. But we must not forget the purpose for which these illus- trations of the Military Virtues are offered to the reader ; — to remind him not merely that they are fictions, but fictions which are the occasion of excess of misery to mankind — to remind him that it is his business, from considerations of hu^ manity and of religion, to refuse to give currency to the po- pular delusions — and to remind him that, if he does promote them, he promotes, by the act, misery in all its forms and guilt in all its excesses. Upon such subjects, men are not left to exercise their own inclinations. MoraUty interposes its commands ; and they are commands which, if we would be moral, we must obey. Unchastity. — No portion of these pages is devoted to the enforcement of moral obligations upon this subject, partly because these obligations are commonly acknowledged how little soever they may be regarded, and partly because, as the reader will have seen, the object of these Essays is to recom- mend those applications of the Moral Law which are fre- quently neglected in the practice even of respectable men. — • But in reference to the influence of public opinion on offences connected with the sexual constitution, it will readily be per- ceived that something should be said, when it is considered that some of the popular notions respecting them are extra- vagantly inconi^istent with the Moral Law. The want of chastity in a woman is visited by public opinion with tli© 228 IXFLUEXCE OF INDIVIDUALS tJPOX [eSSAY II. spverest reprobation — in men, with very little or with none. Now, inorality maives no such distinction. The offence is fre- quently adverted to in the Christian Scriptures; but I believe there is no one precept which intimates that, in the estimation of its writer, there was any diff'erence in the turpitude of the ofl'ence respectively in men and women. If it be in this volume that we are to seek for the principles of the Moral ] .aw, how shall we defend the state of popular opinion ? " If unchastity in a woman, whom St. Paul terms the glory of man, be such a ;scandal and dishonour, then certainly in a man, who is both the image and glory of God, it must, though commonly not so thought, be much more deflowering and dishonourable."* But this departure from the Moral Law, like all other departures, produces its legitimate, that is, per- nicious eflfects. The sex in whom popular opinion reprobates the olfences, comparatively seldom commits them : the sex in whom it tolerates the offences, commits them to an enor- mous extent. It is obvious, therefore, that to promote the present state of popular opinion, is to promote and to encou- rage the want of chastity in men. That some very beneficial consequences result from the strong direction of its current against the offence in a woman, is certain. The consciousness that upon the retention of her reputatiorl (^opends so tremendous a stake, is probably a more efficacious motive to its preservation than any other. The abandonment to which the loss of personal integrity generally consigns a woman, is a perpetual and fearful warning to the sex. Almost every human being deprecates and dreads the general disfavour of mankind ; and thus, notwithstanding temptations of all kinds, the number of women who do incur it is comparatively small. But the fact that public opinion is thus powerful in re- straining one sex, is a sufficient evidence that it would also be powerful in restraining the other. Waiving for the pres- ent the question whether the popular disapprobation of the crime in a woman is not too severe — if the man who was guilty was forthwith and immediately consigned to infamy; if he was expell id from virtuous society, and condemned for the remainder of life to the lowest degradation, how quickly would the frequency of the crime be diminished ! The re- formation amongst men would effect a reformation amongst women too ; and the reciprocal temptations which each ad- dresses to the other, woidd in a great degree be withdrawn. * Milton : Christian Doctrine, p. 624 CHAP. X.] PUBLIC NOtlOXS OF MORALTTIT. 229 If there were few seducers few would be seduced ; and few therefore would in turn become the seducers of men. But instead of this direction of public opinion, what is the ordinary language respecting the man who thus violates the Moral Law ? We are told that " he is rather unsteady ;" that " there is a little of the young man about him ;" that " he is not free from indiscretions." And what is he likely to think of all this ? Why, that for a young man to have a little of the young man about him is perfectly natural ; that to be rather unsteady and a little indiscreet is not, to be sure, what one would wish, but that it is no great harm and will soon wear, off. To employ such language is, we say, to encourage and promote the crime — a crime which brings more wretchedness and vice into the world than almost any other ; and for which, if Christianity is to be believed, the Universal Judge will call to a severe account. If the immediate agent be obnoxious to punishment, can he who encouraged him expect to escape ? I am persuaded that the frequency of this gross offence is attributable much more to the levity of public notions as founded upon levity of language, than to passion ; and per- haps, therefore, some of those who promote this levity may be in every respect as criminal as if they committed the crime itself. Women themselves contribute greatly to the common levity and to its attendant mischiefs. Many a female who talks in the language of abhorrence of an offending sister, and averts her eye in contumely if she meets her in the street, is per- fectly willing to be the friend and intimate of the equally offending man. That such women are themselves duped by the vulgar distinction is not to be doubted — but then we are not to imagine that she who practises this inconsistency abhors the crime so much as the criminal. Her abhorrence is directed, not so much to the violation of the Moral Law as to the party by whom it is violated. " To little respect has that woman a claim on the score of modesty, though her re- putation may be white as the driven snow, who smiles on the libertine whilst she spurns the victims of his lawless appetites." No No. — If such women would convince us that it is the impurity which they reprobate, let them repro- bate it wherever it is found : if they would convince us that morals or philanthropy is their motive when they spurn the sinning sister, let them give proof by spurning him who has occasioned her to sin. The common style of narrating occurrences and trials of seduction this to make him acquainted with the internal community .• and habit, if nothing else, calls his reflections away. From school or from college the business of life is begun It can require no argument to show, that the ordinary pursuit* of life have little tendency to direct a man's meditations t? the moral condition of his own mind, or that they have mucV tendency to employ them upon other and very different things Nay, even the offices of public devotion have almost a ten- dency to keep the mind without itself. What if we say thaf the self-contemplation which even natural religion is likely to produce, is obstructed by the forms of Christian worship^ " The transitions from one office of devotion to another, are contrived, like scenes in the drama, to supply the mind with a succession of diversified engagements."* This supply of diversified engagements, whatever may be its value in other respects, has evidently the tendency of which we speak. It is not designed to supply, and it does not supply, the opportu- nity for calmness of recollection. A man must abstract him- self from the external service if he would investigate the character and dispositions of the inmates of his own breast. Even the architecture and decorations of churches come in aid of the general tendency. They make the eye an auxiliary of the ear, and both keep the mind at a distance from those concerns which, are peculiarly its own ; from contemplating its own weaknesses and wants ; and from applying to God for that peculiar help, which perhaps itself only needs, and which God only can impart. So little are the course of education and the subsequent engagements of life calculated to foster this great auxiliary of moral character. It is difficult, in the wide world, to foster it as much as is needful. Nothing but wakeful solicitude on the part of the parent can be expected sufficiently to direct the mind within ; whilst the general ten- dency of our associations and habits is to keep it without. Let him, however, do what he can. The habitual reference to the dictates of conscience may be promoted in the very young mind. This habit, like others, becomes strong by ex- ercise He that is faithful in little things is intrusted with * Paley, p. 3, b. 5, c. 5. 264 MORAL KnucATTfiry. [essay tt. more ; and this is true in respect of knowledsre as in respect of other departments of the Christian life. Fidelity of obe- dience is commonly succeeded by increase of li^ht; and every act of obedience and every addition to knowledge fur- nishes new and still stronger inducements to persevere in the same course. Acquaintance with ourselves is the inseparable attendant of this course. We know the character and dispo- sitions of our own inmates by frequent association with them : and if this fidelity to the internal law, and consequent know ' ledge of the internal world, be acquired in early life, the pa- rent may reasonably hope that it will never wholly lose its efficiency amidst the bustle and anxieties of the world. Undoulnedly, this most efficient security of moral character is not likely fully to operate during the continuance of the present state of society and of its institutions. It is I believe tnie, that the practice of morality is most complete amongst those persons who peculiarly recommend a reference to the internal law, and whose institutions, religious and social, are congruous with the habit of this reference. Their history exhibits a more unshaken adherence to that which they con- ceived to be right — fewer sacrifices of conscience to interest or the dread of suffering — less of trimming between conflicting motives — more, in a word, of adherence to rectitude without regard to consequences. We have seen that such persons are likely to form accurate views of rectitude ; but whether they be accurate or not, does not affect the value of their moral education as securing fidelity to the degree of knowledge which they possess. It is of more consequence to adhere steadily to conscience though it may not be perfectly en- rightened, than to possess perfect knowledge without consis- tency of obedience. But in reality they who obey most, know most ; and we say that the general testimony of experience is, that those persons exhibit the most unyielding fidelity to the Moral Law whose Moral Education has peculiarly directed taem to the law written in the heart. CHAP. XIII.] EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE. ^9 CHAPTER XIII. EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE. Advanta^s of extended Education — Infant Schools — Habits of enquiry. Whether the Education of those who are not able to pay for educating themselves ought to be a private or a national charge, it is not our present business to discuss. It is in this country, at least, left to the voluntary benevolence of individ- uals, and thi§ consideration may apologize for a brief reference to it here. It is not long since it was a question whether the poor should be educated or not. That time is past, and it may be hoped the time will soon be passed when it shall be a ques- tion. To what extent ? — that the time will soon arrive when it will be agreed that no limit needs to be assigned to the edu- cation of the poor, but that which is assigned by their own necessities, or which ought to be assigned to the education of all men. There appears no more reason for excluding a poor man from the fields of knowledge, than for preventing him from using his eyes. The mental and the visual powers were alike given to be employed. A man should, indeed, " shut his eyes from seeing evz7," but whatever reason there is for letting him see all that is beautiful, and excellent, and innocent in nature and in art, there is the same for enabling his mi;id to expatiate in the fields of knowledge. The objections which are urged against this extended edu- cation, are of the same kind as those which were urged against any education. They insist upon the probability of abuse. It was said, They who can write may forge ; they who can read may read what is pernicious. The answer was, or it might have been — They who can hear, may hear profaneness and learn it ; they who can see, may see bad examples and follow them : — but are we therefore to stop our ears and put out our eyes ? — It is now said, that if you give extended edu- cation to the poor, you will elevate them above their stations ; that a critic would not drive a wheelbarrow, and that a philos- opher would not shoe horses, or weave cloth. But these con- sequences are without the limits of possibility ; because the question for a poor man is, whether he shall perform such offices or starve : and surely it will not be pretended that hungry men would rather criticise than eat. Science and literature would not solicit a poor man from his labour more 23. 9S$ EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE- [eSSAT «- irresistibly than ease and pleasure do now ; yet in spite of these solicitations what is the fact ? That the poor man works for his bread. This is the inevitable result. It is not the positire but the relative amount of knowledge that elevates a man abore his station in society. It is not because he knows much, but because he knows more than his fellows. Educate all, and none will fancy that he is superior to his neighbours. Besides, we assign to the possession of knowledge, effects which are produced rather by habits of life. Ease and comparative leisure are commonly attendant upon extensive knowledge, and leisure and ease disqualify men for the laborious occupations much more than the know- ledge itself. There are some collateral advantages of an extended edu- cation of the people, which are of much importance. It has been observed that if the French had been an educated people, many of the atrocities of their Revolution would never have happened, and I believe it. Furious mobs are composed, not of enlightened but of unenlightened men— of men in whom the passions are dominant over the judgment, because the judgment has not been exercised, and informed, and habitu- ated to direct the conduct. A factious declaimer can much less easily influence a number of men who acquired at school the rudiments of knowledge, and who have subsequently devoted their leisure to a Mechanics' Institute, than a multitude who cannot write or read, and who have never practised reasoning and considerate thought. And as the Education of a People prevents political evil, it effects political good. Despotic rulers well know that knowledge is inimical to their *power. This simple fact is a sufficient reason, to a good and wise man, to approve knowledge and extend it. The attention to public institutions and public measures which is inseparable irom an educated population, is a great good. We all know that the human heart is such, that the possession of power is commonly attended with a desire to increase it, even in oppo- sition to the general weal. It is acknowledged that a check is needed, and no check is either so efficient or so safe as that of a watchful and intelligent public mind : so watchful, that it is prompt to discover and to expose what is amiss ; so intelligent, that it is able to form rational judgments respecting the nature and the means of amendment, In all public insti- tutions there exists, and it is happy that there does exist, a port of vis inerticB which habitually resists change. This, which is beneficial as a general tendency, is often injurious •from its excess : the state of public institutions almost through^ CHAP. XIII.] EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE. 267 out the world, bears sufRcient testimony to the truth, that they need alteration and amendment faster than they receive it — • that the internal resistance of change is greater than is good for man. Unhappily, the ordinary way in which a people have endeavoured to amend their institutions, has been by some mode of violence. If you ask when a nation acquired a greater degree of freedom, you are referred to some era of revolution and probably of blood. These are not proper, cer- tainly they are not Christian, remedies for the disease. It is becoming an undisputed proposition, that no bad institution can permanently stand against the distinct Opinion of a People. This opinion is likely to be universal, and to be intelligent only amongst an enlightened community. Now that reforma- tion of public institutions which results from public opinion, is the very best in kind, and is likely to be the best in its mode : — in its kind, because public opinion is the proper measure of the needed alteration ; and in its mode, because alterations which result from such a cause, are likely to be temperately made. It may be feared that some persons object to an extended education of the people on these very grounds which we pro- pose as recommendations ; that they regard the tendency of education to produce examination, and, if need be, alteration of established institutions, as a reason for withholding it from the poor. To these, it is a sufficient answer, that if increase of knowledge and habits of investigation tend to alter any es- tablished institution, it is fit that it should be altered. There appears no means of avoiding this conclusion, unless it can be shown that increase of knowledge is usually attended with depravation of principle, and that in proportion as the judg- ment is exercised it decides amiss. Generally, that intellectual education is good for a poor man which is good for his richer neighbours : in other words, that is good for the poor which is good for man. There may be exceptions to the general rule ; but he who is disposed to doubt the fitness of a rich man's education for the poor, will do well to consider first whether the rich man's education is fit for himself. The children of persons of property can un- doubtedly learn much more than those of a labourer, and the labourer must select from the rich man's system a part only for his own child. But this does not affect the general con elusion. The parts which he ought to select are precisely those parts which are most necessary and beneficial to the rich. Great as have been the improvements in the methods of conveying knowledge to the poor, there is reason to think that they will be yet greater. Some useful suggestions for S^68, EDUCATION* OF THE PEOPLE. [eSSAY II. the instruction of older children may I think be obtained from the systems in Infant Schools. In a well conducted infant school, children acquire much knowledge, and they acquire it with delight. This delight is of extreme importance : perhaps it may safely be concluded, respecting all innocent knowledge, that if a child acquired it with pleasure he is loell taught. It is worthy observation, that in the infant system, lesson-learn- ing is nearly or wholly excluded. It is not to be expected that in the time which is devoted professedly to education by the children of the poor, much ex;tent of knowledge can be acquired ; but something may be acquired which is of much more consequence than mere school-learning — the love and the habits of enquiry. If education be so conducted that it is a positive pleasure to a boy to learn, there is little doubt that this love and habit will be induced. Here is the great advantage of early intellectual culture. The busiest have some leisure, leisure which they may employ ill or well ; and that they will employ it well may reasonably be expected when knowledge is thus attractive for its own sake. That this effect is in a considerable degree actually produced, is indicated by the improved character of the books which poor men read, and in the prodigious increase in the number of those books. The supply and demand are correspondent. Almost every year produces books for the labouring classes of a higher intellectual order than the last. A journeyman in our days can understand and relish a work which would have been like Arabic to his grandfather. Of moral education we say nothing here, except that the principles which are applicable to other classes of mankind are obviously applicable to the poor. With respect to the in- culcation of peculiar religious opinions on the children who attend schools voluntarily supported, there is manifestly the same reason for inculcating them in this case as for teaching them at all. This supposes that the supporters of the school are not themselves divided in their religious opinions. If they are, and if the adherents to no one creed are able to support a school of their own, there appears no ground upon which they can rightly refuse to support a school in which no reli- gious peculiarities are taught. It is better that intellectual knowledge, together with imperfect religious principles should be communicated, than that children should remain in dark- ness. There is indeed some reason to suspect the genuine- ness of that man's philanthropy, who refuses to impart any knowledge to his neighbours because he cannot, at the same time, teach them his own creed. CHJ^P. XIV.] AMCJSEMENTS. 269 CHAPTER XIV. AMUSEMENTS. The Stage — Religions Amusements — Masquerades — Field Sports — The Turf — Boxing — Wrestling — Opinions of Posterity — Popular Amuse- ments needless. It is a remarkable circumstance, that in almost all Chris- tian countries many of the public and popular amusements have been regarded as objectionable by the more sober and conscientious part of the community. This opinion could scarcely have been general unless it had been just: yet why should a people prefer amusements of which good men feel themselves compelled to disapprove ? Is it because no pub- lic recreation can be devised of which the evil is not greater than the good ? or because the inclinations of most men are such, that if it were devised, they would not enjoy it ? It may be feared that the desires which are seeking for gratifi- cation are not themselves pure ; and pure pleasures are not congenial to impure minds. The real cause of the objection- able nature of many popular diversions is to be sought in the want of virtue in the people. Amusement is confessedly a subordinate concern in life. It is neither the principal nor amongst the principal objects of proper solicitude. No reasonable man sacrifices the more important thing to the less, and that a man's religious and moral condition is of incomparably greater importance than his diversion, is sufficiently plain. In estimating the propri- ety or rather the lawfulness of a given amusement, it may safely be laid down, That none is lawful of which the aggre- gate consequences are injurious to morals : — nor, if its effects upon the immediate agents are, in general, morally bad : — nor if it occasions needless pain and misery to men or to ani- mals : — nor, lastly, if it occupies much time or is attended with much expense. — Respecting all amusements, the ques- tion is not whether in their simple or theoretical character; they are defensible, but whether they are defensible in their actually existing state. The Drama. — So that if a person, by way of showing the propriety of theatrical exhibitions, should ask whether there was any harm in a man's repeating a composition before others and accompanying it with appropriate gestures— ho would ask a verv foolish question : because he would ask a 23* 2T0 AMUSEMENTS. [essAY II question that possesses little or no relevancy to the subject.— What are the ordinary effects of the stage upon those who act on it ? One and one only answer can be given — that whatever happy exceptions there may be, the effect is bad ; — ^that the moral and religious character of actors is lower than that of persons in other professions. " It is an undeni- able fact, for the truth of which we may safely appeal to every age and nation, that the situation of the performers, particu- larly of those of the female sex, is remarkably unfavourable to the maintenance and growth of the religious and moral principle, and of course highly dangerous to their eternal in- terests."* Therefore, if I take my seat in the theatre, I have paid three or five shillings as an inducement to a number of per- sons to subject their principles to extreme danger ; — and the defence which I make is, that I am amused by it. Now, we affirm that this defence is invalid ; that it is a defence which reason pronounces to be absurd, and morality to be vicious. Yet I have no other to make ; it is the sum total of my justi- fication. But this, which is sufficient to decide the morality of the question, is not the only nor the chief part of the evil. The evil which is suffered by performers may be more intense, but upon spectators and others it is more extended. The night of a play is the harvest time of iniquity, where the profligate and the sensual put in their sickles and reap. It is to no purpose to say that a man may go to a theatre or parade a sa- loon without taking part in the surrounding licentiousness. All who are there promote the licentiousness, for if none were there, there would be no licentiousness ; that is to say, if none purchased tickets there would be neither actors to be depraved nor dramas to vitiate, nor saloons to degrade and corrupt, and shock us. — The whole question of the lawfulness of the dra- matic amusements, as they are ordinarily conducted, is resolv- ed into a very simple thing :-^After the doors on any given night are closed, have the virtuous or the vicious dispositions of the Extenders been in the greater degree promoted 1 Every one knows that the balance is on the side of vice, and this conclusively decides the question — " Is it lawful to attend ?" The same question is to be asked, and the same answer I believe will be returned, respecting various other assemblies for purposes of amusement. They do more harm than good. They please but they injure us ; and what makes the case etill stronger is, that the pleasure is frequently such as ought * Wilberforce : Practical View, c. 4, s. 5. CHAP. XIV> AMUSEMENTS, ^^71 not to be enjoyed, A tippler enjoys pleasure in becoming drunk, but he is not to allege the gratification as a set-off against the immorality. And so it is with no small portion of the pleasures of an assembly. Dispositions are gratified which it were wiser to thwart ; and, to speak the truth, if the dispositions of the mind were such as they ought to be, many of these modes of diversion would be neither relished nor resorted to. Some persons try to persuade themselves that charity forms a part of their motive in attending such places ; as when the profits of the night are given to a benevolent in- stitution. They hope, I suppose, that though it would not be ^uite right to go if benevolence were not a gainer, yet that the end warrants the means. But if these persons are charitable, let them give their guinea without deducting half for purpo- ses of questionabl« propriety. Religious amusements, such as Oratorios and the Uke, form one of those artifices of chi- canery by which people cheat, or try to cheat, themselves. The music, say they, is sacred, is devotional ; and we go to hear it as we go to church : it excites and animates our reli- gious sensibilities- This, in spite of the solemnity of the association, is really ludicrous. These scenes subserve reli- gion no more than they subserve chemistry. They do not increase its power any more than the power of the steara-en* gine. As it respects Christianity, it is all imposition and fic- tion ; and it is unfortunate that some of the most solemn topics of our religion are brought into such unworthy and debasing alliance,* Masquerades su-e of a more decided character. If the pleasure which people derive from meeting in disguises con- sisted merely in the " fun and drollery" of the thing, we might wonder to see so many children of five and six feet high, and leave them perhaps to their childishness : — but the truth is, that to many the zest of the concealment consists in the op- portunity which it gives of covert licentiousness ; of doing that in secret, of which, openly, they would profess to be ashamed. Some men and some women who affect propriety when the face is shown, are glad of a ievir hours of concealed libertinism. It is a time in which principles are left to guard the citadel of virtue without the auxiliary of public opinion. And ill do they guard it ! It is no equivocal indication of the slender power of a person's principles, when they do not re- strain him any longer than lus misdeeds will produce expo- Sure. She who is immodest at a masquerade, is modest no- * See also Essay II. c. 1. 2758 AMUSEMENTS. [eSSAY II. where. She may affect the language of delicacy and maii> tain external decorum, but she has no purity of mind. The Field. — If we proceed with the calculation of the benefits and mischiefs of Field Sports, in the merchant-liko manner of debtor and creditor, the balance is presently foi'ml to be greatly against them. The advantages to him who rides after hounds and shoots pheasants, are — ^that he is amu- sed, and possibly that his health is improved ; some of the disadvantages are — that it is unpropitious to the influence of religion and the dispositions which religion induces ; that it expends money and time which a man ought to be able to employ better ; and that it inflicts gratuitous misery upon the inferior animals. The value of the pleasure cannot easily be computed, and as to health it may pass for nothing ; for if a man is so little concerned for his health that he will not take exercise without dogs and guns, he has no reason to expect other men to concern themselves for it in remarking upon his actions. And then for the other side of the calculation. That field sports have any tendency to make a man better, no one will pretend ; and no one who looks around him will doubt that their tendency is in the opposite direction. It is not ne- cessary to show that every one who rides after the dogs is a worse man in the evening than he was in the morning : the influence of such things is to be sought in those with whom they are hai>ilaal. Is the character of the sportsman, then, distinguished by religious sensibility ? No. By activity of Benevolence ? No. By intellectual exertion ? No. By purity of manners ? No. Sportsmen are not the persons who diffuse the light of Christianity, or endeavour to rectify the public morals, or to extend the empire of knowledge. Look igain at the clerical sportsman. Is he usually as exemplary in the discharge of his functions as those who decline such diversions 1 His parishioners know that he is not. So, then, the religious and moral tendency of Field Sports is bad. It is not necessary to show how the ill effect is produced. It is sufficient that it actually is produced. As to the expenditure of time and money, I dare say we shall be told that a man has a right to employ both as he chooses. We have heretofore seen that he has no such right. Obligations apply just as truly to the mode of employing lei- sure and property, as to the use which a man may make of u pound of arsenic. The obligations are not indeed alike en forced in a court of justice : the misuser of arsenic is carried to prison, the misuser of time and money av/aits as sure an enquiry at another tribunal. But no folly is more absurd thaa CHAP. XIV.] AMUSEMENTS. 27$ that of supposing we have a right to do whatever the law does not punish. Such is the state of mankind, so great is the amount of misery and degradation, and so great are the effects of money and active philanthropy in meliorating this condition of our species, that it is no light thing for a man to employ his time and property upon vain and needless gratifications. It is no light thing to keep a pack of hounds, and to spend days and weeks in riding after them. As to the torture which field sports inflict upon animals, it is wonderful to observe our inconsistencies. He who has, in the day, inflicted upon half a dozen animals almost as much torture as they are capable of sustaining, and who has wounded perhaps half a dozen more, and left them to die of pain or starvation, gives in the evening a grave reproof to his child, whom he sees amusing himself with picking off the wings of flies ! The infliction of pain is not that which gives pleasure to the sportsman, (this were ferocious depravity,) but he voluntarily inflicts the pain in order to please himself. Yet this man sighs and moralizes over the cruelty of children ! An appropriate device for a sportsman's dress would be a pair of balances, of which one scale Avas laden with " Virtue and humanity," and the other with " Sport ;" the latter should be preponderating and lifting the other into the air. The Turf is still worse, partly because it is a stronghold of gambhng, and therefore an efficient cause of misery and wickedness. It is an amusement of almost unmingled evil But upon whom is the evil chargeable ? Upon the fifty or one hundred persons only who bring hordes and make bets ? No ; every man participates who attends the course. The great attraction of many public spectacles, and of this amongst others, consists more in the company than in the ostensible object of amusement. Many go to a race-ground who cannot tell when they return what horse has been the victor. Every one therefore who is present must take his share of the mis- chief and the responsibility. It is the same with respect to the gross and vulgar diver- sions of boxing, wrestling, and feats of running and riding. There is the same almost pure and unmingled evil — the same popularity resulting from the concourses who attend, and, by consequence, the participation and responsibility in those who do attend. The drunkenness, and the profaneness, and the debauchery, lie in part at the doors of those who are merely lookers-on ; and if these lookers-on make pretensions to purity of character, their example is so much the more in- fluential and their responsibility tenfold increased. Defencea 874 AMUSEMENTS. [eSSAY 11. of these gross amusements are ridiculous. One tells us of keeping up the national spirit, which is the same thing as to say, that a human community is benefited by inducing into it the qualities of the bull-dog. Another expatiates upon invig- orating the muscular strength of the poor, as if the English poor were under so little necessity to labour, and to strengthen themselves by labour, that artificial means must be devised to increase their toil. The vicissitudes of folly are endless ; the vulgar games of. the present day may soon be displaced by others, the same in genus, but differing in species. At the present moment, Wrestling has become the point of interest. A man is con- veyed across the kingdom to try whether he can throw down another ; and when he has done it, grave narratives of the feat are detailed in half the newspapers of the country! There is a grossness, a vulgarity, a want of mental elevation in these things, which might induce the man of intelligence to reprobate them even if the voice of morality were silent. They are remains of barbarism — evidences that barbarism still maintains itself amongst us — proofs that the higher qual- ities of our nature are not sufficiently dominant over the lower. These grossnesses will pass away, as the deadly conflicts of men with beasts are passed already. Our posterity will wonder at the barbarism of us, their fathers, as we wonder at the barbarism of Rome. Let him, then, who loves intellect- ual elevation advance beyond the present times, and anticipate, in the recreations which he encourages, that period when these diversions shall be regarded as indicating one of the in- termediate stages between the ferociousness of mental dark- ness and the purity of mental light. These criticisms might be extended to many other species of amusement ; and it is humiliating to discover that the con- clusion will very frequently be the same — that the evil out- balances the good, and that there are no grounds upon which a good man can justify a participation in them. In thus conclu- ding, it is possible that the reader may imagine that we would exclude enjoyment from the world, and substitute a system of irreproachable austerity. He who thinks this is unacquainted with the nature and sources of our better enjoyments. It is an ordinary mistake to imagine that pleasure is great only when it is vivid or intemperate, as a child fancies it were more delightful to devour a pound of sugar at once, than to eat an ounce daily in his food. It is happily and kindly provided that the greatest sum of enjoyment is that which is quietly and CHAP. XV.] DUELLING. ^t9 constantly "induced. No men understand the nature of pleas- ure so well, or possess it so much, as those who find it with- in their own doors. If it were not that Moral Education is so bad, multitudes would seek enjoyment and find it here, who now fancy that they never partake of pleasure except in scenes of diversion. It is unquestionably true that no com- munity enjoys life more than that which excludes all these anmsements from its sources of enjoyment. We use there- fore the language, not of speculation, but of experience, when we say, that none of them is, in any degree, necessary to the happiness of life. CHAPTER XV. DUELLING. Pitt and Tierney — Duelling tlie offsprin;? of intellectual meanness, fear, end servilily — " A fighting man" — Hindoo immolations — ^Wilberforce — Seneca. It is not to much purpose to show that this strange practice is in itself wrong, because no one denies it. Other grounds of defence are taken, although, to be sure, there is a plain ab- surdity in conceding that a thing is wrong in morals, and then trying to show that it is proper to practise it. Public notions exempt a clergyman from the " necessity" of fighting duels, and they exempt other men from the " neces* sity" of demanding satisfaction for a clergyman's insult. Now, we ask the man of honour whether he would rather receive an insult from a military officer or from a clergyman ? Which would give him the greater pain, and cause him the more concern and uneasiness ? That from the military officer, certainly. But why ? Because the officer's aflfront leads to a duel, and the clergyman's does not. So, then, it is prefer- able to receive an insult to which the " necessity" of fighting is not attached than one to which it is attached. Why then attach the necessity to any man's affront ? You say, that demanding satisfaction is a remedy for the evil of an insult. But we see that the evil, together with the remedy, is worse than the evil alone. Why then institute the remedy at all ? It is not indeed to be questioned that some insults may be for* 270 DUELLING. [essay II bome, because it is known to what consequences 'they lead. But, on the other hand, for what purpose does one man insult another ? To give him pain ; now, we have just seen that the pain is so much the greater in consequence of the " neces- sity" of fighting, and therefore the motives to insult another are increased. A man who wishes to inflict pain upon another, can inflict it more intensely in consequence of the system of duelling. The truth is, that men fancy the system is useful, because they do not perceive how Public Opinion has been violently turned out of its natural and its usual course. When a mili- tary man is guilty of an insult, public disapprobation fails but lightly upon him. It reserves its force to direct against the insulted party if he does not demand satisfaction. But when a clergyman is guilty of an insult, public disapprobation falls upon him with undivided force. The insulted party receiTcs no censure. Now, if you take away the custom of demand- ing satisfaction, what will be the result 1 Why, that public opinion will revert to its natural course ; it will direct all its penalties to the offending party, and by consequence restrain him from offending. It will act towards all men as it now acts towards the clergy ; and if a clergyman were frequently to be guilty of insults, his character would be destroyed. The reader will perhaps more distinctly perceive that the fan- cied utility of duelling in preventing insults, results from this misdirection of public opinion by this brief argument. An individual either fears public opinion, or he does not. If he does not fear it, the custom of duelling cannot prevent him from insulting whomsoever he pleases ; because public opinion is the only thing which makes men fight, and he does not regard it. If he does fear public opinion, then the most effectual way of restraining him from insulting others, is by directing that opinion against the act of insulting — just as it is now directed in the case of the clergy.* Thus it is that we find — ^what he who knows the perfection of Christian morality would expect — that Duelling as it is immoral, so it is absurd. It appears to be forgotten that a duel is not more allowable to secure ourselves from censure or neglect than any other vio- lation of the Moral Law. If these motives constitute a justi- fication of a duel, they constitute a justification of robbery or poisoning. To advocate duelling is not to defend one species of offence, but to assert the general right to violate tbe laws • See West. Rev. No. 7. Art 2. CHAP. XV,] DUELLING. 37X- of God. If, as Dr. Johnson reasoned, the " notions which prevail" make fighting right, they can make anything right. Nothing is wanted but to alter the " notions which prevail," and there is not a crime mentioned in the statute-book that will not be lawful and honourable to-morrow. It is usual with those who do foolish and vicious things, or who do things from foolish or vicious motives, to invent some fiction by which to veil the evil or folly, and to give it, if pos- sible, a creditable appearance. This has been done in the case of duelling. We hear a great deal about honour, and spirit, and courage, and other qualities equally pleasant, and, as it respects the duellist, equally fictitious. The want of suf- ficient honour, and spirit, and courage, is precisely the very rea- son why men fight. Pitt fought with Tierney ; upon which Pitt's biographer writes — " A mind like his, cast in no common mould, should have risen superior to a low and unworthy pre^ judice, the folly of which it must have perceived, and the wickedness of which it must have acknowledged. Could M?\ Pitt be led away by that false shame which subjects the decisions of reason to the control of fear, and renders the admonitions of conscience subservient to the powers of ridi- cule ?"* Low prejudice, folly, wickedness, false shame, and fear, are the motives which the complacent duellist dignifies ivith the titles of honour, spirit, courage. This, to be sure, is very politic ; he would not be so silly as to call his motives by their right names. Others, of course, join in the chican- ery. They reflect that they themselves may one day have " a meeting," and they wish to keep up the credit of a system which they are conscious they have not principle enough to reject. Put Christianity out of the question — Would not even the philosophy of paganism have despised that littleness of prin- ciple which would not bear a man up in adhering to conduct w'hich he knew to be right — that littleness of principle which sacrifices the dictates of the understanding to an unworthy fear ? — When a good man, rather than conform to some vi- cious institution of the papacy, stood firmly against the frowns and persecutions of the world, against obloquy and infamy, we say that liis mental principles were great as well as good. If they were, the principle* of the duellist are mean as well as vicious. He is afraid to be good and great. He knows the course which dignity and virtue prescribe, but he will not rise above those lower motives which prompt him to deviate from that course. It does not afiect these conclusions to con- * Gifibrd's Life, vol. 1, p. 263. 24 278 DtliLLING. [essay lU cede, that he who is afraid to refuse a challenge may generally be a man of elevated mind. He may be such ; but his refu- sal is an exception to his general character. It is an instance in which he impeaches his consistency in excellence. If it were consistent, if the whole mind had attained to the right- ful stature of a Christian man, he would assuredly contemn in his practice the conduct which he disapproved in his heart If you would show us a man of courage, bring forward hini who will say, I will not fight. Suppose a gentleman who, upon the principles which Gifford says should have actuated Pitt and all great minds, had thus refused to fight, and sup- pose him saying to his withdrawing friends — " I have acted with perfect deliberation : I knew all the consequences of the course I have pursued : but I was persuaded that I should act most like a man of intellect, as well as like a Christian, by declining the meeting; and therefore I declined it. I feel and deplore the consequences, though I do not deprecate them. I am not fearful, as I have not been fearful ; for I appeaL to yourselves whether I have not encountered the more appalling alternative — whether it does not require a greater effort to do what I have done, and what I am at this moment doing, than to have met my opponent." — Such a man's magnanimity might not procure for him the companion,' ship of his acquaintance, but it would do much more ; it would obtain the suffrages of their judgments and their hearts. Whilst they continued perhaps externally to neglect him, they would internally honour and admire. They would feel that his excellence was of an order to which they could make no pretensions ; and they would feel, as they were practising this strange hypocrisy of vice, that thei/ were the proper ob- jects of contempt and pity. The species of slavery to which a man is sometimes re- duced by being, as he calls it, " obliged to fight," is really pitiable. A British officer writes of a petulant and profligate class of men, one of whom is sometimes found in a regiment, and says, " Sensible that an officer must accept a challenge, he does not hesitate to deal them in abundance, and shortly acquires the name of a fighting man ; but as every one is not willing to throw away his life when called upon by one who is indifferent to his own, many become condescending, which this man immediately construes into fear; and, presuming upon this, he acts as if he imagined no one dare contradict him but all must yield obedience to his will.^^ Here the servile bondage of which we speak is brought prominently out. Here is the crouching aad unmanly fear. Here is the abject sub- CHAP. XV.] DVELLIN0. 27t mission of sense and reason to the grossest vulgarity of inso- lence, folly and guilt. The officer presently gives an account of an instance in which the whole mess were domineered over by one of these fighting men ; — and a pitiably ludicrous account it is. The man had invited them to dinner at some distance. " On the day appointed, there came on a most violent snow storm, and in the morning we despatched a ser- vant with an apology'." But alas ! these poor men could not use their own judgments as to whether they should ride in a ** most violent snow storm" or not. The man sent back some rude message that he " expected them." They were afraid of what the fighting man would do next morning ; and so th© whose mess, against their wills, actually rode " near four miles in a heavy snow storm, and passed a day," says the officer, " that was, without exception, the most unpleasant 1 ever passed in my life !"* In the instance of these men, the motives to duelling as founded upon Fear, operated so power- fully that the officers were absolutely enslaved— driven against their wills by Fear, as negroes are by a cart-whip. We are shocked and disgusted at the immolation of women amongst the Hindoos, and think that, if such a sacrifice were attempted in England, it would excite feelings of the utmost repulsion and abhorrence. Of the custom of immolation, Duelling is the sister. Their parents are the same, and, like other sisters, their lineaments are similar. Why does a Hindoo mount the funeral pile ? To vindicate and maintain her honour. AVhy does an Englishman go to the heath with his pistols ? To vindicate and maintain his honour. W^hat is the nature and character of the Hindoo's honour ? Quite fac- titious. Of the duellist's? Quite factitious. How is the motive applied to the Hindoo? To her fears of reproach. To the duellist? To his fears of reproach. What then is the difference between the two customs ? This — that one is practised in the midst of pagan darkness, and the other in the midst of Christian light. And yet these very men give their guineas to the Missionary Society, lament the degradation of the Hindoos, and expatiate upon the sacred duty of enlighten- ing them with Christianity ! " Physician ! heal thyself.''* One consideration connected with duelling is of unusual interest. " In the judgment of that religion which requires purity of heart, and of that Being to whom thought is action, he cannot be esteemed innocent of this crime, who lives in a settled, habitual, determination to commit it, when circum- stances shall call upon him so to do. This is a considera- * lieut. Attburey : Travels in North America. 280' SUICIDE. [essay, ii. tion which places the crime of duelling on a different footing from almost any other; indeed there is perhaps no other, which mankind habitually and deliberately resolve to practise whenever the temptation shall occur. It shows also that the crime of duelling is far more general in the higher classes than is commonly supposed, and that the whole sum of the guilt which the practice produces, is great beyond what has perhaps been ever conceived."* "It is the intention," says Seneca, "and not the effect which makes the wickedness :" and that Greater than Seneca who laid the axe to the root of our vices, who laid upon the mental disposition that guilt which had been laid upon the act, may be expected to regard this habitual willingness and intention to violate his laws, as an actual and great offence. The felon who plans and resolves to break into a house, is not the less a felon because a watchman happens to prevent him ; nor is the offence of him who happens never to be challenged, necessarily at all less than that of him who takes the life of his friend. CHAPTER XVI. SUICIDE. Unmanliness of Suicide — Forbidden in the New Testament — Its folly- Legislation respecting suicide — Verdict of Felo de se. There are few subjects upon which it is more difficult either to write or to legislate with effect, than that of Suicide. It is difficult to a writer, because a man does not resolve upon the act until he has first become steeled to some of the most powerful motives that can be urged upon the human mind ; and to the legislator, because he can inflict no penalty upon the offending party. It is to be feared that there is little probability of diminish- ing the frequency of this miserable offence by urging the considerations which philosophy suggests. The voice of nature is louder and stronger than the voice of philosophy ; and as nature speaks to the suicide in vain, what is the hope that philosophy will be regarded ? — There appears to be but * Wilberforce : Practical View, c. 4. s. 3. CHAP. XVI.] SUICIDE. 281 one efficient means by which the mind can be armed against the temptations to suicide, because there is bat one that can support it against ex)ery evil of life — practical religion — belief in the providence of God — confidence in his wisdom — hope in his goodness. The only anchor that can hold us in safety, is that which is fixed " within the vail." Ke upon whom religion possesses its proper influence, finds that it enables him to endure, with resigned patience, every calamity of life. When patience thus fulfils its perfect work, suicide, which is the result of impatience, cannot be committed. He who is surrounded, by whatever means, with pain or misery, should remember that the present existence is strictly probationary — a scene upon which we are to be exercised, and tried, and tempted ; and in which we are to manifest whether we are willing firmly to endure. The good or evil of the present life is of importance chiefly as it influences our allotment in futurity : sufferings are permitted for our advantage : they are designed to purify and rectify the heart. The universal Father " scourgeth every son whom he receiveth ;" and the suflfering, the scourging, is of little account in comparison with the prospects of another world. It is not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall follow — that glory of which an exceeding and eternal weight is the reward of a ^^ patient continuance in well doing." To him who thus re- gards misery, not as an evil but as a good ; not as the unre- strained assault of chance or malice, but as the beneficent discipline of a Father ; to him who remembers that the time is approaching in which he will be able most feelingly to say, " For all I bless Thee — most for the severe" — every afiiiction is accompanied with its proper alleviation : the present hour may distress but it does not overwhelm him ; he may be per- plexed but is not in despair : he sees the darkness and feels the storm, but he knows that light will again arise, and that the storm will eventually be hushed with an efficacious, "Peace be still;" so that there shall be a great calm. Compared with these motives to avoid the first promptings to suicide, others are likely to be of little effect ; and yet they are neither inconsiderable nor few. It is more dignified, more worthy an enlightened and manly understanding, to meet and endure an inevitable evil than to sink beneath it. The case of him who feels prompted to suicide, is something like that of the duellist as it was illustrated in the preceding chapter. Each sacrifices his life to his fears. The suicide balances between opposing objects of dread, (for dreadful self- destruction must be supposed to be,) and chooses the altema- 24* 282 BtJiciDt:. [essay if. live which he fears least. If his courage, his firmness, his manliness, were greater, he who chooses the alternative of suicide, like him who chooses the duel, would endure the evil rather than avoid it in a manner which dignity and reli- gion forbid. The lesson too which the self-destroyer teaches to his connexions, of sinking in despair under the evils of life, is one of the most pernicious which a man can bequeath. The pow^r of the example is also great. Every act of sui- cide tacitly conveys the sanction of one more judgment in its favour: frequency of repetition diminishes the sensation of abhorrence, and makes succeeding sufferers resort to it with less reluctance. " Besides which general reasons, each case will be aggravated by its own proper and particular conse- quences ; by the duties that are deserted ; by the claims that are defrauded ; by the loss, affliction, or disgrace which our death, or the manner of it, causes our family, kindred, or friends ; by the occasion we give to many to suspect the sincerity of our moral religious professions, and, together with ours, those of all others ;"* and lastly, by the scandal which we bring upon religion itself by declaring, practically, that it is not able to support man under the calamities of life. Some men say that the New Testament contains no prohi- bition of suicide. If this were true, it would avail nothing, because there are many things which it does not forbid, but which every one knows to be wicked. But in reality it does forbid it. Every exhortation which it gives to be patient, every encouragement to trust in God, every consideration which it urges as a support under affliction and distress, is a virtual prohibition of suicide ; — ^because, if a man commits suicide, he rejects every such advice and encouragement, and disregards every such motive. To him who believes either in revealed or natural religion, there is a certain yb//y in the commission of suicide ; for from what does he fly ? From his present sufferings ; whilst death, for aught that he has reason to expect, or at any rate for aught that he knows, may only be the portal to sufferings more intense. Natural religion, I think, gives no countenance to the supposition that suicide can be approved by the Deity, because it proceeds upon the belief that, in another state of existence, he will compensate good men for the sufferings of the present. At the best, and under either religion, it is a desperate stake. He that commits murder may repent, and we hope, be forgiven ; but he that destroys himself, whilst he * Mor, and Pol. Phil, b. 4, a 3, CHAP. XVI.] StJIClDB. 283 incurs a load of guilt, cuts off, by the act, the power of re- pentance. Not every act of suicide is to be attributed to excess of misery. Some shoot themselves or throw themselves into a river in rage or revenge, in order to inflict pain and remorse upon those who have ill used them. Such, it is to be sus- pected, is sometimes a motive to self-destruction in disap- pointed love. The unhappy person leaves behind some mes- sage or letter, in the hope of exciting that affection and com- miseration by the catastrophe, which he could not excite when alive. Perhaps such persons hope, too, that the world will sigh over their early fate, tell of the fidelity of their loves, end throw a romantic melancholy over their story. This needs not to be a subject of wonder : unnumbered multitudes nave embraced death in other forms from kindred motives. We hear continually of those who die for the sake of glory. This is but another phantom, and the less amiable phantom of the two. It is just as reasonable to die in order that the world may admire our true love, as in order that it may ad- mire our bravery. And the lover's hope is the better founded. There are too many aspirants for glory for each to get even his "peppercorn of praise." But the lover may hope for higher honours ; a paragraph may record his fate through the existence of a weekly paper ; he may be talked of through half a county ; and some kindred spirit may inscribe a tribu- tary sonnet in a lady's album. To legislate efficiently upon the crime of suicide is difficult, if it is not impossible. As the legislator cannot inflict a penalty upon the offender, the act must pass with impunity unless the penalty is made to fall upon the innocent. I say the penalty ; for such it would actually be, whatever were the provision of the law — whether, for instance, confiscation of property, or indignity to the remains of the dead. One would make a family poor, and the other perhaps unhappy. It does not appear just or reasonable that these should suffer for an offence which they could not prevent, and by wliich they, above all others, are already injured and distressed. One thing appears to be clear, that it is vain for a Legisla- ture to attempt any interference of which the people do not approve. This is evident from the experience in our own country, where coroner's juries prefer perjuring themselves to pronouncing a verdict of felo de se, by which the remains would be subjected to barbarous indignities. Coroners' in- quests seem to proceed rather upon the pre-supposition that he 284 SUICIDE. [essat II. who destroys himself is insane, than upon the evidence which is brought before them ; and thus, whilst the law is evaded, perjury it is to be feared is very frequent. That the public mind disapproves the existing law is a good reason for alter- ing it ; but it is not a good reason why coroners' juries should violate their oaths, and give encouragement to the suicide by telling him that disgrace will be warded off from his memory and from his family by a generous verdict of insanity. It has been said that it is a common thing for a suicide's friends to fee the coroner in order to induce him to prevent a verdict of felo de se. If this be true, it is indeed time that the arm of the law should be vigorously extended. What punishment is due to the man who accepts a purse as a reward for indu- cing twelve persons to commit perjury 1 It is probable too, that half-a-dozen just verdicts, by which the law was allowed to take its course, would occasion the abolition of the disgust- ing statute ;* for the public would not bear that it should be acted upon. The great object is to associate with the act of suicide ideas of guilt and horror in the public mind. This associa- tion would be likely to preclude, in individuals, i\idX first com- placent contemplation of the act which probably precedes, by a long interval, the act itself. The anxiety which the survi- ving friends manifest for a verdict of " insanity," is a proof how great is the power of imagination, and how much they are in dread of public opinion. They are anxious that the disgrace and reproach of conscious self-murder should not cling to their family. This is precisely that anxiety of which the legislator should avail himself, by enactments that would require satisfactory proof of insanity, and which, in default of such proof, would leave to its full force the stigma and the pain, and excite a sense of horror of the act, and a perception of its wickedness in the public mind. The point for the exercise of legislative wisdom is, to devise such an ultimate procedure as shall call forth these feelings, but as shall not become nu- gatory by being more dreadful than the public will endure. — What that procedure should be, I pretend not to describe ; but it may be observed that the simple circumstance of pronounc- ing a public verdict of conscious self-murder, would, amongst a people of good feelings, go far towards the production of the desired effect. — As the law now exists, and as it is now vio- lated, the tendency is exactly the contrary of what it ought to * This statute has been repealed ; and the law now simply requires, when a verdict of felo de se is returned, that the body shall be interred privately, at night, and without the funeral service. Ed. CHAP. XVII.] RIGHTS OP SELF-DEFEN^CE. 285 be. By the almost universal custom which it generates, of declaring suicides to have been insane, it effectually diminishes thr.t pain to individuals, and that horror in the public, which the crime itself would naturally occasion. CHAPTER XVII. RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. These rigrhts not absolute — Their limits — Personal attack — Preservation of property — Much resistance lawful — Effects of forbearance — Sharpe — Barclay — Ellvvood. The right of defending ourselves against violence is easily deducible from the Law of Nature. There is however little need to deduce it, because mankind are at least sufficiently persuaded of its lawfulness. — The great question, which the opinions and principles that now influence the world makes it needful to discuss is, Whether the right of self-defence is ab- solute and unconditional — Whether every action whatever is lawful, provided it is necessary to the preservation of life ? They who maintain the afllrmative, maintain a great deal; for they maintain that whenever life is endangered, all rules of morality are, as it respects the individual, suspended, annihi- lated : every moral obligation is taken away by the single fact that life is threatened. Yet the language that is ordinarily held upon the subject implies the supposition of all this. " If our lives are threat- ened with assassination or open violence from the hands of rob- bers or enemies, any means of defence would be allowed, and laudable."* Again, " There is one case in which all ex- tremities are justifiable, namely, when our life is assaulted, and it becomes necessary for our preservation to kill the as- sailant."! The reader may the more willingly enquire whether these propositions are true, because most of those who lay them down are at little pains to prove their truth. Men are ex- tremely willing to acquiesce in it without proof, and writers and speakers think it unnecessary to adduce it. Thus per- * Grotius : Rights of War and Peace. t Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil, p 3, b. iv. c. 1. 886 HIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. [eSSaY II. haps it happens that fallacy is not detected because it is not sought. — If the reader should think that some of the instances which follow are remote from the ordinary affairs of life, he is requested to remember that we are discussing the sound- ness of an alleged absolute rule. If it be found that there are or have been cases in which it is not absolute — cases in which all extremities are not lawful in defence of life — ^then the rule is not sound : then there are some limits to the Right of Self-Defence. If " any means of defence are laudable," if " all extremi- ties are justifiable," then they are not confined to acts of re- sistance to the assailing party. There may be other condi- tions upon which life may be preserved than that of violence towards him. Some ruffians seize a man in the highway, and will kill him unless he will conduct them to his neighbour's property and assist them in carrying it oflT. May this man unite with them in the robbery in order to save his life, or may he not 1 If he may, what becomes of the law. Thou shalt not steal ? If he may not, then not every means by which a man may preserve his life is " laudable" or " allowed." We have found an exception to the rule. There are twenty other wicked things which violent men may make the sole condition of not taking our lives. Do all wicked things be- come lawful because life is at stake ? If they do. Morality is surely at an end : if they do not, such propositions as those of Grotius and Paley are untrue. A pagan has unalterably resolved to offer me up in sacrifice on the morrow, unless I will acknowledge the deity of his gods and worship them. I shall presume that the Christian will regard these acts as being, under every possible circum- stance, unlawful. The night offers me an opportunity of as- sassinating him. Now I am placed, so far as the argument is concerned, in precisely the same situation with respect to this man, as a traveller is with respect to a ruffian with a pis- tol. Life in both cases depends on killing the offender. — Both are acts of self-defence. Am I at liberty to assassinate this man? The heart of the Christian surely answers. No. Here then is a case in which I may not take a violent man's life in order to save my own. — We have said that the heart of the Christian answers, No : and this we think is a just spe- cies of appeal. But if any one doubts whether the assassina- tion would be unlawful, let him consider whether one of the Christian apostles would have committed it in such a case. Here, at any rate, the heart of every man answers. No. And mark the reason — ^because every man perceives that the act CHAP. XVII.] RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. 287 would have been palpably inconsistent with the apostolic charac- ter and conduct ; or, which is the same thing, with a Chris' tian character and conduct. Or put such a case in a somewhat different form. A furi- ous Turk holds a scimitar over my head, and declares he will instantly dispatch me unless I abjure Christianity and ac- knowledge the divine legation of "the Prophet." Now there are two supposable ways in which I may save my life ; one by contriving to stab the Turk, and one " by denying Christ before men." You say I am not at liberty to deny Christ, but I am at liberty to stab the man. Why am I not at liberty to deny Him ? Because Christianity forbids it. Then we require you to show that Christianity does not forbid you to take his life. Our religion pronounces both actions to be wrong. You say that, under these circumstances, the killing is right. Where is your proof ? What is the ground of your distinction ? — But, whether it can be adduced or not, our im- mediate argument is established — That there are some things which it is not lawful to do in order to preserve our lives. — This conclusion has indeed been practically acted upon. A company of inquisitors and their agents are about to conduct a good man to the stake. If he could by any means destroy these men, he might save his life. It is a question therefore of self-defence. Supposing these means to be within his power — supposing he could contrive a mine, and by suddenly firing it, blow his persecutors into the air — would it be lawful and Christian thus to act? No. The comrnon judgments of man- kind respecting the right temper and conduct of the martyr, pronounce it to be wrong. It is pronounced to be wrong by the language and example of the first teachers of Christianity. The conclusion therefore again is that all extremities are not allowable in order to preserve life ; — that there is a limit to the right of self-defence. It would be to no purpose to say that in some of the in- stances which have been proposed, religions duties interfere with and limit the rights of self-defence. This is a common fallacy. Religious duties and moral duties are identical in point of obligation, for they are imposed by one authority. Religious duties are not obligatory for any other reason than that which attaches to moral duties also ; namely the Will of God. He who violates the Moral Law is as truly unfaithful in his allegiance to God, as he who denies Christ before men. So that we come at last to one single and simple question, whether taking the life of a person who threatens ours, is oy is not compatible with the Moral Law. We refer for an an- 288 RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. [eSSAY II. swer to the broad principles of Christian piety and Christian benevolence ; that piety which reposes habitual confidence in the Divine Providence, and an habitual preference of futu- rity to the present time ; and that benevolence which not only loves our neighbours as ourselves, but feels that the Samari- tan or the enemy is a neighbour. There is no conjecture in life in which the exercise of this benevolence may be sus- pended ; none in which we are not required to maintain and to practise it. Whether Want implores our compassion, or Ingratitude returns ill for our kindness ; whether a fellow creature is drowning in a river or assailing us on the high- way ; every where, and under ail circumstances, the duty remains. Is killing an assailant, then, within or without the limits of this Benevolence ? — iVs to the man, it is evident that no good-will is exercised towards him by shooting him through the head. Who indeed will dispute that, before we can thus destroy him, benevolence towards him must be excluded from our minds ? We not only exercise no benevolence our- selves, but preclude him from receiving it from any human heart ; and, which is a serious item in the account, we cut him off from all possibility of reformation. To call sinners to repentance, was one of the great characteristics of the mission of Christ. Does it appear consistent, with this char- acteristic for one of His followers to take away from a sinner the power of repentance ? Is it an act that accords, and is congruous, with Christian love ? But an argument has been attempted here. That we may " kill the assailant is evident in a state of nature, unless it can be shown that we are bound to prefer the aggressor's life to our own ; that is to say, tc love our enemy better than our- selves, which can never be a debt of justice, nor any where appears to be a duty of charity." * The answer is this : That although we may not be required to love our enemy better than ourselves, we are required to love him as ourselves ; and therefore, in the supposed case, it would still be a question equally balanced which life ought to be sacrificed ; for it is quite clear that, if we kill the assailant, we love him less than ourselves, which does seem to militate against a duty of char- ity. But the truth is that he who, from motives of obedience to the will of God, spares the aggressor's life even to the en- dangering hi^ own, does exercise love both to the aggressor and to himself, perfectly : to the aggressor, because by spa- ring his life we give him the opportunity of repentance and * Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil, p 3, b. 4. c. 1. CHAP. XVII."! RIGHTS OP SELF-DEFENCfi. 289 amendment : to Wmself, because every act of obedience to Qod is perfect benevolence towards ourselves ; it is consult- ing and promoting our most valuable interests ; it is propitia- ting the favour of him who is emphatically "a rich rewarder." — So that the question remains as before, not whether we should love our enemy better than ourselves, but whether Christian principles are acted upon in destroying him ; and if they are not, whether we should prefer Christianity to our- selves ; whether we should be willing to lose our life for Christ's sake and the gospel's. Perhaps it will be said that we should exercise benevo- lence to the public as well as to the offender, and that we may exercise more benevolence to them by killing than by sparing him. But very few persons, when they kill a man who at- tacks them, kill him out of benevolence to the public. That is not the motive which influences their conduct, or which they at all take into the account. Besides, it is by no means certain that the public would lose anything by the forbear- ance. To be sure, a man can do no more mischief after he is killed ; but then it is to be remembered, that robbers are more desperate and more murderous from the apprehension of swords and pistols than they would be without it. Men are desperate in proportion to their apprehensions of danger. The plunderer who feels a confidence that his own life will not be taken, may conduct his plunder with comparative gen- tleness ; whilst he who knows that his life is in immediate jeopardy, stuns or murders his victim lest he should be killed himself. The great evil which a family sustains by a rob- bery is often not the loss, but the terror and the danger ; and these are the evils which, by the exercise of forbearance, would be diminished. So that, if some bad men are pre- vented from committing robberies by the fear of death, the public gains in other ways by the forbearance : nor is it by any means certain that the balance of advantages is in favour of the more violent course. -^The argument which we are opposing proceeds on the supposition that our own lives are endangered. Now it is a fact that this very danger results, in part, from the want of habits of forbearance; We publicly profess that we would kill an assailant ; and the assailant, knowing this, prepares to kill us when otherwise he would forbear. And after all, if it were granted that a person is at liberty to take an assailant's life in order to preserve his own, how is he to know, in the majority of instances, whether his own would be taken ? When a man breaks into a person's house, ^25 2-00 Rights of sELF-DErENCE. [essay ii. and this person, as soon as he comes up with the robber, takes out a pistol and shoots hirn, we are not to be told that this man was" killed " in defence of life." Or go a step fur- ther, and a step further stilly by which the intention of the robber to commit personal violence or inflict death is more and more probable :-— You must at last shoot him in uncer- tainty whether your life was endangered or not. Besides, you can withdraw — ^you can fly. None but the predeter- mined muYdereY wishes to commit murder. But perhaps you exclaim — " Fly ! fly, and leave your property, unprotected !" Yes — unless you mean to say. thrt preservation of property, as well as preservation of life, makes it lawful to kill an oifender. . This were to adopt a nev/ and a very difierent proposition; but a proposition vrhich I suspect cannot be separated in practice from the former. He who affirms that he may kill another in order to preserve his life, and that he may endanger his life in order to protect his property, does in reality aflEirm that he may kill another in order to preserve his property. But such a prcpocition, in an unconditional form, no one surely will tolerate. The laws of the land do not admit it, nor do they even admit the right of taking an- other's life simply because he is attempting to take ours. Thsy require that we should be tender even of the murderer's life, and that^e should fly rather than destroy it.* We say that the proposition that we may take life in order to preserve our property is intolerable. To preserve how much ? five hundred pounds, or fifty, or ten, or a shilling or a cixpence ? It has actually been declared that the rights of self-defence "justify a man in taking all forcible methods which are necessary, in order to procure the restitution of the freedom or the property of which he had been unjustly deprived."! All forcible methods to obtain restitution of pro- perty ! No limit to the nature or effects of the force ! No limit to the insignificance of the amount of the property ! Apply, then, the rule. A boy snatches a bunch of giapes from a fruiterer's stall. The fruiterer runs after the thief, but finds that he is too light of foot to be overtaken. More- over, the boy eats as he runs. " All forcible methods," rea- sons the fruiterer, " are justifiable to obtain restitution of pro- perty. I may fire after the plunderer, and when he falls regain my grapes." All this is just and right, if Gisbome's proposition is true. It is a dangerous thing to lay down max- ims in morality. The conclusion, then, to which \7e are Isd by these enqui- * Blackstone : Com. t. 4, c. 4. t Gisborne : I-Iordl Philosophy. CHAP. XVII.] RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. 291 ries is, that he who kills another, even upon the plea of self- defence, does not do it in the predominance nor in the exer- cise of Christian dispositions: and if this is true, is it not also true, that his life cannot be thus taken in conformity with the Christian law 1 But this is very far from concluding that no resistance may be made to aggression. We may make, and we ought to make, a great deal. It is the duty of the civil magistrate to repress the violence of one man towards another, and by con- sequence it is the duty of the individual, when the civil power cannot operate, to endeavour to repress it himself. I perceive no reasonable exception to the rule — that what- ever Christianity permits the magistrate to do in order to re- strain violence, it permits the individual, under such circum- stances to do also. I know the consequences to which this rule leads in the case of the punishment of death, and of other questions. These questions will hereafter be discussed. In the mean time, it may be an act of candour to the reader to acknowledge, that our chief motive for the discussions of the present chapter, has been to pioneer the way for a satis- factory investigation of the Punishment of Death, and of other modes by which human life is taken away. Many kinds of resistance to aggression come strictly within the fulfdment of the law of benevolence. He who, by securing, or temporarily disabling a man, prevents him from committing an act of great turpitude, is certainly his benefac- tor ; and if he be thus reserved for justice, the benevolence is great both to him and to the public. It is an act of much kindness to a bad man to secure him for the penalties of the law : or it would be such, if penal law were in the state in which it ought to be, and to which it appears to be making some approaches. It would then be very probable that the man would be reformed : and this is the greatest benefit which can be conferred upon him and upon the community. The exercise of Christian forbearance towards violent men is not tantamount to an invitation of outrage. Cowardice is one thing; this forbearance is another. The man of true forbearance is of all men the least cowardly. It requires courage in a greater degree and of a higher order to practise it when life is threatened, than to draw a sword or fire a pistol. — No : It is the peculiar privilege of Christian virtue to approve itself even to the bad. There is something in the nature of that calmness, and self-possession, and forbear- ance, that religion effects, which obtains, nay which almost commands regard and respect. How diflJerent the effect v 292 RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. [eSSAY II. upon the violent tenants of Newgate, the hardihood of a turn- key and the mild courage of an Elizabeth Fry ! Experience, incontestable experience, has proved, that the minds of few men are so depraved or desperate as to prevent them from being injluenced by real Christian conduct. Let him there- fore who advocates the taking the life of an aggressor, first show that all other means of safety are vain ; let him show that bad men, notwithstanding the exercise of true Christian forbearance, persist in their purposes of death : when he has done this he will have adduced an argument in favour of taking their lives which will not indeed, be conclusive, but which will approach nearer to conclusiveness than any that has yet been adduced. Of the consequences of forbearance, even in the case of personal attack, there are some examples : Archbishop Sharpe was assaulted by a footpad on the highway, who presented a pistol and demanded his money. The Archbishop spoke to the robber in the language of a fellow man and of a Christian. The man was really in distress, and the prelate gave him such money as he had, and promised that, if he would call at the palace, he would make up the amount to fifty pounds. This was the sum of which the robber had said he stood in the utmost need. The man called and re- ceived the money. About a year and a half afterwards, this man again came to the palace and brought back the same sum. He said that his circumstances had become improved, and that, through the " astonishing goodness" of the Arch- bishop, he had become " the most penitent, the most grateful, and happiest of his species." — Let the reader consider how different the Archbishop's feelings were, from what they would have been if, by his hand this man had been cut off.* Barclay, the Apologist, was attacked 'by a highwayman. He substituted for the ordinary modes of resistance, a calm expostulation. The felon dropped his presented pistol, and offered no further violence. A Leonard Fell was similarly attacked, and from him the robber took both his money and his horse, and then threatened to blow out his brains. Fell solemnly spoke to the man on the wickedness of his life. The robber was astonished : he had expected, perhaps, curses, or perhaps a dagger. He declared he would not keep either the horse or the money, and returned both. " If thine enemy hunger, /eec? him; for in so doing thou shalt * See Lond. Chron. Aug. 12, 1785. See also life of Granville Sharpe, Esq., p. 13. CHAP. XVII.] RIGHTS OF SELF-DEFENCE. 293 heap coals of fire upon his head."* — The tenor of the shprt narrative that follows is somewhat different. Ell wood, who is known to the literary world as the suggester to Milton of Paradise Regained, was attending his father in his coach. Two men waylaid them in the dark and stopped the carriage. Young Ellwood got out, and on going up to the nearest, the ruffian raised a heavy club, " when," says Ellwood, " I whipt out my rapier and made a pass upon him. I could not have failed running him through up to the hilt," but the sudden appearance of the bright blade terrified the man so that he stepped aside, avoided the thrust, and both he and the other fled. " At that time," proceeds Ellwood, " and for a good while after, I had no regret upon my mind for what I had done." This was whilst he was young, and when the for- bearing principles of Christianity had little influence upon him. But afterwards, when this influence became powerful, " a sort of horror," he says, " seized on me when I considered how near I had been to the staining of my hands with human blood. And whensoever afterwards I went that way, and indeed as often since as the matter has come into my remem- brance, my soul has blessed Him who preserved and with- held me from shedding man's blood. "f That those over whom, as over Ellwood, the influence of Christianity is imperfect and weak, should think themselves at liberty upon such occasions to take the lives of their fel- low-men, needs to be no subject of wonder. Christianity, if we would rightly estimate its obligations, must be felt in the heart. They in whose hearts it is not felt, or felt but little, cannot be expected perfectly to know what its obligations are. I know not therefore that more appropriate advice can be given to him who contends for the lawfulness of taking ano- ther man's life in order to save his own, than that he would first enquire whether the influence of religion is dominant in his mind. If it is not, let him suspend his decision until he has attained to the fulness of the stature of a Christian man. Then, as he will be of that number who do the Will of Hea- ven, he may hope to " know of this doctrine whether it be of God." » " Select Anecdotes, &c." by John Barclay. t Ellwood's Life. 25* ESSAY III.* POLITICAL RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS. CHAPTER I. PRINCIPLES OP POLITICAL TRUTH, AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. I. — " Political Power is rightly exercised only when it is possessed by con- sent of the community" — Governors officers of the Public — Transfer of their rights by a whole people — The people hold the sovereign power — Right of Governors — A conciliating system. II. — "Political Power is rightly exercised only when it subserves the welfare of the community" — Interference with other nations — Present expedients for present occasions — Proper business of Governments. III. — " Political Power is rightly exercised only when it subserves the welfare of the community by means which the Moral Law permits" — The Moral Law alike binding on nations and individuals — Deviation from rectitude impolitic — " The Holy Alliance" — Durable fame. The fundamental principles wliich are deducible from the law of nature and from Christianity, respecting political af- fairs, appear to be these : — 1 . Political Power is rightly possessed only when it is pos- sessed by consent of the community ; — 2. It is rightly exercised only when it subserves the wel- fare of the community ; — 3. And only when it subserves this purpose, by means which the Moral Law permits. [* This Essay the author did not live to revise, a circumstance which will account for a want of complete connexion of the different parts of a subject which the reader will sometimes meet with. There occur also in this part of the manuscript numerous memoranda, which the author intended to make use of in a future revision. These are to be distin- guished from the Notes, as the former refer, not to any particular passage but only to the subject of the chapter or section. They were hastily, as the thought occurred, written in the margin or on a blank leaf of the manuscript, and they are here introduced at the bottom of the page, in those parts to which they appear to have the nearest reference. — Ed.] CHAP. I.] PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, ETC. 205 I. " POLITICAL POWER IS RIGHTLY POSSESSED ONLY WHEN IT IS POSSESSED BY CONSENT OF THE COMMUNITY." Perfect liberty is desirable if it were consistent with the greatest degree of happiness. But it is not. Men find that, by giving up a part of their liberty, they are more happy than by retaining, or attempting to retain, the whole. Government, whatever be its form, is the agent by which the inexpedient portion of individual liberty is taken away. Men institute government for their own advantage, and because they find they are more happy with it than without it. This is the sole reason, in principle, how little soever it be adverted to in practice. Governors, therefore, are the officers of the public, in the proper sense of the word : not the slaves of the pub- lic ; for if they do not incline to conform to the public will, they are at liberty, like other officers, to give up their office. They are servants, in the same manner, and for the same pur- pose, as a solicitor is the servant of his client, and the physician of his patient. These are employed by the patient or the client voluntarily for his own advantage, and for nothing else. A nation, (not an individual^ but a nation,) is under no other obligation to obedience, than that which arises from the con- viction that obedience is good for itself: — ot rather, in more proper language, a nation is under no obligation to obedience at all. Obedience is voluntary. If they do not think it proper to obey — that is, if they are not satisfied with their officers — they are at liberty to discontinue their obedience, and to ap- point other officers instead. That which is thus true as an universal proposition, is as- serted with respect to this country by the present king:*— " The powers and prerogatives of the crown are vested there' as a trust for the benefit of the people ; and they are sacred only as they are necessary to the preservation of that poise and balance of the constitution which experience has proved to be the best security of the liberty of the subject. "Y It is incidental to the office of the First public servants, that they should exercise authority over those by whom they are selected ; and hence probably, it has happened that the terms " public officer," " public servant," have excited such strange controversies in the world. Men have not maintained sufficient discrimination of ideas. Seeing that governors are great and authoritative, a man imagines it cannot be proper to say they are servants. Seeing that it is necessary and ♦ George IV. t Letter when Prince of Wales, tp Wm. Pitt. Giflford's life of Pitt vol. 2. 5^96 PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [eSSAY fl. tight that individuals should obey, he cannot entertain the notion that they are the servants of those whom they govern. The truth is, that governors are not the servants of individ- uals but of the community. They are the masters of indi- viduals, the servants of the public ; and if this simple dis- tinction had been sufficiently borne in mind, much perhaps of the vehement contention upon these matters had been avoided. But the idea of being a servant to the public, is quite con- sistent with the idea of exercising authority over them. The common language of a patient is founded upon similar grounds. He sends for a physician : — the physician comes at his desire — is paid for his services — and then the patient says, I am ordered to adopt a regimen, I am ordered to Italy ; — and he obeys, not because he may not refuse to obey if he chooses, but because he confides in the judgment of the phy- sician, and thinks that it is more to his benefit to be guided by the physician's judgment than by his own. But it will be said the physician cannot enforce his orders upon the patient against his will : neither I answer can the governor enforce his upon the public against theirs. No doubt Governors do sometimes so enforce them. What they do, however, and what they rightfully do, are separate considerations, and our business is only with the latter. Grotius argues that sovereign power may be possessed by governors, so that it shall not rightfully belong to the com- munity. He says, " From the Jewish as well as the Roman law it appears, that any one might engage himself in private servitude to whom he pleased. Now if an individual may do so, why may not a whole people, for the benefit of better government and more certain protection, completely transfer their sovereign rights to one or more persons without reserv- ing any portion to themselves ?"* I answer, no individual may do this : and, if he might, it would not serve the doc- trine in the case of nations. — It never can be right for a man to resign the absolute direction of his conduct to another, be- cause he must then do actions good or had as that other might command — ^hfe must lie, or rob, or assassinate ; and of this common sense would pronounce the impropriety, if the Moral Law did not. And if you say a man ought not so to resign himself to another, then I answer, he does not transfer sover- eign power but retains it himself — -which, in truth, ends the argument. But if the doctrine were sound for the individual, it is un- * Rights of War and Peace, b. 1. c. 3, s. 8. CHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 297 sound for a community. What is meant by the " transfer of their sovereign rights by a whole people V Is every man, woman, and child, in the country formally to sign the trans- fer ? If not, how shall a whole people transfer it ? At any rate, if they did, their resignation could not bind their chil- dren or successors. Besides, there is the same objection to this transfer of the sovereign power on the part of a nation as on the part of an individual. The thing is absurd in rea- son, and criminal in morals. Grotius illustrates his argument by " that authority to which a woman submits when she gives herself to her husband." But she does not submit to sovereign authority. He says again, " some powers are conferred for the sake of the gov- ernor, as the right of a master over a slave." But such pow- ers are hgygy justly conferred. After all, these arguments do but establish in reality, the fundamental position. They assume that a people can re- sign the sovereign power ; which is the same thing as to ac- knowledge that they rightfully possess it. Grotius himself says, " A state is a perfect body of free men, united together in order to enjoy common rights and advantages."* It gives some anxiety to the mind of the writer, lest the reader should identify his principles with those of many who have asserted the " sovereignty of the people." This doc- trine has been insisted upon by persons who have mingled with it, or deduced from it, principles which the writer not merely rejects, but abhors. A doctrine is not unsound be- cause it has been advocated or perverted by bad men ; and it is neither rational nor honest to reprobate a truth because it has been viciously associated. Gifford, in his life of Pitt, complains of Fox, who by " a strange perversion of terms, and a confusion of intellect that would have disgraced even a schoolboy, called his sovereign the servant of the people." " This," says Gifford, " was a servile imitation of the French regicides, and a direct encouragement to all the theoretical reveries of all the disaffected in England." This is the spe- cies of association which I would deprecate : French regi- cides taught the doctrine, and disaffected theorists taught it. I am sorry that a truth should be so connected ; but it is not the less a truth. The " confusion of intellect" of which Gifford speaks, probably subsisted more in the writer than in Fox — for reasons which the reader has just seen, and because the biographer had probably confounded the doctrine with the conduct of some who supported it. The reader should prac- * Rights of War and Peace. 29d PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [eSSAY III. tise a little of the power of abstraction, and detach accidental associations from truth itself. In reality, it cannot be asserted that the people do not right- fully possess the supreme power, without asserting that gov- ernors may do what they will, and be as tyrannical as they will. Who may prevent them ? The people 1 Then the people hold the sovereign power. Many political constitutions have existed in which the gov- ernor was held to be absolutely the supreme power. The antiquity of such constitutions, or the regular succession of the existing governor, does not make his pretensions to this power just, because the principles on which it is ascertained that the people are supreme, are antecedent to all questions of usage, and superior to them. No injustice, therefore, is done ' — nothing wrong is done — in diminishing or taking away the power of an absolute monarch, notwithstanding the regularity of his pretensions to it. Yet other principles have been held : and it was said of Louis the Sixteenth, that as he " was the sole maker and executor of the laws," and as this power " had been exercised by him and by his ancestors for centuries without question or control, it was not in the power of the states to deprive him of any portion of it without his own consent." So that we are told that many millions of persons ought to be subject for ever to the vices or caprices of one man, in compliment to the fact that their predecessors had been subject before them.* He who maintains such doc- trine, surely forgets for what purpose government is instituted a;t all. The rule that " Political Power is rightly possessed only when it is possessed by consent of the community," neces- sarily applies to the choice of the person who is to exercise it. No man, and no set of men, rightly govern unless they are preferred by the public to others. It is of no conse- quence that a people should formally select a president or a king. They continually act upon the principle without this. A people who are satisfied with their governor make, day by * We do not here defend the conduct of the states, or censure that of Xouis ; we speak merely of the poUtical Truth. That atrocious course of wickedness, the French Revohition, was occasioned by the abuses of the old government and its ramifications. The French people, unhap- pily, had neither virtue enough nor political knowledge enough, to reform these abuses by proper means. A revolution of some kind, and at some period, awaits, I doubt not, every despotic government in Europe and in the world. Happy will it be for those rulers who timely and wisely re- gard the irresistible progress of Public Opinion ! And happy for those communities which endeavour reformation only by virtuous means. CHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 29t day, the choice of which we speak. They prefer him to all others ; they choose to be served by him rather than by any other; and he, therefore, is virtually, though not formally, selected by the public. But, when we speak of the right of a particular person or family to govern a people, we speak, as of all other rights, in conditional langtiage. The right consists in the preference which is given to him ; and exists no longer than that preference exists. If any governor were fully conscious that the community preferred another man or another kind of government, he ought to regard himself in the light of an usurper if he nevertheless continues to retain his power. Not that every government ought to dissolve it- self, or every governor to abdicate his office, because there is a general but temporary clamour against it. This is one thing — the steady deliberate judgment of the people is an- other. Is it too much to hope that the time may come when governments will so habitually refer to the purposes of gov- ernment, and be regulated by them, that they will not even wish to hold the reins longer than the people desire it ; and that nothing more will be needed for a quiet alteration than that the public judgment should be quietly expressed ? Political revolutions are not often favourable to the accurate illustration of political truth ; because, such is the moral con- dition of mankind, that they have seldom acted in conformity with it. Revolutions have commonly been the effect of the triumph of a party, or of the successes of physical power. Yet, if the illustration of these principles has not been accurate, the general position of the right of the people to select their own rulers has often been illustrated. In our own country, when James 11. left the throne, the people filled it with an- other person, whose real title consisted in the choice of the people. James continued to talk of his rights to the crown ; but if William was preferred by the public, James was, what his son was afterwards called, a Pretender. The nonjurors appear to have acted upon erroneous principles, (except in- deed on the score of former oaths to James ; which, however, ought never to have been taken.) If we acquit them of mo- tives of party, they will appear to have entertained some no- tions of the rights of governors independently of the wishes of the people. At William's death, the nation preferred James's daughter to his son ; thus again elevating their judg- ments above all considerations of what the Pretender called his rights. Anne had then a right to the throne, and her . brother had not. At the death of Anne, or rather in contem- plation of her death, the public had again to select their 300 ^INCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [eSSAY III. governor ; and they chose, not the immediate representative of the old family, but the Elector of Hanover ; and it is in virtue of the same choice, tacitly expressed at the present hour, that the heir of the Elector now fills the throne. [The habitual consciousness on the part of a legislature, that its authority, is possessed in order to make it an efficient guardian and promoter of the general welfare and the general satisfaction, would induce a more mild and conciliating sys- tem of internal policy than that which frequently obtains. Whether it has arisen from habit resulting from the violent and imperious character of international policy, or from that tendency to unkindness and overbearing which the con- sciousness of power induces, it cannot be doubted that meas- ures of government are frequently adopted and conducted with such a high hand as impairs the satisfaction of the gov- erned, and diminishes, by example, that considerate attention to the claims of others, upon which much of the harmony, and therefore the happiness of society consists. Govern- ments are too much afraid of conciliation. They too habit- ually suppose that mildness or concession indicates want of courage or want of power — ^that it invites unreasonable de- mands, and encourages encroachment and violence on the part of the governed. Man is not so intractable a being, or so in- sensible of the influence of candour and justice. In private life, he does not the most easily guide the conduct of his neighbours, who assumes an imperious, but he who assumes a temperate and mild demeanour. The best mode of govern- ing, and the most powerful mode too, is to recommend state measures to the judgment and the affections of a people. If this had been sufficiently done in periods of tranquillity, some of those conflicts which have arisen between govern- ments and the people had doubtless been prevented ; and gov- ernments had been spared the mortification of conceding that to violence which they refused to concede in periods of quiet. We should not wait for times of agitation to do that which Fox advised even at such a time, because at other periods it may be done with greater advantage and with a better grace. " It may be asked," said Fox, " what I would propose to do in times of agitation like the present ? I will answer openly : —If there is a tendency in the Dissenters to discontent, what should I do ? I would instantly repeal the corporation and test acts, and take from them thereby all cause of complaint. If there were any persons tinctured with a republican spirit, I would endeavour to amend the representation of the Com- mons, and to prove that the House of Commons, though not CHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 301 chosen by all, should have no other interest than to prove it- self the representative of all. If men were dissatisfied on account of disabilities or exemptions, &c., I would repeal the penal statutes, which are a disgrace to our law-books. If there were other complaints of grievance, I would redress them where they were really proved ; but, above all, I would constantly, cheerfully , patiently listen ; I would make it known, that if any man felt, or thought he felt a grievance, he might come freely to the bar of this House and bring his proofs. And it should be made manifest to all the world that where they did exist they should be redressed ; where not, it should be made manifest."* We need not consider the particular examples and measures which the statesman instanced. The temper and spirit is the thing. A government should do that of which every per- son would see the propriety in a private man ; if misconduct was charged upon him, show that the charge was unfounded ; or, being substantiated, amend his conduct,] II. " POLITICAL POWER IS RIGHTLY EXERCISED ONLY WHEN IT SUBSERVES THE WELFARE OF THE COMMUNITY." This proposition is consequent of the truth of the last. The community, which has the right to withhold power, delegates it, of course, for its own advantage. If in any case its advan- tage is not consulted, then the object for which it was dele- gated is frustrated ; or, in simple words, the measure which does not promote the public welfare is not right. It matters nothing whether the community have delegated specifically so much power for such and such purposes ; the power, being possessed, entails the obligation. Whether a sovereign de- rives absolute authority by inheritance, or whether a president is entrusted with limited authority for a year, the principles of their duty are the same. The obligation to employ it only for the public good, is just as real and just as great in one case as in the other. The Russian and the Turk have the same right to require that the power of their rulers shall be so employed as the Englishman or American. They may not be able to assert this right, but that does not affect its existence nor the ruler's duty, nor his responsibility to that Almighty Being before whom he must give an account of his stewardship. These reasonings, if they needed confirmation, * Fell's Memoirs of the Public Life of C. J. Fox. 26 302 PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [esSAY III. derive it from the fact that the Deity imperatively requires us, according to our opportunities, to do good to man. But, how ready soever men are to admit the truth of this proposition, as a proposition, it is very commonly disregarded in practice ; and a vast variety of motives and objects direct the conduct of governments which have no connexion with the public weal. Some pretensions of consulting the public weal are, indeed, usual. It is not to be supposed that when public officers are pursuing their own schemes and interests, they will tell the people that they disregard theirs. When we look over the history of a Christian nation, it is found that a large proportion of these measures which are most promi- ment in it, had little tendency to subserve, and did not sub- serve the public good. In practice, it is very often forgotten for what purpose governments are instituted. If a man were to look over twenty treaties, he would probably find that a half of them had very little to do with the welfare of the re- spective communities. He might find a great deal about Charles's rights, and Frederick's honour, and Louis's posses- sions, and Francrs's interests, as if the proper subjects of in- ternational arrangements were those which respected rulers rather than communities. If a man looks over the state pa- pers which inform him of the origin of a war, he will probably find that they agitate questions about iMost Christian and Most Catholic Kings, and High Mightinesses, and Imperial Majes- ties — questions, however, in which Frenchmen, and Spaniards, and Dutch, and Austrians, are very little interested or con- cerned, or at any rate much less interested than they are in avoiding the quarrel. Governments commonly trouble themselves unnecessarily and too much with the politics of other, nations. A prince should turn his back towards other countries and his face towards his own — just as the proper place of a landholder is upon his own estates and not upon his neighbour's. If gov- ernments were wise, it would ere long be found that a great portion of the endless and wearisome succession of treaties, and remonstrances, and embassies, and alliances, and memo- rials, and subsidies, might be dispensed with, with so little inconvenience and so much benefit, that the world would wonder to think to what futile ends they had been busying, and how needlessly they had been injuring themselves. No doubt, the immoral and irrational system of international politics which generally obtains, makes the path of one gov- ernment more difficult than it would otherwise be ; and yet it is probable that the most efficacious way of inducing another CHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 303 government to attend to its proper business, would be to attend to our own. It is not sufficiently considered, nor indeed is it sufficiently known, how powerful is the influence of upright- ness and candour in conciliating the good opinion and the good offices of other men. Overreaching and chicanery in one person, induce overreaching and chicanery in another. Men distrust those whom they perceive to be unworthy of confidence. Real integrity is not without its voucher in the hearts of others ; and they who maintain it are treated with confidence, because it is seen that confidence can be safely reposed. Besides, he who busies himself with the politics of foreign ^countries, like the busy bodies in a petty commu- nity, does not fail to ofiend. In the last century, our own country was so much of a busy body, and had involved itself in such a multitude of treaties and alliances, that it was found, I believe, quite impossible to fulfil one, without, by that very act, violating another. This, of course, would oflfend. In private life, that man passes through the world with the least annoyance and the greatest satisfaction, who confines his at- tention to its proper business, that is, generally, to his own : and who can tell why the experience of nations should in this case be different from that of private men? In a rectified state of international affairs, half a dozen princes on a conti- nent would have little more occasion to meddle with one an- other than half a dozen neighbours in a street. But indeed, Communities frequently contribute to their own injury. If governors are ambitious, or resentful, or proud, so, often, are the people ; — and the public good has often been sacrificed by the public, with astonishing preposterousness, to jealousy or vexation. Some merchants are angry at the loss of a branch of trade ; they urge the government to inter- fere ; memorials and remonstrances follow to the state of whom they complain ; — and so, by that process of exaspera- tion which is quite natural when people think that high lan- guage and a high attitude is politic, the nations soon begin to fight. The merchants applaud the spirit of their rulers, while in one year they lose more by the war than they would have lost by the want of the trade for twenty ; and before peace returns, the nation has lost more than it would have lost by the continuance of the evil for twenty centuries. Peace at length arrives, and the government begins to devise means of repairing the mischiefs of the w^ar. Both government and people reflect very complacently on the wisdom of their mea- sures — ^forgetting that their conduct is only that of a man who 304 PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [eSSAY III. wantonly fractures his own leg with a club, and then boasts to his neighbours how dexterously he limps to a surgeon. Present expedients for present occasions, rather than a wide-embracing and far-seeing policy, is the great character- istic of European politics. We are hucksters who cannot resist the temptation of a present sixpence, rather than mer- chants who wait for their profits for the return of a fleet. Si quaeris monumentum, circumspice ! Look at the condition of either of the continental nations, and consider what it might have been if even a short line of princes had attended to their proper business — had directed their solicitude to the improve- ment of the moral, and social, and political condition of the people. Who has been more successful in this huckster policy than France ? and what is France, and what are the French people at the present hour ? — Why, as it respects real welfare, they are not merely surpassed, they are left at an immeasurable distance by a people who sprung up but as yesterday — by a people whose land, within the memory of our grandfathers, was almost a wilderness — and which actu- ally was a wilderness long since France boasted of her great- ness. Such results have a cause. It is not possible that systems of policy can be good, of which the effects are so bad. I speak not of particular measures, or of individual acts of ill policy — these are not likely to be the result of the con- dition of man — but of the whole international system ; a sys- tem of irritability, and haughtiness, and temporary expedients ; a system of most unphilosophical principles, and from which Christianity is practically almost excluded. Here is the evi- dence of fact before us. We %now what a sickening detail the history of Europe is ; and it is obvious to remark, that the system which has given rise to such a history must be vicious and mistaken in its fundamental principles. The same class of history will continue to after generations unless these principles are changed — unless philosophy and Christianity obtain a greater influence in the practice of government ; un- less, in a word, governments are content to do their proper business, and to leave that which is not their business undone. When such principles are acted upon, we may reasonably expect a rapid advancement in the whole condition of the world. Domestic measures which are now postponed to the more stirring occupations of legislators, will be found to be of incomparably greater importance than they. A wise code of criminal law, will be found to be of more consequence and interest than the acquisition of a million square miles of terri- tory: — a judicious encouragement of general education, will CHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 305 be of more value than all the " glory" that has been acquired from the days of Alfred till now. Of moral legislation, how- ever, it will be our after business to speak ; meanwhile the lover of mankind has some reason. for gratulation, in perceiv- ing indications that governments will hereafter direct their attention more to the objects for which they are invested with power. The statesman who promotes this improvement will be what many statesmen have been called — a great man. That government only is great which promotes the prosperity of its own people ; and that people only are prosperous, who are wise and happy. III. "POLITICAL POWER IS RIGHTLY EXERCISED ONLY WHEN IT SUBSERVES THE WELFARE OF THE COMMUNITY BY MEANS WHICH THE MORAL LAW PERMITS." It has been said by a Christian writer, that " the science of politics is but a particular application of that of morals ;" and it has been said by a writer who rejected Christianity, that " the morality that ought to govern the conduct of individ- uals and of nations, is in all cases the same." If there be truth in the principles which are advanced in the first of these Essays, these propositions are indisputably true. It is the chief purpose of the present work to enforce the supremacy of the Moral Law ; and to this supremacy there is no excep- tion in the case of nations. In the conduct of nations this supremacy is practically denied, although, perhaps, few of those who make it subservient to other purposes would deny it in terms. With their lips they honour the doctrine, but in their works they deny it. Such procedures must be expected to produce much self-contradiction, much vacillation between truth and the wish to disregard it, much vagueness of notions respecting political rectitude, and much casuistry to educe something like a justification of what cannot be justified. Let the reader observe an illustration : — A moral philosopher says, " The Christian principles of love, and forbearance, and kindness, strictly as they are to be observed between man and man, are to be observed with precisely the same strictness be- tween nation and nationP This is an unqualified assertion of the truth. But the writer thinks it would carry him too far, and so he makes exceptions. " In reducing to practice the Christian principles of forbearance, &;c., it will not be always feasible, nor always safe, to proceed to the same extent as in acting towards an individual." Let the reader exercise his 26* 306 PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [eSSAY III. skill in casuistry, by showing the difference between conform- ing to laws with " precise strictness," and conforming to them in their " full extent." — Thus far Christianity and Expediency are proposed as our joint governors. — We must observe the Moral Law, but still we must regulate our observance of it by considerations of what is feasible and safe. Presently after- wards, however, Christianity is quite dethroned, and we are to observe its laws only " so far as national ability and national security will permit."* — So that our rule of political conduct stands at length thus : obey Christianity with precise strictness ■ — when it suits your interests. The reasoning by which such doctrines are supported, is such as it might be expected to be. We are told of the " cau- tion requisite in affairs of such magnitude — the great uncer- tainty of the future conduct of the other nation" — and of " pa- triotism." — So that, because the affairs are of great magnitude, the laws of the Deity are not to be observed ! It is all very well, it seems, to observe them in little matters, but for our more important concerns we want rules commensurate with their dignity — we cannot then be bound by the laws of God ! The next reason is, that we cannot foresee " the future con- duct" of a nation. — Neither can we that of an individual. Besides this, inability to foresee inculcates the very lesson that we ought to observe the laws of Him who can foresee. It is a strange thing to urge the limitation of our powers of judgment, as a reason for substituting it for the judgment of Him whose powers are perfect. Then " patriotism" is a rea- son : and we are to be patriotic to our country at the expense of treason to our religion ! The principles upon which these reasonings are founded, lead to their legitimata results : " In war and negotiation," says Adam Smith, " the laws of justice are very seldom ob- served. Truth and fair dealing are almost totally disregarded. Treaties are violated, and the violation, if some advantage is gained by it, sheds scarce any dishonour upon the violator. The ambassador who dupes the minister of a foreign nation, is admired and applauded. The just man, the man who in all private transactions would be the most beloved and the most esteemed, in those public transactions is regarded as a fool and an idiot, who does not imderstand his business ; and he incurs always the contempt, and sometimes even the detes- tation, of his fellow citizens."! Now, against all such principles— against all endeavours to « * Gisborue's Moral Philosophy. t Theory of Moral Senti- ments. CHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 307 defend the rejection of the Moral Law in political affairs, we would with all emphasis protest. The reader sees that it is absurd : — can he need to be convinced that it is unchristian 1 Christianity is of paramount authority, or another authority is superior. He who holds another authority as superior, rejects Christianity ; and the fair and candid step would be avowedly to reject it. He should say, in distinct terms — Christianity throws some light on political principles ; but its laws are to be held subservient to our interests. This were far more sa- tisfactory than the trimming system, the perpetual vacillation of obedience to two masters, and the perpetual endeavour to do that which never can be done — serve both. Jesus Christ legislated for man — ^not for individuals only, not for families only, not for Christian churches only, but for man in all his relationships and in all his circumstances. He legislated for states. In his moral law we discover no indi- cations that states were exempted from its application, or that any rule which bound social did not bind political com- munities. If any exemption were designed, the onus probandi rests upon those who assert it : unless they can show that the Christian precepts are not intended to apply to nations, the conclusion must be admitted that they are. But in reality, to except nations from the obligations is impossible ; for nations are composed of individuals, and if no individual may reject the Christian morality, a nation may not. Unless, indeed, it can be shown that when you are an agent for others you may do what neither yourself nor any of them might do separately —a proposition of which certainly the proof must be required to be very clear and strong. But the truth is, that those who justify a suspension of Christian morality in political affairs, are often unwilling to reason distinctly and candidly upon the subject. They satisfy themselves with a jest, or a sneer, or a shrug ; being unwilling either to contemn morality in politics, or to practise it : and it is to little purpose to offer arguments to him who does not need conviction, but virtue. Expediency is the rock upon which we split — upon which, strange as it appears, not only our principles but our interests suffer continual shipwreck. It has been upon Expediency that European politics have so long been founded, with such lamentably inexpedient effects. We consult our interests so anxiously that we ruin them. But we consult them blindly : we do not know our interests, nor shall we ever know them whilst we continue to imagine that we know them better than He who legislated for the world. Here is the perpetual folly 308 PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL TRUTH, [eSSAY III. as well as the perpetual crime. Esteeming ourselves wise, we have, emphatically, been fools — of which no other evi- dence is necessary than the present political condition of the Christian world. If ever it was true of any human being, that by his deviations from rectitude he had provided scourges for himself, it is true at this hour of every nation in Europe. Let us attend to this declaration of a man who, whatever may have been the value of his general politics, was certainly a great statesman here : " I am one of those who firmly be- lieve, as much indeed as a man can believe any thing, that the greatest resource a nation can possess, the surest principle of power, is strict attention to the principles of justice. I firmly believe that the common proverb of honesty being the best policy, is as applicable to nations as to individuals." — ■ " In all interference with foreign nations justice is the best foundation of policy, and moderation is the surest pledge of peace." — " If therefore we have been deficient in justice to- wards other states, we have been deficient in wisdom."* Here, then, is the great truth for which we would contend — to be unjust is to be unwise. And smce justice is not im- posed upon nations more really than other branches of the Moral Law, the universal maxim is equally true — to deviate from purity of rectitude is impolitic as well as wrong. When will this truth be learnt and be acted upon 1 When shall we cast away the contrivances of a low and unworthy policy, and dare the venture of the consequences of virtue 1 When shall we, in political affairs, exercise a little of that confidence in the knowledge and protection of God, which we are ready to admire in individual life ? — Not that it is to be assumed as certain that such fidelity would cost nothing. Christianity makes no such promise. But whatever it might cost it would be worth the purchase. And neither reason nor experience allows the doubt that a faithful adherence to the Moral Law would more effectually serve national interests, than they have ever yet been served by the utmost sagacity whilst violating that law. The contrivances of expediency have become so habitual to measures of state, that it may probably be thought the dreamings of a visionary to suppose it possible that they should be substituted by purity of rectitude. And yet I be- lieve it will eventually be done — not perhaps by the resolution of a few cabinets — it is not from them that reformation is to be expected — ^but by the gradual advance of sound principles upon the minds of men ; — principles which will assume more * Fell's Memoirs of the Public Life of C. J. Fox. -. GHAP. I.] AND OF POLITICAL RECTITUDE. 309 and more their rightful influence in the world, until at length the low contrivances of a fluctuating and immoral policy will be substituted by firm, and consistent, and invariable integTity. The convention of what is called the Holy Alliance, was an extraordinary event ; and little as the contracting parties may have acted in conformity with it, and little as they or their people were prepared for such a change of principles, it is a subject of satisfaction that such a state paper exists. It contains a testimony at least to virtue and to rectitude ; and even if we should suppose it to be utterly hypocritical, the testimony is just as real. Hypocrisy commonly affects a character which it ought to maintain : and the act of hypoc- risy is homage to the character. In this view, I say, it is subject of some satisfaction that a document exists which de- clares that these powerful princes have come to a " fixed re- solution, both in the administration of their respective states, and in their political relations with every other government, to take for their sole guide the precepts of the Christian re- ligion — the precepts of Justice, Christian Charity, and Peace :" and which declares that these principles, " far from being ap- plicable only to private concerns, must have an immediate in- fluence on the councils of princes, as being the only means of consolidating human institutions, and remedying their im- perfections." The time, it may be hoped, will arrive when such a de- claration will be the congenial and natural result of princi- ples that are actually governing the Christian world. Mean- time, let the philosopher and the statesman keep that period in their view, and endeavour to accelerate its approach. He who does this, will secure a fame for himself that will in- crease and still increase as the virtue of man holds its onward course, while multitudes of the great both of past ages and of the present, will become beacons to warn, rather than ^ex- amples to stimulate us. 310; CIVIL LIBERTY. [eSSAY III. CHAPTER II. CIVIL LIBERTY. Loss of Liberty — ^War — Useless laws. Of personal liberty we say nothing, because its full posses- sion is incompatible with the existence of society. All gov- ernment supposes the relinquishment of a portion of personal liberty. Civil Liberty may, however, be fully enjoyed. It is en- joyed, where the principles of political truth and rectitude are applied in practice, because there the people are deprived of that portion only of liberty which it would be pernicious to them- selves to possess. If political power is possessed by consent of the community ; if it is exercised only for their good ; and if this welfare is consulted by Christian means, the people are free. No man can define the particular enjoyments or exemptions which constitute civil liberty, because they are contingent upon the circumstances of the respective nations. A degree of restraint may be necessary for the general wel- fare of one community, which would be wholly unnecessary in another. Yet the first would have no reason to complain of their want of civil liberty. The complaint, if any be made, should be of the evils which make the restraint necessary. The single question is, whether any given degree of restraint is necessary or not. If it is, though the restraint may be painful, the civil liberty of the community may be said to be complete. It is useless to say that it is less complete than that of another nation; for complete civil liberty is a re- lative and not a positive enjoyment. Were it otherwise, no people enjoy, or are likely for ages to enjoy full civil liberty ; because none enjoy so much that they could not, in a more virtuous state of mankind, enjoy more. " It is not the rigour, but the inexpediency of laws and acts of authority, which makes them tyrannical."* Civil liberty (so far as its present enjoyment goes) does not necessarily depend upon forms of government. All commu- nities enjoy it who are properly governed. It may be enjoy- ed under an absolute monarch ; as we know it may not be enjoyed under a republic. Actual, existing liberty, depends upon the actual, existing administration. One great cause of diminutions of civil liberty is War ; * Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil. p. 3, \ 6, c. 5. CHAP. II.] CIVIL LIBERTY. 311 and if no other motive induced a people jealously to scrutinize the grounds of a war, this might be sufficient. The increased loss of personal freedom to a military man is manifest ; — and it is considerable to other men. The man who now pays twenty pounds a-year in taxes, would probably have paid but two if there had been no war during the past century. If he now gets a hundred and fifty pounds a-year by his exer- tions, he is obliged to labour six weeks out of the fifty-tw,o, to pay the taxes which war has entailed. That is to say, he is compelled to work two hours every day longer than he him- self wishes, or than is needful for his support. This is a ma- terial deduction from personal liberty, and a man would feel it as such, if the coercion were directly applied — if an officer came to his house every afternoon at four o'clock, when he had finished his business, and obliged him, under penalty of a distraint, to work till six. It is some loss of liberty, again, to a man to be unable to open as many windows in his house as he pleases — or to be forbidden to acknowledge the receipt of a debt without going to the next town for a stamp — or to be obliged to ride in an uneasy carriage unless he will pay for springs. It were to no purpose to say he may pay for windows and springs if he will, and if he can. — A slave may, by the same reasoning, be shown to be free ; because, if he will and if he can, he may purchase his freedom. There is a loss of liberty in being obliged to submit to the alternative ; and we should feel it as a loss if such things were not habit- ual, and if we had not receded so considerably from the lib- erty of nature. A housewife on the Ohio would think it a strange invasion of her liberty, if she were told that hence- forth the police would be sent to her house to seize her goods if she made any more soap to wash her clothes. Now, indeed, that war has created a large public debt, it is necessary to the general good that its interest should be paid : and in this view a man's civil liberty is not encroached upon, though his personal liberty is diminished. The public wel- fare is consulted by the diminution. I may deplore the cause without complaining of the law. It may, upon emergency, be for the public good to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act. I- should lament that such a state of things existed, but I should not complain that civil liberty was invaded. The lesson which such considerations teach, is, jealous watchfulness against wars for the future. There are many other acts of governments by which civil liberty is needlessly curtailed — among which may be reckoned the number of laws. Every law implies restriction. To be 312 CIVIL LIBERTY. [eSSAY III. destitute of laws is to be absolutely free : to multiply laws is to multiply restrictions, or, which is the same thing, to dimin- ish liberty. A great number of penal statutes lately existed in this country, by which the reasonable proceedings of a prosecutor were cramped, and impeded, and thwarted. A statesman to whom England is much indebted, has supplied their place by one which is more rational and more simple ; and prosecutors now find that they are so much more able to consult their own understandings in their proceedings, that it may, without extravagance, be said, that our civil liberty is increased. " A law being found to produce no sensible good effects, is a sufficient reason for repealing it."* It is not, therefore, suf- ficient to ask in reply, what harm does the law occasion 1 for you must prove that it is does good : because all laws which do no good, do harm. They encroach upon or restrain the liberty of the community, without that reason which only can make the deduction of any portion of liberty right — the pub- lic good. If this rule were sufficiently attended to, perhaps more than a few of the laws of England would quickly be repealed. CHAPTER III. POLITICAL LIBERTY. Political Liberty the right of a community — Public satisfaction. This is, in strictness, a branch of civil liberty. Political liberty implies the existence of such political institutions as secure^ with the greatest practicable certainty, the future pos- session of freedom — the existence of which institutions is one of the requisites, in a general sense, of Civil liberty ; be- cause it is as necessary to proper government that securities for freedom should be framed, as that present freedom should be permitted. The possession of political liberty is of great importance. A Russian may enjoy as great a share of personal freedom as an Englishman ; that is, he may find as few restrictions upon the exercise of his own will; but he has no security for the * Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil, p 3, b. 6, c. 5. CHAP. III.] POLITICAL LIBERTY. 313 continuance of this. For aught that he knows, he may be arbitrarily thrown into prison to-morrow ; and therefore, though he may live and die without molestation, he is politically en- slaved. When it is considered how much human happiness depends upon the security of enjoying happiness in future, such institutions as those of Russia are great grievances ; and Englishmen, though they may regret the curtailment of some items of civil liberty, have much comparative reason to think themselves politically free. The possession of political liberty is unquestionably a right of a community. They may, with perfect reason require it even of governments which actually govern well. It is not enough for a government to say, none but beneficial laws and acts of authority are adopted. It must, if it would fulfil the duties of a government, accumulate, to the utmost, securities for beneficial measures hereafter. In this view, it may be feared that no government in Europe fulfils all its duty to the people. And here considerations are suggested respecting the repre- sentation oi a people — a point which, if some political writers were to be listened to, was a sine qua non of political liberty. " To talk of an abstract right of equal representation is absurd. It is to arrogate a right to one form of government, whereas Providence has accommodated the different forms of govern- ment to the different states of society in which they subsist."* If an inhabitant of Birmingham should come and tell me that he and his neighbours were debarred of political liberty be- cause they sent no representatives to parliament, I should say that the justness of his complaint was problematical. It does not follow because a man is not represented, that he is not politically free. The question is, whether as good securities for liberty exist, without permitting him to vote, as with it. If it can be shown that the present legislative government af- fords as good a security for the future freedom of the people as any other that might be devised, the inhabitant of Birming- ham enjoys, at present, political liberty. It is a very common mistake amongst writers to assume some particular privilege or institution as a test of this liberty — as something without which it cannot be enjoyed ; and yet I suppose there is no one of their institutions or privileges under which it would' not be possible to enslave a people. Simple republicanism, universal suffrage, and frequent elections, might afford no bet- ter security for civil liberty than absolute monarchy. In fine, poUtical liberty is not a matter that admits of certain conclu- * WiUiam Pitt: Gifford's Life, vol. 3. 27 314 REXIGIOUS LIBERTY. [eSSAY III. sionS from theoretical reasoning ; it is a question of facts ; a question to be decided, like questions of philosophy, by rea- soning founded upon experience. If the inhabitant of Bir- mingham can show, from relevant experience, good ground to conclude that greater security for liberty would be derived from extending the representation, he has reason to complain of an undue privation of political liberty if it is not extended. But, then, it is always incumbent upon the legislature to prove the probable superiority of the existing institutions when any considerable portion of the people desire an altera- tion. That desire constitutes a claim to investigation; and to an alteration, too, unless the existing institutions appear to be superior to those which are desired. It is not enough to show that they are as good ; for though in other respects the two plans were equally balanced, the present are not so good as the others if they give less satisfaction to the community. To be satisfied is one great ingredient in the welfare of a people ; and in whatever degree a people are not satisfied, in the same degree civil government does not perfectly effect its proper ends. To deny satisfaction to a people without show- ing a reason, is to withhold from them the due portion of civil liberty. CHAPTER IV. RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. Civil disabilities — Interference of the Magistrate — Pennsylvania — Tolera- tion — America — Creeds — Religious Tests — " The CathoLc Question." The magistrate may advert to subjects connected with re- ligion so far as the public good requires and as Christianity permits ; or, upon these, as upon other subjects, he may en- deavour to promote the welfare of the people by Christian means. What the public welfare does require, and what means for promoting it are Christian, are separate considerations. Upon which grounds those advocates of religious liberty appear to assert too much, who assert, as a fundamental prin- ciple, that a government never has, nor can have, any just concern, with religious opinions. Unless these persons can show that no advertence to them is allowed by Christianity CHAP. IV.] RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. SlS and that none can contribute to the public good, circumstances may arise in which an advertence would be right. No one perhaps will deny that a government may lawfully provide for the education of the people, and endeavour to diffuse just no- tions and principles, moral and religious, into the public mind. A government, therefore, may endeavour to discountenance unsound notions and principles. It may as reasonably dis- courage what is wrong, as cherish what is right. But by what means ? By influencing opinions, not by pun- ishing persons who hold them. When a man publishes a book or delivers a lecture for the purpose of enlightening the public mind, he does well. A government may take kindred measures for the same purpose, and it does well. But this is all. If our author or lecturer, finding his opinions were not accepted, should proceed to injure those who rejected them, he would act, not only irrationally but immorally. If a gov- ernment, finding its measures do not influence; or alter the views of the people, injures those who reject its sentiments, it acts immorally too. A man's opinions are not alterable at his own will ; and it is not right to injure a man for doing that which he cannot avoid. Besides, in religious matters especially, it is the Christian duty of a man, first, to seek truth ; and next, to adhere to those opinions which truth, as he believes, teaches. And so again, it is not right to injure a man for doing that which it is his duty to do. When, therefore, it is aflirmed, at the head of this chapter, that the magistrate may advert to subjects connected with religion, nothing more is to be understood than that he may endeavour to diffuse just sentiments, and to expose the contrary. To do more than this, although he may think his measures may promote the public welfare, would be to endeavour to promote it " by means which the Moral Ijaw forbids." To inflict civil disabilities is " to do more than this" — it is "to m/wre a man for doing that which he cannot avoid," and " that which it is his duty to do." Here, indeed, a sophism has been resorted to, in order to show that disabilities are not injuries. It is said of the Dissenters of this country, that no penalty is inflicted upon them by excluding them from offices — that the state confers certain offices upon certain conditions, with which conditions a dissenter does not comply. And it is said that this is no more a penalty or a hardship than, when the law defines what pecuniary qualifications capacitate a man for a seat in parliament, it inflicts a penalty upon those who do not possess them. I answer. Both are penalties and hard- ships — and that the argument only attempts to justify one ill 816 RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. [eSSAY. III. practice by the existence of another. It will be said that such regulations are necessary to the public good. — Bring the proof. Here is a certain restraint : " The proof of the advantage of a restraint," says Dr. Paley, " lies upon the legis- lature." Unless, therefore, you can show — what to me is extremely problematical — that the public is benefited by a law that excludes a poor man from the legislature — the argument wholly fails. Consider for what purpose men unite in society — " in order," says Grotius, " to enjoy common rights and advantages" — of which rights and advantages, eligibility to a representative body is one. Those principles of political rec- titude which determine that a law which needlessly restrains natural liberty is wrong, determine that a law which needlessly restrains the enjoyment of the privileges of society, is wrong also. It is therefore not true that a dissenter suffers no hard- ship or penalty on account of his opinions. The only dijOfer- ence between disabilities and ordinary penalties is this, that one inflicts evil, and the other withholds good ; and both are, to all intents and purposes, penalties. But even if the legislator thought he could show that the public were benefited by this penalty, upon conscientious dis- sidents, it would not be suflficient — for the penalty itself is wrong — it is not Christian ; and it is vain to argue that an unchristian act can be made lawful by prospects of advantage. Here, as every where else, we must maintain the supremacy of the Moral Law. All these reasonings proceed upon the supposition that a man does not, in consequence of his opinions, disturb the peace of society by any species of violence. If he does, he is doubtless to be restrained. It may not be more necessary for the magistrate to enquire what are a man's opinions of religion, than for a rider to enquire what are the cogitations of his horse. So long as my horse carries me well, it matters nothing to me whether he be thinking of safe paces, or of meadows and corn chests. So long as the welfare of the public is secured, it matters nothing to the magistrate what notion of Christianity a citizen accepts. But if my horse, in his anxiety to get into a meadow, leaps over a hedge, and im- pedes me in my journey, it is needful that I employ the whip and bridle : and if the citizen, in his zeal for opinions, violates the general good, it is needful that he should be punished or restrained. And even then, he is not restrained for his opin- ions but for his conduct ; just as I do not apply the whip to my horse because he loves a meadow, but because he goes out of the road. CHAP. IV.] RteLlGlOltS LlBERTi?". §1'}' And even in the case of conduct, it is needful to discrimin- ate, accurately, what is a proper subject of animadversion, and what is not. I perceive no truth in the ingenious argu- ment, " that a man may entertain opinions however pernicious, but he may not be allowed to disseminate them ; as a man may keep poison in his house, but may not be allowed to give it to others as wholesome medicine." To support this argu- ment you must have recourse to a petitio principii. How do you know that an opinion is pernicious ? By reasoning and examination, if at all ; and that is the very end which the dissemination of an opinion attains. If the truth or falsehood of an opinion were demonstrable to the senses, as the mis- chief of poison is, there would be some justness in the argu- ment ; but it is not : except, indeed, that there may be opin- ions so monstrous, that they immediately manifest their unsoundness by their effects on the conduct ; and, if they do this, these effects and not the dissemination of the opinion, are the proper subject of animadversion. The doctrine, that a man ought not to be punished for disseminating whatever opinions he pleases, upon whatever subject, will receive some illustration in a future chapter. Meantime, the reader will, I hope, be prepared to admit, at least, that the religious opin- ions which obtain amongst Christian churches, are not such as to warrant the magistrate in visiting those who disseminate them with any kind of penalty. — What the magistrate may punish, and what an individual ought to do, are very different considerations : and though there is reason to think that no man should be punished by human laws for disseminating vicious notions, it is to be believed that those who consciously do it will be held far other than innocent at the bar of God. All reference to creeds in framing laws for a general society is wrong. And it is somewhat humiliating that, in the pres- ent age, and in our country, it is necessary to establish this proposition by formal proof. It is humiliating, because it shows us how slow is the progress of sound principles upon the human mind, even when they are not only recommended by reason, but enforced by experience. It is now nearly a century and a half since one of our own colonies adopted a system of religious liberty, which far surpassed that of the parent state at the present hour. And this system was suc- cessful, not negatively, in that it produced no evil, but posi- tively, in that it produced much good. One hundred and fifty years is a long time for a nation to be learning a short and plain lesson. In Pennsylvania, in addition to a complete tol- eration of " Jews, Turks, Catholics, and people of all persua^ 27* $^t% RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. [eSSAY Hi. sions in religion,"* there was no disability or test exacted of any professor of the Christian faith. " All persons," says Burke, " who profess to believe in one God, are freely toler- ated. Those who believe in Jesus Christ, of whatever de- nomination, are not excluded from employments and posts."! The wisdom or justice of excluding those who were not Christians from employments and posts may be doubted Penn, however, did much ; and far outstripped in enlightened institutions the general example of the world. If he had lived in the present day, it is not improbable that a mind like his would have seen no better reason for excluding those who disbelieved Christianity, than those who believed it imper- fectly or by parts. The consequences, we say, were happy. Burke says again of Penn, " He made the most perfect free- dom, both religious and civil, the basis of his establishment ; and this has done more towards the settling of the province, and towards the settling of it in a strong and permanent man- ner, than the wisest regulations could have done on any other plan."J — " By the favourable terms," says Morse, " which Mr. Penn oiEfered to settlers, and an unlimited toleration of all religious denominations, the population of the province was extremely rapid. "<^ And yet England is, at this present hour, doubting and disputing whether tests are right ! Nor is example wanted at the present day — " In America, the question is not, What is his creed ? but, What is his con- duct ? Jews have all the privileges of Christians — No reli- gious test is required to qualify for public office ; except in some cases, a mere verbal assent to the truth of the Christian religion. While I was in New York," adds Duncan, " the sheriff of the city was a Jew."|| It is in vain to make any objection to the argument which these facts urge, unless we can show that the effect is not good. And where is the man who will even affect to do this ? But if it should be said that what is wise and expedient with such national institutions as those of America, would be unwise and inexpedient with such institutions as those of England or Spain, it will become a most grave enquiry, whether the fault does not lie with the institutions that are not adapted to religious liberty : — for re- ligious liberty is assuredly adapted to man. Observe what absurdities this sacrifice of universal rectitude to particular institutions occasions. There may be ten na- * Clarkson's Life of Penn. t Account of the European Settlements in America. t Ibid. § American Geography. See also Anderson's Deduction of the Origin of Commerce, U Duncan's travels in America. CHAP. IV.] RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 319 tions on a continent, each of which selects a different creed for its preference, and excludes all others. The first excludes all but Catholics — the second all but Episcopalians — ^the third all but Unitarians — the fourth all but the Greek Church ; and so on with the rest. If it be right that Unitarians should be intrusted with power on one side of a river, can it be right that they shall not be intrusted with it on the other ? Or, if such an absurdity be really conducive to the support of the incongnious institutions of the several states, is it not an evi- dence that those institutions need to be amended ? And are not the principles of perfect religious liberty, nevertheless, sound and true ? Englishmen have not to complain of a want of Toleration. But toleration is a word which ought scarcely to be heard out of a Christian's mouth. 1 tolerate the religion of my brother ! I miffht as well say I tolerate the continuance of his head upon his shoulders. I have no more right to hold his creed at my disposal, or his person in consequence of his creed, than his h . ■. The idea of toleration is a relic of the effects of the papal usurpation. That usurpation did not tolerate : and Pro- testants thought it was a great thing for them to do what the papacy had thus refused. And so it was. It was a great ihingfor them. Very imperfectly, however, they did it ; and it was a great thing for Penn, who was brought up in a land of intolerant Protestants, to declare universal toleration for all within his borders. But — (and we may reverently say, Thanks be to God I) — we live in happier times. We have advanced from intolerance to toleration ; and now it is time to advance from toleration to Religious Liberty : to that religious liberty which excludes all reference to creeds from the civil institutions of a people. The reader will perhaps have observed, that Religious Liberty and Religious Establishments are incompatible things. An establishment presupposes incomplete religions liberty. If an Establishment be right. Religious Liberty is not ; and if Religious Liberty be right, an Establishment is not. Dif- ferently constituted religious establishments may, no doubt, impose greater or less restraint upon liberty ; but every idea of an establisliment — of a church preferred by the state — im- poses some restraint. It is the same with Tests. A test, of some kind, is necessary to a church thus preferred by the state ; for how else shall it be known who is a member of that church and who is not ? Religious Liberty is incompatible with Religious Tests : for which reason again, all arguments 320 RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. [ESSAY 111. by which this liberty is shown to be right, are so many proofs that religious tests are wrong. These considerations the reader will be pleased to bear in mind, when he considers the question of Religious Establishments. Tests are snares for the conscience. If their terms are so loose that any man can take them with a safe conscience, they are not tests. If their terms are definite, they make many hypocrites. Men are induced to assent, or subscribe, or perform (whatever the requisitions of the test may be) against their consciences, in order to obtain the advantages which are contingent upon it. An attempt was once made in England to introduce an unexceptionable test, by which the party was to declare " that the books of the Old and New Testament contained, in his opinion a revelation from God." But whom did this exclude ? Perhaps Deists, Mahometans, Pagans, Jews. But, as a snare, the operation was serious ; for, simple as the test appears, it was liable to great uncer- tainty of meaning. Did it mean that all the books contained a revelation 1 Then some think that all the books rro not authentic. Did it mean that there was a revelation in some of the books of the Bible ? Then Jews, Mahometans, Pa- gans, and some Deists might, for aught that I know, conscien- tiously take it. No unexceptionable test is possible. There are, to be sure, gradations of impropriety ; and in England we have not always resorted to the least objectionable. It was well observed by Charles James Fox, that " the idea of making a religious rite the qualification for holding a civil em- ployment is more than absurd, and deserves to be considered as a profanation of a sacred institution." A few, and only a few, sentences, will be allowed to the writer upon the great, the very great question, of extending religious liberty to the Catholics of these kingdoms. I call it a very great question, not because of the difficulty of deci- ding it, if sound principles are applied, but because of the magnitude of the interests that are involved, and of the con- sequences which may follow if those principles are not ap- plied. The reader will easily perceive, from the preceding contents of this chapter, the writer's conviction, that full Re- ligious Liberty ought to be extended to the Catholics, because it ought to be extended to all men. If a Catholic acts in op- position to the public welfare, diminish or take away his freedom ; if he only thinks amiss, let him enjoy his freedom undiminished. To this I know of but one objection that is worth noticing CHAP. IV.] RELIGIOITS LIBERTY. 31^1 here — that they are harmless only because they have not the- power of doing mischief, and that they wait only for the power ta begin to do it. But they say, " This is not the case — we have no such intentions." Now, in all reason, you must believe them, or show that they are unworthy of belief. If you be- lieve them, Religious Liberty follows of course. Can you then show that they are unworthy of belief ? Where is your evidence ? You say, their allegiance is divided between the king and a foreign power. They reply, " It is not ;" " We hold our- selves bound in conscience, to obey the civil government in all things of a temporal and civil nature, notwithstanding any dispensation to the contrary, from the Pope or Church of Rome." You say their declarations and oaths do not bind them, be- cause they hold that they can be dispensed from the obligation of all oaths by the Pope. — They reply, " We do not ;" " We hold that the obligation of an oath is most sacred ; that no power whatsoever can dispense with any oath, by which a Catholic has confirmed his duty of allegiance to his sovereign, or any obligation of duty to a third person." You say, they hold that faith is not to be kept with heretics. —They reply, " We do not:' " British Catholics," say they, " have solemnly sworn that they reject and detest that unchris- tian and impious principle, that faith is not to be kept with heretics or infidels." These declarations are taken from a " Declaration of the Catholic Bishops, the Vicars Apostolic, their coadjutors in Great Britain," 1825. They are signed by the Catholic Bishops of Great Britain, and are approved in an " address" signed by eight Catholic Peers and a large number of other persons of rank and character. Now I ask of those who contend for the Catholic disabil- ities, What proof do you bring that these men are trying to deceive you ? I can anticipate no answer, because I have heard none. Will you, then, content yourselves by saying, We will not believe them ? This would be at least the can- did course, and the world might then perceive that our conduct was regulated not by reason, but by prejudice or the con- sciousness of power. " It is unwarrantable to infer, a priori, and contrary to the professions and declarations of the per- sons holding such opinions, that their opinions would induce acts injurious to the common weal."* But if nothing can be said to show that the Catholic de- clarations do not bind them, something can be said to show * C. J. Fox: Gifford's Life of Pitt, vol. 2. 322 CIVIL OBEDIENCE. [^SSAY III. that they do. If declarations be indeed so little binding upon their consciences, how comes it to pass that they do not make those declarations which would remove their disabilities, get a dispensation from the Pope, and so enjoy both the privileges and an easy conscience ? Why, if their oaths and declara- tions did not bind them, they would get rid of their disabil- ities to-morrow ! Nothing is wanting but a few hypocritical declarations, and Catholic Emancipation is effected. Why do they not make these declarations ? Because their loords hind them. And yet, (so gross is the absurdity,) although it is their conscientiousness which keeps them out of office, we say they are to be kept out because they are not conscien- tious ! I forbear further inquiry : but I could not, with satisfaction, avoid applying what I conceive to be the sound principles of Political Rectitude to this great question ; and let no man allow his prejudices or his fears to prevent him from applying them to this, as to every other political subject. Justice and Truth are not to be sacrificed to our weaknesses and appre- hensions ; and I believe, that if the people and legislature of this country will adhere to justice and truth with regard to our Catholic brethren, they will find, erelong, that they have only been delaying the welfare of the Empire. CHAPTER V. CIVIL OBEDIENCE. Expediency of Obedience — Obligations to Obedience — Extent of the Duty — Resistance to the Civil Power — Obedience may be withdrawn — King James — America — Non-compliance — Interference of the Ma- gistrate — Oaths of Allegiance. Submission to Government is involved in the very idea of the institution. None can govern, if none submit : and hence is derived the duty of submission, so far as it is independent of Christianity. Government being necessary to the good of society, submission is necessary also, and therefore it is right This duty is enforced with great distinctness by Christian- ity — " Be subject to principalities and powers." — " Obey ma- gistrates." — " Submit to every ordinance of man." — The great CHAP, v.] CIVIL OBEDIENCE. 323 question, therefore, is, whether the duty be absolute and un- conditional ; and if not, what are its limits, and how are they to be ascertained ? The law of nature proposes few motives to obedience ex- cept those which are dictated by expediency. The object of instituting goverimient being the good of the governed, any means of attaining that object is, in the view of natural reason, right. So that, if in any case a government does not effect its proper objects, it may not only be exchanged, but exchanged by any means which will tend on the whole to the public good. Resistance — arms — civil war — every act is, in the view of natural reason, lawful if it is useful. But although good government is the right of the people, it is, nevertheless, not sufficient to release a subject from the obligation of obe- dience, that a government adopts some measures which he thinks are not conducive to the general good. A wise pagan would not limit his obedience to those measures in which a government acted expediently ; because it is often better for the community that some acts of misgovernment should be borne, than that the general system ot obedience should be violated. It is, as a general rule, more necessary to the wel- fare of a people that governments should be regula,rly obeyed, than that each of their measures should be good and right. In practice, therefore, even considerations of Utility are suf- ficient, generally, to oblige us to submit to the Civil power. When we turn from the law of nature to Christianity, we find, as we are wont, that the moral cord is tightened, and that not every means of opposing governments for the public good is permitted to us. The consideration of what modes of opposition Christianity allows, and what it forbids, is of great interest and importance. " Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God : the powers that be are or- dained of God. Whosoever, therefore, resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. He is the minister of God to thee for good — a revenger, to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore, ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake."* — Upon this often cited and often canvassed passage, three things are to be ob- served : — 1. That it asserts the general duty of Civil obedience, be- cause govenmient is an institution sanctioned by the Deity. * Rom. xiii. 1 to 5. 324 CIVIL OBEDIENCE. [ESSAY III. 2. That it asserts this duty under the supposition th.3.t the governor is a minister of God for good. 3. That it gives but little other information respecting the extent of the duty of obedience. I. The obligation to obedience is not founded, therefore, simply upon expediency, but upon the more satisfactory and certain ground, the expressed will of God. And here the su- periority of this motive over that of fear of the magistrate's power, is manifest. We are to be subject, not only for wrath, but for conscience' sake — not only out of fear of man, but out of fidelity to God. This motive, where it operates, is likely, as was observed in the first Essay, to produce much more consistent and conscientious obedience than that of expedi- ency or fear. II. The duty is inculcated under the supposition that the governor is a minister for good. It is upon this supposition that the apostle proceeds : "ybr rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil ;" which is tantamount to saying, that if they be not a terror to evil works but to good, the duty of obedience is altered. " The power that is of God" says an intelligent and Christian writer, " leaves neither ruler nor sub- ject to the liberty of his own will, but limits both to the will of God ; so that the magistrate hath no power to command evil to be done because he is a magistrate, and the subject hath no liberty to do evil because a magistrate doth command it."* When, therefore, the Christian teacher says, " Let every soul be subject to the higher powers," he proposes not an absolute but a conditional rule — conditional upon the nature of the actions which the higher powers require. The expres- sion, " There is no power but of God," does not invalidate this conclusion, because the Apostles themselves did not yield unconditional obedience to the powers that were. Simi- lar observations apply to the parallel passage in 1st Peter: " Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake ; whether it be to the king as supreme, or unto governors ?s unto them that are sent by him, for the punishment of evil doers and for the praise of them that do well." The supposi- tion of the just exercise of power is still kept in view. III. The precepts give little other information than this re- specting the extent of the duty of obedience. " Whosoever resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God," is, like the direction, to " be subject," a conditional proposition. What precise meaning was here attached to the word " resisteth,'* * Crisp : " To the Rulers and Inhabitants in Holland, &c. Abt. Ann. 1670, CHAP, v.] CIVIL OBEDIENCE. 32$ cannot perhaps be known ; but there is reason to think that the meaning was not designed to be precise — that the propo- sition was general. " Magistrates are not to be resisted," without defining, or attempting to define, the limits of civil obedience. Upon the whole, this often agitated portion of the Christian Scriptures does not appear to me to convey much information respecting the duties of civil obedience ; and although it ex- plicitly asserts the general duty of obedience to the magistrate, it does not inform us how far that duty extends, nor what are its limits. To say this, however, is a very different thing from saying, with Dr. Paley, that " As to the extent of our civil rights and obligations, Christianity hath left us where she found us ; that she hath neither altered nor ascertained it ; that the New Testament contains not one passage, which, fairly interpreted, affords either argument or objection applicable to any conclusions upon the subject that are deduced from the law and religion of nature." * Although the 13th chapter to the Romans may contain no such passage, yet I think it can be shown that the New Testament does. Indeed, it would be a strange thing if the Christian Scriptures, containing as they do manifold precepts for the regulation of human conduct, manifold precepts, of which the application is very wide, not to say universal — it would, I say, be a strange thing if none of these precepts threw any light upon duties of such wide em- brace as those of citizens in relation to governors. The error (assuming that there is an error) in the statement of Dr. Paley, results, probably, from the supposition, that be- cause no passage specifically directed to civil obedience, con- tained the rules in question, therefore no rules were to be found in the volume. This is an error of every day. There are numberless questions of duty which Christianity decides, yet respecting which, specifically, not a word is to be found in the New Testament. These questions are decided by general principles, which principles are distinctly laid down. These three words, " Love your enemies," are of greater practical application in the affairs of life, than twenty propositions which define exact duties in specific cases. It is for these exact definitions that men accustom themselves to seek ; and when they are not to be found, conclude that Christianity gives no directions upon the subject. Thus it has happened with the question of Civil Obedience. Now, in considering the general principles of Christianity, I think very satisfactory knowledge may be deduced respecting * Mor. and Pol. PhU. b. 6, c. 4. 28 326 ci:kil obedience. [EssAr ui. resistance to the civil power. Those precepts to forbearance, to gentleness, to love, to mildness, which are .iterated as the essence of the Christian morality, apply, surely, to the ques- tion of resistance. Surely there may be some degrees and kinds of resistance, which, being incompatible with the ob- servance of these principles, Christianity distinctly forbids. — If indeed the reader has given assent to our reasonings re- specting self-defence, (especially if he shall give his assent to the reasonings on War,) he will readily admit that Christi- anity forbids an armed resistance to the civil power. Let me be distinctly understood. It forbids this armed resistance, not in as much as it is directed to the civil power, but in as much as such violence to any power is incompatible with the purity of the Christian character. Concluding, then, that specific rules respecting the extent of Civil Obedience are not to be found in Scripture, we are brought to the position, that we must ascertain this extent by the general duties which Christianity imposes upon mankind, and by the general principles of political Truth. In attempt- ing, upon these grounds, to illustrate our civil duties, I am so- licitous to remark that the Individual Christian who, regard- ing himself as a journeyer to a better country, thinks it best for him not to intermeddle in political affairs, may rightly pursue a path of simpler submission and acquiescence than that which I believe Christianity allows. Whatever may be the peculiar business of individuals, the business of man is to act as the Christian citizen — not merely to prepare himself for another world, but to do such good as he may, political as well as social, in the present. And yet so fundamenially, so utterly incongruous with Christian rectitude, is the state of many branches of political affairs in the present day, that I know not whether he who is solicitous to adhere to this rec- titude is not both wise and riorht in standing aloof. This con- sideration applies, especially, to circumstances in which the limits of Civil Obedience are brought into practical illustra- tions. The tumult and violence which ordinarily attend any approach to political revolutions are such, that the best and proper office of a good man may be rather that of a modera- tor of both parties than of a partisan with either. — Neverthe- less, it is fit that the Obligations of Civil Obedience should be distinctly understood. Referring, then, to political truth, it is to be remembered vhat governors are established, not for their own advantage, Sut for the people's. If they so far disregard this object of heir establishment, as greatly to sacrifice the public welfare, CHAP, v.] CIVIL OBEDIENCE. 32'? the people (and consequently individuals) may rightly consider whether a change of governors is not dictated by utility ; and if it is, they may rightly endeavour to effect such a change by recommending it to the public, and by transferring their obedience to those w^ho, there is reason to believe, will better execute the offices for which government is instituted. I per- ceive nothing unchristian in this. A nian who lived in 1688, and was convinced that it was for the general good that Wil- liam should be placed on the throne instead of James, was at liberty to promote, by all Christian means, the accession of William, and consequently to withdraw his own, and to re- commend others to withdraw their obedience, from James. The support of the Bill of Exclusion in Charles the Second's reign, was nearly allied to a withdrawing of civil obedience. The Christian of that day who was persuaded that the bill would tend to the public welfare, was right in supporting it, and he would have been equally right in continuing his sup- port if Charles had suddenly died, and his brother had sud- denly stepped into the throne. If I had lived in America fifty years ago, and had thought the disobedience of the colo- nies wrong, and that the whole empire would be injured by their separation from England, I should have thought my- self at liberty to urge these considerations upon other n>en, and otherwise to exert myself (always within the limits of Christian conduct) to support the British cause. I might, in- deed, have thought that there was so much violence and wickedness on both sides, that the Christian could take part with neither : but this is an accidental connexion, and in no degree affects the principle itself. But when the colonies were actually separated from Britain, and it was manifestly the general will to be independent, I should have readily transferred my obedience to the United States, convinced that the new government was preferred by the people ; that, therefore, it was the rightful government ; and, being such, that it was my Christian duty to obey it. Now the lawful means of discouraging or prompting an al- teration of a government, must be determined by the general duties of Christian morality. There is, as we have seen, nothing in political affairs which conveys a privilege to throw off the Christian character ; and whatever species of opposi- tion or support involves a sacrifice or suspension of this character, is, for that reason, wrong. Clamorous and vehe- ment debatings and harangues — vituperation and calumny — acts of bloodshed and violence, or instigations to such acts, are, I think, measures in which the first teachers of Christianity 3^6 CIVIL OBEDIENCE. [eSSAY III would not have participated ; measures which would have violated their own precepts ; and measures, therefore, which a Christian is not at liberty to pursue. Objections to these sentiments will no doubt be at hand : we shall be told that such opposition would be ineffectual against the encroach- ments of power and the armies of tyranny — that it would be to no purpose to reason with a general who had orders to en- force obedience ; and that the nature of the power to be over- come, dictated the necessity of corresponding power to over- come it. To all which it is, in the first place, a sufficient answer, that the question is not what evils may ensue from an adherence to Christianity, but what Christianity requires. We renew the oft-repeated truth, that Christian rectitude is paramount. When the finst Christians refused obedience to some of the existing authorities — they did not resist. They exemplified their own precepts — to prefer the will of God be- fore all ; and if this preference subjected them to evils — ^to bear them without violating other portions of His Will in order to ward them off. But if resistance to the civil power was thus unlawful when the magistrate commanded actions that were morally wrong, much more clearly is it unlawful, when the wrongness consists only in political grievances. The incon- veniences of bad governments cannot constitute a superior reason for violence, to that which is constituted by the impo- sition of laws that are contrary to the laws of God. And if any one should insist upon the magnitude of political griev ances, the answer is at hand — these evils cannot cost more to the community as a state, than the other class of evils costs to the individual as a man. If fidelity is required in private life, through whatever con sequences, it is required also in public. The national suffer- ing can never be so great as the individual may be. The in- dividual may lose his life for his fidelity, but there is no such thing as a national martyrdom. Besides it is by no means certain that Christian opposition to mis-government would be so ineffectual as is supposed. Nothing is so invincible as de- terminate non-compliance. He that resists by force, may be overcome by greater force ; but nothing can overcome a calm and fixed determination not to obey. Violence might, no doubt, slaughter those who practised it, but it were an un- usual ferocity to destroy such persons in cool malignity. In such enquiries we forget how much difficulty we entail upon ourselves. A rej;iment which, after endeavouring to the ut- termost to destroy its enemies, refuses to yield, is in circum- stances totally dissimilar to that which our reasonings sup CHAP, v.] CIVIL OBEDlENCi!. ^ 32d pose. Such a regiment might be cut to pieces ; but it would be, I beheve, a " new thing under the sun," to go on slaughter- ing a people, of whom it was known not only that they had committed no violence, but that they would commit none. Refer again to America : The Americans thought that it was best for the general welfare that they should be inde- pendent, but England persisted in imposing the tax. Imagine, then, America to have acted upon Christian principles, and to have refused to pay it, but without those acts of exasperation and violence which they committed. England might have sent a fleet and an army. To what purpose 1 Still no one paid the tax. The soldiery perhaps sometimes committed outrages, and they seized goods instead of the impost : still the tax could not be collected, except by a system of univer- sal distraint. — Does any man who employs his reason, believe that England would have overcome such a people ? does he believe that any government, or any army would have gone on destroying them ? especially does he believe this, if the Americans continually reasoned coolly and honourably with the other party, and manifested, by the unequivocal language of conduct, that they were actuated by reason and by Chris- tian rectitude ? No nation exists which would go on slaugh- tering such a people. It is not in human nature to do such things ; and I am persuaded not only that American independ- ence would have been secured, but that very far fewer of the Americans would have been destroyed : that very much less of devastation and misery would have been occasioned if they had acted upon these principles instead of upon the vulgar system of exasperation and violence. In a word, they would have attained the same advantage with more virtue, and at less cost. — With respect to those voluble reasoners who tell us of meanness of spirit, of pusillanimous submission, of base crouching before tyranny, and the like, it may be observed that they do not know what mental greatness is. Courage is not indicated most unequivocally by wearing swords or by wielding them. Many who have courage enough to take up arms against a bad government, have not courage enough to resist it by the unbending firmness of the mind — to maintain a tranquil fidelity to virtue in opposition to power ; or to en- dure with serenity the consequences which may follow. The Reformation prospered more by the resolute non-com- pliance of its supporters, than if all of them had provided themselves with swords and pistols. The most severely per- secuted body of Christians which this country has in later ages seen, was a body who never raised the arm of resistance. 28* 330 CIVIL OBEDIENCE, [eSSAY Ut, They wore out that iron rod of oppression which the attri- tion of violence might have whetted into a weapon that would have cut them off from the earth, and they now reap the fair fruit of their principles in the enjoyment of privileges from which others are still debarred. There is one class of cases in which obedience is to be refused to the civil power without any view to an alteration of existing institutions — that is, when the magistrate com- mands that which it would be imm.oral to obey. What is wrong for the Christian is wrong for the subject. " All hu- man authority ceases at the point where obedience becomes criminal." Of this point of criminality every man must judge ultimately for himself; for the opinion of another ought not to make him obey when he thinks it is criminal, nor to refuse obedience when he thinks it is lawful. Some even appear to think that the nature of actions is altered by the command of the state ; that what would be unlawful without its command is lawful with it. This notion is founded upon indistinct views of the extent of civil authority ; for this au- thority can never be so great as that of the Deity, and it is the Deity who requires us not to do evil. The Protestant would not think himself obliged to obey if the state should require him to acknowledge the authority of the Pope ; and why ? Because he thinks it would be inconsistent with the Divine Will ; and this precisely is the reason why he should refuse obedience in other cases. He cannot rationally make distinctions, and say, " I ought to refuse obedience in ac- knowledging the Pope, but I ought to obey in becoming the agent of injustice or oppression." If I had been a French- man, and had been ordered, probably at the instigation of some courtezan, to immure a man, whom I knew to be inno- cent, in the Bastile, I should have refused ; for it never can be right to be the active agent of such iniquity. Under an enlightened and lenient government like our own, the cases are not numerous in which the Christian is ex- empted from the obligation to obedience. When, a century or two ago, persecuting acts were passed against some Chris- tian communities, the members of these communities were not merely at liberty, they were required to disobey them. One act imposed a fine of twenty pounds a-month for absenting one's self from a prescribed form of worsliip. He who thought that form less acceptable to the Supreme B^ing than another, ought to absent himself notwithstanding the law. So when in the present day, a Christian thinks the profession of arms, or the payment of preachers whom he disapproves, is CHAP, v.] CIVIL OBEDIENCE. 331 xiorong, lie ought, notwithstanding any laws, to decline to pay the money or to bear the arms. Illegal commands do not appear to carry any obligation to obedience. Thus, when the Apostles had been " beaten openly and uncondemned, being Romans," they did not regard the directions of the magistracy to leave the prison, but as- serted their right to legal justice, by making the magistrates " come themselves and fetch them out." When Charles I. made his demands of supplies upon his own illegal authority, I should have thought myself at liberty to refuse to pay them. This were not a disobedience to government. Government was broken. One of its constituent parts refused to impose the tax, and one imposed it. I might, indeed, have held my- self in doubt whether Charles constituted the government or not. If the people had thought it best to choose him alone for their ruler, he constituted the government, and his demand would have been legal ; for a law is but the voice of that governing power whom the people prefer. As it was, the people did not choose such a government : the demand was illegal, and might therefore be refused. Promises or Oaths of Allegiance to Governors do not ap- pear easily reconcilable with political reason. Promises are made for the advantage or security of the imposer ; and to make them to governors seems an inversion of the order which just principles would prescribe. The security should be given by the employed party, not by the employer. A com- munity should not be bound to obey any given officer whom they employ ; because they may find occasion to exchange him for another. Men do not swear fidelity to their represent- atives in the senate. Promising fidelity to the state may ap- pear exempt from these objections, but the promise is likely to be of little avail ; for what is the state ? or how is its will to be discovered but by the voice of the governing power ? To promise fidelity to the state is not very dififerent from promising it to a governor. If it be said that promises of allegiance may be useful in periods of confusion, or when the public mind is divided re- specting the choice of governors, such a period is peculiarly unfit for promising allegiance to one. The greater the insta- bility of an existing government, the greater the unreason- ableness of exacting an oath. If an oath should maintain a tottering government against the public mind, it does mischief, and if a government is secure, an oath is not needed. The sequestered ministers in the time of Charles II., were 332 CIVIL OBEDIENCE. [£sSAt III. required to take an oath, " declaring that they would not at any time endeavour an alteration in the government of the church or state."* One reason of their ejection was, that they would not declare their assent to every thing in the Book of Common Prayer. Why should these persons be required to promise not to endeavour an alteration in Church Govern- ment, when, probably, some of them thought the endeavour formed a part of their Christian duty ? Upon similar grounds it may be doubted whether the Roman Catholics of our day ought to declare as they do, that they will not endeavour any alteration in the religious establishments of the country. To promise this without limitation is surely promising more than a person who disapproves that establishment ought to promise. The very essence of peculiar religious systems tends to the alteration of all others. He who preaches the Romish creed and practice, does practically oppose the Church of England, and practically endeavour an alteration in it. And if a man thinks his own system the best, he ought, by Christian means to endeavour to extend it. And ev^en if these declarations were less objectionable in principle, their practical operation is bad. Some invasion or revolution places a new prince upon the throne — -that very prince, perhaps, whom the people's oath of allegiance was expressly designed to exclude. What are such a people to do ? Are they to refuse obedience to the ruler whom, per- haps, there are the best reasons for obeying ? Or are they to keep their oaths sacred, and thus injure the general weal 1 Such alternatives ought not to be imposed. But the truth is, that allegiance is commonly adjusted to a standard very dis- tinct from the meaning of oaths. How many revolutions have oaths of allegiance prevented? In general a people will obey the power whom they prefer, whatever oaths may have bound them to another. In France, all men were required to swear " that they would be faithful to the Nation, the Law, and the King." A year after these same Frenchmen swore an everlasting abjuration of monarchy ! And now they are living quietly under a monarchy again ! After the accession of William III., when the clergy were required to take oaths contrary to those which they had before taken to James, very few in comparison refused. The rest " took them with such reservations and distinctions, as redounded very little to the honour of their integrity."! Thus it is that these oaths which are objectionable in prin- * Southey's Book of the Church t Smollet's History of England. CHAP. VI.] FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. 333 ciple, are so nugatory in practice. The mischief is radical. Men ought not to be required to engage to maintain, at a fu- ture period, a set of opinions which, at a future period they may probably think erroneous : nor to maintain allegiance to any set of men whom, hereafter, they may perhaps find it ex- pedient to replace by others. CHAPTER YI. FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. Some general principles — Monarchy — Balance of interests and passions — Changes in a constitution — Popular government — The world in a state of improvement — Character of legislators. There is one great cause which prevents the political moralist from describing, absolutely, what form of government is preferable to all others — which is, that the superiority of a form depends, like the proper degree of civil liberty, upon the existing condition of a community. Other doctrine has in- deed been held : " Wherever men are competent to look the first duties of humanity in the face, and to provide for their defence against the invasion of hunger and the inclemencies of the sky, there they will, out of all doubt, be found equally capable of every other exertion that may be necessary to their security and welfare. Present to them a constitution which shall put them into a simple and intelligible method of directing their own afi'airs, adjudging their contests among themselves, and cherishing in their bosoms a manly sense of dignity, equality, and independence, and you need not doubt that prosperity and virtue will be the result."* There is need to doubt and to disbelieve it — unless it can be shown from experience that uncultivated and vicious men require nothing more to make them wise and good than to be told the way. " Present to them a coustitution." Who shall present it? Some foreign intelligence, manifestly; and if this foreign intelligence is necessary to devise a constitution, it will be necessary to keep it in operation and in order. But when this is granted, it is in efiect granted that an unculti- * Godwin's Enq. Pol. Just. vol. 1. p. 69. 334 FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. [eSSAY lit. vated and vicious people are not " capable of every exertion that may be necessary to their security and welfare." But if certain forms cannot be specified which shall be best for the adoption of every state, there are general princi- ples to direct us. It is manifest that the form of government, like the admin- istration of power, should be conformable to the public wish. In a certain sense, and in a sense of no trifling import, that form is best for a people which the people themselves prefer : and this rule applies, even although the form may not be in- trinsically the best ; for public welfare and satisfaction are the objects of government, and this satisfaction may some- times be insured by a form which the public prefer, more ef- fectually than by a form, essentially better, which they dis- like. Besides, a nation is likely to prefer that form which accords best with what is called the national genius ; and thus there may be a real adaptation of a form to a people which is yet not abstractedly the best, nor the best for theii neighbours. But when it is said that that form of govern- ment ought to be adopted for a people, which they themselves prefer, it is not to be forgotten that their preference is often founded upon their weaknesses or their ignorance. Men ad- here to an established form because they think little of a bet- ter. Long prescription gives to even bad systems an obscure sanctity amongst unthinking men. No reasonable man can suppose that the government of Louis the Fourteenth was good for the French people, or that that form, could be good which enabled him to trifle with or to injure the public wel- fare. And yet, when his ambition and tyranny had reduced the French to poverty and to wretchedness, they still clung to their oppressor, and made wonderful sacrifices to support his power. — Now, though it might have been both improper and unjust to give a new constitution to the French when they preferred the old, yet such examples indicate the sense in which only it is true that the form which a people prefer is the best for them ; — and they indicate, too, most powerfully, the duty of every citizen and of every legislator to diffuse just notions of political truth. The nature of a government contributes powerfully, no doubt, to the formation of this na- tional genius ; and thus an imperfect form sometimes contrib- utes to its own duration. In the present condition of mankind, it is probable that some species of monarchy is best for the greater part of the world. Republicanism opens more wide the gates of ambi- tion. He who knows that the utmost extent of attainable CHAP. VI.] FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. 335 power is, to be the servant of a prince, is not likely to be fired by those boundless schemes of ambition which may ani- mate the repubHcan leader. The virtue of the generality of mankind is not sufficiently powerful to prompt them to politi- cal moderation without the application of an external curb : and thus it happens that the order and stability of a govern- ment is more efficiently secured by the indisputable supremacy of one man. Now, order and stability are amongst the first requisites of a good constitution, for the object of political in- stitutions cannot be secured without them. I accept the word Monarchy in a large sense. It is not necessary to the security of these advantages even in the existing state of human virtue, that the monarch should possess what we call kingly power. By monarchy I mean a form of government in which one man is invested with power greatly surpassing that of every other. The peculiar means by which this power is possessed, do not enter necessarily into the account. The individual may have the power of a Sultan or a Czar, or a King or a President ; that is, he may possess various degrees of power, and yet the essential prin- ciple of monarchy and its practical tendencies may be the same in all — the same to repress violence by extent of power — the same to discountenance ambition by the hopelessness of gratifying unlimited desire. It is usual to insist, as one of the advantages of monarchy, upon its secrecy and despatch ; which secrecy and despatch, it is to be observed, would be of comparatively little impor- tance in a more advanced state of human virtue. Where diplomatic chicanery and hostile exertions are employed, de- spatch and secrecy are doubtless very subservient to success ; but take away the hostility and chicanery — take away, that is, such wickedness from amongst men, and secrecy and de- spatch would be of little interest or importance. We love darkness rather than light, because our deeds are evil. Thus it is that unnumbered usages and institutions find advocacy, rather in the immoral condition of mankind, than in direct evidences of their excellence. " An hereditary monarchy is universally to be preferred to an elective monarchy. The confession of every writer on the subject of civil government, the experience of ages, the exam- ple of Poland and of the Papal dominions, seeim to place this amongst the few indubitable maxims which the science of politics admits of."* But, without attempting to decide upon the preferableness of hereditary or elective monarchy, i,t may * Paley : Mor. and Pol. PhU., p. 3, b. 6, c. 6. 336 FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. [eSSAY III. be questioned whether this formidable array of opinion has not been founded upon the mischiefs which actually have re- suhed from electing princes, rather than from those which are inseparable from the election. The election of the kings of Poland convulsed that unhappy country, and sometimes em- broiled Europe. The -election of Popes has produced similar effects ; but this is no evidence that popes and kings cannot be elected by pacific means ; cardinals and lords may embroil a nation, when other electors would not. I call the President of the United States a Monarch. He is not called, indeed, an emperor, or a king, or a duke, but he exercises much of regal power. Yet he is elected : and where is the mischief ? The United States are not convulsed : civil war is not waged ; foreign princes do not support with armies the pretensions of one candidate or another ; — and yet he is elected. Who then will say that other monarchs might not be elected too ? It will not be easy to show that the being invested with greater power than the President of America, necessarily precludes the peaceable election of a prince. The power of the president differs, I believe, less from that of the king of England, than the power of the king differs from that of the Russian emperor. No man can define the maximum of power, which might be conferred without public mischief by the election of the public. Yet I am attempting to eluci- date a political truth, and not recommending a practice. It is, indeed, possible, that when the genius of a people, and the whole mass of their political institutions are favourable to an election of the supreme magistrate, election would be prefer- able to hereditary succession. But election is not without its disadvantages, especially if the appointment be for a short time. When there are several candidates, and when the in- clinations of the community are consequently divided, he who actually assumes the reins is the sovereign of the choice of only a portion of the people. The rest prefer another : which circumstance is not only likely to animate the hostilities of faction, but to make the elected party regard one portion of the people as his enemies and the other as his friends. But he should be the parent of all the people. Fox observed with respect to the British Constitution, that " the safety of the whole depends on the jealousy which each retains against the others, not on the patriotism of any one branch of the legislature."* This is doubtless true ; yet surely it is a melancholy truth. It is a melancholy consideration, that, in constructing a constitution, it is found necessary not * Speech on the Regency Question. CHAP. VI.] FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. 337 lo encourage virtue but to repress vice, and to contrive mutual curbs upon ambition and licentiousness. It is a tacit, but a most emphatical acknowledgment, how much private inclina- tion triumphs over public virtue, and how little legislators are disposed to keep in the right political path, unless they are restrained from deviation by walls and spikes. Yet it is upon this lamentable acknowledgment that the great institutions of free states are frequently founded. A balance of interests and passions is contrived, something like the balance of power, of which we hear so much amongst the nations of Europe — a balance of which the necessity (if it be necessary) consists in the wickedness, the ambition, and the violence of mankind. If nations did not viciously desire to encroach upon one another, this balance of power would be forgotten ; and in a purer state of human virtue, the jeal- ousies of the different branches of a legislature will not need to be balanced against each other. Until the period of this advanced state of human excellence shall arrive, I know not how this balance can be dispensed with. It may still be needful to oppose power to power, to restrain one class of interests by the counteraction of others, and to procure gen- eral quiet to the whole by annexing inevitable evils to the en- croachments of the separate parts. • Thus, again, it happens that constitutions which are not abstractedly the best, or even good, may be the best for a nation now. Whatever be the form of a government, one quality appears to be essential to practical excellence — that it should be sus- ceptible of peaceable change. The science of government, like other sciences, acquires a constant accession of light. The intellectual condition of the world is advancing with on- ward strides. And both these considerations intimate that Forms of Government should be capable of admitting, without disturbance, those improvements which experience may dic- tate, or the advancing condition of a community may require. To reject improvement, is absurd ; to incapacitate ourselves for adopting it, is absurd also. It surely is no unreasonable sacrifice of vanity to admit, that those who succeed us may be better judges of what is good for themselves, than we caa be for them. Upon these grounds no constitution should be regarded as absolutely and sacredly fixed, so that none ought and none have a right to alter it. The question of right is easily set- tled. It is inherent in the community, or in the legislature as their agents. It would be strange, indeed, if our predecessors, five or six centuries ago, had a right to make a constitution for 29 ^^ FORMS OF OOVERNHENT. [eSSAT IK. US, which we have no right to alter for oursv^lves. Such checks ought, no doubt, to be opposed to alteratioa.' ♦hat they may not be lightly and crudely made. The exercis*. o^ poht- ical wisdom is to discover that point in which sufficien' obsta cles are opposed to hasty innovation, and in which suft!".ient facihty is afforded for real improvement by \irtiK>us mee.Tt* The common disquisitions about the value of stability in go- ernments, like those about the sacredness of forms, are fr*. quently founded in inaccurate views. What confusion, it i. exclaimed, and what anarchy and commotions would follow if we were at liberty continually to alter political constitutions ' But it is forgotten that these calamities result from the circum stance that constitutions are not made easily alterable. The interests which so many have in keeping up the present state of things, make them struggle against an alteration ; and it is this struggle which induces the calamities, rather than any thing necessarily incidental to the alteration itself. Take away these interests, take away the motives to these struggles, and improvements may be peacefully made. Yet it must be acknowledged that to take away these interests is no light task. We must once again refer to " the present condition of mankind," and confess that it may be doubted whether any community would possess a stable or an efficient government, if no interests bound its officers to exertion. To such a gov- ernment patronage is probably at present indispensable. They who possess patronage and they who are enriched or exalted by its exercise, array themselves against those propositions of change which would diminish their eminence or their wealth. And I perceive no means by which the existence of these interests, and their consequent operation can be avoided, ex- cept by that elevation of the moral character of our race which would bring with it adequate motives to serve the pub- lic without regard to honours or rewards. It is however in- disputably true, that these interests should be as much as is practicable diminished ; and in whatever degree this is effected, in the same degree there will be a willingness to admit those improvements in the form of governments which prudence and wisdom may prescribe. " Let no new practice in politics be introduced, and no old one anxiously superseded till called for by the public voice."* The same advice may be given respecting the alteration of * Godwin : Pol. Just., v. 2, p. 593. This doctrine is adverse to thai which is quoted in the first page of this chapter, where to be able to pro- vide for mere physical wants, is stated to be a sufficient qualification for the reception of an entirely new svstem of politics CHAP. VI.] FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. 339 forms ; because alterations which are not so called for, may probably fail of a good effect from the want of a congenial temper in the people, and because, as the public wish is the natural measure of sound political institutions, even beneficial changes ought not to be forced upon them against their own consent. The public mind, however, should be enlightened by a government. The legislator who perceives that another form of government is better for his country, does not do all his duty, if he declares himself willing to concur in the alter- ation when the country desires it : he should create that desire by showing its reasonableness. Unhappily there is a vis inerticB in governments of which the tendency is opposite to this. The interests which prompt men to maintain things ag they are, and dread of innovation, and sluggishness, and indif- ference, occasion governments to be amongst the last portion of the community to diffuse knowledge respecting political truth. But, when the public mind has by any means become enlightened, so that the public voice demands an alteration of an existing form, it is one of the plainest as well as one of the greatest duties of a government to make the alteration : not reluctantly but joyfully, not urging the prescription of ages, and what is called " the wisdom of our ancestors," but philo- sophically yet soberly accommodating present institutions to the present state of mankind. If, then, it is asked by what general rule Forms of Govern- ment should be regulated, I would say — Accommodate the form to the opinion of the community, whatever that commu- nity may prefer : and. Adopt institutions such as will facilitate the peaceable admission of alterations, as greater light and knowledge become diffused. I would not say to the Sultan, Adopt the constitution of England to-morrow : because the sudden transition would probably effect, for a long time, more evil than good. I would not say to the King of France, Descend from the throne and establish a democracy ; because I do not think, and experience does not teach us to think, that democracy, even if it were theoretically best, is best for France at the present day. Turning, indeed, to the probable future condition of the world, there is reason to think that the popular branches of all governments will progressively increase in influence, and perhaps eventually predominate. This appears to be the na- tural consequence of the increasing power of public opinion. The public judgment is not only the proper, but almost the necessary eventual measure of political institutions ; and it appears evident that, as that judgment becomes enlightened. 340 FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. [eSSAY Hi it will be exercised, and that, as it is exercised, it will prevail. The expression of public opinion upon political affairs, and consequently the influence of that opinion, partakes obviously of the principles of popular government. If public opinion governs, it must govern by some agency by which public opinion is expressed ; and this expression can in no way so naturally be effected, as by some modification of popular au- thority. These considerations, which appear obvious to rea- soning, are enforced by experience. There is a manifest tendency in the world to the increase of the power of the public voice ; and the effect is seen in the new constitutions which have been established in the new world and in the old. Few permanent revolutions are effected in which the commu- nity do not acquire additional influence in governing them- selves. It will not perhaps be disputed, that if the world were wise and good, the best form of government would be that of democracy in a very simple state. Nothing would be want- ing but to ascertain the general wish and to collect the general wisdom. If, therefore, the present propriety of other forms of government results from the present condition of mankind, there is reason to suppose that they may gradually lapse away, as that condition, moral and intellectual, is improved. Whether mankind are thus improving, readers may differently decide ; and their various decisions will lead to various conclusions respecting the future predominance of the public voice : the writer of these pages is one who thinks that the world is im- proving, that virtue as well as knowledge is extending its power ; and therefore that, as ages roll along, every form of government but that which consists in some organ of the gen- eral mind, will gradually pass away. It may be hoped, too, that this gradual lapse will be occasioned, without solicitude on the part of those who then possess privileges or power, to retain either to themselves. That same state of virtue and excellence which enabled the people almost immediately to govern themselves, would prevent others from wishing to re- tain the reins. Purer motives than the love of greatness, of power, or of wealth, would influence them in the choice of their political conduct. They might have no motive so power- ful as the promotion of the general weal. As no limit can be assigned to that degree of excellence which it may please the Universal Parent eventually to dif- fuse through the world, so none can be assigned to the sim^ plicity and purity of the form in which government shall be carried on. In truth, the mind, as it passes onward and still CHAP. VI.] FORMS OF GOVERNMENT. 341 onward in its anticipations of purity, stops not until it arrives at that period when all government shall cease ; when there shall be no wickedness to require the repressing arm of power ; when terror to the evil-doerg-and praise to them that do well, shall no longer be needed, because none will do evil though there be no ruler to punish, and all will do well from higher and better motives than the praise of man. In speaking of political constitutions, it is not sufficiently remembered in how great a degree good government depends upon the character and the virtue of those who shall conduct it. There is much of truth in the political maxim, that " whatever is best administered is best." But how shall good administration be secured except by the good disposi- tions of the administrators ? The great present concern of mankind, in the selection of their legislators, respects their political opinions rather than their moral and Christian char- acter. This exclusive reference to political biasses is surely unwise, because it leaves the passions and interests to operate without that control which individual virtue only can impart. Thus we are obliged to contrive reins and curbs for the public servants, as the charioteer contrives them for an unruly horse ; too much forgetting that the best means of securing the safety of the vehicle of state, are found in the good dispositions of those who move it onward. Political tendencies are impor- tant ; but they are not the most important point ; moral ten- dencies are the first and the greatest. The question in Eng- land should be, less, " ministerialist or oppositionist ?" in America, less, " federalist or republican ?" than in both, " a good or a bad man ?" Rectitude of intention is the primary requisite ; and whatever preference I might give to superior- ity of talents and to political principles, above all, and before all, I should prefer the enlightened Christian ; knowing that his character is the best pledge of political uprightness, and that political uprightness is the best security of good govern- ment. 29* S4d POLITICAL INFLUENCl. [eSSAY III CHAPTER VII. POLITICAL INFLUENCE.-^PARTY.— MINISTERIAL UNION Influence of the crown — Effects of influence — -Incongruity of public notions — Patronage — American States — Dependency on the mother country — Party — Ministerial Union — " A party man" — The council board and the senate — Resignation of offices. The system of governing by influence appears to be a substitute for the government of force — -an intermediate step between awing by the sword and directing by reason and virtue. When the general character of political measures is such, that reason and virtue do not sufficiently support them to recommend them, on their own merits, to the public appro- bation — these measures must be rejected, or they must be supported by foreign means ; and when, by the political in- stitutions of a people, force is necessarily excluded, nothing remains but to have recourse to some species of Influence. There is another ground upon which Influence becomes, in a certain sense, necessary — which is, that there is so much imperfection of virtue in the majority of legislators — they are so much guided by interested or ambitious or party mo- tives, that for a measure to be recommended by its own excellence, is sometimes not sufficient to procure their con- currence ; and thus it happens that Influence is resorted to, not merely because public measures are deficient in purity, but because there is a deficiency of uprightness in public men. Whilst political affairs continue to be conducted on their present, or nearly on their present, principles, I believe influ- ence is necessary to the stability of almost all governments. How else shall they be supported ? They are not sufficiently virtuous to bespeak the general and unbiassed support of the nations, and w^ithout support of some kind, they must fall. That which Hume says of England is perhaps true of all civilized states — " The influence which the crown acquires from the disposal of places, honours, and preferments, may become too forcible, but it cannot altogether be abolished without the total destruction of monarchy, and even of all regular authority y* A mournful truth it is ! because it neces- sarily implies one of two things — either that the acts " of au- thority" do not recommend themselves by their own excel- * Ilis'tory of England. niAP. VH.J L t.\. /FLUEXCE. 343 iences, or that subjv cts are too Iitl\ prmcipled to be inlluenced by such excellences alone. Whilst the generality of subjects *ontinue to be what they are, Iniluence is inseparable from tho, privilege of appointing to offices. With whomsoever that pi'vilege is eRtrusted, he will possess influence, and consequently power. Multitudes are hoping for the gifts which he has uo bestow ; and they accommodate their conduct to his wishes, iu order to propiti- ate his favour, and to obtain the reward. When they have obtained it, they call themselves bound in i ratitude to con- tinue their deference ; and thus the influence ind the power is continually possessed. Now, there is no v\ ly of destroy- ing this influence but by making men good ,• lor until they are good, they v/ill continue to sacrifice their judgments to their interests, and support men or measures, ii.ot because they are right, but because the support is attended with re- ward. It matters little in morals by whom the power of be- stowing offices is possessed, unless yau can ensure tiie virtue of the bestower. Politicians may talk of taking the power from crowns and vesting it in senates : but it will be oi little avail to change the hands who distribute, if you cannot change the hearts. If a man should ask whether the Influence of the crown in this country might not usefully be transferred to the House of Commons, I should answer, No. Not merely be- cause it would overthrow (for it certainly would overthrow) the monarchy, but because I know not that any security would be gained for a better employment of this influence than is possessed already. In all but arbitrary governnients it appea.rs indispensable that much of the privilege of appoint- ing to offices should rest with the executive power. It is the peculiar source of its authority. In our own government, the peers possess power independently of their political charac- ter, and the commons possess it as representatives of the public mind ; but where, without Infiuence, would be the power of the king ? So it is in America. They have two representative bodies, and a third estate in the office of their president. But that president could not execute the functions of a third estate, nor the office of an executive governor, with- out having the means of infiuencing the people. I do not know whether it was with the determinate object of giving to the president a competent share of power that the Ameri- cans invested him with the privilege of appointing to offices ; but it is not to be questioned, that if they had not done it, the fabric of their government would speedily have fallen. The degree of this influence, which may be required to 344 POLITICAL INFLUENCE. [eSSAY 111. give stability to an executive body, (and therefore to a con- stitution,) will vary with the character of its own policy. The more widely that policy deviates from rectitude, the greater will be the demand for Influence to induce concur- rence in its measures. The degree of influence that is actu- ally exerted by a government, is therefore no despicable cri- terion of the excellence of its practice. In the United States the degree is less than in England ; and it may therefore be feared that we are inferior to them in the purity of the gen- eral administration of the aflairs of state. But let it be constantly borne in mind, that when we thus speak of the "necessity" for influence to support govern- ments, we speak only of governments as they are, and of nations as they are. There is no necessity for influence to support good government over a good people. All influence but that which addresses itself to the judgment, is wrong — . wrong in morals, and therefore indefensible upon whatever plea. Influence is in part necessary to a government in the same sense that oppression is necessary to a slave trader — • not because the captain is a man, but because he has taken up the trade in slaves — ^not because the government is a gov- ernment, but because it conducts so many political affairs upon unchristian principles or in an unchristian manner. The captain says, I cannot secure my slaves without oppres- sion — Let them go free. The government says, I cannot conduct my system without Influence — Make the system good. And here arises the observation, that if a government should faithfully act upon moral principles, that demand for influence which is occasioned by the ill principles of senators or the public, would be diminished or done away. The op- position which governments are wont to experience — inde- fensible as that opposition frequently is — is the result, prin- cipally, of the general character of political systems. Men, seeing that integrity and purity are sacrificed by a govern- ment to other considerations, adopt kindred means of oppo- sing it. If I reason with a man upon the impropriety of his conduct, he will probably listen ; if I use violence, he will probably use violence in return. There is no reason to doubt that, if political measures were more uniformly conformable with the sober judgments of a community, respect and affec- tion would soon become so general and powerful, that tnat clamorous opposition which it is now attempted to oppose by influence, would be silenced by the public voice. Besidea the very fact that influence is exercised, animates opposition CHAP. VII.] POLITICAL INFLUENCE. 345 to measures of state. The possession of power — that is, in a great degree, of Influence — is a tempting bait ; and it can- not be doubted that some range themselves against an execu- tive body, not so much from objections to its measures as from desire of its power. Take away the influence, therefore, and you take away one operative cause of opposition — one great obstacle to the free progress of the vessel of state. " All influence but that which addresses itself to the judg- ment, is wrong.''^ Of the moral oflence which this influence implies, many are guilty who oppose governments, as well as those who support them, or as governments themselves. It is evidently not a whit more virtuous to exert influence in opposing governments than in supporting them : nor, indeed, is it so virtuous. To what is a man influenced ? Obviously, to do that which, without the influence, he would not do; — • that is to say, he is induced to violate his judgment at the request or at the will of other men. It can need no argument to show that this is vicious. In truth, it is vicious in a very high degree ; for to conform our conduct to our own sober judgment, is one of the first dictates of the Moral Law : and the viciousness is so much the greater, because the express purpose for which a man is appointed to legislate, is that the community may have the benefit of his uninfluenced judg- ment. Breach of trust is added to the sacrifice of individual integrity. A nation can gain nothing by the knowledge or experience of a million of " influenced " legislators. It is curious, that the submission to influence which men often practise as legislators, they would abhor as judges. What should we say of a judge or a juryman who accepted a place or a promise as a bribe for an unjust sentence ? We should prosecute the juryman and address the parliament for a re- moval of the judge. Is it then of so much less consequence in what manner affairs of state are conducted than the affairs of individuals, that that which would be disgraceful in one case, is reputable in another ? No account can be given of this strange incongruity of public notions, than that custom has in one case blinded our eyes, and in the other has taught us to see. Let the legislator who would abhor to accept a purse to bribe him to write Ignoramus upon a true bill, apply the principle upon which his abhorrence is founded to his political conduct. When our moral principles are consistent these incongruities will cease. When uniform truth takes the place of vulgar practice and opinion, these incongruities will become wonderful for their absurdity ; and men will scarcely believe that their fathers, who. could see so clearly, S4d POLITICAL INfLUENCi:. [esSAT III. «aw so ill. The same sort of stigma which now attaches to Lord Bacon, will attach to multitudes who pass for honour- able persons in the present day. A man may lawfully, no doubt, take a more active part in political measures, in compliance with the wishes of another, than he might otherwise incline to do ; but to support the measures of an opposition or an administration, because they are their measures, can never be lawful. — Nor can it ever be lawful to magnify the advantages or to expatiate upon the mischiefs of a measure, beyond his secret estimate of its demerits or its merits. That legislator is viciously influ- enced, who says or who does any thing which he would think, it not proper to say or do if he were an independent man. But it will be said. Since influence is inseparable from the possession of patronage, and since patronage must be vested somewhere, what is to be done ? or how are the evils of In- fluence to be done away ?— a question which, like many other questions in political morality, is attended with accidental rather than essential difficulties. Patronage, in a virtuous state of mankind, would be small. There would be none in the church and little in the state. Men would take the over- sight of the Christian flock, not for filthy lucre but of a ready mind. If the ready mind existed, the influence of patronage would be needless : and, as a needless thing, it would be done away. And as to the state, when we consider how much of patronage in all nations results from the vicious condition of mankind — especially for military and naval ap- pointments — it will appear that much of this class of patron- age is accidental also. Take away that wickedness and violence in which hostile measures originate, and fleets and armies would no longer be needed ; and with their dissolution there would be a prodigious diminution of Patronage and of Influence. So, if we continue the enquiry, how far any given source of influence arising from patronage is necessary to the institution of civil government, we shall find, at last, that the necessary portion is very small. We are little accustomed to consider how simple a thing civil government is — nor what an unnumbered multiplicity of offices and sources of patronage would be cut of, if it existed in its simple and rightful state. Supposing this state of rectitude to be attained, and the little patronage which remained to be employed rather as an encouragement and reward of public virtue than of subserv- iency to purposes of party, we should have no reason to com- CHAP. VII.] POLITICAL INFLUENCE. 347 plain of the existence of Influence or of its effects. Swift said of our own country, that " while the prerogative of giv* ing all employments continues in the crown, either immedi- ately or by subordination, it is in the power of the prince to make piety and virtue become the fashion of the age, if, at the same time, he would make them necessary quahfications for favour and preferment."* But unhappily, in the existing character of political affairs in all nations, piety and virtue would be very poor recommendations to many of their con- cerns. " The just man," as Adam Smith says, " the man who, in all private transactions would be the most beloved and the most esteemed, in those public transactions is regarded as a fool and an idiot, who does not understand his business."! It would be as absurd to think of making *' piety and virtue, qualifications''' for these ofRces, as to make idiocy a qualifica" tion for understanding the Principia. — But the position of Swift, although it is not true whilst politics remain to be what they are, contains truth if they were what they ought to be. We should have, I say, no reason to complain of the exist- ence of influence or of its effects, if it were reduced to its proper amount, and exerted in its proper direction. It has, I think, been justly observed that one of the princi- pal causes of the separation of America from Britain, con- sisted in the little influence which the crown possessed over the American States. They had popular assemblies, guided as such assemblies are wont to be, by impatience of control, as well as by zeal for independence ; and the government possessed no patronage that was sufficient to counteract the democratic principles. Occasion of opposition was minis- istered ; and the effect was seen. The American assemblies, and the corresponding temper of the people, were more pow- erful than the little influence which the crown possessed. What was to be done ? It was necessary either to relinquish the government, which could no longer be maintained without force, or to employ force to retain it. The latter was at- tempted ; and, as was to be expected, it failed. I say failure was to be expected ; because the state of America, and of England too, was such, that a government of force could not be supposed likely to stand. Henry VIII. and Elizabeth governed England by a species of force. They induced par- liamentary compliance by intimidation. This intimidation has given place to influence. But every man will perceive that it would be impossible to return to- intimidation again. And it » Project for the Advancement of Religion, t Theo. of Mor. Sent 848 POLITICAL INFLUENCE. PARTY. [eSSAT IlL. ■was equally impossible to adopt it permanently in the case of America. And here it may be observed, in passing, that the separation from a mother country of extensive and remote dependencies is always to be eventually expected. As the dependency in- creases in population, in intelligence, in wealth, and in the various points which enable it to be, and which practically constitute it, a nation of itself — it increases in the tendency to actual separation. This separation may be delayed by the peculiar nature of the parent's government, but it can hardly be in the end prevented. It is not in the constitution of the human species to remain under the supremacy of a foreign power, to which they are under no natural subordination, after the original causes of the supremacy have passed away. Ac- cordingly, there is reason to expect that, in days to come, the possessions of the European powers on the other quarters of the globe will one after another lapse away. Happy will it be for these powers and for the world, if they take counsel of the philosophy of human affairs, and of the experience of times gone by : — if they are willing tranquilly to yield up a superiority of which the reasonableness and the propriety is passed — a superiority which no efforts can eventually main- tain — and a superiority which really tends not to the welfare of the governing, of the governed, or of the world. PARTY. The system of forming Parties in governments is perfectly congruous with the general character of political affairs, but, totally incongruous with political rectitude. Of this incon- gruity considerate men are frequently sensible ; and accord-' ingly we find that defences of party are set up, and set up by men of respectable poUtical character.* To defend a custom is to intimate that it is assailed. What does the very nature of party imply ? That he who adheres to it speaks and votes not always according to the dictates of his. own judgment, but according to the plans of other men. This sacrifice of individual judgment violates one of the first and greatest duties of a legislator — ^to direct his separate and unbiassed judgment to the welfare of the state. There can be no proper accumulation of individual experience and knowledge amongst those who vote with a party. But, indeed, the justifications which are attempted do not • Fox, I believe, was one of them, aud the present Lord John Russell, in his Life o^ Lord Russell, is another. CHAP. VII.] PARTY. 349 refer to the abstract rectitude of becoming one of a party, but to the unfailing ground of defending political evil — Expedi- ency. An administration, it is said, would not be so likely to stand, or an opposition to prevail, when each man votes as he thinks rectitude requires, as when he ranges himself under a leader. The difference is like that which subsists in war be- tween a body of irregular peasantry and a disciplined army : each man's arm is as strong in the one case as in the other but each man's is not equally effective. Very well. If we are to be told that it is fitting, or honest or decent, that senates and cabinets should act upon the prin ciples of conflicting armies, parties may easily be defended, but surely legislators have other business and other duties. It only exhibits the wideness of the general departure from the proper modes of conducting government and legislation, that such arguments are employed. It will be said, thatthere*^ are no means of expelling a bad administration from office but by a systematic opposition to its measures. If this wera true, it would be nothing to the question of rectitude, unless it can be shown that the end sanctions the means. Theques tion is not whether we shall overthrow an administration, but whether we shall do what is right. But, even with respec*. to the success of political objects, it is not very certain that simple integrity would not be the most efficacious. The man who habitually votes on one side, loses, and he ought to lose^ much of the confidence of other members of the public. At what value ought we to estimate the mental principles of a man, who forgoes the dictates of his own judgment, and acts in opposition to it in order to serve a party ? What is the ground upon which we can place confidence in his integrity ? Facts may furnish an answer. The speeches, and statements, and arguments, of such persons, are listened to with suspi- cion ; and an habitual and large deduction is made from their weight. This is inevitable. Hearers and the public cannot tell whether the speaker is uttering his own sentiments or those of others : they cannot tell whether he believes his own statements, or is convinced by his own reasoning. So ihat, even when his cause is good and his advocacy just, he loses hnlf his influence because men are afraid to rely upon him, and because they still do not know whether some illusion is not underneath. The mind is kept so constantly jealous of fallacies, that it excludes one half of the truth. But when the man stands up, of whom it is known that he is sincere, that what he says he thinks, and what he asserts he believes, the mind opens itself to his statements without apprehension 30 350 PARTY. MINISTERIAL UNION. [esSAY III. of deceit. No deductions are made for the overcolourings of party. Integrity carries with it its proper sanction. Now if, generally, the measures of a party are good, the individual support of upright men would probably more effec- tually recommend them to a senate and to a nation, than the ranked support of men whose uprightness must always be questionable and questioned. If the measures are not good, it matters not how inefficiently they are supported. Let those who now range themselves under political leaders of what- ever party, throw awuy their unworthy shackles ; let them convince the legislature and the public that they are abso- lutely sincere men ; and it is probable that a vicious policy would not be able to stand before them. For other motives to opposition than actual viciousness of measures, I have no- thing to say. He whose principles allow him to think that other motives justify opposition, may very well vote against his understanding. The principles and the conduct are con- genial ; but both are bad. MINISTERIAL UNION. The unanimous support or opposition which ordinarily is given to a measure by the members of an administration, whatever be their private opinions, is a species of party. Like other modes of party, it results from the impure condi- tion of political affairs ; like them, it is incongruous with sound political rectitude — and, like them, it is defended upon pleas of expediency. The immorality of this custom is easily shown ; because it sacrifices private judgment, involves a species of hypocrisy, and defrauds the community of that iminfluenced judgment respecting public affairs for which all public men are appointed. " Ministers have been known, publicly and in unqualified terms, to applaud those very meas- ures of a coadjutor which they have freely condemned in private."* Is this manly? Is it honest? Is it Christian ? If it is not, it is vicious and criminal ; and all arguments in its defence — all disquisitions about expediency — are sopliis- tical and impertinent. " The necessity for the co-operation" (I use political lan- guage) results from the general impurity of political systems ■ — systems in which not reason, simply, and principle, direct, but influence also, and the spirit of party — and the love of power. Where influence is to be employed, union amongst a cabinet is likely to urge it in fuller force : — Where the • Gisborne : Duties of Men. HAP. Vn.] MINISTERIAL UNlOiV. 351 spirit of party is to be employed, this union is necessary to the object : — Where the love of power is the g"uide, consis- tency and integrity must be sacrificed to its acquisition or re- tention. But take away this influence — which is bad ; and this spirit of party — which is bad ; and this love of power — which is bad ; and the minister may speak and act like a con- sistent and a virtuous man. It is w^th this, as with unnum- bered cases in life, that what is called the necessity for a par- ticular vicious course of action is quite adventitious, resulting in no degree from the operation of sound principles, but from the diffused impurity of human institutions. But, indeed, the necessity is not perhaps so obvious as is supposed. The same reasons as those which make the sup- port of a partisan comparatively inefficient, operate upon the ministerial advocate. He is regarded as a party man ; and as the exertions of a party man his arguments are received. People say or think, when such arguments are urged, as some men say and think of the labours of the clergy — " What they say is a matter of course ;" — " It is their business ; their trade." No one disputes that these feelings have a powerful effect in diminishing the practical effect of the labours of the pulpit ; and they have the same effect with respect to the labours of a ministry. We listen to a minister rather as a pleader than as a judge ; and every one knows what dispro- portionate regard is paid to these. Why should not ministers be judges ? Why should not senates confide in their integ- rity, believe their statements, give candid attention to their reasonings — as we attend to, and believe, and confide in, what is uttered from the bench ? And does any man think so ill of mankind as to believe that if an administration acted thus, they would not actually possess a greater influence upon the minds of men, than they do now ? Even now, when men are so habituated to the operation of influence and party, I believe that a minister is listened to with much greater con- fidence and satisfaction when he dissents from his colleagues, than when he makes common cause. We then insensibly reflect, that he is no longer the pleader but the judge. The independence of his judgment is unquestioned ; and we regard it therefore as the judgment of an honest man. Uniformity of opinion — or more properly, unity of exertion — is not at all necessary to the stability of a cabinet. Several recent administrations in our own country have been divided in sentiment upon great questions of national policy, and their members have opposed one another in parliament. With what ill eflfects ? Nay, has not that very contrariety recom- 352 MINISTERIAL UNION. [eSSAY III. mended the reasonings of all, as those of sincere integrity ? It is usual with some politicians to declaim vehemently against " unnatural coalitions in cabinets." As to individuals, they, no doubt, may be censurable for political tergiversation ; but as to cabinets being composed of men of different sentiments — of sentiments so different as their respective judgments may occasion — it is both allowable and expedient. It is just what a wise community would wish, because it affords a se- curity for that canvass of public measures which is likely to illustrate their character and tendencies. But it is a sorrow- ful and a sickening sight, to contemplate a number of per- sons frankly urging their various and disagreeing opinions at a council board, and as soon as some resolution is come to, all proceeding to a senate, and one half urging the very ar- guments against which they have just been contending, and by which they are not yet convinced. Is freedom of can- vass for any reasons useful and right at the council board 1 Is it not, for the very same reasons, useful and right in a sen- ate ? The answer would be, yes, if public measures were regarded as the measures of the community, and not of the administration ; because then the desire and judgment of the community would be sought by the public and independent dis- cussion of the question. Here, then, at last is one great cause of the evil — that a large proportion of public acts are the measures of adjninistrations ; and, being such, adminis- trations unitedly support them whatever be the individual opinions of their members. These things ought not so to be. I would not indeed say that, from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot, there is no soundness in the system — but the evil is mingled deplorably with the good. It is sometimes in practice almost forgotten, that an administration is an Ex- ecutive rather than a Legislative body — that their original and natural business is rather to do what the legislature and con- stitution directs than to direct the legislature themselves. I say the original aiid natural business ; for, how congenial so- ever the great influence of administrations in public affairs may be with the present tenor of policy, and especially of international policy, it is not at all congenial with the original purpose and simple and proper objects of civil government — ^the welfare of the community, as determined by an en- lightened survey of the national mind. Of the want of advertence to these simple and proper ob- jects, one effect has been that, in this country, administrations have frequently given up their offices when the senate has rejected their measures. This is an unequivocal indication CHAP. VIII.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 853 of the wrong station in which cabinets are placed in the legis lature — because it indicates, that if a cabinet cannot carry its point, it is supposed to be unfit for its office. All this is natu- ral enough upon the present system, but it is very unnatural when cabinets are regarded, either in their ministerial ca- pacity, as executive officers, or in their legislative capacity, as ordinary members of the senate. Executive officers are to do what the constitution and the legislature directs : — members of a senate are to assist that legislature in directing aright : in all which, no necessity is involved for ministers to resign their offices because the measures which they think best are not thought best by the majority. That a ministry should sometimes judge amiss is to be expected, because it is to be expected of all men : but surely in a sound state of political institutions, their fallibility would not be a necessary argument of unfitness for their offices, nor would the rejection of some of their opinions be a necessary evidence of a loss of the con- fidence of the public. CHAPTER VIIL BRITISH CONSTITUTION. Influence of the Crown — House of Lords — Candidates for a peerag^e— Sudden creation of peers — The Bench of Bishops — Proxies — House of Commons — The wishes of the People — Extension of the elective franchise — Universal suffrage — Frequent ejections — Modes of election — Annual parliaments — Qualifications of voters and representatives— Of choosing the clergy — Duties of a representative — Systematic oppo- sition — Placemen and pensioners — Posthumous fame. That the British Constitution is relatively good, is satis • factorily indicated by its effects. Without indulging in the ordinary gratulations of our " own country being the first coun- try in the world," it is unquestionably, in almost every respect, amongst the first — amongst the first in liberty, in intellectual and moral excellence, and in whatever dignifies and adorns mankind. A country which thus surpasses other nations, and which has, with little interruption, possessed a nearly uniform constitution for ages, may well rest assured that its constitution is good. To say that it is good, is however very 30* 854 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [eSSAY III. different from saying that it is theoretically perfect, or practi- cally as good as its theory will allow. Under a King, Lords, and Commons, we have prospered ; but it does not therefore follow that under a King, Lords, and Commons, we might not have prospered more. Whatever may be the future allotment of our country as to the form of its government, whether at any period, or at what, the progressive advancement of the human species will occa- sion an alteration, we are not at present concerned to enquire. Of one thing, indeed, we may be assured, that if it should be the good pleasure of Providence that this advancement in ex- cellence shall take place, the practical principles of the gov- ernment and its constitutional form, will be gradually moulded and modified into a state of adaptation to the then condition of mankind. - I. Of the regal part of the British Constitution I would say little. The sovereign is, in a great degree, identified with an administration ; and into the principles which would regu- late ministerial conduct, the preceding chapters have attempted some enquiry. Yet it may be observed that, supposing ministerial influence to be " necessary" to the constitution, there appears consider- able reason to think that its amount may be safely and rightly diminished. As this influence becomes needless in proportion to the actual rectitude of political measures ; as there is some reason to hope that this rectitude is increasing ; and as the public capacity to judge soundly of political measures is mani- festly increasing also ; it is probable that some portion of the influence of the crown might be given up, without any danger to the constitution or the public weal. And, waiving all ref- erence to the essential moral character of influence, it is to be remembered, that no degree of it is defensible, even by the politician, but that which apparently subserves the reasonable purposes of government. It is recorded that in 1741, in Scotland, " sixteen peers we^e chosen literally according to the list transmitted from court."* Such a fact would convince a man, without further enquiry, that there must have been something very unsound in the ministerial politics of the day ; or at any rate, (which is nearly the same thing,) something very discordant with the general mind. In 1793, and v/hilst, of course, the Irish Parliament existed, a bill was brought into that parliament to repeal some of the Catholic disabihties. This bill the " parUament loudly, in- • Smollett: Hist. England, v. 3, p. 71. CHAP. VIII.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 8^4 dignantly, and resolutely rejected." A. few months afterwards. a similar bill was introduced under the auspices of the gov- ernment. Pitt had taken counsel of Burke, and wished to grant the Catholics relief: and when the viceroy's secretary accordingly brought in a bill, two members only opposed it ; and at the second reading, it was opposed but by one vote. Now, whatever may be said of the " necessity" of ministerial influence for the purposes, of state, nothing can be said in fa- vour of such influence as this.. Every argument which would show its expediency, would show even more powerfully the impurity of the system which could require it. It is common to hear complaints of ministerial influence in parliament. " That kind of influence which the" noble lord alludes to," said Fox in one of his speeches, " I shall ever deem unconstitutional ; for by the influence of the crown, he means the influence of the crown in parliament."* But, if it is concluded that influence is " necessary," it seems idle to complain of its exercise in the senate. Where should it be exerted with effect ? Whether it be constitutional it is diffi- cult to say, because it is difficult to define where constitutional acts end and unconstitutional acts begin. But, it may safely be concluded that, in such matters, questions of constitutional rectitude are little relevant. Influence you say — and in a cer- tain sense you say it truly — is necessary. To what purpose, then, can it be to complain of the exercise of that influence in those places in which only or principally it is effectual ? It would be impossible for persons, with our views of political rectitude, to execute the office of minister upon any system that approached, in its character, to the present ; but were it otherwise, I would advise a minister openly to avow the exer- cise of influence and to defend it. — This were the frank, and I think the rational course. Why should a man aflfect secrecy or concealment about an act " politically necessary." I would not talk about disinterestedness and independence ; but tell the world that influence was needful, and that I exerted it. Not that such an avowal would stop, or ought to stop, the complaints of virtuous men. The morality of politics is not 80 obscure but that thousands will always perceive that the exertion of influence and the submission to it, is morally vicious. This conflict will continue. Artifice and deception are "necessary" to a swindler, but all honest men know and feel that the artifice and deception are wrong. II. It appears to hfive been discovered, or assumed, in most free states, that it is expedient that there should be two de- « Fell's Public Life of C. J. Fox. 358 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [eSSAT III. liberative assemblies, of which one shall, from its constitution, possess less of a democratical tendency than the other. Not that, in a purer state of society, two such assemblies would be necessary ; but because, while separate iiidividuals or sep- arate classes of men pursue their peculiar interests, and are swayed by their peculiar prejudices, it is found needful to obstruct one class of interests and tendencies by another. Such a purpose is answered by the British House of Lords. The privileges of the members of this house are such as to offer considerable temptation to their political virtue. A body of men, whose eminence consists in artificial distinctions be- tween them and the rest of the community, are likely to desire to make these distinctions needlessly great ; and for that pur- pose to postpone the public welfare to the interests of an order. We all know that there is a collective as well as an individ- ual ambition. It is a truth which a peer should habitually inculcate upon himself, that however rank and title may be conferred for the gratification of the possessor, the legislative privileges of a peer are to be held exclusively subservient to the general good. I use the word exclusively in its strict- est sense : so that, if even the question should come, whether any part or the whole of the privileges of the peerage should be withdrawn, or the general good should be sacrificed, I should say that no reasonable question could exist respecting the proper alternative. Were I a peer, I should not think myself at liberty to urge the privileges of my order in opposi- tion to the public ^v eal : for this were evidently to postpone the greater interests to the less. If rulers of all kinds, if civil government itself, are simply the officers of the nation, surely no one class of rulers is at liberty to put its pretensions in opposition to the national advantage. The love of title and of rank constitutes one of the great temptations of the political man. He can obtain them only from the crown : and it is not usual to bestow them except upon those who support the administration of the day. The intensity of the desire which some men feel for these distinc- tions, has a correspondently intense effect. Lord Chatham said, " that he had known men of great ambition for power and dominion, many whose characters were tarnished by gla- ring defects, some with many vices — who, nevertheless, could be prevailed upon to join in the best public measures ; but the moment he found any man who had set himself down as a candidate for a peerage, he despaired of his ever being a friend to his country?"* This displays a curious political » Quoted by Fox. — Fell's Memoirs. CHAP. Vm.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 357 phenomenon. Can the reader give a better solution than the supposition that, in the love itself of title, there is something little and low, and that the minds which can be so anxious for it, are commonly too little and too low to sacrifice their hopes to friendship for their country? — Many who are not candidates for peerages, nevertheless look upon them with a wishing eye ; and some who have attained to the lower hon- ours of the order, are equally solicitous for advancement to the higher. So that even upon those on whom the temptation is not so powerful as that of which Chatham speaks — some temptation is laid ; — a temptation of which it were idle to dis- pute that the aggregate effect is great. If, without reference to the existing state of Britain, a man should ask whether the legislators of a nation ought to be sub- jected to such temptation — whether it were a judicious politi- cal institution, I should answer, No ; because I should judge that a legislative assembly ought to have no inducements or motives foreign to the general good. This appears to be so obviously true, that the necessity, if there be a necessity, for an assembly so constituted, only evinces how imperfect the political character of a people is. There would be no need for having recourse to an objectionable species of assembly, if it were not wanted to counteract or to effect purposes which a purely constituted assembly could not attain. In estimating the relative worthiness of objects of human pursuit, a peerage does not appear to rank high. I know not, indeed, how it happens that men contemplate it with so much complacency ; and that so few are found who appear to doubt whether it is one of the most reasonable and worthy objects of human desire. A title ! Only think what a title is, and what it is not. It is a thing which philosophy may reasona- bly hold cheap ; a thing which partakes of the character of the tinsel watch, for which the new-breeched urchin looks with anxious eyes, and by which, when he has got it, he thinks he is made a greater man than before. If such be the character of title when brought into comparison with the dig- nity of man, what is it when it is compared with the dignity of the Christian ? Nothing. It may be affirmed, without any apprehension of error, that the greater the degree in which any man is a Christian, the less will be his wish to be called a lord ; and that when he attains to the " fulness of the stat- ure" of a Christian man, no wish will remain. — If additional motives can be urged to reduce our ambition of title, some, perhaps, may be found in considering the grounds upon which it has too frequently been conferred. Queen Anne, when 858 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [esSAT III. once the ministry could not carry a measure in the upper house, made twelve new peers at once. These, of course, voted for the measure. What honourable and elevated mind would have purchased one of these titles at the expense of the caustic question which a member put when they were go- ing to give their first vote — " Are you going to vote by your foreman V Whether the heads of a Christian church should possess seats in the legislature, is a question that has often been dis- cussed — If a Christian bishop can attend to legislative affairs without infringing upon the time and attention which is due to his peculiar office, there appears nothing in that office which disquaUfies him for legislative functions. The better a man is, the more, as a general rule, he is fit for a legislator ; so that, assuming that bishops are peculiarly Christian men, it is not unfit that they should assist in the councils of the nation. Nevertheless, it must be conceded, that there is no peculiar congruity between the office of the Christian over- seer and that of an agent in political affairs. They are not incompatible, indeed, but the connexion is not natural. Poli- tics do not form the proper business of a Christian shepherd. They are wholly foreign to his proper business ; and that retirement from the things of the world which Christianity requires of her ministers, and which she must be supposed peculiarly to require of her more elevated ministers, indicates the propriety of meddling but little in affairs, of state. But, when it comes to be proposed that all the heads of a Chris- tian church shall be selected for legislators, because they are heads of the church — the impropriety becomes manifest and great. To make a high religious office the qualification for a political office, is manifestly wrong. It may be found now and then that a good bishop is fit for a useful legislator — but because you have elevated a man to a more onerous and re- sponsible office in the church, forthwith to superadd an oner- ous and responsible office in the state, is surely not to consult the dictates of Christianity or of reason. Nor is it rational or Christian forthwith to add a temporal peerage. If there be any one thing, not absolutely vicious, which is incongru- ous with the proper temper and character of an exalted shep- herd of the flock, it is temporal splendour. Such splendour accords very well with the political character of the Romis?i church — but with Protestantism, with Christianity, it has no accordance. The splendours of title are utterly dissimilar in their character to the character of the heads of the church, as that character is indicated in the New Testament. How CHAP. VIIl.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 359 preposterous is the association in idea of " My Lord" with a Paul or a Barnabas ! — The truth, indeed, is, that this species of fornication did not originate in religion nor in religious motives. It sprung up with the corruptions of the papacy ; and in this, as in some other instances, we, who have purified the vicious doctrine, have clung to the vicious practice. To these considerations is to be added another : that the extent of jurisdiction which is assigned to the bishops of this country, is such as to occupy, if the office be rightly exe- cuted, a large portion of a bishop's time — a portion so large that if he be exemplary as a bishop, he can hardly be exem- plary as a legislator. If, as will perhaps be admitted, the diligent and conscientious pastor of an ordinary parish has a sufficient employment for his time, it cannot be supposed that a bishop has less. He who presides over hundreds of parishes and hundreds of pastors, and rightly presides over them, can surely find little time for attendance in the senate ; especially when that attendance takes him, as it necessarily does, far away from the inferior shepherds and from the flocks. But, when it comes to be considered that our bishops are the heads of an established church, we are presented with a very different field of enquiry. That which is not congruous with Christianity may be congruous with a religious estab- lishment. Nor, in a religious establishment like that which obtains in England, would there, perhaps, be any propriety in dismissing bishops from the house of Lords. They have to watch over other interests than those of religion — poli- tical interests^ and where shall they efficiently watch over them if they have no voice in political aflTairs ? Bishops in this country have not merely to " feed the flock of God which is among them," but to take care that that flock and their shepherds retain their privileges and their supremacy : so that if I were asked, whether bishops ought to have a seat in the legislature, I should answer — If you mean by a bishop a head of a Christian church, he has other and better busi- ness : — if, by a bishop you mean the head of an established church, the question must be determined by the question of the rectitude of an established church itself. Without stopping to decide this question, it may be ob- served, that some serious mischiefs result from the institution as it exists, A bishop should be not only of unimpeachable, but, as far as may be, of untempted virtue. His office as a peer subjects him to gTeat temptations. Bishops are more dependent upon the crown than any other class of peers, 860 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [esSAY III. because vacancies for elevation in the church are continually occurring ; and for these vacancies a bishop hopes. Since he cannot generally expect to obtain them by an opposition, however conscientious, to the minister of the day, he is placed in a situation which no good man ought to desire for himself ; that of a powerful temptation to sacrifice his integrity to his interests. How frequently, or how far, that temptation pre- vails, I presume not to determine ; but it is plain, whatever be the cause, that the minister can count upon the support of the bishops more confidently than upon any other class of peers. This is not the experience of one minister, or of two, but, in general language, of all. History states informally, and as an unquestioned circumstance, that " from the bench of bishops the court usually expects the greatest complaisance and submission."* I perceive nothing in the nature of the Christian office to induce this support of the minister of the day. I do not see why a Christian pastor should do this rather than a legislator of another station ; for it will hardly be contended that there is so much goodness and purity in ministerial transactions, that a Christian pastor must support them because they are so pure and so good. What conclu- sion then remains, but that temptation is presented, and that it prevails ? That this, simply regarded, is an evil no man can doubt ; but let him remember that the evil is not neces- sarily incidental even to the legislating bishop. There may be bishops without solicitude for translations, for there may be a church without dependence on the Crown, or connexion with the state. Whilst this connexion and this dependence remains, I do not say that ecclesiastical peers cannot be ex- empt from unworthy influence, but there is no hope of exemp- tion in the present condition of mankind. The system which obtains in the House of Lords, of acr cepting proxies in divisions, appears strangely inconsistent with propriety and reason. It intimates utter contempt of the debates of the house, because it virtually declares that the arguments of the speakers are of no weight or concern. Who can tell, or who ought to tell, when he gives his proxy to another, whether the discussion might not alter his views and make him vote on the other side ? Proxies are congru- ous enough with a system of legislation which is conducted upon maxims of interest and party ; but if we suppose legis- lation to proceed upon evidence and reasoning, they are a preposterous mockery of common sense. The number of peers has rapidly increased. This may * Hume's England. CHAP. VIII.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 361 be a subject of regret to the peerage itself, because every addition to its number may be regarded as a reduction from the dignity of each. The dignity is relative, and consists in the distinction between them and other men, which distinc- tion becomes less as peers become common. As the peerage is progressively increased in number, a lord will be progres- sively reduced in practical rank. The title remains the same, but the actual distinction between him and other men is waning away. But, though this may cause regret to a peer, it ought to cause none to the man of reason or the patriot. As to reason, if our estimates of title be accurate, its distinc- tions are sufficiently vain ; and as to patriotism, if our country is increasing in knowledge and in excellence, it is increasing in its ability to direct its own policy without the intervention of an order of peers ; so that, supposing the cessation of that order to be hereafter desirable, the patriot may hope that its distinctions will be yielded up to the general weal more wil- lingly when they have become insignificant by diffusion, than if they were great by being possessed but by a few. In reflecting then upon the political character of the House of Lords, it is to be remembered that its utility appears to be conditional — conditional upon the state of the community. It may be needed to check intemperate measures — to restrain, for instance, the vicious encroachments of democracy ; but it is not needed in any other sense. It is like the physician's prescription or the surgeon's knife — ^useful in an unhealthy state of the social body, but useless if it were sound. The reader will say that this is strong language, and so it is ; but he has no reason to complain if it is the language of truth ; and that it is true, he may perhaps be convinced by authority, upon such a subject, less questionable than mine. " Were the voice of the people always dictated hy reflection, did every man, or even one man in a hundred, think for himself, or actu- ally consider the measure he was about to approve or censure, or even were the common people tolerably steadfast in the judgment which they formed, I should hold the interference of a superior order not only superfluous, hut wronor.^^* III. The House of Commons is constitutionally the repre- sentative of the people, and the degree in which it fulfils this, its constitutional office, is to be estimated by the degree in which the public wish is actually represented by its menib(TS. " It is essential to the happiness of the people, that they should be convinced that they and the members of this house^ * Paley: Mor. and PoL Phil. b. vi. c. 7. 31 362 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [eSSAY III. feel an identity of interest ; that the nation at large, and the representatives of the people, hold a conformity of sentiment. This is the essence of a proper representative assembly."* It is not necessary to the just fulfilment of this office, that every measure which a majority of the people desires, should be adopted by the House, because its members are often bet- ter able to judge what is good for the majority, than they are themselves ; and because, sometimes, popular opinions are not, I think, capricious, but fluctuating, and unreasonably ve- hement. There was a time when the populace were in tu- mult, and almost in insurrection, because the Legislature had erected turnpikes ; but if three-fourths of the population of the country had joined in the outcry, it would not have been a good reason for repealing the act. But, if the public wish is not always to be gratified by the House of Commons, it is always to be expressed within its walls. The house should know what the people desire, though they are at liberty, if they think it needful, to reject that desire. This, it is obvi- ous, is a right which the people may claim of the republican part of the constitution. It were neither decorous nor wise to show even impatience at the respectful petitions of the people ; — not decorous, for it implies forgetfulness that the house is the servant of the public ; — not wise, for a candid attention to the public representations, even when they are not acted upon, is one of the surest means of conciliating the esteem, and of administering to the satisfaction of the community. In estimating the extent to which the decisions of the House of Commons ought actually to correspond with the public wishes, no narrow limits should be prescribed. It is here, if any where, that the people are to be heard. Both the other branches of the constitution tend naturally to their separate and privileged interests ; so that, if in the senate of a repub- lican government the people ought to be represented, much more emphatically ought they to be represented by the Com- mons in a government like our own. ' *> The most accurate test of the degree in which the British House of Commoiis fulfils this its primary office, is to be sought in the deliberate judgments of reasonable and thinking men : not of party men, or interested men, but of the tempe- rate and the good. Now there is reason to think, that in the judgments of this portion of the community, there is not a just and sufficient identity between the public voice and the measures of this house. * William Pitt: GifFord's Life, v. iii. CHAP. Vm.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 363 But, supposing the practical representation to be defective, how is the defect to be repaired ? A question this of far less easy solution than some politicians would persuade us ! Not frequency of parliaments, not extensions of the franchise, not altering the modes of election, will be sufficient. The evil is seated primarily, -and essentially, in the impure condition, in the imperfect virtue of man. To those who are imperfect and impure, temptation is offered : the temptation perhaps of party — perhaps of interest — perhaps of resentment — perhaps of ambition. You cannot make men proof against these temptations but by making them good ; and modes of electing, or frequency of election, will not do this. The only reforma- tion must result from the reformation of the heart. Electors themselves are not solicitous to elect good men : they are in- fluenced by passion, and interest, and party. How then should they select those who are independent, and disinter- ested, and temperate ? But evils which cannot be removed may be diminished ; and since the evil in question indicates an insufficient degree of liberty, both civil and political, it may be of advantage to enquire whether both cannot be, and ought not to be increased. Now, remembering that it lies upon the legislature to prove that the present institutions are the best — what is the evidence that mischief would arise from an extension of the franchise and from an alteration of the modes of election 1 We are not required to evince that benefit would arise from such meas- ures ; because their propriety is dictated by the principles of political truth, unless it is shown that they would be perni- cious. Assuredly, in contemplating mere probabilities, it is more probable that a representative will be virtuously chosen, when he is chosen by a thousand men than when by only ten. The reason is simple, that it is much more difficult to offer vicious motives to. the electors. If the probability of advantage in such an alteration is disputable, it must be by the production of very strong probabilities on the other side. And until those probabilities are adduced, I see not how it can be denied that from the public is withheld a portion of their civil rights. There is always one powerful reason for an extension of the legal right of election, which is, that it tends to satisfy the people. This satisfaction is of impor- tance, whether the wish of the people be in itself desirable or not : so that of two measures which in other respects were equally eligible, that would become the best and the right one, which imparted the greatest satisfaction to the commu- nity. It cannot be hoped that this satisfaction will ever pre- 1864 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [eSSAT HI. vail during the continuance of the present state of the fran- chise. Its irregular and inconsistent character will always (even setting aside its consequences) give rise to uneasiness and complaints. A large county can never think political justice is exercised while it sends no more members than a little borough. Birmingham and Manchester will never think it is exercised, whilst Old Sarum sends two members and they send none. There are, no doubt, many difficulties interposed in the way of the legislature in proceeding to a reformation — which difficulties, however, will generally be found to result from the existing impurity of the present system. It is not per- haps impossible that, if a House of Commons were selected by any approach to universal suffrage, it would ere long in- terfere with the established modes of governing. Many, it is probable, would feel that their prejudices were outraged, and their interests invaded, and their privileges diminished or taken away. These prospects interpose difficulties ; and yet unless these prejudices are reasonable, and these interests virtuous, and these privileges dictated by the public good, it will be seen that the difficulties of reform result, not from any defect in the principles of Political Truth, but from the con- flict between the operation of those principles and exception- able systems. Not, indeed, that a representative body, however elected, is to be concluded as necessarily temperate and wise. There is much reason to fear, in the present state of private virtue, that if the House of Commons were a purely popular assem- bly, it might both injudiciously and unjustifiably excite poli- tical distractions. If, on the one hand, they found that any existing institutions required amendment, they would probably, on the other hand, seek to establish popular power in opposi- tion to the general good. Nevertheless, there appears sufficient reason for thinking that some alteration, and considerable alteration, might be made in the system of representation, which would do good without doing evil. If the British empire is not prepared for a purely popular representation, it is, I think, prepared for a representation more popular than that which obtains. Mild and gradual alteration is perhaps the best. The franchise may be extended, one by one, to new districts or new towns, and taken away or modified, one by one, from places in which the electors are few, or in which they are corrupt. By such means the reformation might keep pace, and only keep pace, with the general progress of the nation. The prospect of CHAP. VIII.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 3Q5 successive amendment would tend to satisfy the public, and the general end be eventually answered by innoxious means. Some want of enlargement of views appears to exist with respect to the propriety and the right of the legislature to re- move the elective franchise. It seems to be thought that a borough ought not to be deprived of it, unless its corruption is both general and distinctly proved. But why ? The fran- chise is not possessed for the gratification of the inhabitants of a particular spot, but for the national good. It might, no doubt, have originally been given for their gratification, but this was always an unreasonable motive for granting it. If the general advantage requires the transfer of the right of election, it were strange indeed if the inhabitants of a little town ought to prevent it by exclaiming. Do not encroach upon our privileges ! As to the property vested in the privilege, it is founded, if not in corruption, in political impropriety. For a householder to say, I have given a hundred pounds more for my premises because they conveyed a right of voting, or for a patron to say, I have given an extra five thousand for a manor because it enabled me to nominate two representatives, is surely a very insufficient reason for continuing a franchise that is adverse to the common weal. However, it is prob- able that the great object is not to take away privileges but to extend them, and by that extension to secure the proba- bility of uninfluenced elections. Universal Suffrage is a by-word of political scorn : and yet it is probable that the country will one day be fit for the adoption of universal suffrage. The objections to it are founded — as, antecedently to enquiry, I should expect they would be founded — upon the ignorant and vicious state of mankind. If knowledge and virtue increase, universal suf- frage may hereafter be rightly adopted. — If they are now in- creasing, approaches towards such suffrage are desirable now. Nor perhaps is the public preparation for these approaches so little as some men suppose. A part of our objections to it are quite fortuitous and accidental, and easily removable by legis- lative enactments. Nor again is it to be forgotten, that some of the states in the American Union do actually adopt univer- sal suffrage, or something that is very much like it. Upon this subject it is always to be remembered, that unless the withholding of the privilege of election is necessary to the national welfare, the possession of it is, in strictness, a civil right. It can never be shown upon other grounds than ex- pediency, why one man should possess the privilege whilst his neighbour should not. 31 • 366 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [eSSAY III The present modes of election are productive of much evil — evil by facilitating undue influence — evil by occasioning immorality and riot — and evil hy attaching to the idea of fre- quent elections ideas of national inquietude ^and confusion. When we see, at the time of an election, a multitude of men brought together, many of them perhaps from a distance, and fed and lodged at the expense of one of the candidates, we certainly see that the door is opened wide for the entrance of corruption. In 1696 an Act was passed, "for voiding all the elections of parliament men, at which the elected had been at any expense in meat, drink, or money, to procure votes."* When we see the neighbouring tenantry of the several large landowners, (petty freeholders though they be,) classed in separate bodies, and voting, almost to a man, for the favourite of their landlord, we see either that improper influence is grossly employed, or that the exercise of private judgment is, with such voters, only a name. If indeed there were no pos- sibility of obtaining more considerate votes from the popula- tion, I know not that much is, to be hoped from a great exten- sion of the franchise, or from an alteration of the modes of election. — The riot and confusion of elections is so great, that politicians find it needful to advise dissolutions of parliament, at periods when it is supposed that the excitement may be safely occasioned without endangering mischief to the gene- ral tranquillity. It would not be found a small item in the na- tional guilt, if we were to compute the amount of private vice, of intemperance, profaneness, and debauchery, which a general election occasions. — These evils, again are urged against proposals for increasing the frequency of elections ! Thus one vicious system becomes an excuse for another. You are afraid to endeavour parliamentary integrity by fre- quent elections, because your bad system of elections pro- duces so much mischief ! The simple and obvious remedy is, to elect representatives on a less objectionable system. A few propositions respecting the modes of election, will prob- ably not be rejected by reasonable men. That the elector should not he obliged to go to a distance from his own home: — ^because, if the place of election be distant, he will either refuse to go — which nullifies the insti- tution with respect to him ; — or he will go, and expect to be reimbursed his expenses and his loss of time — which leads, almost inevitably, to corruption. That candidates should he at no expense in conducting the election : — ^because their payments will operate as bribes — be- * Smollett : History of England CHAP. VIII.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 367 cause the necessity of expense precludes virtuous and able men, who cannot afford it from being chosen — and because he who has, in this sense, purchased his seat, is in danger of thinking himself at liberty to repay himself by seeking the rewards of political subserviency. That it ought not to he known for what candidate an elector votes ;* because, if it is known, the elector will probably be afraid to vote for the man of, his own choice, lest some friend of an adverse candidate, in whose good offices he is inter- ested, should withdraw them. These propositions tend to the recommendation of some species of ballot for securing secrecy ; of elections at the public expense, for excluding the mischiefs of expenses to the can- didate ; and of the visit, probably, of proper offi.cers from house to house, to exclude the mischiefs of requiring electors to leave their homes. Such institutions would, I belicA^e, pre- vent many, at least, of the mischiefs, moral and political, of the present system ; and would take away from the advocate of ig-lived parliaments one popular reason in their favour. ['• Annual Parliaments" is another by-word of contempt ; and perhaps they will never be expedient. This is one ques- tion ; the expediency of septennial parliaments is another. Nor is it a very philosophical nor a very honest mode of con- temning an alteration, to assume that there is no practical in- termediate period between one year and seven. The Ameri- can House of representatives is elected for two years, and as their senate also is a representative body, whilst our House of Lords is not, it is probable that biennial parliaments, with a reformed mode of election, would be practicable and bene- ficial here.] [The electors of a district choose a man of whom they hope rather than know the character. They find in the course of a year or two that he is unable or unwilling to discharge his public duty. To prevent such electors from making ano- ther choice — to oblige them, for seven years, to be, in effect, destitute of a representation, is a serious grievance, and it may be a serious evil. J * I am disposed to acknowledge that this secrecy of suffrages is not congruous with that manly independence which it were desirable to pro- mote. In a better state of society open voting appears the more virtu- ous and honourable course ; for why should a man desire to conceal that which he thinks it right to do? Besides, Balloting endangers the prac- tice of hypocrisy, by promising or pretending to vote according to the wish of another, and taking advantage of the secrecy to vote against it. Yet I see not that these consequences are such as to vitiate the system as applicable and as expedient m the present day. 308 BRITISH CONSTITUTION. [eSSAY III. [A little before a dissolution there is sometimes a manifest endeavour to conciliate the public by the adoption of some measure which they approve. Can it be doubted that there would be an advantage in making such measures more fre- quently necessary ? — or that more frequent parliaments would perceive the necessity, and act upon it ?] With respect to the qualifications for voting, no rule can be prescribed, because no rule can define how large a portion of the people, or whether the whole ought to possess votes. The security of the virtuous exercise of the privilege is manifestly the object to be attained — which security must be sought according to some general rule. It may be doubted whether (until all men are fit to become electors) any general rule is better than that of amount of property ; not so much because the possession of property exempts men from vicious influence, as because, amongst the possessors of some com- petent property, is the largest portion of thinking men. We Wdjit not only an unbiassed, but a rational judgment. In the present state of property, the preference, in towns, o^ free- holders to renters, appears to be carried too far. Tlie man who rents a house for forty pounds a-year, is much more likely to give a free and considerate vote than he who pos- sesses only a freehold of three or four pounds. Whatever qualification is required, it should be universally uniform. At any rate, it should vary only in compliance with the local ne- cessities of a district. " Freedom" of burghs and cities, and the rules by which freedom is obtainable, are relics of a bar- barous state of policy — relics which appear unworthy of the present age. They are like the local jurisdictions of char- tered magistracy, which one of our judges recently reprobated from the bench as blots in the constitution. No qualifications should be required in a representative, but the single and sufficient one, that his constituents prefer him to any other man. It is a hardship upon them and upon him to thwart their choice — the best perhaps that could be made — ^because the candidate does not possess a certain amount of wealth. The case is diflferent from that of the electors ; for though the exaction of wealth in a representative may ex- clude some of the fittest men in the country to assist the councils of the state, yet from the eligibility of every man, there is no danger that such a proportion of poorer men would be elected, as to impede the legislature by their ignorance or vice. 'J'he peculiar circumstances of a people may indeed occa- sion the propriety of requiring some qualification in their le- CHAP. VIII.] BRITISH CONSTITUTION. 369 gislators. When the American colonies had separat What then is to be done ? " Make the tree good." The first step in moral legislation is to rectify the legislator. It holds of nations as of men, that the beam should be first removed out of our own eye. Laws, in their insulated character, will be but partially effectual, whilst the practical example of a government is bad. To this consideration sufficient atten- tion is not ordinarily paid. We do not adequately estimate the influence of a government's example upon the public character. Government is an object to which we look up as to our superior ; and the many interests which prompt men to assimilate themselves to the character of the government, ad- ded to the natural tendency of subordinate parts to copy the example of the superior, occasions the character of a govern- ment, independently of its particular measures, to be of im- mense influence upon the general virtue. Illustrations abound. If, in any instance, political subserviency is found to be a more efficient recommendation than integrity of character, it CHAP. IX.] MORAL LEGISLATION. 377 is easy to perceive that subserviency is practically inculcated, and that integrity is practically discouraged. Amongst that portion, then, of a legislator's office which consists in endeavouring the moral amelioration of a people, the amendment of political institutions is conspicuous. In proportion to the greatness of the influence of governments, is the obligation to direct that influence in favour of virtue. A government of which the principles and practice were accord- ant with rectitude, would very powerfully aflfect the general morals. He, therefore, who explodes one vicious principle, or who amends one corrupt practice, is to be regarded as amongst the most useful and honourable of public men. If, however, in any state there are difficulties, at present insurmountable, in the way of improving political institu- tions, still let us do what we can. Precept without example may do some good : nor are we to forget, that if the public virtue is increased by whatever means, it will react upon the governing power. A good people will not long tolerate a bad government. Amongst the most obvious means of rectifying the general morals by positive measures, one is the encouraging a ju- dicious education of the people. Upon this judiciousness al- most all its success depends. The great danger in underta- king a national system of education, is, that some peculiar notions will be instilled for political purposes, and that it will be converted into a source of patronage. In a word, the great danger is, that national education should become, like national churches, an ally of the state ; and if this is done, the system will inevitably become, if not corrupt, lamentably alloyed with corruption. It does not seem as if the people of this country would countenance any endeavour to institute an education like this, because an attempt has been made, and the public voice was lifted successfully against it. A gov- ernment, if it would rightly provide for the education of the community, must forget the peculiarities of creeds, political or religious. It must regard itself not as the head of a party, but as the parent of the people. We know that schools exist which impart an important and valuable education to the poor, and to which men of all principles and all creeds are willing to subscribe. Here is eflfectod much good with little or no evil. The great defect is in the limited extent of the good. The public cannot or do not give enough of their money to provide education for all. Is there, then, any sufficient reason why a government should not supply the deficiency; or why it should not undertake 32* 378 MORAL LEGISLATION. [^SSAY lit, the whole, and leave private bounty to flow in other channels ? The great difficulty is to provide for the purity of the em- ployment of the funds : for this employment may be made an ally of the petty politics of a town, as the whole institution may be made an ally of the state. However, as the annual grants to almost all such institutions would be small, it might perhaps es- cape that universal bane. One thing would be indispensable — to provide that the authority by which appointments to master- ships, &c., are made, should be studiously constituted with a view to the exclusion of every motive but the single object of the institution. Whether it is possible to exclude improper motives may be doubted ; but it is perhaps as possible to exclude them from those as from the many institutions which the pul^lic money now supports. There is one way indeed in which education may be promoted with little danger of this petty corruption — by the purchase of land and erection of school-houses. This, together with the supply of books and the like, forms a prin- cipal item in the expense of these 'schools : and it might be hoped that, if the government did this, the public would do the remainder. But you say. All this will add to the national burdens. We need not be very jealous on this head, whilst we are so little jealous of more money worse spent. Is it known, or is it considered, that the expense of an ordinary campaign would endow a school in every parish in England and Ireland for ever? Yet how coolly (who will contradict me if I say — how needlessly ?) we devote money to conduct a campaign ! — Prevent, by a just and conciliating policy, one single war, and the money thus saved would provide, perpetually, a competent mental and moral education for every individual who needs it in the three kingdoms. Let a man for a moment indulge his imagination — let him rather indulge his reason, in supposing that one of our wars during the last century had been avoided, and that, fifty years ago, such an education had been provided Of what comparative importance is the war to us now ? In the one case, the money has provided the historian with ma- terials to fill his pages with armaments, and victories, and de- feats : — it has enabled us To point a moral or adorn a tale ; — in the other, it would have effected, and would be now effecting, and would be destined for ages to effect, a great amount of solid good ; a great increase of the virtue, the order, and the happiness of the people. I suppose that the British and Foreign Bible Society, du- CttAP. IX.] MORAL LfeGiSLAtiOif. $79 ring the twenty or thirty years that it has existed, has done more direct good in the world — ^has had a greater effect in meliorating the condition of the human species — than all the measures which have been directed to the same ends, of all the prime ministers in Europe during a century. But suppose much less than this, suppose it has done more good than the moral measures of any one court, and will not this single and simple fact prove that much more is in the power of the legislator than he is accustomed to think ; and prove too, that there is an unhappy want of advertence amongst the conductors of governments to some of the most interesting and important duties of their office ? With what means has this amount of moral good in all quarters of the earth been effected 1 Why, with a revenue that never amounted to a hundred thousand pounds in any one year ! A sum which, if we compare it with sums that are expended for measures of very questionable utility, is really trifling. Supposing that the legislature of this country had given an annual fifty thou- sand pounds to this institution, no man surely will dispute that the sums would have done incalculably more good in our own country — to say nothing of the world — than fifty thou- sand pounds of public money ordinarily effects. In passing, it may be observed too, that such an appropriation of money by a government, would probably do much in propitiating the friendliness and good offices of other nations. " No consideration of emolument can be put in competition with the morals of a nation ; and no minister can be justified, either on civil or religious grounds, in rendering the latter subservient to the former." * Such a truth should be brought into practical operation. If it had been, lotteries in England had not been so long endured — if it were, the prodigious mul- titudes of public-houses would not be endured now. That these haunts and schools of vice are pernicious, no one doubts. Why is an excess of them permitted ? — They in- crease the revenue. " Emolument is put in competition with morals," and it prevails. Even on grounds of political econ- omy, however, the evil is great — for they materially diminish the effective labour of the population. If to this we add the multitudes whom the idleness of drunkards throws upon the parishes, perhaps as much is really lost in wealth by this penny-wise policy, as is lost in virtue. Besides, all needless alehouse-keepers are dead weights upon the national industr}-'. They contribute as little to the wealth of the state as he who lives upon the funds. * Gifford: Life of Pitt 380 MORAL LEGISLATION. [eSSAY III " It would be no injustice," says Playfair, " if publicans were prevented from legal recovery for beer or spirits con- sumed in their houses ; in the same manner that paym«mt cannot be enforced of any person under twenty-one years of age, except for necessaries."* This, however, were to at- tempt to cure one evil by another. It were a practical encouragement of continual fraud. The short and simple way is to refuse licenses, and to take care that those who have the power of licensing shall exercise it justly. This sound proposition, that neither on " civil nor reli- gious grounds" is it right to consult policy at the expense of morals, is, as we have seen, at the basis of political truth. Here, then, let Political Truth be applied. It will be found, by the far-seeing legislator, to be expedient as well as right. Bishop Warburton says, ^' Though a multiplication of good laws does nothing against a general corruption of manners, yet the abrogation of bad ones greatly promotes reform ation."t The truth of the first clause is very disputable : the last is unquestionably true. This abrogation of bad laws, forms a very important part of moral legislation ; and unhappily, it is a part which there are peculiar difficulties in effecting. There are few bad laws of which there are not some persons who are interested in the continuance. The interests of these persons, the supineness of others, the pride of a third class, and the superstitious attachment of a fourth to ancient things, occasion many laws to remain on the statute books of nations, long after their perniciousness has been ascertained. Thus it has happened in our own country with respect to the game laws. It is perfectly certain that they greatly in- crease the vices of the people, and yet they remain unre- pealed. Why ? Voluble answers can no doubt be given, but they will generally be resolvable into vanity or selfishness. The legislator who shall thoroughly amend the game laws, (perhaps thorough amendment will not be far from aiotoion,) will be a greater benefactor to his country than multitudes who are rewarded with offices and coronets. Thus, too, it has happened with the system of primogeni- ture. The two great effects of this system are, first, to in- crease the inequality of property, and next to perpetuate the artificial distinctions of rank. That the existing inequality of property is a great political and moral evil, it was attempted in the third chapter of the » Causes of Decline of Nations, 4to, p. 226. t Letters to Bishop Hurd, No. 32 CHAP. IX.] MORAL LEGISLATION. 381 preceding essay to show. The means of diminishing this in- equality, which in that chapter were urged as an obUgation of private life, are not likely to be fully effectual so long as the law encourages its continuance. A man who possesses an estate in land dies without a will. He has two sons. Why should the law declare that one of these should be rich and the other poor ? Is it reasonable ? Is it just ? As to its reasonableness, I discover no conceivable reason, why, be- cause one brother is born a twelvemonth before another, he should possess ten times as much property as the younger. Affection dictates equality ; and in such cases the dictate of affection is commonly the dictate of reason. We have seen, what antecedently to enquiry we might expect, that the prac- tical effects are bad. Civil laws ought, as moral guides of the community, to discourage great inequality of property. How then shall we sufficiently deplore a system which ex- pressly encourages and increases it ? Some time ago, (and probably at the present day,) the laws of Virginia did not permit one son to inherit the landed estates of his father to the exclusion of his brothers. The effect was beneficial, for it actually diminished the disparity of property.* We, how- ever, not only do not forbid the descent of estates to one son, but we actually ordain it. It were sufficient, surely, to allow private vanity to have its own will in " keeping up a family" at the expense of sense and virtue, without encouraging it to do this by legal enactments when it might otherwise be more wise. The descent of intestates' estates in land to the elder son has the effect of an example, and of inducing vicious no- tions upon those who make their wills. That which is ha- bitual to the mind as a provision of the law, acquires a sort of sanction and fictitious propriety, by which it is recom- mended to the public. The partial distribution of intestates' estates is, however, only of casual operation. Of the laws which make certain estates inalienable, or, which is not very different, allow the present possessor to entail them, the effect is constant and habitual. To prevent a reasonable and good man from making that division of his property which reason and goodness pre- scribe, is a measure which, if it be adopted, ought surely to be recommended by very powerful considerations. And what are they — except that they enable or oblige a man to keep up * The Virginians singularly confounded good moral legislation with bad, for they made a law declaring all landed property inviolable. The consequence was what might have been expected : many got into debt aud remamed quietly on their estates, laughing at their creditors. MORAL LEGISLATION. [esSAT III. the splendour of his family ? Splendour of family ! Oh ! to what an ignis fatuus, to what a pitiable scheme of vanity, are affection, and reason, and virtue, obliged to bow ! Where is the man who will stand forward and affirm that this splendour is dictated by a regard to the proper dignity of our nature ? Where is he who will affirm that it is dictated by sound prin- ciples of virtue ? — Where, especially, is he who will affirm that it is dictated by religion ? It has nothing to do with re- ligion, nor virtue, nor human dignity : religion despises it as idly vain ; morality reprobates it as sacrificing sense and af- fection to vanity ; dignity rejects it as a fictitious and unwor- thy substitute for itself. Yet, perhaps, this humiliating motive of vanity is the most powerful of those which induce attach- ment to the system of primogeniture, or which would occasion opposition to attempts at reform. Perhaps it will be said, that to make the real estate of a man inalienable is really a kindness to his successors, by preventing him from squander- ing it away — -to which the answer is, that there is no more reason for preventing the extravagance of those who possess much property than those who possess little. No legislature thinks of enacting that a man who has two thousand pounds in the funds shall not sell it and spend it if he thinks fit. In general, men take care of their property without compulsion from the law ; and if it is affirmed that the heads of great families are more addicted to this profusion and extravagance than other men, it will only additionally show the mischiefs of excessive possessions. Why should they be more addict- ed to it unless the temptations of greatness are unusually powerful, and unusually prevail ? But it will be said, that the system is almost necessary to an order of nobility. I am sorry for it. If, as is probably at present the case, that order is expedient in the political con- stitution, and if its weight in the constitution must be kept up by the system of primogeniture, I do not affirm that, with re- spect to the peerage, this system should be at present abol- ished. But then let the enlightened man consider whither these considerations lead him. If a system essentially irra- tional and injurious, is indispensable to a certain order of mankind, what is it but to show, that, in the constitution of that order itself, there is something inherently wrong 1 Some- thing that, if the excellence of mankind were greater, it would be found desirable to amend ? Nor here, in accordance with that fearless pursuit of truth, whether welcome or unwelcome, which I propose to myself in these pages, can I refrain from the remark, that in surveying f7'om different points the con- CHAP. IX.] MORAL LEGISLATION. 383 stituent principles of an order of peers, we are led to one and the same conclusion — that there is in these principles something really aijd inherently wrong ; something which adapts the order to an imperfect, and only to an imperfect, state of mankind. If then we grant the propriety of an exception in the case of the peerage, we do not grant it with respect to other men. Much may be done to diminish the inequality of property, and with it to diminish the vices of a people, by abolishing the system of primogeniture except in the case of peers. Of so great ill consequence is excessive wealth, and the ejEfect to which it tends, excessive poverty, that a government might perhaps rightly discountenance the accumulation of ex- treme personal property. Probably there is no means of doing this, without an improper encroachment upon liberty, except by some regulations respecting wills. I perceive nothing either unreasonable or unjust in refusing a probate for an amount exceeding a certain sum. Supposing the law would allow no man to bequeath more than a given sum, what would be the ill effect ? That it would discourage enterprising in- dustry ? That industry is of little use which extends its de- sires of accumulation to an amount that has no limit. The man of talent and application, after he had so far benefited himself and his country by his exertions or inventions, as to acquire such property as would procure for him all the ac- commodations of life which he could rationally enjoy, may retire from the accumulation of more, and leave the result of his talents to bring comfort and competence to other men. It may be said, that a man might still accumulate a larger sum to dispose of before his death : — So he might ; but few would do it. Of those who are ambitious of so much more than conduces to the welfare of themselves and their children, few would continue to toil in order to give it away. Benevolence does not generally form a part of the motives to such accu- mulation. If once the law refused the bequest of more than a fixed sum, by appropriating the excess to the exigencies of the state, or to measures of public utility, men would learn to set limits to their desires. That restless pursuit of wealth which is pernicious to the pursuer and to other men, would be powerfully checked ; and he who had acquired enough, might habitually give place to the many who had too little. The writer of these pages makes no pretensions to a know- ledge of the minute details of moral legislation. It is his business, in a case like this, whilst enforcing the end only to suggest the means, Other and better means of diminishing 384 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [eSSAY III. the inequality of property than those which have just been alluded to, may probably be discovered by practical men. But of the end itself it becomes the writer of morality to speak with earnestness and with confidence.* It admits of neither dispute nor doubt, that in our own country, and in many others, there subsist extremes of wealth and poverty which are highly injurious to private virtue and to the public good ; and therefore it admits neither of dispute nor doubt, that the endeavour to diminish these extremes, is an impor- tant, (unhappy — that it is also a neglected !) branch of moral legislation. CHAPTER X. ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. Substitution of justice for law — Court of Chancery — Of fixed laws — Their inadequacy — They increase litigation — Delays — Expenses — In- formalities — Precedents — Verdicts — Legal proof— Courts of Arbitration — An extended system of trbiiration — Arbitration in criminal trials — Constitution of courts of arbitration — Their effects — Some alterations suggested — Technicalities — Useless laws. In considering this great subject the enquirer after truth is presented, as upon some kindred subjects, with one great per- vading difficulty. If he applies the conclusions of abstract truth, such is the imperfect condition of mankind, that it loses a portion of its practical adaptation to its object. If he de- viates from this truth, where shall he seek for a director of his judgment ? He is left to roam amongst endless specula- tions, where nothing is to be found with the impress of cer- tain rectitude. The dictate of simple truth respecting the Administration of Justice is, that if two men differ upon a question of prop- erty or of right, that decision should be made between them * The legal division of the personal property of intestates admits of easy amendment. Two men die, of whom each leaves six thousand pounds behind him. One has a wife and one child, and the other a wife and eight children. It can hardly be rational to give to the widow in both these cases the same share of the property. In one or two nations the law gives a third of the income of the real estates, in addition, to the widow ; but better regulations even than this were easily devised. CHAP. X.] ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. 385 which Justice, in that specific case, requires ; that if a person has committed a pubUc offence, that punishment should be awarded which his actucA deserts and the proper objects of punishment demand. But if this truth is appKed in the present state of society, it is found so difficult to obtain judges who will apply the sound principles of equity, judges who will exercise absolute -discretionary power without improper biasses, that the en- quirer is fearful to pronounce a judgment respecting the rule which should regulate the administration of justice. Men, seeing the difficulties to which an attempt to admin- ister simple equity is exposed, have advanced as a fundamen- tal maxim — that the law shall be made by one set of men and its execution entrusted to another — thus endeavouring, on the one hand, to prevent rules from being made under the bias re- sulting from the contemplation of particular cases, and on the other, to preclude the appliers of the rules from the influence of the same bias, by obliging them to decide according to a preconcerted law. But, when we have gone thus far — when we have allowed that questions between man and man shall be decided by a rule that is independent of the merits of the present case, we have departed far from the pure dictate of rectitude. We have made the standard to consist not of justice but of law ; and having done this, we have opened wide the door to the entrance of injustice. iVnd it does enter indeed ! The consideration of this state of things indicates one sat- isfactory truth — that we should pursue the rule of abstract rectitude to the utmost of our power ; that we should con- stantly keep in view, that whatever decision is made upon any other ground than that of simple justice, it is so far defeating the object for which Courts of Justice are established : and therefore, that in whatever degree it is practicable to find men who will decide every specific question according to the dic- tates of justice upon that question, in the same degree it is right to supersede the application of inferior principles. Am I then sacrificing the fundamental principles upon which the morality of these Essays is founded? Am I, at last, conceding that expediency ought to take precedence of rectitude 1 No : but I am saying, that if the state of human virtue is such that not one can be found to judge justly be- tween his brethren — men must judge as justly as they can, and a legislator must contrive such boundaries and checks for those who have to administer justice, as shall make the imr perfectioaof human virtue as little pernicious as he may. If 33 386 ADMINISTRATION OF JTrSTTCE. [eSSAT IH, this virtue were perfect, courts of Jaw might perhaps safely and rightly be shut up. There would be a rule of judgment preferable to law • and law itself, so far as it consists of ab- solute rules for the direction of decisions between man and man, might almost be done away. Now, in considering the degree in which this great desid- eratum — the substitution of justice for law — can be effected, let us be especially careful that we throw no other impedi- ments in the way of justice than those which are interposed by the want of purity in mankind. Let us never regard a system of administering justice as fixed, so that its maxims shall not be altered whenever an increase of purity dictates that an alteration may be made. All the existing national systems of administering justice are imperfect and alloyed ; — a mixture of evil and good. It were sorrowful indeed to assume that they cannot be, or to provide that they shall not be, amended. The system in this country, like most systems which are the gradual accretion of the lapse of ages, is incongruous in its different parts. In the decisions that are founded upon legal technicalities, the method of applying absolute uniform law is adopted. In the assessment of damages there is exer- cised very great discretionary power. In pronouncing ver- dicts upon prisoners, juries are scarcely allowed any discretion at all. They say absolutely either not guilty or guilty. — Then again, discretion is entrusted to the judge, and he may pronounce sentences of imprisonment or of transportation, varying according to his judgment in their duration or circum- stances. The reader should well observe this admission of discretionary power to the judicial court, because it is a prac- tical acknowledgment that considerations of equity are in- dispensable to the administration of justice, whatever may be the multiplicity or precision of the laws. Our judges are en- trusted, on the circuits, with the discretionary power of com- muting capital punishments or leaving the offender for execu- tion. This is equivalent to an acknowledgment, that even the most tremendous sanctions of the state are more safely applied upon principles of equity than upon principles of Law. Let the reader bear this in his mind. Of the general tendency and attendant evils of uniform law, some illustrations have been offered in the preceding Essay, and some observations have been offered in the chapter on Arbitration, on the advantages of administering justice upon principles of equity, that is, by a large discretionary power. Now it will be our business to enquire into some of the rea- C^AP. X.] ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. $87 sonings by which the application of uniform law is recom- mended — to illustrate yet further the moral claims of Courts of Equity, and to show if we can that some greater approxi- mation to the adoption of these courts is practicable even in the present condition of mankind. The administration of justice, according to a previously made rule, labours under this fundamental objection, that it as- sumes a knowledge in the maker of the rule which he does not possess. It assumes that he can tell beforehand, not only what is a good decision in a certain class of questions, but what is the best ; and the objection appears so much the more palpable, because it assumes, that a party who judges a case before it exists, can better tell what is justly due to an offended, or an offending person, than those who hear all the particu- lars of the individual case. This objection, which it is evi- dent can never be got over, is practically felt and acknow- ledged. Every relaxation of a strict adherence to the law, every concession of discretionary power to juries or to courts, is an acknowledgment of the inherent inadequacy and im- propriety of fixed rules. You perceive that no fixed rules can define and discriminate justly for specific cases. Multi- ply them as you may, the gradations in the demands for equi- table decision will multiply yet faster ; so that you are forced. at last to concede something to equity, though perhaps there has not hitherto been conceded enough. Our Court of Chancery was originally, and still is called a Court of Equity, the erection of which court is paying a sort of tacit homage to equity as superior to law, and making a sort of tacit ac- knowledgment how imperfect and inefficient the fundamental principles of fixed law are. It is perhaps a subject of regret that this court is now a court of equity rather in name than in fact. It proceeds, in a great degree, according to the rule, of precedent ; one of the principal differences between its practical character and that of legal courts being, that in one a jury decides questions, and in the other a judge. And after all, the fixedness of the law is much less in prac- tice than in theory, We all know how various and contra- dictory are the " opinions " of legal men, so that a person may present his " case " to three or four able lawyers in suc- cession, and receive from each a different answer. Nay, if several should agree when they are applied to as judges in the case, it is found, when a person comes into court, that counsel can find legal arguments, and unanswerable argu- ments too, on both sideg of the question, till at last the ques- tion is decided, not by a fixed law, but by a preponderance of 388- ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [esSAY III. weight 0^ conflicting precedents. Indeed the unfixedness of the law is practically so great, that common fame has made it a proverb. Another inconvenience which is inseparable from the use of fixed rules is, that they almost preclude a court from at- tending sufficiently to one very important point in the admin- istration of justice, the intention of offending parties. Law says, if a man steals another person's watch under such and such circumstances, he shall receive such and such a punish- ment. Yet the guilt of two men who steal watches under the same visible circumstances, is often totally disproportionate ; and this disproportion indicates the propriety of corresponding gradations of penalty. Yet fixed law awards the same pen- alty to both. If it is said that a court may take intention and motives into the account in its sentence, so it may ; but in whatever degree it does this, in the same degree it acknow- ledges the incompetency and inaptitude of fixed laws. " The motives and intentions of the parties." When we consider that the personal guilt of a man depends more upon these than upon his simple acts, and consequently that these rather than his acts indicate his deserts, it appears desirable ♦hat human tribunals should measure their punishments as much by a reference to actual deserts as is consistent with the public good. I would not undertake to affirm that the guilt of the offender is to us the ultimate standard of just pun- ishment, because it may be necessary to the prevention of crimes, that of two offences equal in guilt, one should be pun- ished more severely than another, on account of the greater facilities for its commission — that is, on account of the greater impracticability of guarding against the offence, or of detect- ing the offender after it is committed. But, in speaking of the propriety of adverting to intention, this is not the point in view. I speak not of the difference between two classes of crimes, but of the actual motives, inducements and tempta- tions of the individual offender. Stealing five pounds worth of property in sheep, although it may be no more vicious, as an act, than stealing a five-pound note from the person, may perhaps be rightly visited with a severer punishment. This is one thing. But two men may each steal a sheep with very different degrees of personal guilt. This is another. And this is the point of wliich we speak. A man who is able to maintain himself in respectability, but will not apply himself to an honest occupation — who lives by artifices, or frauds, or thefts, or gambling, or contracting debts, watches night after night an opportunity to carry off sheep from an in- CHAP. X.] ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. 389 closure. He succeeds, and spends the value in drunkenness, or at a bagnio. A man of decent character who in a period of distress, endeavours in vain to procure employment or bread — who pawns, day after day, his furniture, his clothing, his bed, to obtain food for his children and his wife — who finds at last that all is gone, and that hunger continues its de- mands — passes a sheep field. The thought of robbing starts suddenly before him, and he as suddenly executes it. He carries home the meat, and is found by the police hastily cut- ting slices for his voracious family. Ought these two men to receive the same punishment? It is impossible. Justice, common sense, Christianity forbid it. We cannot urge, in such cases, that human tribunals, being unable to penetrate the secret motives of action, must leave it to the Supreme Be- ing to apportion punishment strictly to guilt. We can dis- cover, though not the exact amount of guilt, a great deal of difference between its degrees. We do actually know, that of two persons who commit the same crime, one is often much more criminal than another ; and were it not ^hat our jurisprudence habituates us so much to refer simply to acts, we might know much more than we do. We are often igno- rant of motives only because we dp not enquire for them. A law says, " If any person shall enter a field and steal a sheep or horse, he shall suffer death ;" and so, when a court comes to try a man charged with the act, they perhaps scarcely think of any other consideration than whether he stole the animal or not. Of ten who do thus steal, no two probably deserve exactly the same punishment, and some, undoubtedly deserve much less than others. Discrimination, then, is necessary to the demands alike of humanity, and reason, and religion. But how shall sufficient discrimination be exercised under a system of fixed laws ? If the decisions of courts must be regulated by the acts of the offender, how shall they take into account those endless gra- dations of personal desert, to refer to which is a sine qua non of the administration of justice ? Now, in order to satisfy these demands, courts must by some means be entrusted with a greater discretionary power ; or, which is the same thing, decisions upon maxims of equity must, in a greater degree, take the place of decisions regulated by law. The next great objection is, that to place, for example, men's property at the discretion of a court of equity that was not bound down by fixed rules, would make the possession of every man's property uncertain. Nobody would know whether the estate which he and his fathers enjoyed, might not t(H 33* 390 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [eSSAY III morrow, by the decision of some court of equity, be taken away. But this supposes that the decisions of these courts would be arbitrary and capricious ; whereas, the supposition upon which we set out — the supposition upon which alone we reason, is, that means can be devised by which their decisions shall be generally at least accordant with rectitude. They must de- viate very widely from rectitude if they took away a man's estate without some reason which appeared to them to be good ; and it could hardly appear to be good, on a full hearing of the case, unless the merits of that case were very questionable ; but in proportion to that questionableness would be the small- ness of the grievance if the estate were taken away. Let any man suppose a case for himself — ^he possesses a house, to which no one ever disputed his title till some person chooses to bring his title before a court of equity — of the mem- bers of which court the possessor nominates one half ; does any man in his senses suppose that the property would be endan- gered ? or rather, does any man suppose that a person would be foolish enough to call the title in question ? But we must repeat the other alternative. If a person holds an estate by a decision of law which he would not have held by a decision of rectitude, we do not listen to his complaints though it be taken away. It is just what we desire. It has been contended, that to depart further from the sys- tem of deciding by law, would tend to the increase of litiga- tion; that nothing prevents litigation so much as previous certainty of the rule of decision ; and that if, instead of this certainty, the decision of a court were left to a species of chance, there would be litigation without end. But in this argument it is not sufficiently considered that previous cer- tainty of the rule of decision is very imperfectly possessed — • that, as we have just been observing, the law is not fixed ; and, consequently, that that discouragement of litigation which would arise out of previously known rules, very imperfectly operates. Nor, again, is it enough considered, that the de- cision of a court of equity, if properly constituted, would not be a matter of chance, nor any thing that is like it. Though a legal rule would not bind a court, still it would be bound — Abound by the dictates — commonly the very intelligible dictates — of right and wrong. " Reason," it has been said, " is a thousand times more explicit and intelligible than law ;" and if reason were not more intelligible, still the moral judgments in the mind assuredly are. Again, many causes are now brought into court, not because they are morally good, but legally good. Of this the contending parties are often conscious, and they fiHAP. X,] ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. 391 would therefore be conscious that a court which regulated its decisions by the moral qualities of a case, would decide against them. At present.^ when a man contemplates a law- suit, he has to judge as well as be can of the probability of success, by enquiring into the rules of law and decisions of former cases. If a court of equity were to be the judge, he would have to appeal to a much nearer and more determinate ground of probability — to his own consciousness of the justness of his cause. We are therefore to set the discouragement of litigation, which arrises from this source, against that which arises from the supposed fixedness of law ; and I am dis- posed to conclude that in a well constituted court this dis- couragement would be practically the greater. Another point is this : — It is unhappily certain, that either the ignorance or the cupidity of some legal men prompts many to engage in law- suits who have little even of legal reason to hope for success. This cause of litigation equity would do away; a lawyer would riot be applied to, for a lawyer would have no better means of foreseeing the probable decision of a court of equity than another man. Here, too, it is to be remembered that the great, what if I say the crying evils of the present state of legal practice, re- sult from — ^the employment of fixed laws. It has indeed been acknowledged by an advocate of these laws, that they '' erect the practice of the law into a separate profession."* Now, suppose all the evils, all the expenses, all the disposi- tion to litigation and dispute, all the practical injustice, which results from this profession were done away — would not the benefit be very great ? Would it not be a great advantage to the quiet, and the pockets, and the virtue of the nation ? I regard this one circumstance as forming a recommendation of equity so poAverful, that serious counterbalancing evils must be urged to overcome its weight. Even to the political econ- omist the dissolution or great diminution of the profession is of some importance. I am no proficient in his science : but it requires little proficiency to discover, that the existence of a large number of persons who not only contribute little to the national prosperity, but often deduct from it, is no trifling evil in a state. But it is not simply as it respects the profession that fixed laws are thus injurious. They are the great ulti- mate occasion of those obstacles to the attainment of justice which are felt to be a grievance ivL almost all civilized nations. The delays and the expenses, and the undefined annoyances 6f vexation and disappointment, deter many from seeking * Paley: Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 8. 392 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE.. [ESSAT UK their just rights. Delays are occasioned in a great degree by forms ; and forms are a part of the system of fixed laws. Ex* penses are entailed by the necessity of complying \Vith these forms, and of employing those persons whose knowledge is requisite to tell us what those forms are \ and the acquisition of this knowledge requires so much time and care, that he who imparts it must be well paid. As to indeterminate vex- ations and disappointments, they too result principally from the fixedness of rules. A man with a cause of unquestioned rectitude is too often denied justice on account of the inter- vention of some absolute rule — that has little or no relevance to the question of rectitude. Persons^ fearing these various evils, decline to endeavour the attainment of their just rights, rights which, if equity were in a greater degree substituted for law, would be of comparatively easy attainment. The reader can hardly too vigorously impress upon his mind the consideration, that the various sacrifices of rectitude which are made under colour of the legality of people's claims, result from the system of fixed laws. If to avail one's-self of an informality in a will to defraud the claims of justice be wrong^ — the evil and the temptation is to be laid at the door of fixed law. If an undoubted criminal escapes jus- tice merely because he cannot legally be convicted^ the evil — which is serious — is to be laid at the door of fixed law. And so of a hundred other cases — cases of which the aggre- gate ill consequence is so great, as to form a weighty objec- tion to whatever system may occasion them. I make little distinction between deciding by fixed law and by precedents, because the principles of both are the same^ and both, it is probable, will stand or fall together. Prece- dents are laws — ^but of somewhat less absolute authority ; which indeed they ought to be, since they are made by courts of justice and not by the legislature. They are a sort of sup- plemental statutes, which attempt to supply (what however can never be suppUed) the deficiencies of fixed laws. A stat- ute is a general rule ; a precedent prescribes a case in which that rule shall be observed ; but a thousand cases still arise which neither statute nor precedent can reach. So habitual is become our practice of judging questions rather by a previously made rule than by their proper merits, that even the House of Lords, which is the highest court of equity in the state, searches out, when a question is brought before it, its precedents ! Long debates ensue upon th« paral- lelism of decisions a century or two ago ; when, if the merits of the case only were regarded, perhaps not an hour would CHAP. X.] ADMINIbTRATION OF JUSTICE. 39^ be spent in the decision. Then the House is cramped and made jealous lest its present vote should be a precedent for another decision fifty years to come. New debates are started as to the bearing of the precedent upon some imagined ques- tion in after times ; and at last the decision is regulated per- liaps as much by fears of distant consequences, as by a regard to present rectitude. Do away precedents, and the House might pursue unshackled the dictate of Virtue. And after all, when precedents are sought and found, the House usually acts upon the opinion of its legal members — thus subverting the very nature of a court of equity. It would seem the ra- tional and consistent course, that in the House of Lords, when it constitutes such a court, the law lords should be almost the last to give a sentiment ; for if it be to be decided by lawyers, to what purpose is it brought to the House of Peers ? And another inconvenience of fixed law — or at any rate of fixed laws such as ours are— is, that in cases of criminal trials the jury are bound down, as we have before noticed, to an ab- solute verdict either to acquit the prisoner of all crime and exempt him from all punishment, or to declare that he is guilty and leave him to the sentence of the court. Now since many verdicts are founded upon a balance of probabiHties — probabil- ities which leave the juror's mind uncertain of the prisoner's guilt, it would seem the dictate of reason that corresponding verdicts should be given. If it is quite certain that a man has stolen a watch, it seems reasonable that he should receive a greater punishment than he of whom it is only highly probable that he has stolen it. But the verdict in each case is the same — till, as the probability diminishes, the minds of the jury at last preponderate on the other side, and they pronounce an absolute verdict of acquittal. From this state of things it hap- pens that some are punished more severely than the amount of probability warrants, and that many are not punished at all, because there is no alternative to the jury between the abso- lute acquittal and absolute conviction. Now the imperfection of human judgment, the impossibility of penetrating always into the real facts and motives of men, indicates that some penalties may justly be awarded, even though a court enter- tains doubts of a prisoner's guilt. Man must doubt because he cannot know. We may rightly therefore proceed upon probabilities and punish upon probabilities ; so that we should not wholly exempt a man from punishment because we are not sure that he is guilty, nor inflict a certain stipulated amount of it because we are only strongly persuaded that he is. Pun- ishment may rightly then be regulated by probabilities : but 394 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [esSAY III how shall this be done without a large discretionary power in those who judge ? And how shall such discretionary power be exercised whilst we act upon the maxims of fixed law ? The requisition of what is called legal proof is one result of fixed law that is attended with much evil. It not unfre- quently happens, that a man who claims a right adduces such evidence of its validity that the court — that every man — is convinced he ought to possess it : but there is some deficiency in that precise kind of proof which the law prescribes ; and so, in deference to law, justice is turned away. It is the same with crimes. Crimes are sometimes proved to the satis- faction of every one who hears the evidence ; but because there is some want of strict legal proof, the criminal is again turned loose upon society. Such things, decisions founded upon equity would do away. All that the court would require would be a satisfactory conviction of the prisoner's guilt or of the claimant's rights ; and having obtained that satisfaction, it would decide accordingly. Here, too, a consideration is suggested respecting the pre- rogative which is vested in the crown of pardoning offenders. The crown, if any, is doubtless the right repository of this prerogative ; but it is not obvious, upon principles of equity, that any repository is right. If an ofTender deserves punish- ment, he ought to receive it — and if he does not deserve it, no sentence ought to be passed upon him. This, of which the truth is very obvious, simply considered, is only untrue when you introduce fixed laws. These fixed laws require you to deliver a verdict, and, when it is delivered, to pass a sentence ; — and then, finding your sentence is improper or un- just, you are obliged to go to a court of equity to remedy the evil. Why should we pass a sentence if it is not deserved ? "Why is a sentence the indispensable consequence of a ver- dict 1 Why rather is a formal verdict pronounced at all ? There appears in the view of equity no need for all these forms. What we want is to assign to an offender his due punishment ; — and when no other is assigned, there is no need for prerogatives of pardon. Proceeding, then, upon the conviction that law as distin- guished from justice is attended with many evils, let us en- quire whether the obstacles to decisions by considerations of justice are insuperable. Now I do believe that many of the objections which suggest themselves to an enquirer's mind are really adventitious — that the administration of simple jus- tice may be detached from many of those inconveniences which attach no doubt to ill-constituted discretionary courts. CHAP. X.] ADMIXISrRATlON" 31? JUSTICE, 395 So confident has been the objection to decisions upon ruiea of equity, that Dr. Paley, in the eighth chapter of the Politi- cal division of his Philosophy, has these words : " The first maxim of a free state is, that the laws be made by one set of men and administered by another. When these offices are united in the same person or assembly, particular laws are made for particular cases, springing oftentimes from partial motives^ and directed to private ends.'''' But if these partial motives and private ends can be wholly or in a great degree excluded, the objection which is founded upon them is in a great degree or wholly at an end. If these offices were united in any person or assembly, appointed or constituted as the administerers of justice now are, I doubt not that partial motives and private ends would prevail. But the necessity for this is merely assumed ^ and upon this assumption Paley proceeds: ^' Let it be supposed that the courts of Westminster Hall made their own laws, or that the two houses of parlia- ment, with the king at their head, tried and decided causes at their bar" — ^then, he says, the inclinations of the judges would inevitably attach on one side or the other, and would interfere with the integrity of justice. No doubt this would happen ; but because this would happen to the courts of Westminster Hall, or to the legislative assemblies, it does not follow that it would happen to all arbitrators, however appointed. Thus it is that the mind, habitually associating ideas which may reasonably be separated, founds its conclusions, not upon the proper and essential merits of the question, but upon the ques- tion as it is accidentally brought before it. The proper ground on which to seek objections to decision on rules of equity, is not in the want of adaptation of present judicial institutions, but on the impracticability of framing institutions in which these rules might safely prevail ; and this impracticability has never, so far as the writer knows, been shown. Now, without assigning the extent to which arbitration may eventually take place of law, or the degree in which it may be adopted in the present state of any country, it may be asked — Since a large number of disagreements are actually settled by arbitration, that is, by rules of equity, why may not that number be greatly increased ? It is common in cases of partnership, and other agreements between several parties, to stipulate that if a difference arises it shall be settled by arbi- trators. It must be presumed that this mode of settling is regarded as the best, else why formally stipulate for it ? The superiority, too, must be discovered by experience. It is then in fact found that a great number of questions of property and 396 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE, [fiSSAY III. Other concerns, are settled more cheaply and more satisfac- torily by equity than by law. Why then, we repeat, may not that number be indefinitely increased, or who wOl ,assign a limit to its increase ? Now the constitution of these efficient courts of equity, is not permanent. They are not composed of judges previously appointed to decide all disputes. They are not composed, as the courts of Westminster Hall are, or as the houses of parliament are, or as benches of magistrates are. If they were, they would be open to the undue influence and private purposes of those who composed them. But the members of these courts are appointed by the disputants them- selves, or by some party to whom they mutually agree to commit the appointment. Supposing then the worst, that the disputing parties appoint men who are interested in their fa- vours ; still the balance is equal : — both may do the same. The court is not influenced by undue motives, though its mem- bers are ; and if, in consequence of such motives or of any other cause, the court cannot agree upon a verdict, what do they do 1 They appoint an umpire, or, which is the same thing, the disputants appoint one. This umpire must be pre- sumed to be impartial ; for otherwise the disputants would not both have assented to his appointment. At the worst, then, an impartial decision may be confidently hoped ; and what may not be hoped under better circumstances ? It is, I be- lieve, common for disagreeing parties to nominate at once, disinterested and upright men ; and if they do this, and take care, too, that they shall be intelligent men, almost every thing is done which is in the power of mav\ to secure a just decision between them. Disinterestedness — uprightness — intelligence : — these are the qualities which are needed in an arbitrator. That he should be disinterested; that is, that he should possess no motive to prefer the interests of either party, is obviously indispensable. But this is not enough. Other motives than interest operate upon some men ; and there is no sufficient ?scurity for the integrity of a decision, but in that habitual up Tightness in the arbitrator by which the sanctions of morality are exercised and made influential. The requisiteness of in- telligence, both as it implies competent talent and competent knowledge, is too manifest for remark. Now, one of the great objections which are made to a judi- cature appointed for the decision of one dispute, and that one only, is, *' the want of legal science" — " the ignorance of those who are to decide upon our rights."* This objection applies * Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. G, c. 7. 5HAP. X.] ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. 397 in great force to ordinary juries, but it scarcely applies at all to intelligent arbitrators properly selected— and not applying, we are at liberty to claim in favour of arbitration Avithout abatement, that " indifFerency," that "integrity" that "disin- terestedness," which it is allowed that a casual judicature possesses. Men become skilful by habit and experience. The man who is now selected for the first time in his life to exercise the office of an arbitrator, feels perhaps some difficulties. He is introduced into a new situation in society ; and, like other novices, it is not unlikely that he will be under difficulties re- specting his decision. But if the system of arbitration should become as common as lawsuits are now, men would soon learn expertness in the duties pf arbitrators. If, in a moder- ate town, there were twelve or twenty men, whose characters and knowledge recommended them generally, and especially to the confidence of their neighbours — these are the men who would be selected to adjust their disputes. And even if the same individuals were not often employed, the habit of judging, a familiarity with such matters, becomes diffused, just as every other species of knowledge becomes diffused upon subjects that are common, in the world. Another ground of difficulty to an arbitrator in the present state of things, is the habit, which is so general in the com- munity, of referring for justice to rules of law, A man when he enters an arbitration room, is continually referring in his mind to law-books and precedents. This* is likely to confuse his principles of decision, to intermix foreign things with one another, and to produce sometimes perhaps a decision founded half upon law and half upon justice. This may indeed occa-^ sionally be in some sort imposed upon him — at least he would feel a hesitation, a sort of repugnance to deliver a decision which was absolutely contrary to the rule of law. But this inconvenience is in a great degree accidental and factitious. As the principles of equity assumed their proper dominance in the adjustment of disputes, fixed laws would proportionably decline in influence and in their practical hold upon the minds of men. Their judgments would gradually become emanci- pated from this species of shackle ; — they would rise, disen- cumbered of arbitrary maxims, and decide according to those maxims of moral equity for the dictates of which no man has far to seek. The whole system tends to the invigoration and elevation of the mind. A man who is conscious of an abso- lute authority to decide — of an uncontrolled discretionary power, in a question perhaps of important interests.' is ani- 34 ■ ' 398 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [esSAV III mated by the moral eminence of his station to exert a vigorous and honorable endeavour to award sound justice. Y'ou are not to expect in such a man, what we find in arbitrary judges, that his very absoluteness will make him capricious and tyran- nical ; for the moment he has pronounced his decision, a calamity, if that decision have been unjust, awaits him ; — -the reprobation of his neighbours, of his friends, and of the public. The exercise of his discretion is bound to the side of upright- ness, though not by ordinary pains and penalties, yet by vir- tual pains and penalties, which to such men as are chosen for arbitrators are amongst the most powerful that can be applied. One thing is indispensable to an extended system of arbi- tration, that the civil magistrate should sanction its decisions by a willing enforcement of the verdict. It is usual for dis- putants who refer to arbitrators to sign an agreement to abide by their decision ; and this agreement may by some simple process of law be enforced. The law does indeed now^ sanc- tion arbitrations ; but then it is in a formal and expensive way. A deed is drawn up, and a stamp must be affixed, and a solicitor must be employed ; — so that at last the disagreeing parties do but partly reap the benefits of arbitration. This should be remedied. The reader will observe that I say law is wanted to enforce the decisions of equity. No doubt it is. It is wanted for the same reason as government is wanted, to exert power, which power, it is evident, must be exercised by the government. But if any critic should say that this ac- knowledges the insufficiency of equity, I answer, that we are speaking of unconnected things. The business of equity is to decide between right and wrong, and to say what is right • — with which the infliction of penalties or the enforcement of decisions has no concern. A court and jiu*y say that a man shall be sent for six months to a prison, but it forms no part of their business to execute the sentence. With respect to the applicability of courts of equity to crim- inal trials, I see nothing that necessarily prevents it. Men who can judge respecting matters of property and personal rights, can judge respecting questions of innocence and guilt. In one view, indeed, they can judge more easily ; because moral desert is determinable upon more simple and obvious principles than claims of property. Many who would feel much difficulty in deciding involved disputes about money or land, would feel none in determining, with sufficient accuracy, the degree of an offender's guilt. It being manifest, then, that offences against the peace of society may be as properly referred to courts of equity as CHAP. X.] ADMIXISTRATtON OF JUSTICE. 399 questions of right — what should be the constitution of such a court ? But here the reader is to remember, that the objec- tion is not merely or principally to the constitution of present courts, but to the principles of fixed law upon which justice is administered. So that, if principles of equity were substi- tuted, the constitution of the court would become a secondaiy concern ; and courts consisting of a jury and a judge might not be bad, though they were not the best. If half a dozen intelligent and upright men could be appointed to examine the truth of charges against a prisoner, and if they were al- lowed to award a just punishment, I should have little fear, after making allowances for the frailties of humanity, that their penalties would generally be just ; — at any rate, that they would be more accordant with justice than penalties which are regulated by fixed law. The difficulty is in pro- curing the arbitrators, a difficulty greater than that which ob- tains in cases of private right. For in the first place offend- ers against the peace of society generally excite the feelings of the public, and especially of the neighbourhood, against them. Men too often prejudge cases, and the prisoner is fre- quently condemned in the public mind before any evidence has been brought before a jury. This indicates a difficulty in selecting impartial men. And then, in the case of arbitra- tions, each party chooses one or more of the judges. Shall the same privilege be allowed to persons charged with crime ? If it were, would they not select persons who would frustrate all the endeavours to administer justice ? Besides, where is the conflicting party who shall be equally interested in ap- pointing arbitrators of opposite dispositions ? And if both did appoint such, what is the hope of a temperate and rational decision 1 Again, there are offences which are regarded with peculiar severity by particular classes of men. A court com- posed of country gentlemen, would hardly award a fair verdict against a poacher. These considerations and others indicate difficulty ; and perhaps the difficulty cannot better be avoided than by a court selected by chance. In the selection of juries there have recently been introduced improvements. Still, if equity rather than law is to be regarded, something more is needed. Now, though a jury be ignorant, the judge is learned ; and a learned judge is indispensable where law is to be applied. But if simple justice be the object, such a judge becomes compara- tively little requisite ; yet when we have dispensed with the intelligence of the judge, we must provide for greater intelli- gence in the jury. A jury from the lower classes of the com- 400 ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [eSSAY III. mimity may serve with tolerable sufficiency the purposes of justice in the present system ; but if they were converted from jurymen into arbitrators, much more of intelligence, and, we may add, much more of elevation of character, is required. To endeavour to obtain this intelligence and up- rightness by a mode of chance selection, must always be very uncertain of success. If those who were eligible for this species of jury, were obliged to possess a certain qualifica- tion in point of property : if, of those who were thus eligible, a competent number were selected by ballot, and if the pris- oner and the prosecutor were allowed a large right of chal- lenge, perhaps every thing would be done which is in the power of man. The number of arbitrators who form a court of equity should always be small. Large numbers effect less good by accumulating wisdom, than harm by putting off patient inves tigation to one another, and by " dividing the shame " of a partial decision. The members of such courts, though capable of deciding with competent propriety on questions of right and wrong when facts are laid before them, may be incapable, from wanl of habit, of eliciting those facts from reluctant or partial wit- nesses. Now, I perceive no reason why, both in criminaJ and civil courts, a person could not be employed, whose pro- fession it was^to elicit the truth. Is he to be d^ pleader or ap advocate ? No. The very name is sufficient to discredit the office in the view of pure morality. One professional man only should be employed. That one should be employed by neither party separately, but by both, or by the state. It should be his simple and sole business to elicit the truth, and to elicit it from the witnesses of both sides. Securities against corruption in this man, are obviously as easy as in arbitrators themselves. The judges of England evince, in general, an admirable example of impartiality ; and as to cor- ruptness, it is almost unknown. What reason is there for questioning that officers such as we speak of, may not be in- corrupt and impartial too ? If handsome remuneration be necessary to secure them from undue influence and to main- tain the dignity of their office, let them by all means have it. Even in a present court of law or justice — suppose the ex- amination of witnesses was taken from barristers and con- ducted by the judge, does not every man perceive that the truth might be elicited by one interrogator of the witnesses of both parties ? And does not every one perceive that such an interrogator would elicit it in a far more upright and manly CHAP. X.] ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. 401 way, than is now the case ? Pleading is a thing which, in the administration of justice, ought not to be so much as named. Bearing along in our minds, then, the inconveniences and the evils of Fixed Laws — ^let us suppose that a circuit was taken, and that courts were held from which the application of fixed law was, so far as is practicable, excluded. Suppose these courts to consist of three or five or seven men, selected according to the utmost skill of precautionary measures, for their intelligence and uprightness, and of one publicly autho- rized and dignified person, whose office it should be to assist the court in the discovery of the truth. Suppose that, when the facts of the case, and as far as possible the motives and intentions of the parties, were laid open, these three, or five, or seven men, pronounced a decision as accordant as they could do with the immutable principles of right and wrong, and excluding almost all reference to fixed laws, and prece- dents, and technicalities ; — is it not probable, is it not reason- able, to expect that the purposes of justice would be more effectually answered than they are at present 1 And even if justice was not better administered, would not such a system exclude various existing evils connected with legal institu- tions, evils so great as to be real calamities to the state ? Perhaps it is needless to remark, that all courts of equity which are recognized by the state should be public. Individ- uals who refer their disputes to private arbitrators, may have them privately adjusted if they please. But publicity is a powerful means of securing that impartiality which it is the first object in the administration of justice to secure. There is one advantage, collateral indeed to the adminis- tration of equity, but not therefore the less considerable, thai it would have a strong tendency to diffuse sound i^eas of jus- tice in the public mind. As it is, it may unhappily be affirmed that courts of judicature spread an habitual confusion of ideas upon the subject ; and, what is worse, very frequently incul- cate that as just which is really the contrary. Our notions of a court of judicature are, or they ought to be, that it is a place sacred to justice. But when, superinduced upon this notion, it is the fact, that by very many of its decisions jus- tice is put into the background ; that law is elevated into supremacy ; that the technicalities of forms, and the finesse of pleaders, triumph over the decisions of rectitude in the mind — ^the effect cannot be otherwise than bad. It cannot do otherwise than confound, in the public mind, notions of good and evil, and teach them to think that every thing is 34* '402 - ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. [eSSAY III. virtuous which courts of justice sanction. — If, instead of this, the pubUc were habituated to a constant appeal to equity, and to a constant conformity to its dictates, the effect would be opposite, and therefore good. Justice would stand promi- nently forward to the public view as the object of reverence and regard. The distinctions between equity and injustice would become, by habit, broad and defined. Instead of con- founding the public ideas of morality, a court of judicature would teach, very powerfully teach, discrimination. A court, seriously endeavouring to discover the decision of justice, and uprightly awarding it between man and man, would be a spectacle of which the moral influence could not be lost upon the people. In thus recommending the application of pure moral prin- ciples in the administration of justice, the writer does not presume to define how far the present condition of human virtue may capacitate a legislature to exchange fixed rules of decision for the impartial judgments of upright men. That it may be done to a much greater extent than it is now done, he entertains no doubt. A legislature might perhaps begin with that pernicious species of arbitrary rules which consists of technicalities and forms. To deny justice to a man be- cause he has not claimed it in a specific form of words, or because some legal inaccuracy has been committed in the proceedings, must always disapprove itself to the plain judg- ments of mankind. Begin then with the most palpable and useless rules. Whatever can be dispensed with, it is a sa- cred duty to abolish, and every act of judicious abolition M'^ill facilitate the abolition of others : — it will prepare the public mind for the contemplation of purer institutions, and gradu- ally enable it to adopt those institutions in the national practice. As to the particular modes of securing the administration of simple justice, the writer would say, that those which he has suggested, he has suggested with deference. His busi- ness is rather with the principles of sound political institu- tions, than with the form and mode of applying them to prac- tice. Other and better means than he has suggested are probably to be found. The candid reader will acknowledge, that in advocating institutions so different from those which actually obtain, the political moralist is under peculiar diffi- culties and disadvantages. The best machinery of social in- CHAP. XI.] PROPER SUBJECTS OF PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 403 stitutions is discovered rather from experience than from reasoning, and upon this machinery, in the present instance, experience has thrown little light. Here as in some other parts of this work, the reader will observe that alterations are proposed and improvements suggested which have been actually adopted since these Essays were written. Our courts, and also the legislature, have lately paid some attention to the modes in which public justice is administered. As yet, the alterations which have been made are chiefly confined to the criminal laws: but our judges are now beginning to exert the discretionary power which is vested in them? in preventing the course of justice from being, so frequently as it heretofore has been, intercepted by technicalities and verbal inacuracy. Of this the public had lately an instance in the cause of GuUey v. the Bishop of Exeter. A Parliamentary Commission has been appointed, and is now sitting, whose object it is to devise improvements in the practice of our courts of judicature. — Ed. CHAPTER XL OF THE PROPER SUBJECTS OF PENAL ANIMAD- VERSION. Crimes regarded by the Civil and the Moral Law — Created ofFences — • Seduction — Duelling — Insolvents — Criminal debtors — Gradations of guilt in insolvency — Libels: mode of punishing — -Effects of the laws respecting libels — Effects of public censure — Libels on the Government — Advantages of a free statement of the truth — Freedom of the Press. The man who compares the actions which are denounced as wrong in the Moral Law, with those which are punished by civil government, will find that they are far from an accord- ance. The Moral Law declares many actions to be wicked, which human institutions do not punish ; and there are some that these institutions punish, of which there is no direct re- prehension in the communicated Will of God. It is not easy to refer all these incongruities to the applica- tion of any one general principle of discrimination. You cannot say that the magistrate adverts only to those crimes which are pernicious to society, for all crimes are pernicious. Nor can you say that he selects the greatest for his animad- version, because he punishes many of which the guilt is in- comparably less than others which he passes by. Nor again 404 PROPER SUBJECTS OF [esSAY III. can you say that he punishes only those in which there is an injured and complaining party ; for he punishes some of which all the parties were voluntary agents. Lastly — ;and what seems at first view very extraordinary — we find that civil governments create offences which, simply regarded, have no existence in the view x)f morality, and punish them with severity, whilst others, unquestionably immoral, pass with im- punity. The practical rule which appears to be regarded in the se- lection of offences for punishment, is founded upon the ex- isting circumstances of the community. Offences against which, from any cause, the public disap- probation is strongly directed, are usually visited by the arm of the civil magistrate, partly because that disapprobation im- plies that the offence disturbs the order of society, and partly because, in the case of such offences, penal animadversion is efficient and vigorous by the ready co-operation of the public. Thus it is with almost all offences against property, and with those which personally injure or alarm us. Every man is desirous of prosecuting a housebreaker, for he feels that his own house may be robbed. Every man is desirous of pun- ishing an assault or a threatening letter, because he considers that his peace may be disturbed by the one, and his person injured by the other. This general and strong reprobation makes detection comparatively easy, and punishment efficient. Examples of the contrary kind are to be found in the crimes of drunkenness, of profane swearing, of fornication, of duelling. Not that we have any reason to expect, that at the bar of heaven some of these crimes will be at all less ob- noxious to punishment than the former, but because, from whatever reason, the public very negligently co-operate with law in punishing them, and manifest little desire to see its penal- ties inflicted. An habitual drunkard does much more harm to his family and to the world, than he who picks my pocket of a guinea ; yet we raise a hue and cry after the thief, and suffer the other to become drunk every day. So it is with duelling and fornication. The public know very well that these things are wrong, and pernicious to the general welfare ; but scarcely any one will prosecute those who commit them. The magistrate may make laws, but in such a state of public feeling they will remain as a dead letter ; or, which perhaps is as bad, be called out upon accidental and irregular oc- casions. Another rule which appears to be practically, though not theoretically, adopted is, to punish- those offences of which CHAP. XI.] PfiNAL ANIMADVERSION. 405 there is a natural prosecutor. Thus it is with every kind of robbery and violence. Some one especially is aggrieved the sense of grievances induces a ready prosecution, and whatever is readily prosecuted by the people will generally be denounced in the laws of the state. The opposite fact is exhibited in the case of many offences against the public, such as smuggling, and generally in the case of all frauds upon the revenue. No individual is especially aggrieved, (unless in the case of regular dealers whose business is in- jured by illicit trading,) and the consequence is, either that numberless frauds of this kind are suffered to pass with im- punity, or that the government is obliged to employ persons to detect the offenders, and to prosecute them itself. There are some crimes which seem in this respect of an interme- diate sort; where there is a natural prosecutor, and yet where that prosecutor is not the most aggrieved person. This is instanced in the case of seduction. The father pro- secutes, but he does not sustain one half the injury that is suffered by the daughter. There are obvious reasons why the most injured party should be at best an inefficient prose- cutor ; and the result is consonant — that this offence is fre- quently not punished at all, or, as is the case in our own country, it is punished very slightly — so slightly, that in no case does the person of the offender suffer. This lenity does not arise from the venialness of this crime, or that of adultery. They are amongst the most enormous that can be perpetrated by man. Of the less flagitious of the two, it has been affirmed " that riot one half of the crimes for which men suffer death by the laws of England are so flagitious as this."* This en- ormity is distinctly asserted in both the Old Testament and the New ; in the first, adultery was punished with death ; in the second, both this and foriiication, which is less criminal than seduction, is repeatedly assorted with the greatest of crimes, and alike threatened with the tremendous punishments of religion. Such considerations lead the enquirer to expect that the offences which are denounced in a statute book will bear some relation to the state of virtue in the people. The more vir- tuous the people are, the greater will be the number of crimes which can be efficiently visited by the arm of power. Thus, during some part of the seventeenth century, that is, during the interregnum, adultery was punished with death ; and it may be remarked, without paying a compliment to the religion or politics of those times, that the actual practice of morality was then, amongst a large proportion of the nation, at a * Pafey: Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. .3, p. ^.^Seduction. 406 PROPER SUBJECTS OF [esSAY III. higher standard than it is now. No society exists without some species of penal justice — from that of a gang of thieves to that of a select and pious Christian community. The thieves will punish some crimes, but they will be few. The virtuous community will punish, or, which for our present purpose is the same thing, animadvert upon, very many. In a well-ordered family many things are held to be offences, and are noticed as such by the parent, which in a vicious family pass unregarded. When therefore we contemplate the unnumbered offences against morality which the magistrate does not attempt to dis- courage, we may take comfort from hoping that, as the virtue, of mankind increases, it may increase in more than a simple"''^ ratio. As the public become prepared for it, governments will lend their aid ; and thus they who have now little re- straint from some crimes but that which exists in their own minds, may hereafter be deterred by the fear of human pen- alty. And this induces the observation, that to throw obsta- cles in the way of increasing the subjects of penal animad- version, is both impolitic and wrong. This, unhappily, has frequently been done in our own country. Some public writers (writers not of great eminence to be sure) have taken great pains to ridicule legislation respecting cruelty to ani- mals — and the endeavours on the part of well-disposed men to enforce almost obsolete statutes against some other com- mon crimes. There are, surely, a sufficiejacy of obstacles to the extension of the subjects of penal legislation, without needlessly adding more. Besides these men directly encour- age the crimes. To sneer at him who prosecutes a ferocious man for cruelty to an animal, is to encourage cruelty. When a man is brought before a magistrate for profaneness — to joke about how the culprit swore in the court, is to teach men to be profane. That which we have called, in the commencement of this chapter, the creation of offences, demands peculiar solicitude on the part of a government. By a created offence, I mean an act which, hut far the law, would be no offence at all. Of this class are some offences against the game laws. He who on another continent was accustomed without blame to knock down hares and pheasants as he found occasion, would feel the force of this creation of offences when, on doing the same thing in England, he was carried to a jail. The most fruitful cause of these factitious offences is in extensive tax- ation. When a new tax is imposed, the legislature endeav- CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 407 ours to secure its due payment by requiring or forbidding cer- tain acts. These acts, which antecedently were indifferent, become criminal by the legislative prohibition, or obligatory by the legislative command ; and non-compliance is therefore punished as an oflfence by the civil power.* There is no more harm in a man's buying brandy in France and bringing it to England, than in buying a horse of his neighbour. The law lays a duty upon brandy, prohibits any man from bring- ing it to the country except through a custom-house, and treats as criminals those who do. Now we do not affirm that those who commit these created offences do not absolutely offend against morality. They do offend ; for in general every evasion or violation of the laws of the state is an immoral act. But this does not affect the truth, that such offences should be as few as they can be. The reasons are, first, that they are encroachments upon civil liberty, and secondly, which is our present concern — that they are pernicious to the public. Men perceive the distinction between moral crimes and legal crimes, without perhaps ever having enquired into its foundation. And they act upon this perception. He who has been convicted of killing hares, or evading taxes, or smuggling lace, is commonly willing to tell you of his exploits. He who has been con- victed of stealing from his neighbour, hangs down his head for shame. The sanctions of law ought to approve them- selves to the common judgments of mankind. Whatever the state denounces, that the public ought to feel to be crimi- nal, and to be willing to suppress. The penalties of the law ought to be accompanied in men's minds by the sanction of morality. They should feel that to be punished by a magis- trate was tantamount to being a bad man. When, instead of this, there is an intricate admixture — when we see some things which are, simply regarded, innocent, visited by the same punishment as others that all men feel to be wicked, men are likely to feel a diminished respect for penal law itself. They learn to regard the requisitions of law as hav- ing little countenance from rectitude ; and think that to vio- late them, though it may be dangerous, is not wrong. It does not approve itself, as a whole, to the public judgment ; and there are many perhaps who feel, on this account, a diminished res- pect for penal institutions without being able to assign the reason. * I have somewhere met with a book which contended that to commit these created offences was no breach of morality. This, however is not true, because the obligation to obey civil government, in its innocent en- actments, is clearly stated in the Moral Law. 408 I'ROPER SUBJECTS OP [eSSAY lit. In the extension of this political and moral evil the great- est of all agents is war. With respect to the creation of of- fences, it stands sui generis, and converts a greater number of indifferent actions into punishable ones, than all other agents united. War produces the extensive taxation of which we speak; but the practical system has offences peculiar to itself — offences which the Moral Law of our Creator never de- nounced, but which the system of war visits with tremendous punishments. Adam Smith adverts to this deplorable circum- stance. He says that the punishment of death to a sentinel who falls asleep upon his watch, " how necessary soever, al- ways appears to be excessively severe. The natural atrocity of the crime seems to be so little, and the punishment so great, that it is with great difficulty that our heart can reconcile itself to ity* Nor will the heart, nor ought the heart, ever to be reconciled to it. It is, I know, perfectly easy to urge ar- gumentvS in its favour from expediency and the like ; but urge these arguments as you may, the uninitiated or unhardened heart will never be convinced ; and it is vain to tell us that that is right, which the immutable dictates in our minds pro- nounce to be wrong. There are, indeed, few spectacles more calculated to sicken the heart and to make it turn in disgust away from the monstrousness of human institutions, than a contemplation of martial law — a code which not only creates a multiplicity of offences that were never prohibited by our merciful Parent, but which visits the commission of those of- fences with inflictions that ought not to be so much as named amongst a Christian people. Whilst then the philanthropist hopes that some of those in- trinsically criminal actions to which human penalties are not attached, will one day become the object of their animadver- sion, he hopes that this other class, which are not intrinsically vicious, will gradually be expunged from amongst penal laws. Both the additions to, and the deductions from, the system which morality dictates, are the result of the impure or cor- rupt condition of society. Meantime some approaches to a juster standard to regulate penal animadversion may be made, by transferring, in our own country, some offences from the civil to the criminal courts. An instance exists in the crime of seduction and its affinities. This crime, whether we regard it simply or in its conse- quences, or in the deliberation with which it is committed, is, as we have just seen, excessively flagitious. How then does it happen that its perpetration is regarded as a matter for the * Theory of Moral Sentiments. CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 409 cognizance only of legal courts, and for the punishment only of a pecuniary fine ? What should we say to that mode of jislice which allowed the ruffian who assaults your person to escape by paying money ? Yet even a severe assault does not approach, in enormity, to the crime of which we speak. I would punish seducers in their persons. I would send them to prison like other malefactors ; and oblige them to la- bour, or subject them to that system of prison discipline which might give hope (if any thing could give hope) of re- formation. Alas ! if there is no reason for not acting thus, there is a motive. That class of society to whom the fra- ming of laws is entrusted, regard the crime with but very am- biguous detestation. " The law of honour," it is said, " ap- plauds the address of a successful intrigue." How should they who value themselves upon being the subjects of the law of honour, wish to consign a man to prison for that which the law of honour applauds ? I doubt not that, if seduction were confined to low life, the legislature would quickly send seducers to the criminal courts. Would they were sent ! The very idea of the punishment would, amongst gay men in the superior walks of life, often prevent the crime. To be seized by police ! To be carried to a jail ! To be brought to the bar with thieves and murderers ! To be sentenced by the court ! To be carried back to labour in a prison, or to be embarked for New South Wales ! — The idea, I say, of this would go far to prevent the perpetration of this abandoned crime. Duelling is another of the crimes which should , be pros- ecuted in criminal courts. It is indeed prosecuted there if any where ; but it is seldom prosecuted at all. The ultimate cause is easily discovered : — the crime is sanctioned by the law of honour. Like the preceding, if it were practised only by the poor,* it would quickly be visited by the arm of the law. Of the probability of this, we have an illustration in the case of boxing. One or more of the judges have recently declared, that if a man is convicted of having caused another's death in a boxing match, they will inflict the sentence which the law denounces upon manslaughter. The law of honour has no voice here ; and here the voice of reason and common sense is regarded. Make boxing-matches, like duelling, a * In Franne, it is said, and in America, duelling is descending to the inferior classes of Society. If this should become general, we may soon reckon upon an efficient diminution of the practice. The rich will for- bear it on account of its vulgarity, and they will t^e care to^ punish it when it is practised only by the poor. 35 410 PROPER SUBJECTS OF [eSSAY III. part of the system of the law of honour, and we shall hear very little about the punishment of manslaughter. The reader saw, in the last Essay, what an influence the law of honour had in a case of duelling on the mind, and on the charge of a judge on the Scotch bench. — These things suggest sorrowful reflections ! Much and very contradictory decLamation is often employed respecting the treatment which is due to those who become insolvent. By our present law, the debtor may be arrested, that is, he may be imprisoned ; on which account it may be allowable to range the discussion under the head of penal law. Imprisonment for debt is, in eflect, a penalty, although it be not inflicted by a court of justice. One class of persons declaims against the oppression of immuring men in a prison who have committed no crime ; against the cruelty of the relentless creditor, who, when mis- fortune has overtaken a fellow creature, adds to his miseries the terrprs of the law, and deprives him of the opportunity of exertion, and his family of the means of support : — and all this, it is said, is done without obtaining any other advan- tage to the persecutor than the gratification of his resentment or malignity. Another class expatiates upon the unprincipled fraud which is committed upon industrious traders by spend- thrifts or villains — upon the hardship of leaving honest men at the mercy of every idle or profligate person who has ad- dress enough to obtain credit, and upon the absurdity of that philanthropy which would prevent them from deterring him from his frauds by the terrors of a jail. To determine between these vehement and conflicting opinions, the great question is. Whether a debtor is a crimi- nal ? If he is, there is no reason why he should not be treated as a criminal ; and if he is not, there is no reason why an in- nocent man should meet the fate which is due only to the guilty. These contradictory opinions appear to result from the circumstance, that one set of persons regard insolvents as criminals, and the other as unfortunate men. The truth, how ever, is, that many are of one class and many of the other It is therefore no subject of surprise, that when one set of persons view one side of the question, and another the oppo site, they should involve themselves and the subject in con flict and contradiction. From these considerations one conclusion appears plainly to follow — ^that no undiscriminating law upon the subject can be even tolerably just ; that to concede the power of imprison- ing all debtors, is to permit oppression: that to deny it to any, *HAP- XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 411 is to withhold punishment from guilt. In order therefore to attain the ends of justice, it is absolutely indispensable that discrimination should be made in every individual case. Suppose, then, the first legal step towards enforcing pay- ment from a debtor were, not to obtain a writ, but to summon him before a magistrate. If he refuses to attend to the sum mons a warrant might be granted for his arrest, since the rea- sonable inference would be, that his motives for withholding payment, or the causes by which he had become unable to pay, were such as he was afraid to acknowledge. If he at- tended, the case would be heard — not from lawyers but from the parties themselves. Supposing it appeared that the debtor was capable of paying but unwilling, or that, although then unable, his inability had been occasioned by manifest miscon- duct : — let him be committed to prison. And why ? Because he is an offender against public justice, and, like other offend- ers, should await his punishment. Supposing, again, it appeared that the debtor could not pay, and that his insolvency involved no fault : — let him be regard- ed as a man overtaken by misfortune, as a man whom it would be oppressive and wrong to punish, and who therefore should be set at large. His property of course would be secured. Discrimination of this kind, whatever might be the mode of its exercise, appears to be a sine qua non of the adminis- tration of justice. It is exceedingly obvious, that when ac- tions of which the external consequences may be the same, result some from innocent and some from criminal causes, they should not receive the same treatment at the hand of the law : — just as he who accidentally occasions a man's death should not receive the same treatment as he who commits murder. Now this manifest requisite of justice is in no other way attainable in the case of insolvency, than by investigating the conduct of every individual man. When the criminal debtors are committed like other crim- inals to prison, they should be regarded as public offenders, and as such become amenable to penal animadversion. Courts of a simple construction might perhaps be erected for this class of offenders, which might possess the power of awarding such punishments for the various degrees of guilt as the law thought fit to prescribe. Nor does there appear any reason for deviating materially from those species of pun- ishment which are properly employed for other offenders, be- cause insolvency is occasioned by guilt in endless gradations, and sometimes by great crime. The number of insolvents who are entirely innocent is comparatively small, and of those 412 PROPER SUBJECTS OF [eSSAT III. who are not innocent the gradations of criminality are without end. Some are incautious or imprudent, some are heedlessly and some shamefully negligent, and some again are atrociously profligate. The whole amount of injury which is inflicted upon the people of this country by criminal insolvency, is much greater than that which is inflicted by any one other crime which is ordinarily punished by the law. Neither swindling, nor forgery, nor robbery, in their varieties, pro- duces an equal amount of mischief. To every single indi- vidual who loses his property by theft or fraud, there are pro- bably twenty who lose it by criminal debtors. Such facts evidently furnish weighty considerations for the legislator as the guardian of the public welfare ; and that system of juris- prudence is surely defective which allows so much public mischief almost without restraint. Justice and policy alike indicate the necessity of more efficient security against the want of probity in debtors, than has hitherto been furnished by the law. A man who begins business with a thousand pounds of his own, and who keeps a stock of goods to the value of fifteen hundred, is obliged in honesty to insure. If he does not in- sure, and a fire destroys his goods, so that his creditors lose five hundred pounds, he surely is chargeable with a moral of- fence. It cannot be just knowingly to endanger the loss of other men's property, which has been entrusted in the con- fidence of its repayment. But if such a man commits injus- tice towards others, upon what grounds is he to be exempted from the rightful consequences of injustice ? We would not speak of such a man as a criminal, nor aflirm that he deserves severity of punishment ; but we say that, since he has need- lessly and negligently sacrificed the property of other men, it is fit that the penal legislator should notice and discountenance his ofl!ence. Another trader, without any vicious intention, " neglects his business." His customers by degrees leave him. Year passes after year with an income continually diminishing, until at length he finds that his property is less than his debts. This man is more vicious than the former, and should be vis- ited by a greater amount of punishment. Another, with a prosperous business and no great vices, allows a more expen- sive domestic establishment than his income warrants. His property gradually lapses away and at last he cannot pay twenty shillings in the pound to his creditors. Can it be dis- puted that a man who knows that he is in a course of life which will probably end in defrauding others of their prop- CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 413 erty, should be regarded in any other light than as an offender , against justice ? And can it be unreasonable for the jurispru- dence of a community to act towards such an offender as if he were a dishonest man ? Another engages in speculations which endanger the prop- erty of his creditors, and which, if they do not succeed, will defraud them. Such speculations certainly are dishonest ; and when they prove unsuccessful, he who makes them should be treated as the committer of voluntary fraud. The pro- priety of this is enforced by the consideration, that it is nearly impossible for creditors to provide against such fraudulence ; and laws should be severe in proportion as the facilities of wrong are great. Such gradations might be multiplied indefinitely, until we arrived at those in which men contract debts without the pro- bable prospect of payment ; and thence up to the intentionally and voluntarily fraudulent. For such offenders the penalties should be severe. The guilt of some of them is at least as great as that of him who robs you of your purse or forges your signature. With respect, indeed, to those who pursue a deliberate course of fraud, and, under pretence of business, possess themselves of the property of others, and expend it or carry it off, there are few crimes connected with property that are equally atrocious. The law, indeed, appears to ac- knowledge this, for its penalty for a fraudulent bankrupt is des- perately severe. Without stopping to enquire why it is so seldom inflicted, one truth appears to be plain, that a penal system which, like ours, scarcely adverts to crimes so ex- tended and so great, must be greatly defective. Surely there are many persons who walk our streets every day, yet who are, in the view both of natural and of Christian justice, in- comparably more guilty and more justly obnoxious to punish- ment, than the majority of those whom the law confines in jails or transports beyond the ocean. We are persuaded, that if the penal law took cognizance of all insolvents, and regarded all who could not satisfactorily account for their insolvency as public delinquents — if these were prosecuted as systematically as thieves are now, and if by these means the idea of " crime " was associated with their conduct in the public mind, the deplorable mischiefs of bankruptcy would be quickly and greatly diminished. In the restraint of all crimes the power of public opinion is great. At present, unhappily, the man whose offence is justly worthy of imprisonment or transportation, obtains his certificate, and then becomes the accepted associate of virtuous men. But 35* 414 PROPER SUBJECTS OF [eSSAY HI. teach the public to connect with him the idea not of a bank- rupt but of a prisoner ; not of a man who has acted dishon- ourably towards his creditors, but of a convicted criminal — and this association would cease. Who would admit a foot- pad to his table ? And who would admit to his table a man who was just like a footpad ? It requires little knowledge of the constitution of society to know, that when the offences of fraudulent and negligent insolvency are ranked in the public estimation with those of ordinary criminals, men will be in- fluenced by a new, and a powerful, and an efficient motive to avoid them. It is a question that involves some difficulties, whether the publication of statements injurious to individuals, to a govern- ment, or to religion, are proper subjects of penal animadver- sion. That the publishers of these statements frequently act criminally is certain, and they are therefore justly obnoxious to punishment : but still it is to be enquired, whether they can be efficiently punished ; and whether, if they be, the punish- ment can be such as to attain the proper ends of all punish- ment — reformation, example, and redress. And here we are presented, at the outset, with a great im- pediment resulting from the nature of fixed law. If a libeller is to be legally punished, the law must give some definition of what a libel is. Now it is actually impossible to frame any definition which shall not either on the one hand give license to injurious publications by its laxity, or on the other prohibit a just publication of the truth by its rigour. The utmost sa- gacity of legislation cannot avoid one of these two conse- quences. They are not a Scylla and Charybdis which a wary helmsman may avoid : on the one or the other the legislator will infallibly find himself wrecked. If libellers, like other offenders, were tried by courts of equity, which were guided in their award by the simple merits of the case, without any regard to the definitions of law — the case would be difierent. We might then expect that the pub- lication of wholesome truths would receive no punishment though they constituted what is defined to be a libel now, and that the publication of gratuitous malignity would receive a punishment though lawyers now might say that the book was not a libel. Yet even if these difficulties resulting from the vain attempt at legal definitions were surmounted, and equity alone were entrusted with the decision, it may still be greatly doubted CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 415 whether, in the large majority of this class of publications, all attempts at direct punishment would not be better avoided. Refer to the objects of punishment. Assume for the pres- ent that reformation is the first. Is it probable, from the motives and nature of the offence that the reformation of the offender can often be hoped from any species of judicial penalties 1- The second object we suppose to be example. Men may, no doubt, be deterred from publishing injurious statements by the fear of consequences ; and thus far the end is attained. Sup- posing that the publishers could generally be discovered, and that the decisions of the courts were practically just, I should think the object of example would be a strong reason for inflicting judicial punishment upon the libeller : — still other considerations will presently be submitted, which induce the belief that such punishment is not the most effectual nor the most proper means of prevention. Then as to redress. There is only one way in which ra- tio -. :1 redress can be attained by the aspersed party ; and that is," by proving and making known the falsehood of the asper- sion. But this can be done without applying to judicial courts. The reader will ask. What then is it proposed to do ? and, in furnishing a reply, I shall proceed upon the supposition that courts of law only exist. A statement injurious to a private individual is published to the world. He prosecutes the libeller under the most favourable circumstances. He can prove that it is legally a libel, and he can prove also that it is false. What then does he gain by proceeding to law? Nothing individually, but that he proves the falsehood ; and this he may do more satis- factorily, more cheaply, and more efficiently, without a court of law than within it. If there are documents, or if there is testimony by which he can prove the falsehood, they can be adduced before the public without the intervention of courts, and juries, and pleaders. Besides, the verdict of law upon such cases is habitually^ received with a sort of suspicion and want of confidence in its foundation ; because we know that verdicts are continually given against the publishers of libels although the libel is true. Now, in whatever degree the pub- lic doubts respecting the absolute falsehood of the libel, in the same degree the great private object of prosecuting the libeller is frustrated. The same evidence of falsehood ad- duced without the intervention of law, would be much more effectual, because it would be exempted from the same suspi- cion. — I put other motives to prosecution, such as a regard to 418 PROPER StTBJECtS OP [eSSAY IH the public, out of the question, because these are not often the motives which operate. In such matters men usually act not from public but from private views. But the prosecutor's circumstances may be less favourable. Suppose the statement, however injurious, is not legally a libel. Then whatever evidence he produces, the verdict is against him, and the public, who do not trouble themselves with nice distinctions, perhaps think that the imputation upon his character is deserved. Again, it may be a libel, and yet he may fail of producing legal proof. The most mortifying and insignificant deficiencies in proof disappoint all his hopes. The publication of a libel which all the world has seen, and of wliich every body knows the publisher, does not admit perhaps of legal proof. No man can be brought forward who has seen, with his own eyes, that a certain man did publish it. And here again the prosecutor obtains no redress. But further. — Many public statements are libellous, and are cruelly injurious to the sufferer, which, nevertheless, are true. To prosecute these statements is worse than merelv .ain. You only extend further and wider the reproach whica w'as confined withiri narrower limits before. You make the evil to yourself more intense as well as more extended ; for the prosecuted party will no doubt take care to bring proof of the truth of his statements. Thus the scandal which was accepted with doubt, and by a few, previous to the trial, is accepted with certainty and by a multitude afterwards. What then is to be done ? Is every man to be at liberty to say with impunity whatever he pleases, true or false, against other men 1 Not with impunity ; but with impunity from the law. That this legal impunity may be productive of some evils is undoubtedly true. But the question is not whether evils exist, but whether they can be remedied. — Let us suppose, then, that there was no such thing as libel law. I think it probable that if these laws were repealed to-morrow, the press would quickly inundate the public with torrents of vilification and slander. The malignity of bad men would, for a while, prevent them from perceiving the alteration which awaited the public habits. They would think that an aspersion would continue to have the same effect in practically injuring and blackening the characters of others, as it has now, that it is comparatively unfrequent from the restraints of law. But what woidd be the result ? Inevitably this ; that the public would very quickly regard libels as they regard all other common things, with heedless indifference. They would not seize upon them as they now do with a vicious avidity. Published slander CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 4lt would become to the public, what the abuse of fishwomen is to the inhabitants of Billingsgate, a thing which they do not regard — a thing about which they do not trouble themselves to consider whether the mutual vilifications be true or false, and for which they scarcely think either the worse or the better of the quarrellers. With respect to published slander, such a state of things could not last. Private malignity would often die for want of food. It would not publish the asper- sion which when published, no one would regard, and the flood of vituperation would soon subside. But, suppose, for a moment, that the contrary were possible. What would then happen ? Why, the public would habituate themselves to discriminatiour. They would not, they could not, accept every libel as true : and in general they would ac- cept none as true of which the truth was not proved. Here again the desire of virtue would be in a great degree fulfilled ; for we need not trouble ourselves to repress libels by which no man's mind is influenced. In all suppositions, too, the proper means of redress are in the suflerer's power — ^to ad- duce proof of the falsehood and malignity of the assertion. And this is not only the greatest object to himself, but it would also be a positive punishment to the slanderer, whilst the cus- tom would become a terror to other promulgators of slander. What punishment is so likely to be influential as to be proved to be a malicious and lying vilifier of innocent men 1 What motive so powerful to prevent this vilification, as the knowledge that this proof would be laid before the public ? If an innocent person, whose character had been in this manner publicly aspersed, should ask what I would advise him to do ? — I should say — Think nothing of law : go to those persons who have the means of testifying the falsehood of the aspersion ; procure their explicit and attested allegations ; or, if by any other means your innocence can be shown — avail yourself of them, and forthwith lay your exculpation before the public. Here the great end is attained. Your character is not injured ; and as to the slanderer, he is punished by being made the subject of public reprobation and disgust. A few days previous to that on which I write, a wide, extended daily newspaper published some insinuations against the character of a gentleman eminent in society. What was done 1 Why, the same day or the next, a nobleman who happened to know the truth, and whose word no one would dispute, sent a note to another paper saying, the insinuation was unfounded. Was not every object then attained 1 Would this gentleman have been further benefited by prosecuting the editor 1 or could 4i8 PR6PER SUBJECTS OP [eSSAY III. tills editor have been more appropriately punished than by this exposure of his malignity ? But it will be said, that there do not exist the means of dis- proving some aspersions, however false. This is correct ; but what is to be done ? If the sufferer cannot disprove it in a newspaper or pamphlet, neither can he in a court of law : and unless it is disproved, a prosecution, besides procuring little or no redress, publishes the aspersion to a tenfold number. Yet such a person may demand proof of the slanderer, and require that he come forward. This, and such things, may be done in a manner that so indicates integrity and innocence, that in failure of a justification of the slander it would recoil upon the author. The most pitiable situation is that of a person, now perhaps virtuous and good, who is charged with some of the crimes or vices of which he was actually guilty in past times. Here the libel cannot be repelled, for it is true. To invite investi- gation is to publish and deepen the slander. It must therefore be borne : a painful alternative but unavoidable ; and he who endures it will, perhaps, if he be now a Christian, regard it with humility, as a not unjust retribution of his former sins. But to allow the unrestrained publication of facts or false- hood, is not a matter purely evil. The statutes which prevent men from publishing libels, prevent them also from publishing truths — ^truths which all men ought to hear. There are some actions which can in no other way be punished or discounte- nanced than by exposing them to the public reprobation. I saw the other day, in a newspaper, (I think these popular references much to the purpose,) a narrative of the gross cru- elty of some gentleman to his horse, by which a large part of the animal's tongue had been cut or torn from its mouth. The narrator said he was afraid to mention this man's name on account of the libel laws. Suppose the statement to have been true, and the name to have been made public ; would it not have been a proper and a severe punishment for the inhu- manity ? Would it not have deterred others from such inhu- manity ? In a word, ought not such charges to be published ? — And thus it would be with a multitude of other offences, for which scarcely any punishment is so effectual as the repro- bation of the public. " There is no terror that comes home to the heart of vice, like the terror of being exhibited to the public eye." I am willing to acknowledge, that if the publi- cation of many species of vicious conduct was more frequent — so frequent as to be habitual, it would eventually tend to the extension of private and of public virtue. Men who were in CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 419 any way ill-disposed, would find themselves under a constant apprehension of exposure, from which almost no vigilance could secure an escape. The writer from whom I have quoted the sentence above holds much stronger language than mine. " If truth," says he, " were universally told of men's dispo- sitions and actions, gibbets and wheels might be dismissed from the face of the earth. The knave unmasked would be obliged to turn honest in his own defence. Nay, no man would have time to grow a knave. Truth would follow him in his first irresolute essays, and public disapprobation arrest him in the commencement of his career."* All this is not now to be hoped : yet when men knew that the exposure of their misdeeds was in the uncontrollable power of the press, and that there were no means of securing themselves from its punishment but by being virtuous, would not they be more anxious to practise virtue 1 Would not the dread of exposure operate upon some of the unpunished vices of private life, as the dread of public opinion operates upon more public vices now ? The restraining power of public opinion we know is great : — by dispensing with libel laws we should extend that power. Finally, the repeal of these laws would be attended with one of two consequences. If the consequence was, that these publications were not increased in number, no evil could be done. If they were increased, and greatly increased in num- ber, the public would soon learn to discriminate. Tales are believed now, because they are seldom told, and the public discrimination is not sufficiently habituated to distinguish the false from the true. If it were, the true only would pass cur- rent. These often ought to pass ; and as to the false- — who would publish what no one would believe ? f Publications to the discredit of government or of its officers, assume a different character ; but the difference appears to be such as still more strongly to argue against visiting them with legal penalties. Charles James Fox remarked upon this dif- ference. He thought however that private libels, some of the true as well as the false, might rightly be punished by the state ; but " in questions relating to public men," says he, * Godwin : Enq. Pol. Just. v. 2. p. 643. t I learn from a book which professes to give information respecting " Society and Manners in High and Low Life," that there existed 'and perhaps there still exists) a House of Call in London, where he who had malice without ability might bespeak a libel upon any subject. The price was seven and sixpence. In a few hours he might hear the scandal, if such was his order, sung about the streets. — Such a fact may well af- fect our jr<«8olution to punish Ubellers by the grave power of the law 420 PI16PER SUBJECTS OF [eSSAY III. " verity in respect of public measures ought to be regarded as a complete justification of a libel."* Whether truth be a^'u^- tification of a political libel — is one question, Whether such a libel ought to be punished by the law — is another. But I think that no statement respecting public measures ought to be punished by the law — for this simple reason amongst others : — if the statement be true, it is commonly right that the truth should be publicly known ; if it be false, the mis- chief is better remedied by publicly showing the falsehood than by any other means. Surely to repel the aspersion upon public men, by showing that it is unfounded, is more consistent with the dignity of a government than to pursue the vituperator with fines and imprisonments. Surely this more dignified course would recommend the government and its measures to the judgments of all wise and judicious men. To what purpose will you prosecute a true statement. If a hundred men hear of it before the prosecution, ten thousand perhaps will hear of it afterwards. Nor is this all: for I scarcely know an act which can more powerfully tend to weaken a government, than first to act amiss, and then vin- dictively to pursue him who mentions the misconduct. If the object of a government in instituting such a prosecution be to strengthen its own hands, surely it pursues the object by most inexpedient means ; — and as to suppressing truth by the mere influence of terror, it is a mode of governing for which no man in this country ought to lift his voice. A very serious point in addition is this — that almost all polftical libels, vv^hether true or false, are countenanced by a party. A prosecution, therefore, however seemingly success- ful, is sometimes totally defeated, because the party recom- penses the victim for his sufferings or his losses. The pro- secution and those who conduct it become the laughing-stock of the party. In the days of Pitt, a person published a libel which that statesman declared in the House of Commons to be " the most infamous collection of sedition and treason that ever was published."t The man was prosecuted, found guilty, and sentenced to some imprisonment. What was the result 1 Why, the party made a subscription for him to the amount, it was said, of four thousand pounds. What bad man would not publish a libel to be so paid 1 What discreet government would prosecute a libel to be so defeated. But if the uses of a free statement of the truth be so great in the case of private persons, much more is it desirable in the case of political affairs. To discuss, and, if needful, tern » FeU's Memoirs. t Gifford's Life. CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 421 perately to animadvert upon the conduct of governments, is the proper business of the public. How else shall the judg- ment of a people be called forth and expressed ? How else shall they induce an amendment in public measures ? The very circumstance that government is above the customary control of the laws, is a good reason for allowing the people freely to deliver their sentiments upon its conduct. Many ill actions of the private man may be punished by the law ; but how shall the ill actions of public persons be discountenanced if it be not by the expression of the public mind ? A people have sometimes no other means of promoting reformations in the conduct of government, than by exposing those parts in which reformation is needed. The argument then is short. — To prosecute false political libels is unreasonable, for there are better and wiser means of procedure. To prosecute true statements is wrong, because tnuh ought to be freely told ; and if it were not wrong, it would be absurd, because a gov- ernment inflicts more injury upon itself by the prosecution than was inflicted by the statement itself. As the subject maligned rises in dignity, we are presented with stronger and still stronger dissuasions to the legal prose- cution of the maligner. There are more reasons against prose- cuting a political than a private aspersion : there are more reasons against prosecuting aspersions upon religion than either. — Supposing, which we must suppose, that religion is true, then all libels upon it must be false : and, like other false libels, are better met by proving the truth than by punish- ing the liar. " Christianity is but ill defended," says Paley, " by refusing audience or toleration to the objections of unbe- lievers."* It is a scandal to religion to prosecute the man who makes objections to its truths : for what is the inference in the objector's mind but this, that we resort to force because we cannot produce arguments ? Nor let me be misinterpreted if I ask, What is Christianity, or who shall define it ? I may be of opinion, and in fact I am of opinion, that some of the doctrines which the professors of Christianity promulgate, are as much opposed to Christianity as some of the arguments of unbelievers. But this is not a good reason for making my judgment the standard of Truth. Yet, without a standard, how shall we prosecute him who impugns Christianity? How, lather, shall we know whether he impugns Christianity or something else ? Truth is an overmatch for falsehood. Where they are al- « Mor. and Pol. PhU. b. 5, c. 9. 36 '432 t>ROPER SUBJECTS Of [eSSAY III. lo-wed fairly to conflict, truth is sure of the victory. Who then would rob her of the victory by silencing falsehood by force ? It is by such contests that the cause of truth is promoted. The assailant calls forth defenders ; and it has in fact hap- pened, that the proofs and practical authority of religion have been strengthened by defences which, but for the assaults of error, might never have been made or sought. If it be said that fair argument, however unsound, may be tolerated, and that you only mean to punish the authors of reproachful and scandalous attacks upon religion — we answer, that these attacks, like every other, are better repelled by ex- posure or by neglect than by force. You can scarcely prose- cute these bad men (so experience teaches) without making them cry out about persecution, and without calling around them a party who might otherwise have held their peace. They exclaim, " The sufferer believed what he wrote, and thought that to publish it was for the general good !" All this may be false, but it is specious. At any rate you cannot dis- prove it. Sympathy for the man induces sympathy for his principles. — Another way in which a prosecution defeats its proper object is, that to prosecute a writing, whether scandal- ous or only false, is a sure way of making the book read. Thousands enquire for a profligate book because they hear it is of so much importance as to be prosecuted, who else would not have enquired because they would not have heard of it. So it Avas about forty years ago with Paine's Works. What, says gaping curiosity, can this book be, which ministers and bishops are so anxious that we should not read ? Multitudes have read the profligate later works of the unhappy Lord Byron, but probably unnumbered multitudes more would have read them, if they had been prosecuted by the Attorney Gen- eral and burnt by the hangman. As it is, it may be hoped they will sink into oblivion by the weight of their own obscene profaneness.* One objection applies to nearly all prosecutions of books — that it is almost impossible to restrain the licentiousness of * This man affords an instance of that strange detraction from our own reputation with posterity to which we have before referred. He cer- tainly wished that " dull oblivion" should not " bar His name from out the temple where the dead Are honour'd by the nations." — How prq)osterous, then, to be the suicide of so large a portion of his hopes, by writuig what experience might teach him the nations would not honour ! CHAP. XI.] PENAL ANIMADVERSION. 423 the press without diminishing its wholesome freedom. The boundaries of freedom and hcentiousness cannot be defined by law. No law can be devised which shall at once exclude the evil and permit the good. Now to restrain the freedom of the press is amongst the greatest mischiefs which can be inflicted on mankind. The reader wall be prepared to ac- knowledge the magnitude of the mischief, if he considers how powerful and how proper an agent public opinion is in pro- moting social and political reformations. There is no agent of reformation so desirable as the quiet influence of the public judgment ; and, in order to make this judgment sound and powerful, the press should be free. The general conclusion that is suggested by the present chapter, is what the intelligent and Christian reader might expect — ^that the legislator should endeavour, so far as from time to time becomes practicable, to direct penal animadver- sion to those actions which are prohibited by the Moral Law ; that he should endeavour this, both by addition and deduction ; by ceasing to punish that which morality does not condemn, and by extending punishment to more of those actions which it does condemn. As to the seeming exception in the case of libels, we do not contend so much for their impunity, as that the law is not the best means of punishment. By -taking the care of restraining this oflfence from the law, and placing it in the hands of the public, the punishment would sometimes be not only more ef- fectual but more severe. CHAPTER XII. OF THE PROPER ENDS OF PUNISHMENT. The three Objects of Punishment :-— Reformation of the Offender : — Ex- ample : — Restitution — Punishment may be increeised as well as dimin- ished. Why is a man who commits an offence punished for the act? Is it for his own advantage, or for that of others, or for 434 THE PROPER ENDS OF PUNISHMENT. [eSSAY III. both ? — For both, and primarily for his own :* which answer will perhaps the more readily recommend itself, if it can be shown that the good of others, that is,. of the public, is best consulted by those systems of punishment which are most effectual in benefiting the offender himself. When we recur to the precepts and the spirit of Chris- tianity, we find that the one great pervading principle by which it requires us to regulate our conduct towards others, is that of operative, practical good-will — that good-will which, if they be in suffering, will prompt us to alleviate the misery, if they be vicious, will prompt us to reclaim them from vice. That the misconduct of the individual exempts us from the obligation to regard this rule, it would be futile to imagine. It is by him that the exercise of benevolence is peculiarly needed. He is the morally sick, M^ho needs the physician ; and such a physician he, who by comparison is morally whole, should be. If we adopt the spirit of the declaration, " I came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance," we shall entertain no doubt that the reformation of offenders is the primary business of the Christian in devising punishments. There appears no reason why, in the case of public criminals, the spirit of the rule should not be acted upon — " If a brother be overtaken in a fault restore such an one." Amongst the Corinthians there was an individual who had committed a gross offence, such as is now punished by the law of England. Of this criminal Paul speaks in strong terms of reprobation in the first epistle. The effect proved to be good ; and the offender having apparently become reformed, the Corinthians were directed in the second epistle, to forgive and to comfort him. When therefore a person has committed a crime, the great duty of those who in common with himself are candidates for the mercy of God, is to endeavour to meliorate and rectify the dispositions in which his crime originates; to subdue the vehemence of his passions — to raise up in his mind a power that may counteract the power of future temptation. We should feel towards these mentally diseased, as we feel towards the physical sufferer — compassion ; and the great object should be to cure the disease. No doubt, in endeav- ouring this object, severe remedies must often be employed. It is just what we, should expect ; and the remedies will prob- * " The end of all correction is either the amendment of wicked men or to prevent the influence of ill example." This is the rule of Seneca ; and by mentioning amendment first, he appears to have regarded it as the primary object. CHAP. XII-l THE PROPER ENDS OF PUNISHMENT. 426 ably be severe in proportion to the inveteracy and malignity of the complaint. But still the end should never be forgotten, and I think a, just estimate of our moral obligations, will lead us to regard the attainment of that end as paramomit to every other. There is one great practical advantage in directing the at- tention especially to this moral cure, which is this, that if it be successful, it prevents the offender from offending again. It is well known that the proportion of those who, having once suffered the stated punishment, again transgress the laws and are again convicted, is great. But to whatever extent reforma- tion was attained, this unhappy result would be prevented. The second object of punishment, that of example, appears to be recognised as right by Christianity, when it says that the magistrate is a " terror" to bad men ; and when it admon- ishes such to be " afraid" of his power. There can be no reason for speaking of punishment as a terror, unless it were right to adopt such punishments as would deter. In the pri- vate discipline of the church the same idea is kept in view : — " Them that sin rebuke before all, that others also may feary* The parallel of physical disease may also still hold. The offender is a member of the social body ; and the physi- cian who endeavours to remove a local disease, always acts with a reference to the health of the system. In stating reformation as the first object, we also conclude, that if, in any case, the attainment of reformation and the ex- hibition of example should be found to be incompatible, the former is to be preferred. I say if; for it is by no means certain that such cases will ever arise. The measures which are necessary to reformation must operate as example ; and in general, since the reformation of the more hardened offend- ers is not to be expected, except by severe measures, the in- fluence of terror in endeavouring reformation will increase with the malignity of the crime. This is just what we need, and what the penal legislator is so solicitous to secure. The point for the exercise of wisdom is, to attain the second object in attaining the first. A primary regard to the first object is compatible with many modifications of punishment, in order more effectually to attain the second. If there are two meas- ures, of which both tend alike to reformation, and one tends most to operate as example, that one should unquestionably be preferred. There is a third object which, though subordinate to the others, might perhaps still obtain greater notice from the legis- * 1 Tim. V. 20. 36* 426 THE PROPER ENDS OF PUNISHMENT. [esSAY 111 lator than it is wont to do — Restitution or Compensation.* Since what are called criminal actions are commonly injuries committed by one man upon another, it appears to be a very obvious dictate of reason that the injury should be repaired ; — ^that he from whom the thief steals a purse should regain its value ; that he who is injured in his person or otherwise, should receive such compensation as he may. When my house is broken into and a hundred pounds' worth of property is carried off, it is but an imperfect satisfaction to me that the robber will be punished. I ought to recover the value of my property. The magistrate, in taking care of the general, should take care of the individual weal. The laws of England do now award compensation in damages for some injuries. This is a recognition of the principle ; although it is remark- able, not only that the number of offences which are thus pun- ished is small, but that they are frequently of a sort in which ])ecuniary loss has not been sustained by the injured party. I do not imagine that in the present state of penal law, or of the administration of justice, a general regard to commp^sa- tion is practicable, but this does not prove that it ought not to be regarded. If in an improved state of penal affairs, it should be found practicable to oblige offenders to recompense by their labour those who had suffered by their crime, this advantage would attend, that while it wouid probably involve considerable punishment, it would approve itself to the offend- er's mind as the demand of reason and of justice. This is no trifling consideration ; for in every species of coercion and punishment, public or domestic, it is of consequence that the punished party should feel the justice and propriety of the measures which are adopted. The writer of these Essays would be amongst the last to reprobate a strict adherence to abstract principles, as such ; but some men, in their zeal for such principles, have proposed strange doctrines upon the subject of punishment. It has been said that when a crime has been committed it cannot be recalled ; that it is a " past and irrevocable action," and that to inflict pain upon the criminal because he has committed it, " is one of the wildest conceptions of untutored barbarism." No one perhaps would affirm that, in strictness, such a motive to punishment is right ; but how, when an offence is commit- * " The law of nature commands that reparation be made." Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 8. And this dictate of nature appears to have been recognized in the Mosaic law, in which compensation to the suffering party is expressly required. CHAP. XII.] THE PROPER ENDS OP PUNISHMENT. 42t ted, can you separate the objects of punishment so as not practically to punish because the man has offended ? If you regulate the punishment by its legitimate objects, you punish because the offender needs it ; and as all offenders do need it, you punish all, which amounts in practice to nearly the same thing as punishing because they have committed a crime. However, as an abstract principle, there might be little oc- casion to dispute about it ; but when it is made a foundation for such doctrine as the following, it is needful to recall the supreme authority of the Moral Law : " We are bound, under certain urgent circumstances, to deprive the offender of the liberty he has abused. Further than this, no circumstance can authorize us. The infliction of further evil, when his power to injure is removed, is the wild and unauthorized dic- tate of vengeance and rage." This is affirmative ; and in turn I would affirm that it is the sober and authorized dictate of justice and good-will. But indeed why may we even restrain him 1 Obviously for the sake of others ; and for the sake of others we may also do more. Besides, this philoso-r phy leaves the offender's reformation out of the question. If he is so wicked that you are obliged to confine him lest he should commit violence again, he is so wicked that you are obliged to confine him for his own good. And, in re- ality, the writer himself had just before virtually disproved his own position. "Whatever gentleness," he says, "the intellectual physician may display, it is not to be believed that men can part with rooted habits of injustice and vice without the sensation of considerable pain."* But, to occasion this pain in order to make them part with vicious habits is to do something " further" than to take away liberty. Respecting the relative utility of different modes of punish- ment and of prison discipline, we have little to say, partly because the practical recognition of reformation as a primary object affords good security for the adoption of judicious measures, and partly because these topics have already ob- tained much of the public attention. One suggestion may, however, be made, that as good consequences have followed from making a prisoner's confinement depend for its duration on his conduct, so that if it be exemplary the period is dimin- ished, there appears no sufficient reason why the parallel system should not be adopted of increasing the original sen- tence if his conduct continue vicious. There is no breach of reason oi of justice in this. For the reasonable object of pun- * Godwin : Enq. Pol. Just. v. ii. p. 748, 751. 48? PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. [eSSAT lit. isliment is to attain certain ends, and if, by the original sen- tence, it is found that these ends arc not attained, reason ap- pears to dictate that stronger motives should be employed. — It caimot surely be less reasonable to add to a culprit's penal- ty if his conduct be bad, than to deduct from it if it be good. For a sentence should not be considered as a propitiation of the law, nor when it is inflicted should it be considered, as of necessity, that all is done. The sentence which the law pronounces is a general rule — good perhaps as a general rule, but sometimes inadequate to its end. And the utility of re- taining the power of adding to a penalty is the same in kind, and probably greater in degree, than the power of diminishing it. In one case the culprit is influenced by hope, and in the other by fear. Fear is the more powerful agent upon some men's minds, and hope upon others. And as to the justice of such an institution, it appears easily to be vindicated ; for what is the standard of justice ? The sentence of the law ? No ; for if it were, it would be unjust to abate of it as well as to add. Is it the original crime of the offender ? No ; for if it were, the same crime, by whatever variety of conduct it was afterwards followed, must always receive an equal pen- alty. The standard of justice is to be estimated by the ends for which punishments are inflicted. Now, although it would be too much to affirm that any penalty, or duration of penalty, would be just until these ends were attained, yet surely it is not unjust to endeavour their attainment by some additions to an original penalty when they cannot be attained without. CHAPTER XIII. PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. Of the three objects of punishment, the punishment of death regards but one — Reformation of minor offenders: Greater criminals neglected — Capital punishments not efficient as examples — Public executions- Paul — Grotius — Murder — The punishment of death irrevocable — Rous- seau — Recapitulation. W I SELECT for observation this peculiar mode pf punishment on account of its peculiar importance. And here we are impressed at the outset with the consid- CHAP. Xljl. PTTNISHKENT OP DEATH. 4^9 eration, that of the three great objects which havfe just been proposed as the proper ends of punishment, the punishment of death regards but one ; and that one not the first and the greatest. The only end which is consulted in taking the life of an offender, is that of example to other men. His own reformation is put almost out of the question. Now if the principles delivered in the preceding chapter be sound, they present at once an almost insuperable objection to the punish- ment of death. If reformation be the primary object, and if the punishment of death precludes attention to that object, the punishment of death is wrong. To take the life of a fellow-creature is to exert the utmost possible power which man can possess over man. It is to perform an action the most serious and awful which a hu- man being can perform. Respecting such an action, then, can any truth be more manifest than that the dictates of Christianity ought especially to be taken into account ? If these dictates are rightly urged upon us in the minor concerns of life, can any man doubt whether they ought to influence us in the greatest ? Yet what is the fact ? Why, that in de- fending capital punishments, these dictates are almost placed out of the question. We hear a great deal about security of property and life, a great deal about the necessity of making examples ; but almost nothing about the Moral Law. It might be imagined that upon this subject our religion imposed no obligations ; for nearly every argument that is urged in fa- vour of capital punishments would be as valid and as appro- priate in the mouth of a Pagan as in our own. Can this be right ? Is it conceivable that, in the exercise of the most . tremendous agency which is in the power of man, it can be right to exclude all reference to the expressed will of God ? I acknowledge that this exclusion of the Christian law from the defences of the punishment, is to me almost a conclusive argument that the punishment is wrong. Nothing that is right can need such an exclusion ; and we should not practise it if it were not for a secret perception, that to apply the pure requisitions of Christianity would not serve the purpose of the advocate. Look for a moment upon the capital offender and upon ourselves. He, a depraved and deep violator of the law of God — one who is obnoxious to the vengeance of heaven — one, however, whom Christ came peculiarly to call 10 repentance and to sn,ve— Ourselves, his brethren — brethren by the relationship of nature — brethren in some degree in offences against God — ^brethren especially in the trembling hope of a common salvation. How ought beings so 430 PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. [eSSAY III situated to act towards one another 1 Ought we to kill or to amend him ? Ought we, so far as is in our power, to cut off his future hope, or, so far as is in our power, to strengthen the foundation of that hope ? Is it the reasonable or decent of- fice of. one candidate for the mercy of God to hang his fellow-candidate upon a gibbet ? I am serious, though men of levity may laugh. If such men reject Christianity, I do not address them. If they admit its truth, let them manfully show that its principles should not thus be applied. No one disputes that the reformation of offenders is desira- ble, though some may not allow it to be the primary object. For the purposes of reformation we have recourse to constant oversight — to classification of offenders — to regular labour — to religious instruction. For whom? For minor criminals. Do not the greater criminals need reformation too ? If all these endeavours are necessary to effect the amendment of the less depraved, are they not necessary to affect the amend- ment of the more ? But we stop just where our exertions are most needed ; as if the reformation of a bad man was of the less consequence as the intensity of his wickedness became greater. If prison discipline and a penitentiary be needful for sharpers and pickpockets, surely they are necessary for murderers and highwaymen. Yet we reform the one and hang the other ! Since, then, so much is sacrificed to extend the terror of example, we ought to be indisputably certain that the ter- ror of capital punishment is greater than that of all others. — We ought not certainly to sacrifice the requisitions of the Christian law unless we know that a regard to them would be attended with public evil.* Do we know this? Are we indisputably certain that capital punishments are more effi- cient as examples than any others 1 We are not. We do not know from experience, and we cannot know without it. — In England the experiment has not been made. The punish- ment therefore is wrong in us, whatever it might be in a more experienced people. For it is wrong unless it can be shown to be right. It is not a neutral affair. If it is not indispen- sably necessary, it is unwarrantable. And since we do not know that it is indispensable, it is, so far as we are concerned, unwarrantable. And with respect to the experience of other nations, who will affirm that crimes have been increased in consequence of the diminished frequency of executions ? Who will affirm * We ought not for any reason to do this ; but I speak in the present paragraph of the pretensions of expediency. CHAP. XIII.] PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. 431 that the laws and punishments of America are not as effectual as our own ? Yet they have abolished capital punishment for all private crimes except murder of the first degree. Where, then, is our pretension to a justification of our own practice ? It is a satisfaction that, so many facts and arguments are be- fore the public which show the inefficacy of the punishment of death in this country ; and this is one reason why they are not introduced here. " There are no practical despisers of death like those who touch, and taste, and handle death daily, by daily committing capital offences. They make a jest of death in all its forms ; and all its terrors are in their mouths a scorn." * " Profligate criminals, such as common thieves and highwaymen," "have always been accustomed to look upon the gibbet as a lot very likely to fall to them. When it does fall to them therefore, they consider themselves only as not quite so lucky as some of their companions, and submit to their fortune without any other uneasiness than what may arise from the fear of death — a fear which even, by such worthless wretches, we frequently see can be so easily and so very completely conquered." A man some time ago was executed for uttering forged bank-notes, and the body was delivered to his friends. What was the effect of the ex- ample upon them ? Why, with the corpse lying on a bed be- fore them, they were themselves seized in the act of again uttering forged hank-notes. The testimony upon a subject like this, of a person who has had probably greater and better opportunities of ascertaining the practical efficiency of pun- ishments than any other individual in Europe, is of great im- portance. " Capital convicts," says Elizabeth Fry, '• pacify their conscience with the dangerous and most fallacious notion, that the violent death which awaits them will serve as a full atonement for all their sins." f It is their passport to felicity — the purchase -money of heaven ! Of this deplorable notion the effect is doubly bad. First, it makes them compara- tively little afraid of death, because they necessarily regard it as so much less an evil ; and, secondly, it encourages them to go on in the commission of crimes, because they imagine that the number or enormity of them, however great, will not preclude them from admission into heaven. Of both these mischiefs, the punishment of death is the immediate source. Substitute another punishment, and they will not think that that is an "atonement for their sins," and will not receive their present encouragement to continue their crimes. But * Irving's Orations. t Observations on the visiting, &c., of Female Prisoner^, p. 73. 432 . PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. [ESSAY III. with respect to example, this unexceptionable authority speaks in decided language. " The terror of example is very gener- ally rendered abortive by the predestinarian notion, vulgarly prevalent among thieves, that ' if they are to be hanged they are to be hanged, and nothing can prevent it.' "* It may be said that the same notion might be attached to any other pun- ishment, and that thus that other would become abortive ; but there is little reason to expect this, at least in the same de- gree. The notion is now connected expressly with hanging, and it is not probable that the same notion would ever be transferred with equal power to another penalty. Where then is the overwhelming evidence of utility, which alone, even in the estimate of expediency, can justify the punish- ment of death ? It cannot be adduced ; it does not exist. But if capital punishments do little good, they do much harm. " The frequent public destruction of life has a fear- fully hardening effect upon those whom it is intended to in- timidate. While it excites in them the spirit of revenge, it seldom fails to lower their estimate of the life of man, and renders them less afraid of taking it away in their turn by acts of personal violence."! This is just what a consideration of the principles of the human mind would teach us to ex- pect. To familiarize men with the destruction of life, is to teach them not to abhor that destruction. It is the legitimate process of the mind in other things. He who blushes and trembles the first time he utters a lie, learns by repetition to do it with callous indifference. Now you execute a man in order to do good by the spectacle — while the practical conse- quence, it appears, is, that bad men turn away from the spec- tacle more prepared to commit violence than before. It will be said, that this effect is produced only upon those who are already profligate, and that a salutary example is held out to the public. But the answer is at hand — The public do not usually begin with capital crimes. These are committed after^ the person has become depraved — that is, after he has arrived at that state in which an execution will harden rather than deter him. We " lower their estimate of the life of man." It cannot be doubted. It is the inevitable tendency of exe- cutions. There is much of justice in an observation of Bec- caria's. " Is it not absurd that the laws which detect and punish homicide should, in order to prevent murder, publicly commit murder themselves ?"J By the procedures of a court, we virtually and perhaps literally expatiate upon the sacred- * Observations on the visiting, &c., of Female Prisoners, p. 73. t Ibid. X Essay on Capital Punishments, c. 28. CHAP. XIII.] PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. 433 ness of human life, upon the dreadful guilt of taking it away — and then forthwith take it away ourselves ! It is no sub- ject of wonder that this " lowers the estimate of the life of man." The next sentence of the writer upon whose testi- mony I offer these comments, is of tremendous import : — " There is much reason to believe that our public executions have had a direct and positive tendency to promote both mur- der and suicide" " Why, if a considerable time elapse be- tween the trial and the execution, do we find the severity of the public changed into compassion ? For the same reason that a master, if he do not beat his slave in the moment of resentment, often feels a repugnance to the beating him at all."* This is remarkable. If executions were put off for a twelvemonth, I doubt whether the public would bear them. But why if they were just and right ? Respecting " the con- tempt and indignation with which every one looks on an exe- cutioner," Beccaria says the reason is, " that in a secret cor- ner of the mind, in which the original impressions of nature are still preserved, men discover a sentiment which tells them that their lives are not lawfully in the power of any one."t Let him who has the power of influencing the legislature of the country or public opinion, (and who has not?) consider the responsibility which this declaration implies, if he lifts his voice for the punishment of death ! But further : the execution of one offender excites in others " the spirit of revenge." This is extremely natural. Many a soldier, I dare say, has felt impelled to revenge the death of his comrades ; and the member of a gang of thieves, who has fewer restraints of principle, is likely to feel it too. But upon whom is his revenge inflicted ? Upon the legislature, or the jury, or the witnesses ? No, but upon the public — upon the first person whose life is in their power, and which they are prompted to take away. You execute a man, then, in order to save the lives of others ; and the eflfect is, that you add new inducements to take the lives of others away. Of a system which is thus unsound — unsound because it rejects some of the plainest dictates of the Moral Law — and unsound because so many of its effects are bad, I should be ready to conclude, with no other evidence, that it was utterly inexpedient and impolitic — ^that as it was bad in morals, it was bad in policy. And such appears to be the fact. — " It is incontrovertibly proved that punishments of a milder and less * Godwin : Enq. Pol. Just. v. 2, p. 726. t Beccaria : Essay on Capital Punishments, chap. 28. 37 434 PUNIglUTENT OF DEATH. [eSSAY III. injurious nature are calculated to produce, for every good pur pose, afar more -powerful effect^''* Finally. — " The best of substitutes for capital punishment will be found in that judicious management of criminals in prison which it is the object of the present tract to recom- mend ;"t which management is Christian management — a system in which reformation is made the first object, but in which it is found that in order to effect reformation severity to hardened offenders is needful. Thus then we arrive at the goal : — we begin with urging the system that Christianity dictates as right ; we conclude by discovering that, as it is the right system, so it is practically the best. But an argument in favour of capital punishments has been raised from the Christian Scriptures themselves. — " If I be an offender, or have committed any thing worthy of death, 1 refuse not to die.";j: This is the language of an innocent per- son who was persecuted by malicious enemies. It was an assertion of innocence ; an assertion that he had done nothing worthy of death. The case had no reference to the question of the lawfulness of capital punishment, but to the question of the lawfulness of inflicting it upon him. Nor can it be supposed that it was the design of the speaker to convey any sanction of the punishment itself, because the design would have been wholly foreign to the occasion. The argument of Grotius goes perhaps too far for his own purpose. " /f / he an offender, or have done any thing worthy of death, I refuse not to, die." He refused not to die, then, if he were an offender, if he had done one of the " many and grievous things" which the Jews charged upon him. But will it be contended that he meant to sanction the destruction of every person who was thus "an offender ?" — His enemies were endeavouring to take his life, and he, in earnest asseveration of his innocence, says, " If you can fix your charges upon me, take it." Grotius adduces, as an additional evidence of the sanction of the punishment by Christianity, this passage, " Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear, &c. — What glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently 1 but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God."^ Some arguments disprove the doctrine which they are advanced to support, and this surely is one of them. It surely cannot be true that * Observations on the visiting, &c., of Female Prisoners, p. 75. t Ibid. p. 76. X Acts, XXV. XI ; see Grotius: Rights of War and Peace. § 1 Pet. U. 18, 20. CHAP. Xni.] PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. 435 Christianity sanctions capital punishments, if this is the best evidence of the sanction that can be found.* Some persons again suppose that there is a sort of moral obligation to take the life of a murderer : " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." This suppo- sition is an example of that want of advertence to the suprem- acy of the Christian morality, which in the first Essay we had occasion to notice. Our _ law is the Christian law, and if Christianity by its. precepts or spirit prohibits the punish- ment of death, it cannot be made right to Christians by refer- ring to a commandment which was given to Noah. There is, in truth, some inconsistency in the reasonings of those who urge the passage. The fourth, fifth, and sixth verses of Genesis ninth, each contains a law delivered to Noah. Of these three laws, we habitually disregard two : how then can we with reason insist on the autliority of the third ?t After all, if the command were in full force, it would not justify our laws ; for they shed the blood of many who have not shed blood themselves. And this conducts us to the observation, that the grounds upon which the United States of America still affix death to murder of the first degree, do not appear very clear ; for if other punishments are found effectual in deterring from crimes of all degrees of enormity up to the last, how is it shown that they would not be effectual in the last also ? There is nothing in the constitution of the human mind to indicate, that a mur- derer is influenced by passions which require that the coun- teracting power should be totally diffejent from that which is employed to restrain every other crime. The difference too in the personal guilt of the perpetrators of some other crimes, and of murder, is sometimes extremely small. At any rate, it is not so great as to imply a necessity for a punishment totally dissimilar. The truth appears to be, that men enter- tain a sort of indistinct notion that murder is a crime which requires a peculiar punishment, which notion is often founded, not upon any process of investigation, by which the propriety of this peculiar punishment is discovered, but upon some vague ideas respecting the nature of the crime itself. But the dictate of philosophy is, to employ that punishment which will be most efficacious. Efficacy is the test of its propri- * "Wickliffe," says Priestley, "seems to have thought it wrong to take away the life of a man on any account." t Indeed it would almost appear from Genesis ix. 5, that even accidental homicide was thus to be punished with death : and if so, it is wholly dis- regarded in our present practice. 436 PUNISHMENT OF DEATH. [eSSAY III ety; and in estimating this efficacy, the character of the crime is a foreign consideration. Again, the dictate of Christianity is, to employ that punishment which, while it deters the spectator, reforms the man. Now, neither philoso- phy nor Christianity appears to be consulted in punishing murder with death, because it is murder. And it is worthy of especial remembrance, that the purpose for which Grotius defends the punishment of death is, that he may be able to defend the practice of war : — a bad foundation if this be its best! It is one objection to capital punishment that it is abso- lutely irrevocable. If an innocent man suffers it is impos- sible to recall the sentence of the law. Not that this con- sideration alone is a sufficient argument against it, but it is one argument amongst the many. In a certain sense indeed, all personal punishments are irrevocable. The man who by a mistaken verdict has been confined twelve months in a prison, cannot be repossessed of the time. But if irrevoca- ble punishments cannot be dispensed with, they should not be made needlessly common, and especially those should be regarded with jealousy which admit of no removal or relaxa- tion in the event of subsequently discovered innocence, or subsequent reformation. It is not sufficiently considered that a jury or a court of justice never know that a prisoner is guilty. — A witness may know it who saw him commit the act, but others cannot know it who depend upon testimony, for testimony may be mistaken or false. All verdicts are founded upon probabilities — probabilities which, though they sometimes approach to certainty, never attain to it. Surely it is a serious thing for one man to destroy another upon grounds short of absolute certainty of his guilt. There is a sort of indecency attached to it — an assumption of a degree of authority which ought to be exercised only by Him whose knowledge is infallibly true. It is unhappily certain that some have been put to death for actions which they never committed. At one assizes, we believe, not less than six persons were hanged, of whom it was afterwards discovered that they were entirely innocent. A deplorable instance is given by Dr. Smollett : — " Rape and murder were perpetrated upon an unfortunate woman in the neighbourhood of London, and an innocent man suffered death for this complicated out- rage, while the real criminals assisted at his execution, heard him appeal to Heaven for his innocence, and in the character of friends embraced him while he stood on the brink of eter- CHAP. XIIl.] PUNISHMENT OF i)UATH. 437 nity."* Others equally innocent, but whose innocence has never been made known, have doubtless shared the same fate. These are tremendous considerations, and ought to make men solemnly pause before, upon grounds necessarily uncertain, they take away that life which God has given, and which they cannot restore. Of the merely philosophical speculations respecting the rectitude of capital punishments, whether affirmative or nega- tive, I would say little ; for they in truth deserve little. One advantage indeed attends a brief review — that the reader will perceive how little the speculations of philosophers will aid us in the investigation of a Christian question. The philosopher, however, would prove what the Christian cannot, and Mably accordingly says, " In the state of nature, I have a right to take the life of him who lifts his arm against mine. This right, upon entering into society, I surrender to the magistrate.''^ If we conceded the truth of the first posi- tion, (which we do not,) the conclusion from it is an idle sophism ; for it is obviously preposterous to say, that because I have a right to take the life of a man who will kill me if I do not kill him, the state, which is in no such danger, has a right to do the same. That danger which constitutes the al- leged right in the individual, does not exist in the case of the state. The foundation of the right is gone, and where can be the right itself? Having, however, been thus told that the state has a right to kill, we are next informed, by Filan- gieri, that the criminal has no right to live. He says, " If I have a right to kill another man, he has lost his right to life"f Rousseau goes a little further. He tells us, that in conse- quence of the "social contract" which we make with the sovereign on entering into society, " Life is a conditional grant of the state :"J so that we hold our lives, it seems, only as " tenants at will," and must give them up whenever their owner, the state requires them. The reader has probably hitherto thought that he retained his head by some other tenure. The right of taking an offender's life being thus proved, Mably shows us how its exercise becomes expedient. " A murderer," says he, " in taking away his enemy's life, believes he does him the greatest possible evil. Death, then, in the murderer's estimation, is the greatest of evils. By the fear of death, therefore, the excesses of hatred and revenge must be restrained." If language wilder than this can be held, * Hist, of Eng. V. 3, p. 318. t Montagu on Punishment of Death. t Contr. Soc. ii. 5, Montagu. 37* 438 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [ESSAf lit. Rousseau, I think, holds it. He says, " The preservation of both sides (the criminal and the state) is incompatible ; one of the two must perish." How it happens that a nation " must perish," if a convict is not hanged, the reader, I suppose, will not know. Even philosophy, however, concedes as much : "Absolute necessity alone" says Pastoret, " can justify the punishment of Death ;" and Rousseau himself acknowledges that " we have no right to put to death, even for the sake of ex- ample, any but those who cannot be permitted to live without danger." Beccaria limits the right to one specific case — and in doing this he appears to sacrifice his own principle, (de- duced from that splendid fiction, the " social contract,") which is, that " the punishment of death is not authorized by any right : — ^no such right exists." For myself, I perceive little value in such speculations to whatever conclusions they lead, for there are shorter and surer roads to truth ; but it is satisfactory to find that, even upon the principles of such philosophers, the right to put criminals to death is not easily made out. The argument, then, respecting the punishment of death, is both distinct and short. It rejects, by its very nature, a regard to the first and great- est object of punishment. It does not attain either of the other objects so well as they may be attained by other means. It is attended with numerous evils peculiarly its own. CHAPTER XIV. RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. The primitive church — The established church of Ireland — America — Advantages and disadvantages of established churches — Alliance of a church with the state — An established church perpetuates its own evils — Persecution generally the growth of religious establishments— State religions injurious to the civil welfare of a people — Legal provision for Christian teachers — Voluntary payment — Advancement in the church — The appointment of religious teachers. A LARGE number of persons embark from Europe, and col- onize an uninhabited territory in the South Sea. They erect CliAP. XIV.] RELIGTOtlS KSTABLlSttMfiNTS. 439 a government — suppose a republic — and make all persons, of whatever creed, eligible to the legislature. The community prospers and increases. In process of time a member of the legislature, who is a disciple of John Wesley, persuades himself that it will tend to the promotion of religion that the preachers of methodism should be supported by a national tax ; that their stipends should be sufficiently ample to pre- vent them from necessary attention to any business but that of religion ; and that accordingly they shall be precluded from the usual pursuits of commerce and from the profes- sions. He proposes the measure. It is contended against by the episcopalian members, and the independents, and the catholics, and the unitarians — by all but the adherents to his own creed. They insist upon the equality of civil and reli- gious rights, but in vain. The majority prove to be metho- dists ; they support the measure : the law is enacted ; and methodism becomes, thenceforth, the religion of the state. This is a Religious Establishment. i i X it is a religious establishment in its best form ; and, per- hapa, none ever existed of which the constitution was so sim- ple and so pure. During one portion of the papal history, the Romish church was indeed not so much an " establishment" of the state as a separate and independent constitution. For though some species of alliance subsisted, yet the Romanists did not acknowledge, as Protestants now do, that the power of estab- lishing a religion resides in the state. In the present day other immunities are possessed by ec- clesiastical establishments than those which are necessary to constitute the institution — such, for example, as that of ex- clusive eligibility to the legislature : and other alliances with the civil power exist than that which necessarily results from any preference of a particular faith — such as that of placing ecclesiastical patronage in the hands of a government, or of those who are under its influence. From these circumstances it happens, that in enquiring into the propriety of religious establishments, we cannot confine ourselves to the enquiry whether they are proper as they usually exist. And this is so much the more needful, because there is little reason to expect that when once an ecclesiastical establishment has been erected — when once a particular church has been se- lected for the preference and patronage of the civil power- that preference and patronage will be confined to those cir- cumstances which are necessary to the subsistence of an es- tablishment at all. It is sufficiently obvious that it matters nothing to the ex- 440 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAY HI. istence of an established church, what the faith of that church is, or what is the form of its government. It is not the creed which constitutes the establishment, but the preference of the civil power ; and accordingly the reader will be pleased to bear in mind, that neither in this chapter nor in the next ha\e we any concern with religious opinions. Our business is not with churches, but with church establishments. The actual history of religious establishments in Christian countries, does not differ in essence from that which we have supposed in the South Sea. They have been erected by the influence or the assistance of the civil power. In one coun- try a religion may have owed its political supremacy to the superstitions of a prince ; and in another to his policy or am- bition : but the effect has been similar. Whether supersti- tion or policy, the contrivances of a priesthood, or the fortui- tous predominance of a party, have given rise to the estab- lished church, is of comparatively little consequence to the fundamental principles of the institution. Of the divine right of a particular church to supremacy I say nothing ; because none with whom I am at present con- cerned to argue imagine that it exists. The only ground upon which it appears that religious es- tablishments can be advocated are, first, that of example or approbation in the primitive churches ; and, secondly, thai of public utility. I. The primitive church was not a religious establishment in any sense or in any degree. No establishment existed un- til the church had lost much of its purity. Nor is there any expression in the New Testament, direct or indirect, which would lead a reader to suppose that Christ or his apostles re- garded an establishment as an eligible institution. " We find, in his religion no scheme of building up a hierarchy, or of ministering to the views of human governments.'''' — " Our reli- gion, as it came out of the hands of its Founder and his apostles, exhibited a complete abstraction from all views either of ecclesiastical or civil policy.''^* The evidence which these facts supply respecting the moral character of religious estab- lishments, whatever be its weight, tends manifestly to show that that character is not good. I do not say because Chris- tianity exhibited this " complete abstraction," that it therefore necessarily condemned establishments ; but I say that the bear- ing and the tendency of this negative testimony is against them. In the discourses and writings of the first teachers of our * Paley : Evidences of Christianity, p. 2, c. 2. CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 441 religion, we find such absolute disinterestedness, so little dis- position to assume political superiority, that to have become the members of an established church would certainly have been inconsistent in them. It is indeed almost inconceivable that they could ever have desired the patronage of the state for themselves or for their converts. No man conceives that Paul or John could have participated in the exclusion of any portion of the Christian church from advantages which they themselves enjoyed. Every man perceives that to have done this, would have been to assume a new character, a character which they had never exhibited before, and which was incon- gruous with their former principles and motives of action. But why is this incongruous with the apostolic character un- less it is incongruous with Christianity? Upon this single ground, therefore, there is reason for the sentiment of " many well-informed persons, that it seems extremely questionable whether the religion of Jesus Christ admits of any civil es- tablishment at all."* I lay stress upon these considerations. We all know that much may be learnt respecting human duty by a contempla- tion of the spirit and temper of Christianity as it was exhi- bited by its first teachers. When the spirit and temper is compared with the essential character of religious establish- ments, they are found to be incongruous — foreign to one an- other — having no natural relationship or similarity. I should regard such facts, in reference to any question of rectitude, as of great importance ; but upon a subject so intimately con- nected with religion itself, the importance is peculiarly great. II. The question of the utility of religious establishments is to be decided by a comparison of their advantages and their evils. Of their advantages, the first and greatest appears to be that they provide, or are assumed to provide, religious instruc- tion for the whole community. If this instruction be left by the state to be cared for by each Christian church as it pos- sesses the zeal or the means, it may be supposed that many districts will be destitute of any public religious instruction. At least the state cannot be assured before hand that every district will be supplied. And when it is considered how great is the importance of regular public worship to the virtue of a people, it is not to be denied, that, a scheme which, by destroying an establishment, would make that instruction in- adequate or uncertain, is so far to be regarded as of question- able expediency. But the effect which would be produce^ * Simpson's Plea for Religion and the Sacred Writings. 442 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS [eSSAY III. by dispensing with establishments is to be estimated, so far as is in our power, by facts. Now dissenters are in the situa- tion of separate unestablished churches. If they do not pro- vide for the public officers of religion voluntarily, they will not be provided for. Yet where is any considerable body of dissenters to be found who do not provide themselves with a chapel and a preacher ? And if those churches which are not established, do in fact provide public instruction, how is it shown that it would not be provided although there were no established religion in a state ? Besides, the dissenters from an established church provide this under peculiar disadvan- ^ tages ; for after paying, in common with others, their quota to the state religion, they have to pay in addition to their own. But perhaps it will be said that dissenters from a state reli- gion are actuated by a zeal with which the professors of that religion are not ; and that the legq-1 provision supplies the de- ficiency of zeal. If this be said, the enquiry imposes itself —How does this disproportion of zeal arise ? Why should dissenters be more zealous than churchmen ? What account can be given of the matter, but that there is something in the patronage of the state which induces apathy upon the church that it prefers ? One other account may indeed be offered — that to be a dissenter is to be a positive religionist, whilst to be a churchman is frequently only to be nothing else ; that an establishment embraces all who are not embraced by others ; and that if those whom other churches do not in- clude were not cared for by the state religion, they would not be cared for at all. This is an argument of apparent weight, but the effect of reasoning is to diminish that weight. For what is meant by " including," by " caring for," the indifferent and irreligious ? An established church only offers them in- struction ; it does not " compel them to come in," and we have just seen that this offer is made by unestablished churches also. Who doubts whether in a district that is suf- ficient to fill a temple of the state religion, there would be found persons to offer a temple of public worship though the state did not compel it ? Who doubts whether this would be the case if the district were inhabited by dissenters ? and if it would not be done supposing the inhabitants to belong to the state religion, the conclusion is inevitable, that there is a tendency to indifference resulting from the patronage of XW. state. Let us listen to the testimony of Archbishop Newcome. He speaks of Ireland, and says, " Great numbers of country- parishes are without churches^ notwithstanding the largeness CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 443 and frequency of parliamentary grants for building them ;" but meeting-houses and Romish chapels, which are built and re- paired with greater zeal, are in sufficient numbers about the country."* This is remarkable testimony indeed. That church which is patronised and largely assisted by the state, does not provide places for public worship : those churches which are not patronised and not assisted by the state, do pro- vide them, and provide them in " sufficient numbers" and " with greater zeal." What then becomes of the argument, that a church establishment is necessary in order to provide instruction which would not otherwise be provided 1 Yet here one point must be conceded. It does not follow because one particular state religion is thus deficient, that none would be more exemplary. The fault may not be so much in religious establishments as such, as in that particular establishment which obtains in the instance before us. Kindred to the testimony of the Irish primate is the more cautious language of the archdeacon of Carlisle : — " I do not know," says he, " that it is in any degree true that the influ- ence of religion is the greatest where there are the fewest dissenters. "t This, I suppose, may lawfully be interpreted into positive language — that the influence of religion is the greatest where there are numerous dissenters. But if numer- ous adherents to unestablished churches be favourable to re- ligion, it would appear that, although there were none but un- established churches in a country, the influence of religion would be kept up. If established churches are practically useful to religion, what more reasonable than to expect that where they possessed the more exclusive operation, their utility would be the greatest ? Yet the contrary, it appears, is the fact. It may indeed be urged that it is the existence of a state religion which animates the zeal of the other churches, and that in this manner the state religion does good. To which it is a sufficient answer, that the benefit, if it is thus occasioned, is collateral and accidental, and offers no testi- mony in favour of establishments as such ; — and this is our concern. Besides, there are many sects to animate the zeal of one another, even though none were patronised by the state. To estimate the relative influence of religion in two countries is no easy task. Yet, I believe, if Ave compare its influence in the United States with that which it possesses in most of the European countries which possess state religions, it will be found that the balance is in favour of the community in * See Gisbome's Duties of Men. t Paley : Evidences of Chris- tianity. ^ 444 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAY III which there is no established church : at any rate, the balance is not so much against it as to afford any evidence in favour of a state religion. A traveller in America has remarked, " There is more religion in the United States than in England, and more in England than in Italy. The closer the monopoly, the less abundant the supply."* Another traveller writes almost as if he had anticipated the present disquisition—" It has been often said, that the disinclination of the heart to re- ligious truth, renders a state establishment absolutely neces- sary for the purpose of Christianizing the country. Ireland and America can furnish abundant evidence of the fallacy of such an hypothesis. In the one country we see an ecclesi- astical establishment of the most costly description utterly inoperative in dispelling ignorance or refuting error ; in the other no establishment of any kind, and yet religion making daily and hourly progress, promoting enquiry, diffusing know- ledge, strengthening the weak, and mollifying the hardened."! In immediate connexion with this subject is the argument that Dr. Paley places at the head of those which he advances in favour of religious establishments — that the knowledge and profession of Christianity cannot be upholden without a clergy supported by legal provision, and belonging to one sect of Chris- tians. 1^. The justness of this proposition is founded upon the necessity of research. It is said that " Christianity is an his- torical religion," and that the truth of its history must be in- vestigated ; that in order to vindicate its authority and to as- certain its truths, leisure and education and learning are indis- pensable — so that such an " order of clergy is necessary to perpetuate the evidences of revelation, and to interpret the obscurity of those ancient writings in which the religion is contained." To all this there is one plain objection, that when once the evidences of religion are adduced and made public, when once the obscurity of the ancient writings is in- terpreted, the work, so far as discovery is concerned, is done ; and it can hardly be imagined that an established clergy is necessary in perpetuity to do that which in its own nature can be done but once. Whatever may have been the validity of this argument in other times, when few but the clergy pos- sessed any learning, or when the evidences of religion had not been sought out, it possesses little validity now. These evidences are brought before the world in a form so clear and accessible to literary and good men, that, in the present state of society, there is little reason to fear they will be lost for * Hall. t Duncan's Trav. in America. t See Mor. and Pol. PhU. b. 6 c. 10. CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 445 want of an established church. Nor is it to be forgotten that with respect to our own country, the best defences of Christianity which exist in the language, have not been the work either of the estabUshed clergy or of members of the established church. The expression, that such " an order of clergy is necessary to perpetuate the evidences of revelation," appears to contain an illusion. Evidences can in no other sense be perpetuated than by being again and again brought before the public. If this be the meaning, it belongs rather to the teaching of re- ligious truths than to their discovery ; but it is upon the dis- covery, it is upon the opportunity of research, that the argument is founded : and it is particularly to be noticed, that this is the primary argument which Paley adduces in deciding " the first and most fundamental question upon the subject." It pleases Providence to employ human agency in the vin- dication and diffusion of his truth ; but to employ the expres- sion " the knowledge and profession of Christianity" cannot be upholden without an established clergy, approaches to irreverence. Even a rejector of Christianity says, " If public worship be conformable to reason, reason without doubt will prove adequate to its vindication and support. If it be from God it is profanation to imagine that it stands in need of the alliance of the state."* And it is clearly untrue in fact ; be- cause, without such a clergy, it is actually upheld, and because, during the three first centuries, the religion subsisted and spread and prospered without any encouragement from the state. And it is remarkable, too, that the diffusion of Chris- tianity in our own times in Pagan nations, is effected less by the clergy of established churches than by others. f Such are amongst the principal of the direct advantages of religious establishments as they are urged by those who ad- vocate them. Some others will be noticed in enquiring into the opposite question of their disadvantages. These disadvantages respect either the institution itself — or religion generally — or the civil welfare of a people. I. The institution itself. " The single end we ought to propose by religious establishments is, the preservation and communication of religious knowledge. Every other idea, and every other end, that have been mixed with this, as the making of the church an engine, or even an ally, of the state • » Godwin's Pol. Just. 2, 608. t In the preceding discussion, I have left out all reference to the pro- per qualification or appointment of Christian ministers, and have assumed (but without conceding) that the magistrate is at hberty to adjust those matters if he pleases. 38 446 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMEXTS. [eSSAY III. converting it into the means of strengthening or diffusing in- fluence ; or regarding it as a support of regal, in opposition to popular forms of government ; have served only to debase the institution, and to introduce into it numerous corruptions and abuses."* This is undoubtedly true. Now, we affirm that this " debasement of the institution," this " introduction of numerous corruptions and abuses," is absolutely inseparable from religious establishments as they ordinarily exist; that wherever and whenever a state so prefers and patronizes a particular church, these debasements and abuses and corrup- tions will inevitably arise. " An engine or ally of the state." How will you frame — I will not say any religious establishment, but — any religious establishment that approaches to the ordinary character, with- out making it an engine or ally of the state ? Alliance is in- volved in the very idea of the institution. The state selects, and prefers, and grants privileges to, a particular church. The continuance of these privileges depends upon the con- tinuance of the state in its present principles. If the state is altered, the privileges are endangered or may be swept away. The privileged church, therefore, is interested in supporting the state, in standing by it against opposition ; or, which is the same thing, that church becomes an ally of the state. You cannot separate the effect from the cause. Wherever the state prefers and patronises one church, there will be an alliance between the state and that church. There may be variations in the strength of this alliance. The less the patronage of the state, the less strong the alliance will be. Or there may be emergencies in which the alliance is suspended by the influence of stronger interests ; but still the alliance, as a general consequence of the preference of the state, will inevi- tably subsist. When, therefore, ♦Dr. Paley says, that to make an establishment an ally of the state is to introduce into it numerous corruptions and abuses, he in fact says, that to make an establishment at all is to introduce into a church numerous corruptions and abuses. It matters nothing what the doctrines or constitution of the church may be. The only point is, the alliance, and its de- gree. It may be episcopal, or presbyterian, or independent ; but wherever the degree of alliance — ^that is, of preference and patronage — is great, there the abuses and corruptions will be great. In this country during a part of the seventeenth cen- tury, independency became, in effect, the established church. It became of course an ally of the state ; and fought from its » Paley: Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 10. CHAP. XIV.] RELIOIOtTS ESTABLISHMENTS. 44? pulpits the battles of the state. Nor will any one, I suppose, deny that this alliance made independency worse than it was before, — that it "introduced into it corruptions and abuses." The less strict the alliance, the fewer the corruptions that spring from an alliance. One state may impose a test to dis- tinguish the ministers of the preferred church, and leave the selection to the church itself : another may actually appoint some or all of the ministers. These differences in the close- ness of the alliance will produce differences in the degree of corruption ; but alliance and corruption in both cases there will be. He who receives a legal provision from the minister of the day, will lend his support to the minister of the day. He who re- ceives it by the operation of a general law, will lend his support to that political system which is likely to perpetuate that law. " The means of strengthening or diffusing influence." This abuse of religious establishments is presupposed in the ques- tion of alliance. It is by the means of influence that the alliance is produced. There may be and there are gradations in the directness or flagrancy of the exercise of influence, but influence of some kind is inseparable from the selection and preference of a particular church. " A support of regal in opposition to popular forms of gov- ernment." This attendant upon religious establishments is accidental. An establishment will support that form, what- ever it be, by which it is itself supported. In one country it may be the ally of republicanism, in another of aristocracy, and in another of monarchy ; but in all it will be the ally of its own patron. The establishment of France supported the despotism of the Louises. The establishment of Spain sup- ports at this hour the pitiable policy of Ferdinand. So accu- rately is alliance maintained, that in a mixed government it will be found that an establishment adheres to that branch of the government by which its own pre-eminence is most sup- ported. In England the strictest alliance is between the church and the executive ; and accordingly, in ruptures be- tween the executive and legislative powers, the establishment has adhered to the former. There was an exception in the reign of James II. : but it was an exception wliich confirms the rule ; for the establishment then found or feared that its alliance with the regal power was about to he broken. Seeing, then, the debasement of a Christian church — ^that the introduction into it of corruptions and abuses, is insepar- able from religious establishments, what is this debasement and what are these abuses and corruptions ? Now, without entering into minute enquiry, many evils 448 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAY 111. arise obviously from the nature of the case. Here is an in- troduction, into the office of the Christian ministry, of motives and interests, and aims, foreign to the proper business of the office ; and not only foreign but incongruous and discordant with it. Here are secular interests mixed up with the mo- tives of religion. Here are temptations to assume the minis- terial function in the church that is established, for the sake of its secular advantages. Here are inducements, when the function is assumed, to accommodate the manner of its exer- cise to the inclinations of the state ; to suppress, for example, some religious principles which the civil power does not wish to see inculcated ; to insist for the same reason with undue emphasis upon others ; in a word, to adjust the religious con- duct so as to strengthen or perpetuate the alliance with the state. It is very easy to perceive that these temptations will and must frequently prevail ; and wherever they do prevail, there the excellence and dignity of the Christian ministry are diminished, are depressed ; there Christianity is not exem- plified in its purity: there it is shorn of a portion of its beams. The extent of the evil will depend of course upon the vigour of the cause ; that is to say, the evil will be pro- portionate to the alliance. If a religious establishment were erected in which the executive power of the country ap- pointed all its ministers, there would, I doubt not, ensue an almost universal corruption of the ministry. As an establish- ment recedes in its constitution from this closeness of al- liance, a corresponding increase of purity may be expected. During the reformation, and in Queen Elizabeth's time, " of nine thousand four hundred beneficed clergy," (adherents to Papacy,) " only one hundred and seventy-seven resigned their preferment rather than acknowledge the Queen's supremacy,"* yet the Pope to them was head of the church. One particu- lar manner in which the establishment of a church injures the character of the church itself is, by the temptation which it holds out to equivocation or hypocrisy. It is necessary to the preference of the teachers of a particular sect, that there should be some means of discovering who belong to that sect : — there must be some test. Before the man who is desirous of undertaking the ministerial office, , there are placed two roads, one of which conducts to those privileges which a state religion enjoys, and the other does not. The latter may be entered by all who will : the former by those only who affirm their belief of the rectitude of some church forms or of some points of theology. It requires no argument to prove * Southey : Book of the Church, Sir Thomas More. CHAP. XlV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 449 that this is to tempt men to affirm that which they do not be- lieve : that it is to say to the man who does not believe the stipulated points, Here is money for you if you will violate your conscience. By some the invitation will be accepted ;* and what is the result ? Why that, just as they are going publicly to insist upon the purity and sanctity of the Moral Law, they violate that law themselves. The injury which is thus done to a Christian church by establishing it, is negative as well as positive. You not only tempt some men to equiv- ocation or hypocrisy, but exclude from the office others of sounder integrity. Two persons, both of whom do not as- sent to the prescribed points, are desirous of entering the church. One is upright and conscientious, the other subser- vient and unscrupulous. An establishment excludes the good man and admits the bad. " Though some purposes of order and tranquillity may be answered by the establishment of creeds and confessions, yet they are at all times attended with serious inconveniences : they check enquiry ; they violate li- berty ; they ensnare the consciences of the clergy, by hold- ing out temptations to prevarication."! And with respect to the habitual accommodation of the ex- ercise of the ministry to the desires of the state it is manifest that an enlightened and faithful minister may frequently find himself restrained by a species of political leading-strings. He has not the full command of his intellectual and religious attainments. He may not perhaps communicate the whole counsel of God. J It was formerly conceded to the English clergy that they might preach against the horrors and impolicy of war, provided they were not chaplains to regiments or in the navy. Conceded! Then if the state had pleased, it might have withheld the concession ; and accordingly from some the state did withhold it. They were prohibited to preach against that, against which the apostles wrote ! What would these apostles have said if a state had bidden them keep silence respecting the most unchristian custom in the world ? They would have said, Whether we ought to obey God rather than man, judge ye. What would they have done ? They would have gone away and preached against it * " Chillingworth declared in a letter to Dr. Sheldon, that if he sub- scribed he subscribed his own damnation, and yet in no long space of time he actually did subscribe to the articles of the church again and again." Simpson's Plea. t Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 10. X " Honest and dismterested boldness in the path of duty is one of the first requisites of a minister of the gospel." Gisbome. But how shall thev be thus disinterested ? Mem. in the MS. 38* 450 RELIGIOUS Establishments. [essay iit. as before. One question more should be asked — ^What would they have said to an alliance which thus brought the Chris- tian minister under bondage to the state ? The next point of view in which a religious establish- ment is injurious to the church itself is, that it perpetuates any evils which happen to exist in it. The reason is this : the preference which a state gives to a particular church is given to it as it is. If the church makes alterations in its constitu- tion, its discipline, or its forms, it cannot tell whether the state would continue to prefer and to patronise it. Besides, if al- terations are begun, its members do not know whether the alac- rity of some other church might not take advantage of the loosening alliance with the state, to supplant it. In short, they do not know what would be the consequences of amend- ments, nor where they would end. Conscious that the church as it is possesses the supremacy, they think it more prudent to retain that supremacy with existing evils, than to endanger it by attempting to reform them. Thus it is that whilst unestablished churches alter their discipline or consti- tution as need appears to require, established churches remain century after century the same,* Not to be free to alter, can only then be right when the church is at present as perfect as it can be ; and no one perhaps will gravely say that there is any established church on the globe which needs no amend- ment. Dr, Hartley devoted a portion of his celebrated work to a discussion of the probability that all the existing church establishments in the world would be dissolved ; and he founds this probability expressly upon the ground that they need so much reformation. " In all exclusive establishments, where temporal emolu- ments are annexed to the profession of a certain system of doctrines, and the usage of a certain routine of forms, and appropriated to an order of men so and so qualified, that order of men will naturally think themselves interested that things should continue as they are. A reformation might endang'er their emoluments."! This is the testimony of a dignitary of one of these establishments. And the fact being admitted, what is the amount of the evil which it involves ? Let another dignitary reply : " He who, by a diligent and faithful examination of the original records, dismisses from the system one article which contradicts the apprehension, the experience, or the reasoning * It was not to religious establishments that Protestants were indebted for the first efforts of reformation. They have uniformly resisted reform- ation. Mem. in the MS. t Archdeacon Blackburn's Confessional: Pref. CHAP. XIV.] RfiLIGiOTTS ESTABLISHMENTS. 461 of mankind, does more towards recommending the belief, and with the belief the influence of Christianity, to the understand- ings and consciences of serious enquirers, and through them to universal reception and authority, than can be effected by a thousand contenders for creedsand ordinances of human es- tablishments." If the benefits of dismissing such an article are so great, what must be the evil of continuing it ? If the benefit of dimissing one such article be so great, what must be the evil of an established system which tends habitually and constantly to retain many of them ? Yet these " articles, which thus contradict the reasoning of mankind," are actually retained by established churches. " Creeds and confessions," says Dr. Paley, " however they may express the persuasion, or be accommodated to the controversies or to the fears of the age in which they are composed, in process of time, and by reason of the changes which are wont to take place in the judgment pf mankind upon religious subjects, they come at length to contradict the actual opinions of the church whose doctrines they profess to contain."* It is then confessed by the members of an established church that religious establish- ments powerfully obstruct the belief, the influence, the uni- versal reception and authority of Christianity. Great, indeed, must be the counter advantages of these establishments if they counterbalance this portion of its evils. II. This last paragraph anticipates the second class of dis- advantages attendant upon religious establishments : their ill effects upon religion generally. It is indisputable, that much of the irreligion of the world has resulted from those things which have been mixed up with Christianity, and placed be- fore mankind as parts of religion. In some countries, the mixture has been so flagrant that the majority of the thinking part of the population have almost rejected religion altogether. So it was, and so it may be feared it still is, in France. The intellectual part of her people rejected religion, not because they had examined Christianity and were convinced that it was a fiction, but because they had examined what was pro- posed to them as Christianity and found it was absurd or false. So numerous were the " articles that contradicted the experience and judgment of mankind," that they concluded the whole was a fable and rejected the whole. Now that which the French church establishment did in an extreme degTee, others do in a less degree. If the French church retained a hundred articles that contradicted the judg- ment of mankind, and thus made a nation of unbelievers, the * Paley : Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 10. 452 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAY III. church which retains ten or five such articles, weakens the general influence of religion although it may not destroy it. Nor is it merely by unauthorized doctrinal articles or forms that the influence of religion is impaired, but by the general evils which aflect the church itself. It is sufficiently manifest, that whatever tends to diminish the virtue, or to impeach the character, of the ministers of religion, must tend to diminish the influence of religion upon mankind. If the teacher is not good, we are not to expect goodness in the taught. If a man enters the church with impure or unworthy motives, he can- not do his duty when he is there. If he makes religion sub- servient to interest in his own practice, he cannot effectually teach others to make religion paramount to all. Men asso- ciate (they ought to do it less) the idea of religion with that of its teachers ; and their respect for one is frequently mea- sured by their respect for the other. Now, that the eflect of religious establishments has been to depress their teachers in the estimation of mankind, cannot be disputed. The effect is, in truth, inevitable. And it is manifest that whatever con- veys disrespectful ideas of religion diminishes its influence upon the human mind. In brief, we have seen that to estab- lish a religion is morally pernicious to its ministers ; and whatever is injurious to them diminishes the power of religion in the world. Christianity is a religion of good-will and kind affections. Its essence, so far as the intercourse of society is concerned, is Love. Whatever diminishes good- will and kind aflfections amongst Christians, attacks the essence of Christianity. Now, religious establishments do this. They generate ill-will, heart- burnings, animosities — those very things which our religion deprecates more almost than any other. It is obvious that if a fourth or a third of a community think they are unreason- ably excluded from privileges which the other parts enjoy, feelings of jealousy or envy are likely to be generated. If the minority are obliged to pay to the support of a religion they disapprove, these feelings are likely to be exacerbated. They soon become reciprocal ; attacks are made by one party and repelled by another, till there arises an habitual sense of uii- kindness or ill-will.* The deduction from the practical influ- * I once met with rather a grotesque definition of rehgious dissent, but it illustrates my proposition : — " Dissenterism " — that is, " systematic op- position to the established religion." " The placing all the religious sects (in America) upon an equal foot- ing with respect to the government of the country, has effectually se- niirorl fVio riAnoA nf thA pnmmnnitv. at the. samft time that it has essen- ing witn respect to me government oi me country, nas eiieuiu. cvured the peace of the community, at the same time that it has CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 453 ence of religion upon the minds of men which this effect of religious establishments occasions, is great. The evil, I trust, is diminishing in the world ; but then the diminution results, not from religious establishments, but from that power of Christianity which prevails against these evils. From these, and from other evidences of the injurious effects of religious establishments upon the religious condition of mankind, we shall perhaps bc' prepared to assent to the ob- servations which follow : " The history of the last eighteen centuries does, indeed, afford, in various ways, a strong pre- sumptive evidence, that the cause of true Christianity has very materially suffered in the world in consequence of the con- nexion between the church and the state. It is probably in great measure the consequence of such an union that the church has assumed, in almost all Christian countries, so sec- ular a character — that Christianity has become so lament- ably mixed up with the spirit, maxims, motives, and poli- tics of a vain and evil world. Had the union in question never been attempted, pure religion might probably have found a freer course ; the practical effects of Christianity might have been more unmixed and more extensive ; and it might have spread its influence in a much more efficient manner than is now the case, even over the laws and politics of kings and nations. Before its union with the state, our holy religion flourished with comparative incorruptness ; afterwards it gradually declined in its purity and its power until all was nearly lost in darkness, superstition, and spiritual tyranny." * " Religion should remain distinct from the political constitu- tion of a state. Intermingled with it, what purpose cah it serve, except the baneful purpose of communicating and of receiving contamination ?" f III. Then as to the effect of religious establishments upon the civil welfare of a state — we know that the connexion he- tween religious and civil welfare is intimate and great. tially promoted the interests of truth and virtue." — Mem. Dr. Priestley, p. 175. Mem. in the MS. Pennsylvania. — " Although there are so many sects and such a differ- ence of religious opinions in this province, it is surprising the harmony which subsists among them ; they consider themselves as children of the same father, and live like brethren because they have the liberty of thinking like men ; to this pleasing harmony, in a great measure is to be attributed the rapid and flourishing state of Pennsylvania above all the other provinces." Travels through the Interior parts of North America, by an Officer. 1791. Lond. The officer was Thomas Aubery, who was taken prisoner by the Americans. Mem. in the MS. * J. J. Gurney : Peculiarities, c. 7. t Charles James Fox : Fell's Life, 454 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAY III Whatever therefore diminishes the influence of religion up- on a people, diminishes their general welfare. In addition, however, to this general consideration, there are some partic- ular modes of the injurious effects of religious establishments which it may be proper to notice. And, first, religious establishments are incompatible with complete religious liberty. This consideration we requested the reader to bear in mind when the question of religious lib- erty was discussed. * " If an establishment be right, re- ligious liberty is not ; and if religious liberty be right, an establishment is not." Whatever arguments therefore exist to prove the rectitude of complete religious liberty, they prove at the same time the wrongness of religious establish- ments. Nor is this all ; for it is the manifest tendency of these establishments to withhold an increase of religious lib- erty, even when on other grounds it would be granted. The secular interests of the state religion are set in array against au increase of liberty. If the established church allows other churches to approach more nearly to an equality with itself, its own relative eminence is diminished ; and if by any means the state religion adds to its own privileges, it is by deducting from the privileges of the rest. The state religion is, besides, afraid to dismiss any part even of its confessedly use- less privileges, lest, when an alteration is begun, it should not easily be stopped. And there is no reason to doubt that it is temporal rather than religious considerations — interest rather than Christianity — which now occasions restrictions and dis- abilities and tests. In conformity with these views, persecution has generally been the work of religious establishments. Indeed, some alliance or some countenance at least from the state is neces- sary to a systematic persecution. Popular outrage may per- secute men on account of their religion, as it often has done ; but fixed stated persecutions have perhaps always been the work of the religion of the state. It was the state religion of Rome that persecuted the first Christians ; not to mention that it was the state religion of Judea that put our Saviour himself to death, — " Who was it that crucified the Saviour of the world for attempting to reform the religion of his country ? The Jewish priesthood. — Who was it that drowned the altars of their idols with the blood of Christians for attempting to abolish Paganism ? The Pagan priesthood. — Who was it that persecuted to flames and death those who, in the time of WicklifTe and his followers, laboured to reform the errors * Essay 3, c. 4. CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 455 of Popery ? The Popish priesthood. — Who was it, and who is it that, both in England and in Ireland since the Reforma- tion — but I check my hand, being unwilling to reflect upon the dead, or to exasperate the living."* We also are unwill- ing to reflect upon or to exasperate, but our business is with plain truth. Who, then, was it that since the Reformation has persecuted dissentients from its creed, and who is it that at this hour thinks and speaks of them with unchristian an- tipathy ? The English Priesthood. It was, and it is, the state religion in some European countries that now persecutes Dissenters from its creed. It was the state religion in this country that persecuted the Protestants ; since Protestantism has been established, it is the state religion which has persecuted Protestant Dissenters. Is this the fault principally of the faith of these churches, or of their alliance with the state ? No man can be in doubt for an answer. We are accustomed to attribute too much to bigotry. Big- otry has been very great and very operative ; but bigotry alone would not have produced the disgraceful and dreadful trans- actions which fill the records of ecclesiastical history. No. Men have often been actuated by the love of supremacy or of money, whilst they were talking loudly of the sacredness of their faith. They have been less afraid for religion than for the dominance of a church. When the creed of that church was impugned, those who shared in its advantages were zealous to suppress the rising enquiry ; because the dis- credit of the creed might endanger the loss of the advantages. The zeal of a Pope for the real presence, was often quite a fiction. He and his cardinals cared perhaps nothing for the real presence, as they sometimes cared nothing for morality. But men might be immoral without encroaching upon the Papal Power — they could not deny the doctrine without endangering its overthrow. Happily, persecution for religion is greatly diminished; yet, whilst we rejoice in the fact, we cannot conceal from our- selves the consideration, that the diminution of persecution has resulted rather from the general diffusion of better princi- ples than from the operation of religious establishments as such. In most or in all ages, a great portion of the flagitious trans- actions which furnish materials for the ecclesiastical historian, have resulted from the political connexions or interests of a church. It was not the interest of Christianity but of an es- tablishment, which made Becket embroil his king and other * Miscellaneous Tracts by Richard Watson, D. D., Bishop of Lan- fUff, V. 2. 456 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAT III. sovereigns in distractions. It was not the interests of Chris- tianity but of an establishment, which occasioned the mon- strous impositions and usurpations of the Papal see. And I do not know whether there has ever been a religious war of which religion was the only or the principal cause. Besides all this, there has been an inextricable succession of intrigues and cabals — of conflicting interests — and clamour and dis- traction, which the world would have been spared if secular interests had not been brought into connection with religion. Another mode in which religious establishments are inju- rious to the civil welfare of a people, is by their tendency to resist political improvements. That same cause which in- duces state religions to maintain themselves as they are, indu- ces them to maintain the patron state as it is. It is the state in its present condition, that secures to the church its advan- tages ; and the church does not know whether, if it were to encourage political reformation, the new state of things might not endanger its own supremacy. There are indeed so many other interests and powers concerned in political reformations, that the state religion cannot always prevent alterations from being effected. Nor would I affirm that they always endea- vour to prevent it. And yet we may appeal to the general experience of all ages, whether established churches have not resisted reformation in those political institutions upon which their own privileges depended. Now, these are seri- ous things. For after all that can be said, and justly said, of the mischiefs of political changes and the extravagances of political empiricism, it is sufficiently certain that almost every government that has been established in the world, has needed from time to time important reformations in its constitution or its practice. And it is equally certain, that if there be any influence or power which habitually and with little discrimi- nation supports political institutions as they are, that influence or power must be very pernicious to the world. W« have seen that one of the requisites of a religious es- tablishment is a " legal provision " for its ministers — that is to say, the members of all the churches which exist in a state must be obliged to pay to the support of one, whether they approve of that one or not. Now in endeavouring to estimate the effects of this system, with a view to ascertain the preponderance of public advan- tages, we are presented at the outset with the enquiry — Is this compulsory maintenance right 1 Is it compatible with Christianity ? If it is not, there is an end of the controversy ; for it is nothing to Christians whether a system be politic cor C^AP. XIV.] RELIGTOtrS ESTABLISHMENTS. 457 impolitic, if once they have discovered that it is wrong. Bui I waive for the present the question of rectitude. The reader is at liberty to assume that Christianity allows governments to make this compulsory provision if they think fit. I waive, too, the question whether a Christian minister ought to receive payment for his labours, whether that payment be voluntary w not. The single point before us is, then, the balance of advan- tages. Is it more advantageous tha,t ministers should be paid by a legal provision or by voluntary subscription ? That advantage of a legal provision which consists in the supply of a teacher to every district has already been noticed ; so that our enquiry is reduced to a narrow limit. Supposing that a minister would be appointed in every district although the state did not pay him, is it more desirable that he should be paid by the state or voluntarily by the people ? 0( the legal provision some of the advantages are these : it holds out no inducement to the irreligious or indifferent to absent themselves from public worship lest they should be expected to pay the preacher. I\iblic worship is conducted — the preacher delivers his disuourse— whether such persons go or not. They pay no more for going, and no less for stay- ing away : and it is probable, in the present religious stale of mankind, that some go to places for worship since it costs them nothing, who otherwise would stay away. But it is manifestly better that men should attend even in such a state of indifference than that they should not attend at all. Upon the voluntary system of payment, this gX)od effect is not so fully secured ; for though the doors of chapels be open to all, yet few persons of competent means would attend them con- stantly without feeling that they might be expected to con- tribute to the expenses. I do not believe that the non-attend- ance of indifferent persons would be greatly increased by the adoption of the voluntary system, especially if the payments were as moderate as they easily might be ; — but it is a ques- tion rather of speculation than of experience, and the reader is to give upon this account to the system of legal provision, such an amount of advantage as he shall think fit. Again, — Preaching, where there is a legal provision, is not ** a mode of begging." If you adopt voluntary payment, that payment depends upon the good pleasure of the hearers, and there is manifestly a temptation upon the preacher to accom- modate his discourses, or the manner of them, to the wishes of his hearers, rather than to the dictates of his own judgment. But the man who receives his stipend whether his hearers be 39 458 RELIGIOUS ESTAFLISHMEIifTS. [esSAY III. pleased or not, is under no such temptation. He is at liberty to conform the exercise of his functions to his judgment with- out the diminution of a subscription. This^ I think, is an undeniable advantage. Another consideration is this : — That where the> e is a re- ligious establishment with a legal provision, it is usual, not to say indispensable, to fill the pulpits only with persons who entertain a certain set of religious opinions. It would be ob- viously idle to assume that these opinions are true, but they are. or are in a considerable degree, uniform. Assuming then, that one set of opinions is as sound as another, is it better that a district should always hear one s«t, or that the teachers of twenty different sets should successively gain possession of the pulpit, as the choice of the people might direct ? 1 presume not \o determine such a question ; but it may be ob- served, that, in point of fact, those churches which do pro- ceed upon the voluntary system, are not often subjected to such fluctuations of doctrine. There does not appear much difficulty in constituting churches upon the voluntary plan which shall in practice secure considerable uniformity in the sentiments of the teachers. And as to the bitter animosities and distractions which have been predicted if a choice of new teachers was to be left to the people — they do not, I believe ordinarily follow. Not that I apprehend the ministers, for in- stance, of an independent church are always elected with that unanimity and freedom from heart-burnings which ought to subsist, but that animosities do not subsist to any great extent. Besides, the prediction appears to be fouiided on the suppo- sition, that a certain stipend was to be appropriated to one teacher or to another, according as he might obtain the greater number of votes — whereas every man is at liberty, if he pleases, to withdraw his contribution from him whom he dis- approves, and to give it to another. And, after all, there may be voluntary support of ministers without an election by those who contribute, as is instanced by the Methodists in the pres- ent day. On the other hand, there are some advantages attendant on the voluntary system which that of a legal provision does not possess. And first it appears to be of importance that there should ^be a union, a harmony, a cordiality between the minister and the people. It is, in truth, an indispensable requisite. Chris- tianity, which is a religion of love, cannot flourish where un- kindly feelings prevail. Now, I think it is manifest that har- mony and cordiality are likely to prevail more where the CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 459 minister is chosen and voluntarily remunerated by his hearers, than where they are not consulted in the choice ; where they are obliged to take him whom others please to appoint, and where they are compelled to pay him whether they like him or not. The tendency of this last system is evidently opposed to perfect kindliness and cordiality. There is likely to be a sort of natural connexion, a communication of good offices induced between hearers and the man whom they themselves choose and voluntarily remunerate, which is less likely in the other case. , If love be of so much consequence generally to the Christian character, it is especially of consequence that it should subsist between him who assumes to be a dispenser, and them who are in the relation of hearers of the gospel of Christ. Indeed the very circumstance that a man is compelled to pay a preacher, tends to the introduction of unkind and unfriendly feelings. It is not to be expected that men will pay him more graciously or with a better will than they pay a tax- gatherer ; and we all know that the tax-gatherer is one of the last persons whom men wish to see. He who desires to ex- tend the influence of Christianity, would be very cautious of establishing a system of which so ungracious a regulation formed a part. There is truth- worthy of grave attention in the ludicrous verse of Cowper's — A rarer man than you In pulpit none shall hear ; But yet, methinks to tell you true, You sell it plaguy dear. It is easy to perceive that the influence of that man's exhor- tations- must be diminished, whose hearers listen with the re- flection that his advice is " plaguy dear." The reflection, too, is perfectly natural, and cannot be helped. And when super- added to this is the consideration, that it is not only sold " dear," but that payment is enforced — material injury must be sustained by the cause of religion. In this view it may be remarked, that the support of an establishment by a general tax would be preferable to the payment of each pastor, by his own hearers. Nor is it unworthy of notice that some persons will -always think (whether with reason or without it) that compulsory maintenance is not right ; and in whatever degree they do this, there is an increased cause of dissatisfaction or estrangement. Again, the teacher who is independent of the congregation — who will enjoy all his emoluments whether they are satis- fied with him or not — is under manifest temptation to remiss- 465 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. [eSSAY lit. ness in his duty ; not perhaps to* remissness in those partie* ulars on which his superiors would animadvert, but in those which respect the unstipulated and undefinable, but very im- portant duties of private care, and of private labours. To mention this is sufficient. No man who reflects upon the human constitution, or who looks around him, will need argu- ments to prove that they are likely to labour negligently whose profits are not increased by assuidity and zeal. I know that the power of religion can, and that it often does, counteract this ; but that is no argument for putting temptation in the way. So powerful indeed is this temptation, that with a very great number it is acknowledged to prevail. Even if we do not assert, with a clergyman, that a great proportion of his breth- ren labour only so much for the religious benefit of their par- ishioners as will screen them from the arm of the law, there is other evidence which is unhappily conclusive. The des- perate, extent to which non-residence is practised, is infallible proof that a large proportion of the clergy are remiss in the discharge of the duties of a Christian pastor. They do not discharge them con amore ; and how should they ? It was not the wish to do this which prompted them to become cler- gymen at first. They were influenced by another object, and that they have obtained — they possess an income : and it is not to be expected that, when this is obtained, the mental de- sires should suddenly become elevated and purified, and that they who entered the church for the sake of its emoluments, should commonly labour in it for the sake of religion. Although to many the motive for entering the church is the same as that for engaging in other professions, it is an unhappiness peculiar to the clerical profession, that it does not ofl'er the same stinmlus to subsequent exertion ; that a:d- vancement does not usually depend upon desert. The man who seeks for an income from surgery, or the bar, is continu- ally prompted to pay exemplary attention to its duties. Un- less the surgeon is skilful and attentive, he knows that practice is not to be expected : unless the pleader devotes himself to statutes and reports, he knows that he is not to expect cases and briefs. But the clergyman, whether he studies the Bible or not — whether he be diligent and zealous or not— still pos- sesses his living. Nor would it be rational to expect, that where the ordinary stimulus to human exertion is wanting, the exertion itself should generally be found. So naturally does exertion follow from stimulus, that we believe it is an observation frequently made that curates are more exemplary than beneficed clergymen. And if beneficed clergymen wer© CHAP. XIV.] RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 46-1 more solicitous thaa they are to make the diligence of their curates the principal consideration in employing them, this diiference between curates and their employers would be much greater than it is. Let beneficed clergynien employ and re- ward curates upon as simple principles as those are on which a merchant employs and rewards a clerk, and it is probable that nine-tenths of the parishes in England would wish for a curate rather than a rector. But this very consideration affords a powerful argument against the present system. If much good would result from making clerical reward the price of desert, much evil results from making it independent of desert. This effect of the En- glish Establishment is not, like some others, inseparable from the institution. It would doubtless be possible, even with compulsory maintenance, so to appropriate it that it should form a constant motive to assiduity and exertion. Clergymen might be elevated in their profession according to their fidelity to their office ; and if this were done — if, as opportunity offered, all were likely to be promoted who deserved it ; and if all who did not deserve it were sure to be passed by, a new face would soon be put upon the affairs of the church. The complaints of neglect of duty would quickly be diminished, and non-residence would soon cease to be the reproach of three thousand out of ten. We cannot, however, amuse our- selves with the hope that this will be done, because, in refer- ence to the civil constitution of the church, there is too near an approach to that condition in which the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. If then it be asserted, that it is one great advantage of the establishment that it provides a teacher for every parish, it is one great disadvantage, that it makes a large proportion of those teachers negligent of their duty. ^ There may perhaps be a religious establishment in which the ministers shall be selected for their deserts^ though I know not whether in any it is actually and sufficiently done. That it is one of the first requisites in the appointment of religious teachers is plain ; and this point is manifestly better consulted by a system in which the people voluntarily pay and choose their pastors, than when they do not. Men love goodness in others, though they may be bad themselves ; and they espe- cially like it in their religious teachers : so that, when they come to select a person to fdl that office, they are likely to select one of whom they think at least that he is a good man. The same observation holds of non-residence. Non-resi- 39* 462 RELIGIOUS ESTALISHMENTS. [eSSAY III. dence is not necessary to a state religion. By the system of voluntiry payment it is impassible. It has sometimes been said (with whatever truth) that ia times of public discontent these persons have been disposed to disaffection. If this be tru«, compulsory support is in this respect a political evil, inasmuch as it is the cause of the alien- ation of a part of the community. \¥e will not suppose so strong a case as that this alienation might lead to physical opposition; but supposing the dissatisfaction only to exist, affords no inconsiderable topic of the statesman's enquiry. Happiness is the object of civil government, and this object is frustrated in part in respect of those who think themselves aggrieved by its policy. And when it is considered how nu- merous the dissenters are, and that they increase in number, the political impropriety and impolicy of keeping them in a state of dissatisfaction becomes increased. The best security of a government is in the satisfaction and affection of the people ; which satisfaction is always diminished, and which affection is always endangered, in re- spect of those who, disapproving a certain church, are com- pelled to pay to its support. This is a consequence of a " legal provision" that demands much attention from the legis- lator. Every legislator knows that it is an evil. It is a point that no man disputes, and that every man knows should be prevented, unless its cause effects a counterbalance of ad- vantages. Lastly, Upon the question of the comparative advantages of a legal provision, and a voluntary remuneration in securing the due discharge of the ministerial function, what is the evi- dence of facts 1 Are the ministers of established, or of un- established churches, the more zealous, the more exemplary, the more laborious, the more devoted ? Whether of the two are the more beloved by their hearers ? Whether of the two lead the more exemplary and religious lives ? Whether of the two are the more active in works of philanthropy ? It is a question of facts, and facts are before the world. The discussions of the present chapter conduct the mind of the writer to these short conclusions : That of the two grounds upon which the propriety of Re- ligious Establishments is capable of examination, neither af- fords evidence in their favour: That Religious Establishments derive no countenance from the nature of Christianity, or from the example of the primitive churches ; and, That they aro not recommended hy practical Utility. CflAP. XvJ RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMEXTS, ETC 46^ CHAPTER XV, THE RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND. The English Chnrch the offspring of the Reformation, the Church estab- lishment, of Papacy — Alliance of Church and State — " The Priesthood averse from Reformation " — Noble Ecclesiastics — Purchase of Advow- sons — Non-residence — Pluralities — Parliamentary Returns — The Cler- 'gy fear to preach the truth — Moral Preaching — Recoil from Works of Philanthropy— Tithes— " The Church is in Danger"— The Church establishment is in daager — Monitory Suggestion. THE ENGLISH ESTABLISHMENT IS OF PAPAL ORIGIN. If the sou's Plea. 40 470 REMGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [esSAY III till the renovation of all things."* Why " church governors" and " ministers of state" should be so peculiarly backward to improve, is easily known. Ministers of state are more anx- ious for the consolidation of their power than for the amend- ment of churches ; and church governors are more anxious to benefit themselves by consolidating that power, than to reform the system of which they are the heads. But let no man anticipate that we shall indeed remain as we are till the renovation of all things. The work will be done though these may refuse to do it. " If," says a statesman, " the friends of the church, instead of taking the lead in a mild reform of abuses, contend obstinately for their protection, and treat every man as an enemy who aims at reform, they will cer- tainly be overpowered at last, and the correction applied by those who will apply it with no sparing hand.^'j If these de- clarations be true (and who will even question their truth ?) we may be allowed, without any pretentions to extraordinary sagacity, to add another : that to these unsparing correctors the work will assuredly be assigned. How infatuated, then, the policy of refusing reformation even if policy only were concerned ! The next point in which the effect of the state alliance is injurious to the church itself, is by its effects upon the ministry. It is manifest that where there are such powerful motives of interest to assume the ministerial office, and where there are such facilities for the admission of unfit men — unfit men will often be admitted. Human nature is very stationary ; and kindred results arose very many centuries ago. " The attainments of the clergy in the first ages of the Anglo-Saxon church were very considerable. But a great and total degen- eracy took place during the latter years of the Heptarchy, and for two generations after the union of its kingdoms." And why ? Because " mere worldly views operated upon a great proportion of them ; no other way of life offered so fair a prospect of power to the ambitious, of security to the pru- dent, of tranquillity and ease to the easy-minded. "j: — Such views still operate, and they still produce kindred effects. It is manifest, that if men undertake the office of Christian * A Defence of the Considerations on the propriety of requiring a sub- scription to Articles of Faith. By Dr. Paley : p. 35. t Letters on the subject of the British and Foreign Bible Society, by the present Lord Bexley. t Southey : Book of the Church, c. 6. CHAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 471 teachers not from earnestness in the cause, but from the desire of profit or power or ease, the office will frequently be ill dis- charged. Persons who possess little of the Christian minis- ter but the name, will undertake to guide the flock ; and hence it is inevitable that the ministry, as a body, will become re- duced in the scale of religious excellence. So habitual is the system of undertaking the office ybr the sake of its emolu- ments, that men have begun to avow the motive and to defend it, " It is no reproach to the church to say that it is supplied with ministers by the emoluments it affords."* Would it not have been a reproach to the first Christian churches, or could it have been said of them at all ? Does he who enters the church for the sake of its advantages, enter it " of a ready mind?" — But the more lucrative ofiices of the church are talked of with much familiarity as " prizes," much in the same manner as we talk of prizes in a lottery. " The same fund produces more effect — when distributed into prizes of different value than when divided into equal shares."! This " effect" is described as being " both an allurement to men of talents to enter into the church, and as a stimulus to the in- dustry of those who are already in it." But every man knows that talent and industry are not the only nor the chief things which obtain for a person the prizes of the church. There is more of accuracy in the parallel passage of another moral- ist. " The medical profession does not possess so many splendid prizes as the church and the bar, and on that account^ perhaps, is rarely, if ever, pursued by young men of noble families."! Here is the point : it is rather to noble families than to talent and industry, that the prizes are awarj^ed. There are, indeed, rich preferments, but these, it is observed, do not usually fall to merit as the reward of it, but are lavished where interest and family connexion put in their irresistible claim."^ That plain-speaking man Bishop Warburton writes to his friend Hurd, " Reckon upon it, that Durham goes to some nohle ecclesiastic. 'Tis a morsel only for them."H It is manifest that when this language can be appropriate, the office of the ministry must be dishonoured and abused. Re- specting the priesthood, it is acknowledged that " the charac- ters of men are formed much more by the temptations than the duties of their profession."^ Since then the temptations are worldly, what is to be expected but that the character should be worldly too 1 — Nor would any thing be gained by » Knox's Essays, No. 18. t Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 10. X Gisborae's Duties of Men. § Knox's Essays, No. 53. I) Warburton's Letters to Hurd, No. 47. T Mor. and Pol. Phil. p. 266. 472 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [eSSAY III. the, dexterous distinction that I have somewhere met with, that although the motive for " taking the oversight of the flock" be indeed " lucre," yet it does not come under the apos- tolical definition of " filthy." Of the eventual consequences of thus introducing unquali- fied, and perhaps irreligious, nobles into the gOA^ernment of the church, Bishop Warburton speaks in strong language. " Our grandees have at last found their way back into the church. I only wonder they have been so long about it. But be assured that nothing but a new religious revolution, to sweep away the fragments that Harry the VIII . left after banqueting his courtiers, will drive them out again."* When that revolution shall come which will sweep away these prizes, it will prove not only to these but to other things to be a besom of destruction. If the fountain be bitter, the current cannot be sweet. The principles which too commonly operate upon the digni- taries of the church, descend, in some degree, to the inferior ranks. I say in some degree ; for I do not believe that the degree is the same or so great. Nor is it to be expected. The temptation which forms the character, is diminished in its power, and the character therefore may rise. I believe that (reverently be it spoken) through the goodness of God, there has been produced since the age of Hartley, a considerable improvement in the general character (at least oif the inferior orders) of the English clergy. In observing the character which he exhibited, let it be remembered that that character was the legitimate ofTspring of the state re- ligion. The subsequent amendment is the offspring of another, and a very different, and a purer parentage. " The superior clergy are in general ambitious, and eager in the pursuit of riches ; flatterers of the great, and subservient to party interest ; neg- ligent of their own immediate charges, and also of the in- ferior clergy and their immediate charges. The inferior clergy imitate their superiors, and, in general, take little more care of their parishes than barely what is necessary to avoid the censures of the law. — I say this is the general case ; that is, far the greater part of the clergy of all ranks in this king- dom are of this kind."t — These miserable eflects upon the character of the clergy are the effects of a Religious Estab- lishment. If any man is unwilling to admit the truth, let him adduce the instance of an unestablished church, in the past eighteen hundred years, in which such a state of things has * Warburton's Letters to Hurd, No. 47. t Hartley : Observations on man. CHAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 47^ existed. Of the times of Gregory Nazianzen, Bishop Burnet says — " The best men of that age, instead of pressing into orders or aspiring to them, fled from them, excused themselves, and judging themselves unworthy of so holy a character and so high a trust, were not without difficulty prevailed upon to submit to that which, in degenerate ages, men rUn to as a sub- sistence or the means of procuring it,"* It might almost be imagined that the right of private pat- ronage was allowed for the express purpose of deteriorating the character of the ministers of religion — ^because it can hardly be supposed that any church would allow such a sys- tem without a perfect consciousness of its effects. To allow any man or woman, good or bad, who has money to spend, to purchase the power of assigning a Christian minister to a Christian flock, is one of those desperate follies and enormi- ties which should never be spoken of but in the language of detestation and horror.f A man buys an advowson as he buys an estate, and for the same motives. He cares perhaps nothing for the religious consequences of his purchase, or for the religious assuidity of the person to whom he presents it. Nay, the case is worse than that of buying as you buy an es- tate ; for land will not repay the occupier unless he cultivates it — but the living is just as profitable whether he exerts him- self zealously or not. He who is unfit for the estate by want of industry or of talent, is nevertheless fit for the living! These are dreadful and detestable abuses. Christianity is not to be brought into juxtaposition with such things. It were almost a shame to allow a comparison. " Who is not aware that, in consequence of the prevalence of such a sys- tem, the holy things of God are often miserably profaned ?"| — " It is our firm persuasion, that the present system of bestowing church patronage is hastening the decay of morals, the pro- gress of insubordination, and the downfall of the establishment itself." Morality and subordination have happily other sup- ports: — the fate of the establishment is sealed. I say sealed. It cannot perpetually stand without thorough reformation ; and it cannot, be reformed while it remains an establishment. * Disc, of the Pastoral Care, 12th ed. p. 77. " Under Lanfranc's primacy no promotion in the church was to be obtained by purchase, nei- ther was any unfit person raised to the episcopal rank."* t Upon such persons " rests the awful responsibility (I might almost call it the divine prerogative) of assigning a flock to the shepherd, and of selecting a shepherd for the flock." Gurney's Peculiarities, 3d. ed. p. 164. X Christian Observer, v. 20, p. 1 1. • Southey : Book of the Church, chap. 7. 40* 474 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [eSSAY III. Another mode in which the state religion of England is inju- rious to the character of its ministers, is by its allowance and prac- tical encouragement of non-residence and pluralities. These are the natural effects of the principles of the system. It is very possible that there should be a state religion without them ; but if the alliance with the state is close — if a princi- pal motive in the dispensation of benefices is the promotion of political purposes — if the prizes of the church are given where interest and family connexions put in their claim — ^it becomes extremely natural that several preferments should be bestowed upon one person. And when once this is counte- nanced or done by the state itself, inferior patrons will as nat- urally follow the example. The prelate who receives from the state three or four preferments, naturally gives to his son or his nephew three or four if he can. Pluralities and non-residence, whatever may be said in their favour by politicians or divines, will always shock the common sense and the virtue of mankind. Unhappily, they are evils which seem to have increased. " Theodore, the seventh archbishop of Canterbury, restricted the bishops and secular clergy to their own dioceses ;" and no longer ago than the reign of James I., " when pluralities were allowed, which was to be as seldom as possible, the livings were to be near each other."* But now we hear of one dignitary who possesses ten different preferments, and of another vAio, with an annual ecclesiastical revenue of fifteen thousand pounds, did not see his diocese for many year-« together. f And as to that proximity of livings which was directed in James's time, they are now held in plurality not only at a distance from each other, but so as that the duties cannot be performed by one person.^ Of the moral character of this deplorable custom, it is not necessary that we should speak. " I do not enter," says an eminent prelate, " into the scandalous practices of non-resi- dence and pluralities. This is so shameful a profanation of holy things, that it ought to be treated with detestation and horror."§ Another friend of the church says, " He who grasps at the revenue of a benefice, and studies to evade the * Soathey : Book of the Church, c. 6. t For these examples see Simpson's Plea. I say nothing of present examples. t Here it may be observed how imperfect is the argument (see Paley,) that a religious establishment does good by keeping an enlightened man in each parish. Mem. in the MS. ^ Burnet : Hist. Own Times, v. 2, p. 646. CHAP. X^.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 475 personal discharge of the various functions which that reve- nue is intended to reward, and the performance of those mo- mentous duties to God and man, which, by accepting the living, he has undertaken, evinces either a most reprehensi- ble neglect of proper consideration, or a callous depravity of . heart."* It may be believed that all are- not thus depraved who accept pluralities without residence. Custom, although it does not alter the nature of actions, affects the character of the agent ; and although I hold no man innocent in the sight of God who supports, in his example, this vicious practice, yel some may do it now with a less measure of guilt than that which would have attached to him who first, for the sake of money, introduced the scandal into the church. The public has now the means of knowing, by the returns to Parliament, the extent in which these scandalous customs exist — an extent which, when it was first communicated to the Earl of Harrowby, " struck me." says he, " with sur- prise, I could almost say with horror." Alas, when temporal peers are horror-struck by the scandals that are tolerated and practised by their spiritual teachers ! By one of these returns it appears that the whole number of places! is ten thousand two hundred and sixty-one. Of the possessors of these livings, more than one half were non- resident. The number of residents was only four thousand four hundred and twenty-one. — But the reader will perhaps say. What matters the residence of him who receives the mo- ney, so that a curate resides 1 Unfortunately, the proportion of absentee curates is still greater than that of incumbents. Out of three thousand six hundred and ninety four who are em- ployed, only one thousand five hundred and eighty-seven live in the parishes they serve ; so that two thousand one hundred and seven parishes are left without even the residence of a curate. Besides this, there are nine hundred and seventy in- cumbents who neither live in their parishes themselves nor employ any curate at all ! What is the result ? That above one half of those who receive the stipends of the charch, live away from their flocks ; and that there are in this country three thousand and seventy-seven flocks amongst whom no shepherd is to be found ! — When it is considered that all this is a gratuitous addition to the necessary evils of state re- * Gisborne : Duties of Men. t The diocese of St. David's is not included, and the return Includes some dignities, sinecures, and dilapidated churches. It cites that of 1810. I do not know but the details are substantially the same at the present time. 4t6 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [eSSAY IU. ligions, that there may be established churches without it, it speaks aloud of those mischiefs of our establishments which are peculiarly its own. One other consideration upon this subject remains. An in- ternal discipline in a church, both over its ministers and its members, appears essential to the proper exercise of Christian duty. From what cause does it happen that there is little ex- ercise of discipline, or none, in the church of England ? The reader will perhaps answer the question to himself: "The exercise of efficient discipline in the church is impossible ;" and he would answer truly. It is impossible. Who shall exercise it ? The first Lord of the Treasury ? He will not, and he cannot. The Bench of Bishops ? Alas ! there is the origin of a great portion of the delinquency. If they were to establish a discipline, the first persons upon whom they must exercise it would be themselves. Who ever heard of per- sons, so situated, instituting or re-establishing a discipline in the church? Who then shall exercise it? The subordinate clergy ? If they have the will, they have not the power ; and if they had the power, who can hope that they would use it ? Who can hope that, whilst above half of these clergy are non- residents, they will erect a discipline by which residence shall be enforced ? — I say, discipline, efficient discipline is impossible ; and I submit it to the reader whether any Estab- lishment in which Christian Discipline is impossible, is not esi^entially bad. From the contemplation of these effects of the English es- tablishment upon its formularies, its ministers, and its disci- pline, we must turn to its effects generally upon the religious welfare of the people. This welfare is so involved with the general character of the establishment and its ministers, that to exhibit an evil in one is to illustrate an injury to the other. If the operation of the state religion prevents ministers from inculcating some portions of divine truth, its operation must indeed be bad. And how stands the fact ? " Aspiring clergymen, wishing to avoid every doctrine which would retard their advancement, were very little inclined to preach the reality or necessity of divine influence."* The evil which this indicates is twofold : first, the vicious state of the heado of the church ; for why else should " advancement" be refuse i to those who preached the doc- trine of the gospel ; — and next, the injury to religion ; for reli- gion must needs be injured if a portion of its truths are concealed. * Vicessimus Knox : Christian philosophy, 3d edition, p 24. CHAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IllELAND. 477 Another quotation gives a similar account : " Regular divines of great virtue, learning and apparent piety, feared to preach the Holy Ghost and his operations, the main doctrines of the Gospel, lest they should countenance the puritan, the quaker, or the methodist, and lose the esteem of their own order or of the higher powers."* Did Paul or Barnabas ever " fear to preach the main doctrines of the gospel " from considerations like these, or from any considerations whatever 1 Did our Lord approve or tolerate such fear when he threatened with punishment any man who should take away from the words of his book ? But why again should the clerical order or the higher powers disesteem the man who preached the main doctrines of the gospel, unless it were from motives of interest founded in the establishment 1 And thus it is, that they who are assumed to be the reli- gious leaders of the people, who ought, so far as is in their power, to guide the people into all truth, conceal a portion of that truth from motives of interest ! If this concealment is practised by men of great virtue, learning, and apparent piety, what are we to expect in the indifferent or the bad ! We are to expect that not one but many doctrines of the gospel will be concealed. We are to expect that discourses not very differ- ent from those which Socrates might have delivered will be dispensed, instead of the whole counsel of God. What has been the fact ? Of " moral preaching," Bishop Lavington says, " We have long been attempting the reformation of the nation by discourses of this kind. With what success ? None at all. On the contrary, we have dexterously preached the people into downright infidelity.^'' Will any man affirm that this has not been the consequence of the state religion ? Will any man, knowing this, affirm that a state religion is right or useful to Christianity ? But as to the tendency of the system to diffuse infidelity, we are not possessed of the testimony of Bishop Lavington alone. " It is evident that the worldly-mindedness and neglect of duty in the clergy, is a great scandal to religion, and cause of infidelity."! Again : " Who is to blame for the spread of infidelity ? The bishops and clergy of the land more than any other people in it. We, as a body of men, are almost solely and exclusively culpable. "J Ostervald, in his " Trea- tise concerning the Causes of the present Corruption of Chris- tians," makes the same remark of the clergy of other churches ; — " The cause of the corruption of Christians is chiefly to be * Vicessimus Knox: Christian Philosophy, 3d edition, p. 23. t Hartley : Observations on Man. X Simpson's Plea, 3d edit. p. 76. 478 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [esSAY HI. found in the clergy." Now, supposing this to be the language of exaggeration — supposing that they corrupt Christians only as much as men who make no peculiar pretensions to religion - — how can such a fact be accounted for, but by the conclu- sion that there is something corrupting in the clerical system ? The refusal to amend the constitution or formularies of the church, is another powerful cause of injury to religion. Of one particular article — the Athanasian creed — a friend of the church, and one who mixed with the world, says, " I really believe that creed has made more deists than all the writings of all the oppugners of Christianity, since it was first unfor- tunately adopted in our liturgy."* Would this deist-making document have been retained till now if the church were not allied to the state ? — Bishop Watson uses language so unspa- ring, that just and true as it is, I know not whether I would cite it from any other pen than a bishop's : "A motley mon- ster of bigotry and superstition — a scarecrow of shreds and patches, dressed up of old by philosophers and popes to amuse the speculative, and to affright the ignorant." Do I quote this because it is the unsparing language of truth ? No ; but because of that which succeeds it : " Now,''^ says the bishop, " a butt of scorn, against which every unfledged witling of the age essays his wanton efforts, and, before he has learned his catechism, is fixed an infidel for life ! This I am persuaded is too frequently the case, for I had too frequent opportunities to observe it."t If, by the church as it subsists, many are fixed infidels for life, how diffusively must be spread that mi- nor, but yet practical disrespect for religion, which, though it amounts not to infidelity, makes religion an unoperative thing — unoperative upon the conduct and the heart — unoperative in animating the love and hope of the Christian — unoperative in supporting under afiiiction, and in smoothing and brightening the pathway to the grave ! To these minor consequences also we have unambiguous testimony : " Where there is not this open and shameless dis- avowal of religion, few traces of it are to be found. Improving in every other branch of knowledge, we have become less and less acquainted with Christianity. "| — Two-thirds of the lower order of people in London," says Sir Thomas Bernard, " live as utterly ignorant of the doctrines and duties of Chris- tianity, and are as errant and unconverted pagans, as if they had existed in the wildest part of Africa." — " The case," con- * Observations on the Liturgy, by an Under Secretary of State, t Misc. Tracts by Watson, Bishop of LandafF, v. 2, p. 49. t Wilberforce : Practical View, 6th edit. p. 389. CHAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 479 tinues the Quarterly Review, "is the same in Manchester, Leeds, Bristol, Sheffield, and in all our large towns. The greatest part of the manufacturing populace, of the miners, and colliers, are in the same condition ; and if they are not universally so, it is more owing to the zeal of the methodista than to any other cause."* How is it accounted for, that in a country in which a teacher is appointed to diffuse Christianity in every parish, a considerable part of the population are con- fessed to be absolute pagans? How, especially is it accounted for, that the few who are reclaimed from paganism, are re- claimed, not by the established, but by an unestablished church ? It is not difficult to account for all this, if the con- dition of the established church is such as to make what fol- lows the flippant language of a clergyman who afterwards was a bishop : "The person I engaged in the summer," as a curate, " is run away ; as you will think natural enough, when I tell you he was let out of jail to be promoted to this service."t The in effect of non-residence upon the general interests of religion is necessarily great. A conscientious clergyman finds that the offices of his pulpit are not the half of his busi- ness : he finds that he can often do more in promoting the re- ligious welfare of his parishioners out of his pulpit than in it. It is out of his pulpit that he evinces and exercises the most unequivocal affection for his charge ; that he encourages or warns as individuals have need ; that he animates by the presence of his constant example ; that he consoles them in their troubles ; that he adjusts their disagreements ; that he assists them by his advice. It is by living amongst them, and by that alone, that he can be " instant in season, and out of season," or that he can fulfil the duties which his station in- volves. How prodigious, then, must be the sum of mischief which the non-residence of three thousand clergymen inflicts upon religion! How yet more prodigious must be the sum of mischief which results from that negligence of duty of which non-residence is but one effect ! Yet all this is occa- sioned by our religious estabUshment. "The total absence of non-residence and pluralities in the Church of Scotland, and the annual examination of all the inhabitants of the parish by its minister, are circumstances highly advantageous to re- ligion r\ The minister in the English church is under peculiar dis- advantages in enforcing the truths or the duties of religion * Quarterly Review, April 1816, p. 233. t Letters between Bishop Warburton and Bishop Hurd. \ Gisborne : Duties of Men. 480 RELIOIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [essAY III. upon irreligious or sceptical men. Many of the topics which such men urge are directed, not against Christianity, but against that exhibition of Christianity which is afforded by the church. It has been seen that this is the cause of infidelity. How then shall the established clergyman efficiently defend our religion ? He may indeed confine himself to the vindication of Chris- tianity without reference to a church ; but then he does not defend that exhibition of Christianity which his own church affords. The sceptic presses him with those things which it is confessed are wrong. He must either defend them, or give them up as indefensible. If he defends them, he confirms the sceptic in his unbelief ; if he gives them up, he declares not only that the church is in the wrong, but that himself is in the wrong too ; and in either case, his fitness for an advocate of our religion is impaired. Hitherto, I have enforced the observations of this chapter by the authority of others. Now, I have to appeal for con- firmation to the experience of the reader himself. That pe- culiar mode of injury to the cause of virtue, of which I speak has received its most extensive illustrations during the pres- ent century ; and it has hitherto, perhaps, been the subject, rather of private remark than of public disquisition. I refer to a sort of instinctive recoil from new measures that are de- signed to promote the intellectual, the moral, or the religious improv^ement of the public. I appeal to the experience of those philanthropic men who spend their time either in their own j.eighbourhoods, or in " going about doing good," whether they lo not meet with a greater degree of this recoil from work 5 of philanthropy, amongst the teachers and members of the state religion than amongst other men — and whether this recoil is not the strongest amongst that portion who are re- puted to be the most zealous friends of the church. Has not this been your experience with respect to the Slave Trade and to Slavery — with respect to the education of the people — with respect to scientific or literary institutions for the la- bouring ranks — with respect to sending preachers to pagan countries — with respect to the Bible Society ? Is it not famil- iar to you to be in doubt and apprehension respecting the as- sistance of these members of the establishment, when you have no fear and no doubt of the assistance of other Christians ? Do you not call upon others, and invite their co-operation with confidence ? Do you not call upon these with distrust, and is not that distrust the result of your previous experience ? Take, for example, that very simple institution, the Bible Society — simple, because its only object is, to distribute the CHAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 481 authorized records of the dispensations of God. It is an in- stitution upon which it may be almost said, that but one opinion is entertained — that of its great utility : but one desire is felt — that of co-operation, except by the members of established churches. From this institution the most zealous advocates of the English church stand aloof. Whilst Christians of other names are friendly almost to a man, the proportion is very large of those churchmen who show no friendliness. It were to no purpose to say that they have claims peculiarly upon themselves, for so have other Christians — claims which gen- erally are complied with to a greater extent. Besides, it is obvious that these claims are not the grounds of the conduct that we deplore. If they were, we should still possess the cordial approbation of these persons — ^their personal, if not their pecuniary support. From such persons silence and ab- sence are positive discouragement. How then are we to ac- count for the phenomenon 1 By the opera'tion of a state re- ligion. For when our philanthropist applies to the members of another church, their only question perhaps is. Will the projected institution be useful to mankind ? But when he ap- plies to such a member of the state religion, he considers, How will it affect the establishment ? — Will it increase the influence of dissenters ? — May it not endanger the immunities of the church 1 — Is it countenanced by our superiors ? — Is it agreeable to the administration 1 And when all these consid- erations have been pursued, he very commonly finds some- thing that persuades him that it is most "prudent" not to encourage the proposition. It should be remarked too, as an additional indication of the cause of this recoil from works of goodness, that where the genius of the state religion is most influential, there is commonly the greatest backwardness in works of mental and religious philanthropy. The places of peculiar frigidity are the places in which there are the great- est number of the dignitaries of the church. Thus it is that the melioration of mankind is continually and greatly impeded, by the workings of an institution of whiah the express design is to extend the influence of religion and morality. Greatly impeded : for England is one of the prin- cipal sources of the current of human improvement, and in England the influence of this institution is great. These are fruits which are not borne by good and healthy trees. How can the tree be good of which these are the fruits ? Are these fruits the result of episcopacy 1 No, but of episcopacy wedded to the state. Were this union dissolved, (and the parties are not of that number whom God hath joined,) not only would 41 482 RELIOIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [ESSAY III. human reformation go forward with an accelerated pace, but episcopalianism itself would in some degree arise, and shake herself as from the dust of the earth. She would find thai her political alliance has bound around her glittering but yel enslaving chains — chains which, hugged and cherished as they are, have ever fixed her, and ever will fix her, to the earth, and make her earthly. The mode in which the legal provision for the ministry is made in this country, contains, like many other parts of the institution, evils superadded to those which are necessarily incidental to a state religion. If there be any one thing which, more than another, ought to prevail between a Christian min- ister and those whom he teaches, it is harmony and kindli- ness of feeling: and this kindliness and harmony is peculiarly diminished by the system of Tithes. There is no circum- stance which so often " disturbs the harmony that should ever subsist between a clergyman and his parishioners as conten- tions respecung tithes."* Vicessimus Knox goes further: *' One great cause of the clergy's losing their influence is, that the laity in this age of scepticism grudge them their tithes. The decay of religion and the contempt of the clergy arise in a great measure from this source."! What advantages can compensate for the contempt of Christian ministers and the decay of religion ? Or who does not perceive that a legal provision might be made which would be productive, so far as the new system of itself was concerned, of fewer evils ? — Of the political ill consequences of the tithe system I say no- thing here. If they were much less than they are, or if they did not exist at all, there is sufficient evidence against the system in its moral effects. It is well known, and the fact is very creditable, that the clergy exact tithes with much less rigour, and consequently occasion far fewer heartburnings, than lay claimants. The ■want of cordiality often results, too, from the cupidity of the payers, who invent vexatious excuses to avoid payment of the whole claim, and are on the alert to take disreputable ad- vantages. But to the conclusions of the Christain moralist it matters lit- tle by what agency a bad system operates. The principal point of his attention is the system itself. If it be bad, it will be sure to find agents by whom its pernicious principles will be elicited and brought into practical operation. It is therefore no extenu- ation of the system, that the clergy frequently do not disagree ■with their parishioners : -whilst it is a part of the system that * Gisbome : Duties of Men. t Essays, No. 10. CHAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 483 Tithes are sold, and sold to him, of whatever character, who will give most for them — he will endeavour to make the most of them again. So that the evils which result from the Tithe system, although they are not chargeable upon religious estab- lishments, are chargeable upon our own, and are an evidence against it. The animosities which Tithe farmers occasion are attributable to the Tithe system. Ordinary men do not make nice discriminations. He who is angry with the Tithe farmer is angry with the rector, who puts the power of vexa- tion into his hands, and he who is out of temper with the teacher of religion loses some of his complacency in religion itself. You cannot then prevent the loss of harmony between the shepherd and his flock, the loss of his influence over their affections, the contempt of the clergy, and the decay of religion from Tithes. You must amend the civil institution, or you cannot prevent the religious mischief. Reviewing, then, the propositions and arguments which have been delivered in the present chapter — propositions which rest upon the authority of the parties concerned, what is the general conclusion ? If Religious Establishments are constitutionally injurious to Christianity, is not our establish- ment productive of superadded and accumulated injury ? Let not the writer of these pages be charged with enmity to religion because he thus speaks. Ah ! they are the best friends of the church who endeavour its amendment. I may- be one of those who, in the language of Lord Bexley, shall be regarded as an enemy, because, in the exhibition of its evils, I have used great plainness of speech. But I can- not help it. I have other motives than those which are affected by these censures of men ; and shall be content to bear my portion, if I can promote that purification of a Christian Church, of which none but the prejudiced or the interested deny the need. They who endeavour to conceal the need may be the advocates, but they are not the friends of the church. The wound of the daughter of my people may not be slightly healed. It is vain to cry Peace, Peace, when there is no peace. What then will the reader, who has noticed the testimonies which have been offered in this chapter, think of the propriety of such statements as these ? The " establishment is the firmest sup- port and noblest ornament of Christianity."* It "presents the best security under heaven for the preservation of the true * Dr Howley, Bishop of London : Charge, 1814, p 25. 484 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [eSSAY III. apostolical faith in this country." * " Manifold as are the blessings for which Englishmen are beholden to the in- stitutions of their country — there is no part of those institu- tions from which they derive more important advantages than from its church establishment." f Especially what will the reader think of the language of Hannah More 1 — Hannah More says of the established church, " Here Christianity presents herself neither dishonoured, degraded, nor disfig- ured ;" Bishop Watson says of its creed, that it is " a motley monster of bigotry and superstition." Hannah More says, *' Here Christianity is set before us in all her original purity ;" Archdeacon Blackburn says, that "the forms of the church, having been weighed in the balance of the sanctuary, are found greatly wanting." Hannah More says, " She has been completely rescued from that encumbering load under which she had so long groaned, and delivered from her heavy bond- age by the labours of our blessed reformers ;" \ Dr. Lovvth says, that the reformation from Popery " stopped in the mid- way." Hannah More says, " We here see Christianity in her whole consistent character — in all Her fair and just pro- portions — as she came from the hands of her divine author ;" Dr. Watson calls her creed " a scarecrow, dressed up of old by philosophers and Popes." To say that the language of this good woman is imprudent and improper, is to say very little. Yet I would say no more. Her own language is her severest censurer. When will it be sufficiently remembered that the evils of a system can neither be veiled nor defended by praise ? When will it be remembered that, if we " con- tend for abuses," the hour will arrive when " correction will be applied with no sparing hand ?" It has frequently been said, that the " church is in danger." What is meant by the church? Or what is it that is en- dangered ? Is it meant that the Episcopal form of church government is endangered — ^that some religious revolution is likely to take place, by which a Christian community shall be precluded from adopting that internal constitution which it thinks best? This surely cannot be feared. The day is gone by, in England at least, when the abolition of Prelacy could become a measure of state. One community has its conference, and another its annual assembly, and another its * On the Nature of Schism, by C. Daubeny, Archdeacon of Sarum, p. 153. t First words of Southey's Book of the Church. ; Moral Sketches, 3d edit. p. 90. CRAP. XV.] ENGLAND AND IRELAND. ,TH 485 independency, without any molestation. Who, then, would mo- lest the English Church because it prefers the government of bishops and deacons to any other ? Is it meant that the doctrines of the church are endangered, or that its liturgy will be prohib- ited ? Surely no. Whilst every other church is allowed to preach what doctrines it pleases, and to use what formularies it pleases, the liberty will not surely be denied to the Episcopal church. If the doctrines and government of that church be Christian and true, there is no reason to fear for their stability. Its members have superabundant ability to defend the truth. What then is it that is endangered. Of what are those who complain of danger afraid ? Is it meant that its civil immu- nities are endangered — that its revenues are endangered ? Is it meant that its members will hereafter have to support their ministers without assistance from other churches ? Is it feared that there will cease to be such things as rich dean- eries and bishopricks ? Is it feared that the members of other churches will become eligible to the legislature, and that the heads of this church will not be temporal peers 1 In brief, is it feared that this church will become merely one amongst the many, with no privileges but such as are common to good citizens and good Christians ? These surely are the things of which they are afraid. It is not for religious truth but for civil immunities : It is not for forms of church government, but for political pre-eminence : it is not for the church, but for the church establishment. Let a man, then, when he joins in the exclamation, The church is in danger ! present to his mind distinct ideas of his meaning and of the object of his fears. If his alarm and his sorrow are occasioned, not for religion, but for politics — not for the purity and useful- ness of the church, but for its immunities — not for the offices of its ministers, but for their splendours — ^let him be at peace. There is nothing in all this for which the Christian needs to be in sorrow or in fear. And why? Because all that constitutes a church, as a Christian community, may remain when these things are swept away. There may be prelates without nobility ; there may be deans and archdeacons without benefices and patron- age ; there may be pastors without a legal provision ; there may be a liturgy without a test. In the sense in which it is manifest that the phrase, " the church is in danger," is ordinarily to be understood — that is, " the establishment is in danger" — the fears are undoubtedly well founded : the danger is real and imminent. It may not be immediate perhaps : perhaps it may not be near at hand ; 41* 486 RfiLIGIOITS ESTABLISHMENTS OF [eSSAT III. but it is real, immiiient, inevitable. The establishment is in- deed in danger ; and I believe that no advocacy, however zealous, that no support, however determined, that no power, however great, will preserve it from destruxjtion. If the dec- larations which have been cited in this chapter be true — if the reasonings which have been offered in this and in the last be just, who is the man that, as a Christian, regrets its danger, or would delay its fall 1 He may wish to delay it as a politician ; he may regret it as an expectant of temporal advantages ; but, as a Christian, he will rejoice. Supposing the doctrines and government of the church to be sound, it is probable that its stability would be increased by what is called its destruction. It would then only be detached from that alliance with the state which encumbers it, and weighs it down, and despoils its beauty, and obscures its brightness. Contention for this alliance will eventually be found to illustrate the proposition, that a man's greatest ene- mies are those of his own household. He is the practical enemy of the church who endeavours the continuance of its connexion with the state : except indeed that the more zealous the endeavour, the more quickly, it is probable, the connexion will be dissolved ; and therefore, though such persons " mean not so, neither do their hearts think so," yet they may thus be the agents, in the hand of God, of hastening the day in which she shall be purified from every evil thing ; in which she shall arise and shine, because her light is come, and because the glory of the Lord is risen upon her. Let him, then, who can discriminate between the church and its alliances, consider these things. Let him purify and exalt his attachment. If his love to the church be the love of a Christian, let him avert his eye from every thing that is political ; let his hopes and fears be excited only by reli- gion ; and let his exertions be directed to that which alone ought to concern a Christian church, its purity and its useful- ness. In concluding a discussion, in which it has been needful to utter, with plainness, unwelcome truths, and to adduce testimo- nies which some readers may wish to be concealed, I am so- licitous to add the conviction, with respect to the ministers of the English Church, that there is happily a diminished ground of complaint and reprehension — the conviction that, whilst the liturgy is unamended and unrevised, the number of minis- ters is increased to whom temporal things are secondary mo- tives, and who endeavour to be faithful ministers of one cow- dBAP. XV.] EN^GLAND AND IRELAND. 487 mon Lord : the conviction too, with respect to other members of the church, that they are collectively advancing in the Christian path, and that there is an " evident extension of re- ligion within her borders." Many of these, both of the teach- ers and of the taught are persons with whom the writer of these pages makes no pretensions of Christian equality — yet even to these he would offer one monitory suggestion — They are critically situated with reference to the political alliance of the church. Let them beware that they mingle not, with their good works and faith unfeigned, any confederacy with that alliance, which will assuredly be laid in the dust. That confederacy has ever had one invariable effect — to dimin- ish the Christian brightness of those who are its partizans. It will have the same eflect upon them. If they are desirous of superadding to their Christianity the privileges and emolu- ments of a state religion — if they endeavour to retain in the. church the interests of both worlds — if, together with their desire to serve God with a pure heart, they still cling to the Efl iiages which this unholy alliance brings — and, contend- ing i'or the faith, contend also for the establishment — the ef- fect- will be bad as the endeavour will be vain ; bad, for it will obstruct their own progress and the progress of others in the Christian path ; and vain, for the fate of that establishment is sealed. In making these joyful acknowledgments of the increase of Christianity within the borders of the church, one truth, how- ever, must be added ; and it is a solemn truth — ^The increase is not attributable to the state religion, but has taken place notwithstanding it is a state religion. I appeal to the experi- ence of good men : has the amendment been the effect of the establishment as such ? Has the political connexion of the church occasioned the amendment or promoted it? Nay — Has the amendment been encouraged by those on whom the political connexion had the greatest influence ? No : the reader, if he be an observer of religious affairs, knows that the state alliance is so far from having effected a reformation, that it does not even regard the instruments of that reforma- tion with complacency. 488 LEGAL PROVISION f ESSAY III CHAPTER XVI. OF LEGAL PROVISION FOR CHRISTIAN TEACHERS— OF VOLUNTARY PAYMENT AND OF UNPAID MINISTRY. Compulsory payment-— America — Legal provision for one church unjust — Payment of Tithes by dissenters — Tithes a *' property of the church " — Voluntary payment — The system of remuneration — Qualifi- cations of a minister of the gospel — Unpaid ministry — Days of greater purity. If some of the observations of the present chapter are not accurately classed with political subjects, I have to offer the apology that the intimacy of their connexion with the precee- ding discussions, appears to afford a better reason for placing them here, than an adherence to system affords for placing them elsewhere. " The substance of method is often sacri- ficed to the exterior show of it." * LEGAL PROVISION. By one of those instances which happily are not unfrequent in the progress of human opinion from error to truth, the no- tion of a divine right on the part of any Christian teachers to a stated portion of the products of other men's labours, is now nearly given up.f There was a time when the advocate of the claim would have disdained to refer for its foundation to questions of expediency or the law of the land. And he probably as little thought that the divine right would ever have been given up by its advocates, as his successors now * Bishop Warburton. t Yet let it not be forgotten that it is upon this exploded notion of the divine right that the legal right is founded. The. law did not give Tithes to the clergy because the provision was expedient, but because it was their divine right. It is upon this assumption that the law is founded. See Statues at Large ; 29 Hen. VIII. c. 20. Mem. in the MS. " The whole weis received into a common fund, for the fourfold pur- pose of supporting the clergy, repairing the church, relieving the poor, and entertaining the pilgrim and the stranger." — " The payment of Tithes had at first been voluntary, though it was considered as a reli- gious obligation. King Ethelwolf, the father of Alfred, subjected the whole kingdom to it by a legislative act." Southey's book of the Church ; c. 6. Mem. in the MS. WicklifFe's followers asserted, " that Tithes were purely eleemosynary, and might be withheld by the people upon a delinquency in the pastor, and transferred to another at pleasure." Brodie's history of the British Empure. Introduction. Mem. in the MS. CHAP. XVI.] FOR CHRISTIAN TEACHERS. 489 think that they have fallacious grounds in reasoning upon pub- lic utility. Thus it is that the labours of our predecessors in the cause of Christian purity have taken a large portion of labour out of our hands. They carried the outworks of the citadel ; and whilst its defenders have retired to some inner strong- hold, it becomes the business of our day to essay the firmness of its walls. The writer of these pages may essay them in vain ; but he doubts not that before some power their defend- ers, as they have hitherto retired, will continue to retire, until the whole fortress is abandoned. Abandoned to the enemy ? Oh no. — He is the friend of a Christian community, who in- duces Christian principles into its practice. In considering the evidence which Christianity affords re- specting the lawfulness of making a legal provision for one Christian church, I would not refer to those passages of Scripture which appear to bear upon the question, whether Christian ministrations should be absolutely free : partly, be- cause I can add nothing to the often urged tendency of those passages, and partly, because they do not all concern the question of legal provision. The man who thinks Christian- ity requires that those who labour in the gospel should live of the gospel, does not therefore think that a legal pravision should be made for the ministers of one exclusive church. One thing seems perfectly clear — that to receive from their hearers and from those who heard them not, a compulsory payment for their preaching, is totally alien to all the prac- tices of the apostles, and to the whole tenor of the principles by which they were actuated. Their one single and simple motive in preaching Christianity, was to obey God, to da good to man ; nor do I believe that any man imagines it pos- sible that they would have accepted of a compulsory remune- ration from their own hearers, and especially from those who heard them not. We are therefore entitled to repeat the obser- vation, that this consideration affords evidence against the moral lawfulness of instituting such compulsory payment. Why would not, and could not, the apostles have accepted such payment, except for the reason that it ought not to be enforced ? No account, so far as I perceive, can be given of the matter, but that the system is contrary to the purity of Christian practice. An English prelate writes thus : " It is a question which might admit of serious discussion, whether the majority of the members of any civil community have a right to compel all the members of it to pay towards the maintenance of a set of teachers appointed by the majority to preach a particu-* 4d0 . tEGAL PROVISION [eSSAT 111. lar system of doctrines."* No discussion could be enter- tained respecting this right, except on the ground of its Chris- tian unlawfulness. A legislature has a right to impose a general tax to support a government, whether a minority ap- proves the tax or not ; and the bishop here rightly assumes that there is an antecedent question — whether it is morally lawful to oblige men to pay teachers whom they disapprove ? It is from the want of taking this question into the ac- count, that inquirers have involved themselves in fallacious reasonings. It is not a question of the right of taxation, but of the right of the magistrate to oblige men to violate their consciences. Of those who have regarded it simply as a question of taxation, and who therefore have proceeded upon fallacious grounds, the author of the " Duties of Men in So- ciety" is one. He says, " If a state thinks that national piety and virtue will be best promoted by consigning the whole sum raised by law to teachers of a particular descrip- tion — ^it has the same right to adopt this measure, as it would have to impose a general tax for the support of a board of physicians, should it deem that step conducive to national health." Far other — No man's Christian liberty is invaded, no man's conscience is violated, by paying a tax to a board of physicians ; but many a man's religious liberty may be in- vaded, and many a man's conscience may be violated, by pay- ing for the promulgation of doctrines which he thinks Chris- tianity condemns. Whither will the argument lead us ? If a Papal state thinks it will promote piety to demand contri- butions for the splendid celebration of an auto-da-fe, would Protestant citizens act rightly in contributing ? Or would the state act rightly in demanding the contribution ? Or has a Bramin state a right to impose a tax upon Christian residents to pay for the fagots of Hindoo immolations? The antece- dent question in all these cases is — Whether the immolation, and the auto-da-fe, and the system of doctrines, are consistent with Christianity ? If they are not, the citizen ought not to contribute to their practice or diffusion ; and by consequence, the state ought not to compel him to contribute. Now, for * See Quarterly Review, No. 58. " There was a party in the nation who conceived that every man should not only be allowed to choose his own religion, but contribute as he himself thoujs^ht proper towards the support of the pastor whose duties he exacted. The party however, does not appear to have been great. Yet let us not despise the opinion, but remember that it has been taken up by Dr. Adam Smith himself as a sound one, and been acted upon successfully in a vast empire, the United States of America." — Brodie's History of the British Empire, v. 4, p. 365. Mem. in the MS. CHAP. XVI.] FOR CHRISTIAN TEACHERS. 491 the purposes of the present argument, the consistency of any set of doctrines with Christianity cannot be proved. It is to no purpose for the Unitarian to say, Afy system is true ; nor for the Calvinist or Arminian or Episcopalian to say, My sys- tem is true. The Unitarian has no Christian right to compel me to pay him for preaching Unitarianism, nor has any reli- gious community a right to compel the members of another to pay him for promulgating his own opinions. If by any revolution in the religious affairs of this country, another sect was elevated to the pre-eminence, and its minis- ters supported by a legal provision, I believe that the minis- ters of the present church would think it an unreasonable and unchristian act to compel them to pay the preachers of the npw state religion. Would not a clergyman think himself aggrieved, if he were obliged to pay a Priestley, and to aid in disseminating the opinions of Priestley ? — That same griev- ance is now inflicted upon other men. The rule is disre- garded, to do as we would be done by. Let us turn to the example of America. In America the government does not oblige its citizens to pay for the support of preachers. Those who join themselves to any particular religious community commonly contribute towards the support of its teachers, but there is no law of the state which com- pels it. This is as it should be. The government which obliged its citizens to pay, even if it were left to the individual to say to what class of preachers his money should be given, would act upon unsound principles. It may be that the citi- zen does not approve of paying ministers at all ; or there may be no sect in a country with which he thinks it right to hold communion. How would the reader himself be situated in Spain perhaps, or in Turkey, or in Hindostan ? Would he think it right to be obliged to encourage Juggernaut, or Ma- homet, or the Pope ? But passing from this consideration : it is after all said, that in our own country the individual citizen does not pay the ministers of the state religion. I am glad that this seem- ing paradox is advanced, because it indicates that those who ad- vance it confess that to make them pay would be wrong. Why else should they deny it ? It is said, then, that persons who pay tithes do not pay the established clergy ; that tithes are property held as a person holds an estate ; that if tithes were taken off, rents would advance to the same amount ; that the buyer of an estate pays so much the less for it because it is subject to tithes — and therefore that neither owner nor occu- pier pays any thing. This is specious, but only specious. 492 LEGAL PROVISION [ESSAY HI. The landholder " pays" the clergyman just as he pays the tax-gatherer. If taxes were taken off, rents would advance just as much as if tithes were taken off; and a person may as well say that he does not pay taxes as that he does not pay tithes. — The simple fact is, that an order of cler- gy are, in this respect, in the same situation as the body of stockholders who live upon their dividends. They are supported by the country. The people pay the stockholder in the form of taxes, and the clergyman in the form of tithes. Suppose every clergyman in England were to leave the country to-morrow, and to cease to derive any income from it, it is manifest that the income which they now derive would be divided amongst those who remain — that is, that those who now pay would cease to pay. Rent, and Taxes, and Tithes, are in these respects upon one footing. Without now enquiring whether they are right, they are all payments — something by which a man does not receive the whole of the product of his labour. The argument, therefore, which affirms that dissenters from the state religion do not pay to that religion, appears to be wholly fallacious ; and being such, we are at liberty to assume, that to make them pay is indefensible and unchristian. For we repeat the observation, that he who is anxious to prove they do not pay, evinces his opinion that to compel them to pay would be wrong. There is some injustice in the legal provision for one church. The episcopalian, when he has paid his teacher, or rather when he has contributed that portion towards the maintenance of his teacher which by the present system be- comes his share, has no more to pay. The adherent to other churches has to pay his own preacher and his neigh- bour's. This does not appear to be just. The operation of a legal provision is, in effect, to impose a double tax upon one portion of the community without any fault on their part. Nor is it to any purpose to say, that the dissenter from the Episcopalian church imposes the tax on himself; so he does ; but it is just in the same sense as a man imposes a penalty upon himself when he conforms to some prohibited point of Christian duty. A papist, two or three centuries ago, might almost as well have said that a protestant imposed the stake on himself, because he might have avoided it if he chose. It is a voluntary tax in no other way than as all other taxes are voluntary. It is a tax imposed by the state as truly as . he window tax is imposed, because a man may, if he pleases, CHAP. XVI. J FOR CHRISTIAN TEACHERS. 493 live in darkness ; or as a capitation tax is imposed, because a man may, if he pleases, lose his head. But what is he who conscientiously disapproves of a state religion to do ? Is he, notwithstanding his judgment, to aid in supporting that religion, because the law requires it ? No : ibr then, as it respects him, the obligation of the law is taken away. He is not to do what he believes Christianity forbids, because the state commands it. If public practice be a cri- I'ferion for the public judgment, it may be concluded that the number of those who do thus believe respecting our state re- ligion, is very small ; for very few decline actively to support it. Yet when it is considered how numerous the dissenters from the English establishment are, and how emphatically some of them disapprove the forms or doctrines of that estab- lishment, it might be imagined that the number who decline thus to support it would, in consistency, be great. How are we to account for the fact as it is 1 Are we to suppose that the objections of these persons to the establishment are such as do not make it a case of conscience whether they shall sup- port it or not ? Or are we to conclude that they sacrifice their consciences to the terrors of a distraint ? If no case of conscience is involved, the dissenter, though he may think the state religion inexpedient, can hardly think it wrong. And if he do not think it wrong, why should he be so zealous in opposing it, or why should he expect the church to make con- cessions in his favour ? If, on the other hand, he sacrifices his conscience to his fears, it is obvious that, before he repre- hends the establishment, he should rectify himself. He should leave the mote, till he has taken out the beam. Perhaps there are some who, seriously disapproving of the state religion, suspect that in Christian integrity they ought not to pay to its support — and yet are not so fully convinced of this, or do not so fully act upon the conviction, as really to decline to pay. If they are convinced let them remember their responsibility, and not know their Master's will in vain. If these are not faithful, where shall fidelity be found ? How shall the Christian churches be purified from their de- filements, if those who see and deplore their defilements, contribute to their continuance ? Let them show that their principles are worthy a little sacrifice. Fidelity on their part, and a Christian submission to the consequences, might open the eyes and invigorate the religious principle of many more ; and at length the objection to comply with these unchristian demands might be so widely extended, that the legislature would be induced to withdraw its legal provisitwi ; and thus 43 494 LEGAL PROVISION [essaY III. one main constituent of an ecclesiastical system, which has grievously obstructed, and still grievously obstructs, the Chris- tian cause, might be taken away. As an objection to this fidelity of practice it has been said, that since a man rents or buys an estate for so much less be- cause it is subject to tithes, it is an act of dishonesty after- wards, to refuse to pay them. The answer is this — that no dishonesty can be committed whilst the law exacts payment by distraint ; and if the law were altered, there is no place for dishonesty. Besides, the desire of saving money does not enter into the refuser's motives. He does not decline to pay from motives of interest, but from motives of duty. It is, however, argued that the legislature has no right to take away tithes any more than it has a right to deprive citi- zens of their lands and houses ; and that a man's property in tithes is upon a footing with his property in an estate. Now we answer that this is not true in fact ; and that, if it were, it would not serve the argument. It is not true in fact, — If tithes were a property, just as an es- tate is a property, why do men complain of the scandal of plural- ities ? Who ever hears of the scandal of possessing three or four estates 1 Why, again, does the law punish simoniacal con- tracts ? Who ever hears of simoniacal contracts for lands and houses ? The truth is, that tithes are regarded as religious pro- perty. The property is legally recognised, not for the sake of the individual who ma-y possess it, but for the sake of religion. The law cares nothing for the men, except so far as they are ministers. Besides, tithes are a portion of the produce only of the land. The tithe-owner cannot walk over an estate, and say of every tenth acre this is mine. In truth he has not, except by consent of the landholder, any property in it at all ; for the landholder may, if he pleases, refuse to cultivate it — oc- casion it to produce nothing ; and then the tithe-owner has no interest or property in it whatever. And in what sense can that be said to be property, the possession of which is at the absolute discretion of another man 1 But grant, for a moment, that tithes are property. Is it af- firmed that whatever property a man possesses, cannot be taken from him by the legislature ? Suppose I go to Jamaica and purchase a slave, and bring him to England, has the law no right to take this property away 1 Assuredly it has the right, and it exercises it too. Now, so far as the argument is concerned, the cases of the slave-holder and of the tithe- owner are parallel. Compulsory maintenance of Christian ministers, and compulsory retention of men in bondage, are CHAP. XVI.] FOR CHRISTIAN TEACHERS. 495 hoth inconsistent with Christianity ; and as such, the property which consists in slaves and in tithes, may rightly be taken away — unless, indeed, any man will affirm that any property, however acquired, cannot lawfully be taken from the pos- sessor. But when we speak of taking away the property in tithes, we do not refer to the consideration that it has been under the sanction of the law itself that that property has been purchased or obtained. The law has, in reality, been accessory to the offence, and it would not be decent or right to take away the possession which has resulted from that of- fence without offering an equivalent. I would not advise a legislature to say to those persons who, under its own sanc- tion, have purchased slaves, to turn upon them and say, I am persuaded that slavery is immoral, and therefore I command you to set your slaves at liberty ; — and because you have no moral right to hold them, I shall not grant you a compensa- tion. Nor, for the same reasons, would I advise a legislature to say so to the possessor of tithes. But what sort of a compensation is to be offered 1 Not surely an amount equivalent to the principal money, compu- ting tithes as interest. The compensation is for life interest only. The legislature would have to buy off, not a freehold but an annuity. The tithe-owner is not like the slaveholder, who can bequeath his property to another. When the pres- ent incumbent dies, the tithes, as property, cease to exist — until it is again appropriated to an incumbent by the patron of the living. This is true except in the instances of those deplorable practices, the purchase of advowsons, or of any other by which individuals or bodies acquire a pecuniary in- terest in the right of disposal. The notion that tithes are a " property of the church," is quite a fiction. In this sense, what is the church ? If no individual man has his property taken away by a legislative abolition of tithes, it is unmeaning to talk of " the church" having lost it. It is, perhaps, a vain thing to talk of how the legislature might do a thing which perhaps it may not resolve, for ages, to do at all. But if it were to take away the right to tithes as the present incumbents died, or as the interests of the pres- ent owners ceased, there would be no reason to complain of injustice, whatever there might be of procrastinating the ful- filment of a Christian duty. Whether a good man, knowing the inconsistency of forced maintenance with the Christian law, ought to accept a prof- fered equivalent for that maintenance, is another considera- 496 VOLUNTARY PAYMENT [eSSAY III. tion. If it is wrong to retain it, it is not obvious how it can be right, or how at least it can avoid the appearance of cv^il, to accept money for giving it up. It is upon these principles that the religious community who decline to pay tithes, de- cline also to receive them. By legacy or otherwise, the legal right is sometimes possessed by these persons, but their moral discipline requires alike a refusal to receive or to pay. VOLUNTARY PAYMENT.* That this system possesses many advantages over a legal provision we have already seen. But this does not imply that even voluntary payment is conformable with the dignity of the Christian ministry, with its usefulness, or witn the re- quisitions of the Christian law. And here I am disposed, in the outset, to acknowledge that the question of payment is involved in an antecedent question — the necessary qualifications of a Christian minister. If one of these necessary qualifications be, that he should devote his youth and early manhood to theological studies, or to studies or exercises of any kind, I do not perceive how the propriety of voluntary payment can be disputed ; for, when a man who might otherwise have fitted himself, in a counting-house or an office, for procuring his after-support, employs his time necessarily in qualifying himself for a Christian instructor, it is indispensable that he should be paid for his instructions. Or if, after he has assumed the ministerial function, it be hi& indispensable business to devote all or the greater portion of his time to studies or other preparations for the pulpit, the same necessity remains. He must be paid for his ministry, because, in order to be a minister, he is prevented from main- taining himself. But the necessary qualifications of a minister of the gospel cannot here be discussed. We pass on, therefore, with the simple expression of the sentiment, that how beneficial soever a theological education and theological enquiries may be in the exercise of the office, yet that they form no necessary qualifications ; — that men may be, and that some are, true and sound ministers of that gospel, without them. Now, in enquiring into the Christian character and tenden- cy of payment for preaching Christianity, one position will perhaps be recognized as universally true — that if the same ability and zeal in the exercise of the ministry could be at- * " Thou shall take no gift : for the gift blindeth the wise, and pervert- eth the words of the righteous." — Exod. xxiii. 8. Mem. in the MS. CHAP. XVlj AND UNPAID MINISTRY* 497 tained without payment as with it, the payment might reason- ably and rightly be forborne. Nor will it perhaps be disputed, that if Christian teachers of the present day were possessed of some good portion of the qualifications, and were actuated by the motives, of the first teachers of our religion, stated remuneration would not be needed. If love for mankind, and the " ability which God giveth," were strong enough to induce and to enable men to preach the gospel without pay- ment, the employment of money as a motive would be with- out use or propriety. Remuneration is a contrivance adapted to an imperfect state of the Christian church :— nothing but imperfection can make it needful ; and, when that imperfec- tion shall be removed, it will cease to be needful again. These considerations would lead us to expect, even ante- cedently to enquiry, that some ill effects are attendant upon the system of remuneration. Respecting these effects, one of the advocates of a legal provision holds language which, though it be much too strong, nevertheless contains much truth. " Upon the voluntary plan," says Dr. Paley, " preach- ing, in time, would become a mode of begging. With what sincerity or with what dignity can a preacher dispense the truths of Christianity, whose thoughts are perpetually soli- cited to the reflection how he may increase his subscription ? His eloquence, if he possess any, resembles rather the exhi- bition of a player who is computing the profits of his theatre, than the simplicity of a man who, feeling himself the awful expectations of religion, is seeking to bring others to such a sense and understanding of their duty as may save their souls. — He, not only whose success but whose subsistence depends upon collecting and pleasing a crowd, must resort to other arts than the acquirement and communication of sober and profitable instruction. For a preacher to be thus at the mercy of his audience, to be obliged to adapt his doctrines to the pleasure of a capricious multitude, to be continually af- fecting a style and maimer neither natural to him nor agree- able to his judgment, to live in constant bondage to tyrannical and insolent directors, are circumstances so mortifying not only to the pride of the human heart but to the virtuous love of independency, that they are rarely submitted to without a sacrifice of principle and a depravation of character ; — at least it may be pronounced, that a ministry so degraded would soon fall into the lowest hands ; for it would be found impos- sible to engage men of worth and ability in so precarious and humiliating a profession."* * Mor. and Pol. PhU. b. 6, c. 10. 42* 458 VdLFNfARY PAYMfiNl^ [eSSAY Itl. To much of this it is a sufficient answer, that the predic- tions are contradicted by the fact. Of those teachers who are supported by voluntary subscriptions, it is not true that their eloquence resembles the exhibition of a player who is computing the profits of his theatre ; for the fact is, that a very large proportion of them assiduously devote themselves from better motives to the religious benefit of their flocks : — it is not true that the office is rarely undertaken without what can be called a depravation of character ; for the character, both religious and moral, of those teachers who are volunta- rily paid, is at least as exemplary as that of those who are paid by provision of the state : — it is not true that the office falls into the lowest hands, andthat it is impossible to*engage men of worth and ability in the profession, because very many of such men are actually engaged in it. . But although the statements of the Archdeacon are not wholly true, they are true in part. Preaching will become a mode of begging. When a congregation wants a preacher, and we see a man get into the pulpit expressly and confess- edly to show how he can preach, in order that the hearers may consider how they like him, and when one object o'f his thus doing is confessedly to obtain an income, there is reason — not certainly for speaking of him as a beggar — but for be- lieving that the dignity and freedom of the gospel are sacri- ficed. — Thoughts perpetually solicited to the reflection how he may increase his subscription. Supposing this to be the lan- guage of exaggeration, supposing the increase of his subscrip- tion to be his subordinate concern, yet still it is his concern, and being his concern, it is his temptation. It is to be feared, that by the influence of this temptation his sincerity and his independence may be impaired, that the consideration of what his hearers wish rather than of what he thinks they need, may prompt him to sacrifice his conscience to his profit, and to add or to deduct something from the counsel of God. Such temptation necessarily exists ; and it were only to exhibit ignorance of the motives of human conduct to deny that it will sometimes prevail. — To live in constant bondage to inso- lent and tyrannical directors. It is not necessary to suppose that directors will be tyrannical or insolent, nor by conse- quence to suppose that the preacher is in a state of constant bondage. But if they be not tyrants and he a slave, they may be masters and he a servant ; a servant in a sense far different from that in which the Christian minister is required to be a servant of the Church — in a sense which implies an undue subserviency of his ministrations to the will of men, CHAP. XVI.] ANt> TJNPA D MINISTRY. 4^0 and which is inrompatihle with the obligation to have no mas- ter but Christ. Other modes of vohmtary payment may be and perhaps they are adopted, but the effect will not be essentially differ- ent. Subscriptions may be collected from a number of con- gregations and thrown into a common fund, which fund may be appropriated by a directory or conference : but the objec- tions still apply ; for he who wishes to obtain an income as a preacher, has then to try to propitiate the directory instead of a congregation, and the temptation to sacrifice his independ- ence and his conscience remains. • There is no way of obtaining emancipation from this sub- jection, no way of avoiding this temptation, but by a system in which the Christian ministry' is absolutely free. But the ill effects of thus paying preachers are not confined to those who preach. The habitual consciousness that the preacher is paid, and the notion which some men take no pains to separate from this consciousness, that he preaches because he is paid, have a powerful tendency to diminish the influence of his exhortations, and the general effect of his labours. The vulgarly irreligious think, or pretend to think, that it is a sufficient excuse for disregarding these labours to say. They are a matter of course — preachers must say some- thing, because it is their trade. And it is more than to be feared that notions, the same in kind however different in extent, operate upon a large proportion of the community. It is not probable that it should be otherwise ; and thus it is that a continual deduction is made by the hearer from the preach- er's disinterestedness or sincerity, and a continual deduction therefore from the effect of his labours. How seldom can such a pastor say, with full demonstration of sincerity, " I seek not yours, but you." The flock may indeed be, and happily it often is, his first and greatest motive to exertion ; but the demonstrative evidence that it is so, can only be afforded by those whose ministrations are absolutely free. The deduction which is thus made from the practical influence of the labours of stipended preachers, is the same in kind (though differing in amount) as that which is made from a pleader's addresses in court. He pleads because he is paid for pleading. Who does not perceive, that if an able man came forward and pleaded in a cause without a retainer, and simply from the desire that justice should be awarded, he would be listened to with much more of confidence, and that his arguments would have much more weight, than if the same words were uttered by a barrister who was fee'd? A 500 VOLUJrtARY PAYMENT [eSSAY III. similar deduction is made from the writings of paid ministers, especially if they advocate their own particular faith. " He is interested evidence," says the reader — he has got a retain- er, and of course argues for his client ; and thus arguments that may be invincible, and facts that may be incontrovertibly true, lose some portion of their effect, even upon virtuous men, and a large portion upon the bad, because the preacher is paid. If, as is sometimes the case, " the amount of the salary given is regulated very precisely by the frequency of the ministry required," — so that a hearer may possibly allow the reflection„The preacher will get half a guinea for the sermon he is going to preach — it is almost impossible that the dignity of the Christian ministry should not be reduced, as well as that the influence of his exhortations should not be dimin- ished. " It is however more desirable," says Milton, " for example to be, and for the preventing of offence or suspicion, as well as more noble and honourable in itself, and conducive to our more complete glorying in God, to render an unpaid service to the church, in this as well as in all other instances ; and, after the example of our Lord, to minister and serve gra- tuitously."* Some ministers expend, all the income which they derive from their office in acts of beneficence. To these we may safely appeal for confirmation of these remarks. Do you not find that the consciousness, in the minds of your hearers, that you gain nothing by your labour, greatly increases its influ- ence jipon them ? Do you not find that they listen to you with more confidence and regard, and more wiUingly admit the truths which you inculcate and conform to the advices which you impart ? If these things be so — and who will dis- pute it 1 — how great must be the aggregate obstruction which pecuniary remuneration opposes to the influence of religion in the world. But indeed it is not practicable to the writer to illustrate the whole of what he conceives to be the truth upon this sub- ject, without a brief advertence to the qualifications of the minister of the gospel : because, if his view of these qualifi- cations be just, the stipulation for such and such exercise of the ministry, and such and such payment is impossible. If it is " admitted that the ministry of the gospel is the work of the Lord, that it can be rightly exercised only in virtue of his appointment," and only when " a necessity is laid upon the minister to preach the gospel," — ^it is manifest, that he cannot * Chxistian Doctrine : p. 484. CHAP. XVI.] AND UNPAID MINISTRY. 501 engage beforehand to preach when others desire it. It is manifest, that " the compact which binds the minister to preach on the condition that his hearers shall pay him for his preach- ing, assumes the character of absolute inconsistency with the spirituality of the Christian religion."* "Freely ye have received, freely give." When we contem- plate a Christian minister who illustrates, both in his commis- sion and in his practice, this language of his Lord ; who teaches, advises, reproves, with the authority and affection of a commissioned teacher ; who fears not to displease his hear- ers, and desires not to receive their reward ; who is under no temptation to withhold, and does not withhold, any portion of that counsel which he thinks God designs for his church ; — when we contemplate such a man, we may feel somewhat of thankfulness and of joy ; — of thankfulness and joy that the Universal Parent thus enables his creatures to labour for the good of one another, in that same spirit in which he cares for them and blesses them himself. I censure not, either in word or in thought, him who, in sincerity of mind, accepts remuneration for his labours in the church. It may not be inconsistent with the dispensations of Providence, that in the present imperfect condition of the Christian family, imperfect principles respecting the ministry should be permitted to prevail : nor is it to be questioned that some of those who do receive remuneration, are fulfilling their proper allotments in the universal church. But this does not evince that we should not anticipate the arrival, and promote the extension, of a more perfect state. It does not evince that a higher allotment may not await their successors — that days of greater purity and brightness may not arrive ; — of purity, when every motive of the Christian minister shall be simply Christian ; and of brightness, when the light of truth * 1 would venture to suggest to some of those to whom these consider- ations are offered, whether the notion that a preacher is a sine qua non of the exercise of pubHc worship, is not taken up without sufficient con- sideration of the principles which it involves. If, " where two or three are gathered together in the name" of Christ, there He, the minister of the sanctuary, is "in the midst of them," it suiely cannot be necessary to the exercises of such worship, that another preacher should be there Surely, too, it derogates something from the excellence, something from the glory of the Christian dispensation, to assume that, if a' number of Christians should be so situated as to be without a preacher, there the public worship of God cannot be performed. This may often happen in remote places, in voyages or the like : and I have sometimes been im- pressed with the importance of these considerations when I have heard a person say, " is absent, and therefore there will be no divine service this morning." 602 PATRIOTISM. [essay III. shall be displayed with greater effulgence. When the Great Parent of all shall thus turn his favour towards his people ; when He shall supply them with teachers exclusively of his own appointment, it will be perceived that the ordinary present state of the Christian ministry is adapted only to the twilight of the Christian day; and some of those who now faithfully labour in this hour of twilight will be amongst the first to re- joice in the greater glory of the noon. CHAPTER XVII. PATRIOTISM. Patriotism as it is viewed by Christianity — A Patriotism which is opposed to general benignity — Patriotism not the soldier's motive. We are presented with a beautiful subject of contemplation, when we discover that the principles which Christianity ad- vances upon its own authority, are recommended and enforced by their practical adaptation to the condition and the wants of man. With such a subject I think we are presented in the case of Patriotism. " Christianity does not encourage particular patriotism in opposition to general benignity."* If it did, it would not be adapted for the world. The duties of the subject of one state would often be in opposition to those of the subject of another, and men might inflict evil or misery upon neighbour nations in conforming to the Christian law. Christianity is designed to benefit, not a community, but the world. The promotion of the interests of one community by injuring another — that is, " patriotism in opposition to general benignity," — it utterly rejects as wrong ; and in doing this, it does that which in a system of such wisdom and benevolence we should expect. — " The love of our country," says Adam Smith, " seems not to be derived from the love of mankind."! I do not mean to say that the word patriotism is to be found in the New Testament, or that it contains any disquisitions respecting the proper extent of the love of our country — but I say that the universality of benevolence which Christianity * Bishop Watson. t Theo. Mor. Sent. The limitation with which this opinion should be regaiued, we shall presently propose. CHAP. XVII.] PATRIOTISM. 503 inculcates, both in its essential character and in its precepts, is incompatible with that patriotism which would benefit our own community at the expense of general benevolence. Pa- triotism, as it is often advocated, is a low and selfish principle, a principle wholly unworthy of that enlightened and expanded philanthropy which religion proposes. Nevertheless Christianity appears not to encourage the doc- trine of being a " citizen of the world," and of paying no more regard to our own community than to every other. And why ? Because such a doctrine is not rational ; because it opposes the exercise of natural and virtuous feelings ; and because, if it were attempted to be reduced to practice, it may be feared that it would destroy confined benignity without effecting a counterbalancing amount of universal philanthropy. This preference of our own nation is indicated in that strong lan- guage of Paul, " I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites."* And a similar sentiment. is inculcated by the admonition — " As we have, therefore, opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith. "f In another place the same sentiment is applied to more private life ; — " If any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith."t All this is perfectly consonant with reason and with nature. Since the helpless and those who need assistance must obtain it somewhere, where can they so rationally look for it, where shall they look for it at all, except from those with whom they are connected in society ? If these do not exercise be- nignity towards them, who will ? And as to the dictate of nature, it is a law of nature that a man shall provide for his own. He is prompted to do this by the impulse of nature. Who, indeed, shall support, and cherish, and protect a child if his parents do not ? That speculative philosophy is vain which would supplant these dictates by doctrines of general philanthropy. It cannot be applicable to human affairs until there is an alteration in the human constitution. Not only religion therefore, but reason and nature, reject that philoso- phy which teaches that no man should prefer or aid another because he is his countryman, his neighbour, or his child :— for even this, the philosophy has taught us ; and v/e have been seriously iold that, in pursuance of general philanthropy, we ought not to cherish or support our own offspring in pre- ference to other children. The effect of these doctrines, if *Rom.a.3, t Gal. vi. 10. II Tim. v. 8. 504 PATRIOTISM. - [essay III. they were reduced to practice, would be, not to diffuse univer- sal benevolence, but to contract or destroy the charities of men for their families, their neighbours, and their country. It is an idle system of philosophy which sets out with extin- guishing those principles of human nature which the Creator has implanted for wise and good ends. He that shall so far succeed in practising this philosophy as to look with indiffer- ence upon his parent, his wife, and his son, will not often be found with much zeal to exercise kindness and benevolence to the world at large. Christianity rejects alike the extravagance of Patriotism and the extravagance of seeming philanthropy. Its precepts are addressed to us as men with human constitutions, and as men in society. But to cherish and support my own child rather than others ; to do good to my neighbours rather than to stran- gers ; to benefit my own country rather than another nation, does not imply that we may injure other nations, or strangers, or their children, in order to do good to our own. Here is the point for discrimination — a point which vulgar patriotism and vulgar philosophy have alike overlooked. The proper mode in which Patriotism should be exercised, is that which does not necessarily respect other nations. He is the truest patriot who benefits his own country without diminishing the welfare of another. For which reason, those who induce improvements in the administration of justice, in the maxims of governing, in the political constitution of the state — or those who extend and rectify the education, or in any other manner amend the moral or social condition of a people, possess incomparably higher claims to the praise of patriotism than multitudes of those who receive it from the popular voice. That patriotism which is manifested in political partizan- ship, is frequently of a very questionable kind. The motives to this partizanship are often far other than the love of our country, even when the measure which a party pursues tends to the country's good ; and many are called patriots, of whom both the motives and the actions are pernicious or impure. The most vulgar and unfounded talk of patriotism is that which relates to the agents of military operations. In general, the patriotism is of a kind which Christianity'^condemns ; because it is " in opposition to general benignity." It does more harm to another country than good to our own. In truth, the merit often consists in the harm that is done to another country, with but little pretensions to benefiting our own. These agents therefore, if they were patriotic at all, would commonly be so CHAP. XVII.] PATRIOTISM. 505 in an unchristian sense. And as to their being influenced by patriotism as a motive, the notion is ordinarily quite a fiction. When a Frenchman is sent with ten thousand others into Spain, or a Spaniard with an army into France, he probably is so far from acting the patriot that he does not know whether his country would not be more benefited by throwing down his arms ; nor probably does he know about what the two na- tions are quarrelling. Men do not enter armies because they love their countries, but because they want a living, or are pleased with a military life : and when they have entered, they do not fight because they love their country, but because fighting is their business. At the very moment of fighting, the nation at home is perhaps divided in opinion as to the propriety of carrying on the war. One party maintains that the war is beneficial, and one that it is ruining the nation. But the soldier, for whatever he fights, and whether really in pro- motion of his country's good, or in opposition to it, is secure of his praise. All this is sufficiently deceptive and absurd : the delusion would be ridiculous if the topic were not too grave for ridicule. It forms one amongst the many fictions by which the reputa- tion of military affairs is kept up. Why such fictions are needful to the purpose, it may be wise for the reader to en- quire. I suppose the cause is, that truth and reality would not serve the purposes of military reputation, and therefore that recourse is had to pleasant fictions. This may, however, have been done without a distinct consciousness, on the part of the inventors, of the delusions which they spread. I do not wholly coincide with the writer who says, — " The love of our country is one of those specious illusions which have been invented by impostors in order to render the multitude the blind instruments of their crooked designs."* The love of our country is a virtuous motive of action. The " specious illusion" consists in calling that "love of country" which ought to be called by a far other name. As to those who have thus misnamed human motives and actions, I know not whether they have often been such wily impostors. The probable supposition is, that they have frequently been duped themselves. He whom ambition urged on to conquest, tried to persuade himself, and perhaps did persuade himself, that he was actuated by the love of his country. He persuaded, also, his followers in arms ; and they, no doubt, were suffi- ciently willing to hope that they were influenced by such a motive. But, in whatever manner the fiction originated, a * Godwin : Pol. Justice, v. 2, p. 514. 43 "SOB SLAVERY. [essay III. fiction it assuredly is ; and the circumstance that it is still industriously imposed upon the world, is no inconsiderable evidence that the system which it is employed to encourage, would shrink from the eye of virtue and the light of truth. Upon the whole, we shall act both safely and wisely in lowering the relative situation of patriotism in the scale of Christian virtues. It is a virtue ; but it is far from the great- est or the highest. The world has given to it an unwarranted elevation — an elevation to which it has no pretensions in the view of truth ; and if the friends of truth consign it to its pro- per station, it is probable that there will be fewer spurious pre- tensions to its praise. CHAPTER XVIII. SLAVERY Requisitions of Christianity professedly disregarded — Persian law — The slave system a costly iniquity. At a future day it will probably become a subject of won- der how it could have happened that upon such a subject as Slavery men could have enquired, and examined, and debated, year after year ; and that many years actually passed before the minds of a nation were so fully convinced of its enormity, and of their consequent duty to abolish it, as to suppress it to the utmost of their power. I say this will probably be a sub- ject of wonder ; because the question is so simple, that he who simply applies the requisitions of the Moral Law finds no time for reasoning or for doubt. The question, as soon as it is proposed, is decided. How, then, it will be asked, in future days, could a Christian Legislature argue and contend, and contend and argue again, and allow an age to peiss with- out deciding. The cause is, that men do not agree as to the rule of deci- sion — as to the test by which the question should be examined. One talks of the rights to property — one of the interests of merchants — one of safety — one of policy — all of which are valid and proper considerations ; but they are not the primary consideration. The first question is. Is Slavery right ? Is it consistent with the Moral Law ? This question is, in prac- tice, postponed to others, even by some who theoretically ac- CHAP. XVIII.] SLAVERY. 507 knowledge its primary claim ; and when to the indistinct prin- ciples of these is added the want of principle in others, it is easy to account for the delay and opposition with which the advocate of simple rectitude is met. I'o him who examines slavery by the standard to which all questions of human duty should be referred, the task of de- ciding, we say, is short. Whether it is consistent with the Christian Law for one man to keep another in bondage with- out his consent, and to compel him to labour for that other's advantage, admits of no more doubt than whether two and l^wo make four. It were humiliating, then, to set about the proof that the Slave System is incompatible with Christianity ; be- cause no man questions its incompatibility who knows what Christianity is, and what it requires. Unhappily, some who can estimate, with tolerable precision, the duties of morality upon other subjects, contemplate this through a veil — a veil which habit has suspended before them, and which is dense enough to intercept the view of the moral features of slavery as they are presented to others who examine it without an in- tervening medium, and with no other light than the light of truth. To these the best counsel that we can offer is, to sim- plify their reasonings — to recur to first principles ; and first principles are few. Look, then, at the foundation of all the relative duties of man — Benevolence — Love — that love and benevolence which is the fulfilling of the Moral Law — that " charity" which prompts to actions of kindness, and tender- ness, and fellow-feeling for all men. Does he who seizes a person in Guinea, and drags him shrieking to a vessel, prac- tise this benevolence 1 When three or four hundreds have been thus seized, does he who chains them together in a suf- focating hold practise this benevolence ? When they have reached another shore, does he who gives money to the first for his victims — keeps them as his property — and compels them to labour for his profit, practise this benevolence 1 Would either of these persons think, if their relative situations were exchanged with the Africans', that the Africans used them kindly and justly? No. Then the question is decided. Chris- tianity condemns the system ; and no further enquiry about rectitude remains. The question is as distinctly settled as when a man commits a burglary it is distinctly certain that he has violated the law. But of the flagitiousness of the system in the view of Chris- tianity, its defenders are themselves aware — for they tell us, if not with decency at least with openness, that Christianity must be excluded from the enquiry. What does this exclu- :50iS SLAVERY. [essay III. sion imply? Obviously, that the advocates of slavery are conscious that Christianity condemns it. They take her away from the judgment seat, because they know she will pro- nounce a verdict against them, — Does the reader desire more than this 1 Here is the evidence, both of enemies and of friends, that the Moral Law of God condemns the slave sys- tem. If, therefore, we are Christians, the question is not merely decided, hxni confessedly decided: and what more do we ask? It is, to be sure, a curious thing, that they who affirm they are Christians, will not have their conduct examined by the Christian Law ; and whilst they baptize their children and kneel at the communion table, tell us that with one of the greatest questions of practical morality our religion has no concern. Two reasons induce the writer to confine himself, upon this subject, to little more than the exhibition of fundamental principles ; — first that the details of the Slavery question are already laid, in unnumbered publications, before the public ; and, secondly, that he does not think it will long remain, at least in this country, a subject for discussion. That the sys- tem will, so far as the British government is concerned, at no distant period be abolished, appears nearly certain ; and he is unwilling to fill the pages of a book of general morality with discussions which, ere many years have passed, may possess no relevance to the affairs of the Christian world. Yet one remark is offered as to a subordinate means of es- timating the goodness or badness of a cause — that which con- sists in referring to the principles upon which each party reasons, to the general spirit, to the tone and the temper of the disputants. Now, I am free to confess, that if I had never heard an argument against Slavery, I should find, in the writings of its defenders, satisfactory evidence that their cause is bad. So true is this, that if at any time I needed peculiarly to impress myself with the flagitiousness of the system, I should take up the book of a determined advocate. There I find the most unequivocal of all testimony against it — that which is unwittingly furnished by its advocates. There I find, first, that the fundamental principles of morality are given to the winds ; — that the proper foundation of the reason- ing is rejected and ridiculed. There I find that the temper and dispositions which are wont to influence the advocate of a good cause, are scarcely to be found ; and that those which usually characterize a bad one, continually appear ; and there- fore, even setting aside inaccurate statements and fallacious 6kAP. xvitij sLAVfiftif. 60^ reasonings, I am assured, from the general character of thei defence and conduct of the defenders, that the system is radi- cally vicious and bad. The distinctions which are made between the original rob- bery in Africa, and the purchase, the inheritance, or the " breeding" of slaves in the colonies, do not at all respect the kind of immorality that attaches to the whole system. They respect nothing but the degree. The man who wounds and robs another on the highway, is a more atrocious offender than he who plunders a hen-roost ; — but he is not more truly an offender, he is not more certainly a violater of the law. — > And so with the slave system. He who drags a wretched man from his family in Africa, is a more flagitious transgres- sor than he who merely compels the African to labour for his own advantage ; but the transgression, the immorality, is as real and certain in one case as in the other. He who had no right to steal the African can have none to sell him. From him who is known to have no right to sell, another can have no right to buy or to possess. Sale, or gift, or legacy, imparts no right to me, because the seller, or giver, or bequeath- er, had none himself. The sufferer has just as valid a claim to liberty at my hands as at the hands of the ruffian who first dragged him from his home. — Every hour of every day, the present possessor is guilty of injustice. Nor is the case al- tered with respect to those who are born on a man's estate. The parents were never the landholder's property, and there- fore the child is not. Nay, if the parents had been rightfully slaves, it would not justify me in making slaves of their chil- dren. No man has a right to make a child a slave, but him- self. What are our sentiments upon kindred subjects? What do we think of the justice of the Persian system, by which, when a state offender is put to death, his brothers and his children are killed and mutilated too ? Or, to come nearer to the point, as well as nearer home, what should we say of a law which enacted, that of every criminal who was sen- tenced to labour for life, all the children should be sentenced so to labour also ? — And yet, if there is any comparison of rea- sonableness, it seems to be in one respect in favour of the culprit. He is condemned to slavery for his crimes : the African, for another man's profit. That any human being who has not forfeited his liberty by his crimes, has a right to be free — and that whosoever forci- bly withholds liberty from an innocent man, robs him of his right and violates the Moral Law, are truths which no man would dispute or doubt, if custom had not obscured our 43* ^>^. 510 sLAVfiRY. [essat nu perceptions, or if wickedness did not prompt us to close our eyes. The whole system is essentially and radically bad : — Injustice and oppression are its fundamental principles. What- ever lenity may be requisite in speaking of the agent, none should be shown, none should be expressed for the act. I do not affirm or imagine that every slaveholder is therefore a wicked man ; — ^but if he be not, it is only upon the score of ignorance. If he is exempt from the guilt of violating the Moral Law, it is only because he does not perceive what it requires. Let us leave the deserts of the individual to Him who knoweth the heart ; of his actions, we may speak; and we should speak in the language of reprobation, disgust, and ab- horrence. Although it could be shown that the slave system is expe- dient, it would not affect the question, whether it ought to be maintained ? — yet it is remarkable that it is shown to be im- politic as well as bad. We are not violating the Moral Law because it fills our pockets. We injure ourselves by our own transgressions. The slave system is a costly iniquity both to the nation and to individual men. It is matter of great satis- faction that this is known and proved ; and yet it is just what, antecedently to enquiry, we should have reason to expect. — The truth furnishes one addition to the many evidences, that, even with respect to temporal affairs, that which is right is commonly politic ; and it ought, therefore, to furnish addi- tional inducements to a fearless conformity of conduct, private and public, to the Moral Law. It is quite evident that our slave system will be abolished, and that its supporters will hereafter be regarded with the same public feelings, as he who was an advocate of the slave trade, is now. How is it that legislators or that public men are so indifferent to their fame ? Who would now be willing that biography should record of him — This man defend- ed the slave trade ? The time will come when the record — This man opposed the abolition of slavery — will occasion a great deduction from the public estimate of worth of charac- ter. When both these atrocities are abolished, and but for the page of history forgotten, that page will make a wide dif- ference between those who aided the abolition, and those who obstructed it. The one will be ranked amongst the Howards that are departed, and the other amongst those who, in ignorance or in guilt, have employed their little day in in- flicting misery upon mankind. CHAP. XIX.] WAH. 511 CHAPTER XIX WAR. Causes of War. — Want of enquiry: Indifference to human misery: National irritability : Interest : Secret motives of Cabinets : Ideas of glory — Foundation of military glory. Consequences of War. — Destruction of human life : Taxation : Moral depravity : Familiarity with plunder : Implicit submission to superiors : Resignaiion of moral agency : Bondage and degradation — Loan of armies — Effects on the community. Lawfulness of War. — Influence of habit — Of appealing to antiquity — , The Christian Scrii>ture8 — Subjects of Christ's benediction — Matt. . xxvii. 52. — The Apostles and Evangelists — The Centurion — Cornelius — Silence not a proof of approbation — Luke xxii. 36. — ^John the Baptist —Negative evidence — Prophecies of the Old Testament — The requi- sitions of Christianity of present obligation — Primitive Christians — Ex- ample and testimony of early Christians — Christian soldiers — Wars of I'-"" Jews — Duties of individuals and nations — Offensive and defensive \ . — Wars always aggressive— Paley — War wholly forbidden. Of the probable practical Effects of adherlng to the Moral Law in respect to War. — Quakers in America and Ireland — Colonization of Pennsylvania; — Unconditional reliance on Providence — Recapitulation^ — General Observations. It is one amongst the numerous moral phenomena of the present times, that the enquiry is silently yet not slowly spread- ing in the world — Is War compatible with the Christian reli- gion ? There was a period when the question was seldom asked, and when war was regarded almost by every man both as inevitable and right. That period has certainly passed away ; and not only individuals but public societies, and socie- ties in distant nations, are urging the question upon the atten- tion of mankind. The simple circumstance that it is thus urged contains no irrational motive to investigation : for why should men ask the question if tliey did not doubt ; and how, after these long ages of prescription, could they begin to doubt, without a reason 1 It is not unwq^thy of remark, that whilst disquisitions are frequently issuing from the press, of which the tendency is to show that war is not compatible with Christianity, few seri- ous attempts are made to show that it is. Whether this results from the circumstance that no individual peculiarly is interested in the proof — or that there is a secret conscious- ness that proof cannot be brought — or that those who may be desirous of defending the custom, rest in security that the im- potence of its assailants will be of no avail against a custoin 513 WAR. [essay III. so established and so supported — I do not know ; yet the fact is remarkable, that scarcely a defender is to be found. It cannot be doubted that the question is one of the utmost inter- est and importance to man. Whether the custom be defensi- ble or not, every man should enquire into its consistency with the Moral Law. If it is defensible he may, by enquiry, dis- miss the scruples which it is certain subsist in the minds of multitudes, and thus exempt himself from the offence of par- ticipating in that which, though pure, he " esteemeih to be unclean." If it is not defensible, the propriety of investigation is increased in a tenfold degree. It may be a subject therefore of reasonable regret to the friends and the lovers of truth, that the question of the Moral Lawfulness of War is not brought yair/y before the public. I say fairly: because though many of the publications which impugn its lawfulness advert to the ordinary arguments in its favour, yet it is not to be assumed that they give to those argu- ments all that vigour and force which would be imparted by a stated and an able advocate. Few books, it is probable, would tend more powerfully to promote the discovery and dis- semination of truth, than one which should frankly and fully and ably advocate, upon sound moral principles, the practice of war. The public would then see the whole of what can be urged in its favour without being obliged to seek for argu- ments, as they now must, in incidental or imperfect or scat- tered disquisitions : and possessing in a distinct form the evidence of both parties, they would be enabled to judge justly between them. Perhaps if, invited as the public are to the discussion, no man is hereafter willing to adventure in the cause, the conclusion will not be unreasonable, that no man is destitute of a consciousness that the cause is not a good one. Meantime it is the business of him whose enquiries have conducted him to the conclusion that the cause is not good, to exhibit the evidence upon which the conclusion is founded. It happens upon the subject of war, more than upon almost any other subject of human enquiry, that the individual finds it difficult to contemplate its merits withjp,n uninfluenced mind. He finds it difficult to examine it 9s it would be ex- amined by a philosopher to whom the subject was new. He is familiar wiih its details ; he is habitu^d^o the idea of its miseries , he has perhaps never doubted, because he has neve'* questio aed, its rectitude ; nay, he has associated with it ideas not of splendour only but of honour and of merit. That such an enquirer will not, without some effort of abstrac- tion, examine the question with impartiality and justice, is CHAP. XIX.] CAUSES OF WAlt. 513 plain ; and therefore the first business of him who would satisfy his mind respecting the lawfulness of war, is to divest himself of all those habits of thought and feeling which have been the result not of reflection and judgment, but of the ordi- nary associations of life. And perhaps he may derive some assistance in this necessary but not easy dismissal of previous opinions, by referring first to some of the ordinary Causes and Consequences of War. The reference will enable us also more satisfactorily to estimate the moral character of the prac- tice itself: for it is no unimportant auxiliary in forming such an estimate of human actions or opinions, to know how they have been produced and what are their effects. CAUSES OF WAR. Of these Causes one undoubtedly consists in the want of enquiry. We have been accustomed from earliest life to a familiarity with its " pomp and circumstance ;" soldiers have passed us at every step, and battles and victories have been the topic of every one around us. It therefore becomes famil- iarized to all our thoughts and interwoven with all our associ- ations. We have never enquired whether these things should be : the question does not even suggest itself. We acquiesce in it, as we acquiesce in the rising of the sun, without any other idea than that it is a part of the ordinary processes of the world. And how are we to feel disapprobation of a sys- tem that we do not examine, and of the nature of which we do not think 1 Want of enquiry has been the means by which long-continued practices, whatever has been their enormity ,^^ have obtained the general concurrence of the world, and by, which they have continued to pollute or degrade it, long after, the few who enquire into their nature have discovered them- to be bad. It was by these means that the Slave Trade was' so long tolerated by this land of humanity. Men did not think, of its iniquity. We were induced to think, and we soon ab- horred, and then abolished it. Of the effects of this want of ^ enquiry we have indeed frequent examples upon the subject* before us. Many who have all their lives concluded that war is lawful and right, have found, when they began to examine the question, that their conclusions were founded upon no evi- dence ; — that they had believed in its rectitude not because they had possessed themselves of proof, but because they had never enquired whether it was capable of proof or not. In the present jpaoral state of the wprld, one of the ifirst concerns dl4 CAUSES OF WAR. [eSSAY III. of him wlio would discover pure morality should be, to ques- tion the purity of that which now obtains. Another cause of our complacency with war, and therefore another cause of war itself, consists in that callousness to human misery which the custom induces. They who are shocked at a single murder on the highway, hear with indif- ference of the slaughter of a thousand on the field. They whom the idea of a single corpse would thrill with terror, con- template that of heaps of human carcasses mangled by human hands, with frigid indifference. If a murder is committed, the narrative is given in the public newspaper, with many ad- jectives of horror — with many expressions of commiseration, and many hopes that the perpetrator will be detected. In the next paragraph, the editor, perhaps, tells us that he has hur- ried a second edition to the press, in order that he may be the first to glad the public with the intelligence, that in an en- gagement which has just taken place, eight hundred and fifty of the enemy were killed. Now, is not this latter intelligence eight hundred and fifty times as deplorable as the first ? Yet the first is the subject of our sorrow, and this — of our joy ! The inconsistency and disproportionateness which has been occasioned in our sentiments of benevolence, offers a curious moral phenomenon.* The immolations of the Hindoos fill us with compassion or * Part of the Declaration and Oath prescribed to be taken by Cath- olics is this : " I do solemnly declare before God, that I believe that no act in itself unjust, immoral, or wicked, can ever be justified or excused by or under pretence or colour that it was done either for the good of the church or in obedience to any ecclesiastical power whatsoever." This declaration is required as a solemn act, and is supposed, of course, to in- volve a great and sacred principle of rectitude. We propose the same declar- ation to be taken by military men, with the alteration of two words. " I do solemnly declare before God, that I believe that no act in itself unjust, immoral, or wicked, can ever be justified or excused by or under pre- tence cr colour that it was done either for the good of the state or in obedience to any military power whatsoever." How would this declara- tion assort with the customary practice of the soldier? Put state for church, and ntilitary for ecclesiastical, and then the world thinks that acts in themselves most unjust, immoral, and wicked, are not only justi- fied and excused, but very meritorious: for in the whole system of war- fare, justice and morality are utterly disregarded. Are those who approve of this Catholic declaration conscious of the grossness of their own inconsistency ? Or will they tell us that the interests of the state are so paramount to those of the church, that what would be wickedness in the service of one, is virtue in the service of the other ? The truth we sup- pose to be, that so intense is the power of public opinion, that of the thousands who approve the Catholic declarations and the practices of war, there are scarcely tens who even perceive their own inconsistency.-— Mem. in the MS. CHAP. XIX.] CAUSES OF WAR. 5^5 horror, and we are zealously labouring to prevent them. The sacrifices of life by our own criminal executions, are the sub- ject of our anxious commiseration, and we are strenuously endeavouring to diminish their number. We feel that the life of a Hindoo or a malefactor is a serious thing, and that no- thing but imperious necessity should induce us to destroy the one, or to permit the destruction of the other. Yet what are these sacrifices of life in comparison with the sacrifices of war ? In the late campaign in Russia, there fell, during one hundred and seventy-three days in succession, an average of two thousand nine hundred men per day : more than five hundred thousand human beings in less than six months ! And most of these victims expired with peculiar intensity of suller- ing. We are carrying our benevolence to the Indies, but what becomes of it in Russia, or at Leipsic ? We are labour- ing to save a few lives from the gallows, but where is our so- licitude to save them on the field ? Life is life wheresoever it be sacrificed, and has every where equal claims to our re- gard. I am not now saying that war is wrong, but that we regard its miseries with an indiflference with which we regard no others : that if our sympathy were reasonably excited re- specting them, we should be powerfully prompted to avoid war ; and that the want of this reasonable and virtuous sym- pathy, is one cause of its prevalence in the world. And another consists in national irritability. It is assumed (not indeed upon the most rational grounds) that the best way of supporting the dignity, and maintaining the security of a nation is, when occasions of disagreement arise, to assume a high attitude and a fearless tone. We keep ourselves in a state of irritability which is continually alive to occasions of offence ; and he that is prepared to be offended readily finds offences. A jealous sensibility sees insults and injuries where sober eyes see nothing ; and nations thus surround themselves with a sort of artificial tentacula, which they throw wide in quest of irritation, and by which they are stimulated to re- venge by every touch of accident or inadvertency. They who are easily offended will also easily offend. What is the experience of private life ? The man who is always on the alert to discover trespasses on his honour or his rights, never fails to quarrel with his neighbours. Such a person may be dreaded as a torpedo. We may fear, but we shall not love him ; and fear, without love, easily lapses mto enmity. There are, therefore, many feuds and litigaiions in the life of such a man, that would never have disturbed its quiet if he had not captiously snarled at the trespasses of accident, and savagely 5l6 CAUSES OF WAR. [eSSAY III. retaliated insignificant injuries. The viper that we chance to molest, we suffer to live if he continue to be quiet ; but if he raise himself in menaces of destruction we knock him on the head. It is with nations as with men. If on every offence we fly to arms, we shall of necessity provoke exasperation ; and if we exasperate a people as petulent as ourselves we may pro- bably continue to butcher one another, until we cease only from emptiness of exchequers or weariness of slaughter. To threaten war, is therefore often equivalent to beginning it. In the present state of men's principles, it is not probable that one nation will observe another levying men, and building ships, and founding cannon, without providing men, and ships, and cannon themselves ; and when both are thus threatening and defying, what is the hope that there will not be a war ? If nations fought only when they could not be at peace, there would be very little fighting in the world. The wars that are waged for " insults to flags," and an endless train of similar motives, are perhaps generally attributable to the irritability of our pride. We are at no pains to appear pacific towards the offender : our remonstrance is a threat ; and the nation, which would give satisfaction to an enquiry , will give no other answer to a menace than a menace in re- turn. At length we begin to fight, not because we are aggrieved, but because we are angry. One example may be offered: "In 1789, a small Spanish vessel committed some violence in Nootka Sound, under the pretence that the country belonged to Spain. This appears to have been the principal ground of oifence ; and with this both the government and the people of England were very angry. The irritability and haughtiness which they manifested were unaccountable to the Spaniards, and the peremptory tone was imputed by Spain, not to the feelings of oflfended dignity and violated justice, but to some lurking enmity, and some secret designs which we did not choose to avow."* If the tone had been less peremp- tory and more rational, no such suspicion would have been excited, and the hostility which was consequent upon the sus- picion would, of course, have been avoided. Happily the ETiglish were not so passionate, but that before they proceeded to fight they negotiated, and settled the affair amicably. The preparations for this foolish war cost, however, three millions one hundred and thirty-three thousand pounds ! So well indeed is national irritabihty known to be an effi- cient cause of war, that they who from any motive wish to * Smollett's England. CHAP. XIX.] CAUSES OF WAR. 6l7 promote it, endeavour to rouse the temper of a people by stimulating their passions — just as the boys in our streets stimulate two dogs to fight. These persons talk of the insults, or the encroachments, or the contempts of the destined enemy, with every artifice of aggravation ; they tell us of foreigners who want to trample upon our rights, of rivals who ridicule our power of foes who will crush, and of tyrants who will en- slave us. They pursue their object, certainly, by efficacious means : they desire a war, and therefore irritate our passions ; and when men are angry they are easily persuaded to fight. That this cause of War is morally bad — that petulance and irritability are wholly incompatible with Christianity, these pages have repeatedly shown. Wars are often promoted from considerations of interest, as well as from passion. The love of gain adds its influence to our other motives to support them ; and without other motives, we know that this love is sufficient to give great obliquity to the moral judgment, and to tempt us to many crimes. During a war of ten years there will always be many whose income depends on its continuance ; and a countless host of commis- saries, and purveyors, and agents, and mechanics, commend a war because it fills their pockets. And unhappily, if money is in prospect, the desolation of a kingdom is often of little concern : destruction and slaughter are not to be put in com- petition with a hundred a-year. In truth, it seems some- times to be the system of the conductors of a war, to give to the sources of gain endless ramifications. The more there are who profit by it the more numerous are its supporters ; and thus the projects of a cabinet become identified with the wishes of a people, and both are gratified in the prosecution of war. A support more systematic and powerful is however given to war, because it offers to the higher ranks of society a pro- fession which unites gentility with profit, and which, without the vulgarity of trade maintains or enriches them. It is of little consequence to enquire whether the distinction of vulgar- ity between the toils of war and the toils of commerce be fic- titious. In the abstract, it is fictitious ; but of this species of reputation public opinion holds the arhitrium et jus et norma ; and public opinion is in favour of war. The army and the navy, therefore, afford to the middle and higher classes a most acceptable profession. The profession of arms is like the profession of law or physic — a regular source of employment and profit. Boys are educated for the urmy as they are educated for the bar ; and parents appear to 44 "618 » CAUSES OF WAR. [eSSAY III, have no other idea than that war is part of the business of the world. Of younger sons, whose fathers in pursuance of the unhappy system of primogeniture, do not choose to support them at the expense of the heir, the army and the navy are the common resource. They would not know what to do without them. To many of these the news of a peace is a calamity; and though they may not lift their voices in fa- vour of new hostilities for the sake of gain, it is unhappily cer- tain that they often secretly desire it. It is in this manner that much of the rank, the influence, and the wealth of a country become interested in the promo- tion of wars ;. and when a custom is promoted by wealth, and influence, and rank, what is the wonder that it should be con- tinued 1 It is said, (if my memory serves me, by Sir Walter Raleigh,) " he that taketh up his rest to live by this profession shall hardly be an honest man." By depending upon war for a subsistence, a powerful in- ducement is given to desire it ; and when the question of war is to be decided, it is to be feared that the whispers of interest will prevail, and that humanity, and religion, and conscience will be sacrificed to promote it. Of those causes of war which consist in the ambition of princes or statesmen or commanders, it is not necessary to speak, because no one to whom the world will listen is will- ing to defend them. Statesmen however have, besides ambition, many purposes of nice policy which make wars convenient : and when they have such purposes, they are sometimes cool speculators in the lives of men. They who have much patronage have many dependents, and they who have many dependents have much power. By a war, thousands become dependent on a minister ; and if he be disposed, he can often pursue schemes of guilt, and intrench himself in unpunished wickedness, be- cause the war enables him to silence the clamour of opposi- tion by an office, and to secure the suffrages of venality by a bribe. He has therefore many motives to war — in ambition, that does not refer to conquest ; or in fear, that extends only to his office or his pocket : and fear or ambition, are some- times more interesting considerations than the happiness and the lives of men. Cabinets have in truth, many secret mo- tives to wars of which the people know little. They talk in public of invasions of right, of breaches of treaty, of the sup- port of honour, of the necessity of retaliation, when these mo- tives have no influence on their determinations. Some un- told purpose of expediency, or the private quarrel of a prince. CHAP. XIX.] CAUSES OF WAR. 519 or the pique or anger of a minister, are often the real motives to a contest, whilst its promoters are loudly talking of the honour or the safety of the country. But perhaps the most operative cause of the popularity of war, and of the facility with which we engage in it, consists in this ; that an idea of glory is attached to military exploits, and of honour to the military profession. The glories of battle, and of those who perish in it, or who return in triumph to their country, are favourite topics of declamation Avith the historian, the biographer, and the poet. They have told us a thousand times of dying heroes^ who " resign their lives amidst the joys of conquest, and, filled with their country's glory, smile in death;" and thus every excitement that eloquence and genius can command, is employed to arouse that ambition of fame which can be gratified only at the expense of blood. Into the nature and principles of this fame and glory We have already enquired ; and in the view alike of virtue and of intellect, they are low and bad.* " Glory is the most selfish of all passions except love."t — " I cannot, tell how or why the love of glory is a less selfish principle than the love of riches. "J Philosophy and intellect may therefore well despise itj and Christianity silently, yet emphatically, con- demns it. " Christianity," says Bishop Watson, " quite an- nihilates the disposition for martial glory." Another testi- mony, and from an advocate of war, goes further — No part of the heroic character is the subject of the " commendation, or precepts, or example of Christ ;" but the character the most opposite to the heroic is the subject of them all.§ Such is the foundation of the glory which has for so many ages deceived and deluded multitudes of mankind ! Upon this foundation a structure has been raised so vast, so brilliant, so attractive, that the greater portion of mankind are content to gaze in admiration, without any inquiry into its basis or any solicitude for its durability. If, however, it should be, that the gorgeous temple will be able to stand only till Chris- tian truth and light become predominant, it surely will be wise of those who seek a niche in its apartments as their para- mount and final good, to pause ere they proceed. If they de- sire a reputation that shall outlive guilt and fiction, let them look to the basis of military fame. If this fame should one day sink into oblivion and contempt, it will not be the first in- stance in which wide-spread glory has been found to be a * See Essay II, c. 10. t West. Rev. No. 1, for 1827. t Mem. and Rem. of the late Jane Taylor. ^ Paley : Evidences of Christianity, p. 2, e. 2. 520 CAUSES OF WAR. [essay at. glittering bubble, that has burst and been forgotten. Look at the days of chivalry. Of the ten thousand Quixotes of the middle ages, where is now the honour or the fame ? yet poets once sang their praises, and the chronicler of their achievements believed he was recording an everlasting fame. Where are now the glories of the tournament ? glories "Of which all Europe rang from side to side." Where is the champion whom princesses caressed and no- bles envied 1 Where are now the triumphs of Duns Scotus, and where are the folios that perpetuated his fame ? The glories of war have indeed outlived these ; human passions are less mutable than human follies ; but I am willing to avow my conviction, that these glories are alike destined to sink into forgetfulness ; and that the time is approaching when the applauses of heroism, and the splendours of conquest, will be remembered only as follies and iniquities that are past. Let him who seeks for fame, other than that which an era of Christian purity will allow, make haste ; for every hour that he delays its acquisition will shorten its duration. This is certain if there be certainty in the promises of heaven. Of this factitious glory as a cause of War, Gibbon speaks in the Decline and Fall, " As long as mankind," says he, " shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their des- troyers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters." " 'Tis strange to imagine," says the Earl of Shaftesbury, that war, which of all things appears the most savage, should be the passion of the most heroic spirits." — But he gives us the rea- son. — " By a small misguidance of the affection, a lover of mankind becomes a ravager ; a hero and deliverer becomes an oppressor and destroyer." * These are amongst the great perpetual causes of war. And what are they? First, that we do not enquire whether War is right or wrong. Secondly, That we are habitually haughty and irritable in our intercourse with other nations. Thirdly, That War is a source oi profit to individuals, and establishes professions which are very convenient to the middle and higher ranks of life. Fourthly, That it gratifies the ambition of pub- lic men, and serves the purposes of state policy. Fifthly, that notions of glory are attached to Warlike affairs ; which glory is factitious and impure. In the view of reason, and especially in the view of religion, what is the character of these Causes ? Are they pure ? * Essay on the Freedom of Wit and Humour. CHAP. XIX.] CONSEQUENCES OF WAR. 62l Are they honourable ? Are they, when connected with thai* effects, compatible with the Moral Law? — Lastly, and es- pecially, is it probable that a system of which these are the great ever-during Causes, can itself be good or right ? CONSEQUENCES OF WAR To expatiate upon the miseries which war brings upon mankind, appears a trite and a needless employinent. We all know that its evils are great and dreadful. Yet the very circumstance that the knowledge is familiar, may make it un- operative upon our sentiments and our conduct. It is not the intensity of misery, it is not the extent of evil alone, which is necessary to animate us to that exertion which evil and mis- ery should excite : if it were, surely we should be much more averse than we now are to contribute, in word or in action, to the promotion of War. But there are mischiefs attendant upon the system which are not to every man thus familiar, and on which, for that reason, it is expedient to remark. In referring especially to some of those Moral consequences of war which commonly obtain little of our attention, it may be observed, that social and political considerations are necessarily involved in the moral tendency: for the happiness of society is always diminished by the dimi- nution of morality ; and enlightened policy knows that the greatest support of a state is the virtue of the people. And yet the reader should bear in mind — what nothing but the frequency of the calamity can make him forget — the in- tense sufferings and irreparable deprivations which one battle inevitably entails upon private life. These are calamities of which the world thinks little, and which, if it thought of them, it could not remove. A father or a husband can seldom be replaced ; a void is created in the domestic felicity which there is little hope that the future will fill. By the slaughter of a war, there are thousands who weep in unpitied and un- noticed secrecy, whom the world does not see ; and thousands who retire, in silence, to hopeless poverty, for whom it does not care. To these, the conquest of a kingdom is of little im- portance. The loss of a protector or a friend is ill repaid by empty glory. An addition of territory may add titles to a king, but the brilliancy of a crown throws little light upon domestic gloom. It is not my intention to insist upon these calamities, intense, and irreparable, and unnumbered as they are ; but those who begin a war without taking them into their esti- mates of its consequences, must be regarded as, at most, half- 44* $22 CONSEQUENCES OP WAR. [^SSAY llf seeing politicians. The legitimate object of political meas- ures is the good of the people ; — and a great sum of good a war must produce, if it out-balances even this portion of its mischiefs. Nor should we be forgetful of that dreadful part of all war- fare, the destruction of mankind. The frequency with which this destruction is represented to our minds, has almost ex- tinguished our perception of its awfulness and horror. Be- tween the years 1141 and 1815, an interval of six hundred and seventy years, our country has been at war, with France alone, two hundred and sixty-six years. If to this we add our wars with other countries, probably we shall find that one half of the last six or seven centuries has been spent by this country in war ! A dreadful picture of human violence ! How many of our fellow-men, of our fellow-Christians, have these centuries of slaughter cut off! What is the sum total of the misery of their deaths ?* When political writers expatiate upon the extent and the evils of taxation, they do not sufficiently bear in mind the reflec- tion, that almost all our taxation is the eflfect of war. A man declaims upon national debts. He ought to declaim upon the parent of those debts. Do we reflect that if heavy taxation entails evils and misery upon the community, that misery and those evils are inflicted upon us by war 1 The amount of sup- plies in Queen Anne's reign was abouf seventy millions ;t and of this about sixty-six millions^ was expended in war. Where is our equivalent good ? Such considerations ought, undoubtedly, to influence the conduct of public men in their disagreements with other states, even if higher considerations do not influence it. They ought to form part of the calculations of the evil of hostility. I be- lieve that a greater mass of human suffering and loss of hu- man enjoyment are occasioned by the pecuniary distresses of a war, than any ordinary advantages of a war compensate. But this consideration seems too remote to obtain our notice. Anger at offence or hope of triumph, overpowers the sober cal- culations of reason, and outbalances the weight of after and long-continued calamities. The only question appears to be, whether taxes enough for a war can be raised, and whether * " Since the peace of Amiens more than four millions of human beings have been sacrificed io the personal ambition of Napoleon Buona- parte."— Quarterly Review, 25 Art. 1, 1825. t The sum was i;69,8l5,457. t The sum was £65,853,799. "The nine years' war of 1739, cost this nation upwards of sixty-four millions without gaining any object." Chaimer's Estimate of the Strength of Great Britian. CHAP. XIX.] CONSEQUENCfiS Of WAR. 523 a people will be willing to pay them. But the great question ought to be, (setting questions of Christianity aside,) whether the nation will gain as much by the war as they will lose by taxation and its other calamities. If the happiness of the people were, what it ought to be, the primary and the ultimate object of national measures, I think that the policy which pursued this object, would often find that even the pecuniary distresses resulting from a war make a greater deduction from the quantum of felicity, than those evils which the war may have been designed to avoid. " But war does more harm to the morals of men than even to their property and persons."* If, indeed, it depraves our morals more than it injures our persons and deducts from our property, how enormous must its mischiefs be ! I do not know whether the greater sum of moral evil result- ing from war, is suffered by those who are immediately en- gaged in it, or by the public. The mischief is most exten- sive upon the community, but upon the profession it is most intense. " Rara fides pietasque viris qui castra sequuntur." — Lucan. No one pretends to applaud the morals of an army, and for its religion, few think of it at all. The fact is too notorious to be insisted upon, that thousands who had filled their sta- tions in life with propriety, and been virtuous from principle, have lost, by a military life, both the practice and the regard of morality ; and when they have become habituated to the vices of war, have laughed at their honest and plodding breth- ren, who are still spiritless enough for virtue or stupid enough for piety. Does any man ask. What occasions depravity in military life ? I answer in the words of Robert Hall,t " War reverses, with respect to its objects, all the rules of morality. It is nothing less than a temporary repeal of all the principles of virtue. It is a system out of which almost all the virtues are excluded, and in which nearly all the vices are incorporated." And it requires no sagacity to discover, that those who are engaged in a practice which reverses all the rules of morality — which repeals all the principles of virtue, and in which nearly all the vices are incorporated, cannot, without the intervention of a miracle, retain their minds and morals un- depraved. Look for illustration to the familiarity with the plunder of property and the slaughter of mankind which war induces. * Erasmus. t Sermon, 1822. 824 dOJfSEQtJENCES OF WAR. JeSSAY ill. He who plunders the citizen of another nation without re- morse or reflection, and bears away the spoil with triumph, will inevitably lose something of his principles of probity.* He who is familiar with slaughter, who has himself often per- petrated it, and who exults in the perpetration, will not retain undepraved the principles of virtue. His moral feelings are blunted ; his moral vision is obscured ; his principles are shaken ; an inroad is made upon their integrity, and it is an inroad that makes after inroads the more easy. Mankind do not generally resist the influence of habit. If we rob and shoot those who are '' enemies" to-day, we are in some degree prepared to shoot and rob those who are not enemies to-mor- row. Law may indeed still restrain us from violence ; but the power and efficiency of Principle is diminished : and this alienation of the mind from the practice, the love, and the perception of Christian purity, therefore, of necessity extends its influence to the other circumstances of life. The whole evil is imputable to war ; and we say that this evil forms a powerful evidence against it, whether we direct that evidence to the abstract question of its lawfulness, or to the practical question of its expediency. That can scarcely be lawful which necessarily occasions such wide-spread immorality. That can scarcely be expedient, which is so pernicious to virtue, and therefore to the state. The economy of war requires of every soldier an implicit submission to his superior ; and this submission is required of every gradation of rank to that above it. " I swear to obey the orders of the officers who are set over me : so help me, God." This system may be necessary to hostile opera- tions, but I think it is unquestionably adverse to intellectual and moral excellence. The very nature of unconditional obedience implies the relinquishment of the use of the reasoning powers. Little more is required of the soldier than that he be obedient and brave. , His obedience is that of an animal, which is moved by a goad or a bit, without judgment of his own; and his bravery is that of a mastiflf that fights whatever mastiff" others put before him.f It is obvious that in such agency the intel- lect and the understanding have little part. Now I think that » See Smollett's England, vol. 4, p. 376. " This terrible truth, which I cannot help repeating, must be acknowledged : — indifference and selfish- ness are the predominant feelings in an army." Miot's Memoires de I'Exp^dition en Egypte, &lc. Mem. in the MSS. t By one article of the Constitutional Code even of republican France, " the army were expressly prohibited from deliberating on any subject whatever." CHAP. XIX.] CONSEQUENCES OF WAR. 525 this is important. He who, with whatever motive, resigns the direction of his conduct implicitly to another, surely can- not retain that erectness and independence of mind, that manly consciousness of mental freedom, which is one of the highest privileges of our nature. A British Captain declares that " the tendency of strict discipline, such as prevails on board ships of war, where almost every act of a man's life is regulated by the orders of his superiors, is to weaken the faculty of independent thought."* Thus the Rational Being becomes reduced in the intellectual scale : an encroachment is made upon the integrity of its independence. God has given us, individually, capacities for the regulation of our in- dividual conduct. To resign its direction, therefore, to the absolute disposal of another, appears to be an unmanly and unjustifiable relinquishment of the privileges which he has granted to us. And the effect is obviously bad ; for although no character will apply universally to any large class of men, and although the intellectual character of the military profes- sion does not result only from this unhappy subjection ; yet it will not be disputed, that the honourable exercise of intel- lect amongst that profession is not relatively great. It is not from them that we expect, because it is not from them that we generally find, those vigorous exertions of intellect which dignify our nature and which extend the boundaries of human knowledge. But the intellectual effects of military subjection form but a small portion of its evils. The great mischief is, that it requires the relinquishment of our moral agency ; that it re- quires us to do what is opposed to our consciences, and what we know to be wrong. A soldier must obey, how criminal soever the command, and how criminal soever he knows it to be. It is certain, that of those who compose armies, many commit actions which they believe to be wicked, and which they would not commit but for the obligations of a military life. Although a soldier determinately believes that the war is unjust, although he is convinced that his particular part of the service is atrociously criminal, still he must proceed — ^he must prosecute the purposes of injustice or robbery, he must participate in the guilt, and be himself a robber. To what a situation is a rational and responsible being re- duced, who commits actions, good or bad, at the word of an- other? I can conceive no greater degradation. It is the * Captain Basil Hall : Voyage to Loo Choo, c. 2. We make no dis- tinction between the military and naval professions, and employ one word to indicate both. 526 CONSEQUENCES OP WAR. [eSSAY III. lowest, the final abjectness of the moral nature. It is this if we abate the glitter of war, and if we add this glitter it is nothing more. Such a resignation of our moral agency is not contended for, or tolerated in any one other circumstance of human life. War stands upon this pinnacle of depravity alone. She, only, in the supremacy of crime, has told us that she has abolished even the obligation to be virtuous. Some writers who have perceived the monstrousness of this system, have told us that a soldier should assure himself, before he engages in a war, that it is a lawful and just one ; and they acknowledge that, if he does not feel this assurance, he is a " murderer." But how is he to know that the war is just ? It is frequently difficult for the people distinctly to discover what the objects of a war are. And if the soldier knew that it was just in its commencement, how is he to know that it will continue just in its prosecution? Every war is, in some parts of its course, wicked and unjust ; and who can tell what that course will be ? You say — When he discovers any injustice or wickedness, let him withdraw : we answer, He cannot ; and the truth is, that there is no way of avoiding the evil, but by avoiding the army. It is an enquiry of much interest, under what circumstances of responsibility a man supposes himself to be placed, who thus abandons and violates his own sense of rectitude and of his duties. Either he is responsible for his actions, or he is not ; and the question is a serious one to determine.* Chris- tianity has certainly never stated any cases in which personal responsibility ceases. If she admits such cases, she has at least not told us so ; but she has told us, explicitly and repeat- edly, that she does require individual obedience and impose individual responsibility. She has made no exceptions to the imperativeness of her obligations, whether we are re- quired by others to neglect them or not ; and I can discover in her sanctions no reason to suppose, that in her final adju- dications she admits the plea, tJiat another required us to do that which she required us to forbear. — But it may be feared, it may be believed, that how little soever religion will abate * Vattel indeed tells us that soldiers ought to " submit their judgment." " What," says he, " would be the consequence, if at every step of the Sovereign the subjects were at liberty to weigh the justice of his reasons, and refuse to march to a war which, to them, might appear unjust?" Law of Nat. b. 3, c. 11, sec. 187. Gisborne holds very different lan- guage. " It is," he says, " at all times the duty of an Englishman stead- fjtstly to decline obeying any orders of his superiors, which his conscience should tell him were in any degree impious or unjust." Duties of Men. CHAP. XIX.] CONSEQUENCES OF WAR. 627 of the responsibility of those who obey, she will impose pot a little upon those who command. They, at least, are an- swerable for the enormities of war : unless, indeed, any one shall tell me that responsibility attaches nowhere ; that that which would be wickedness in another man, is innocence in a soldier ; and that heaven has granted to the directors of war a privileged immunity, by virtue of which crime incurs no guilt and receives no punishment. And here it is fitting to observe, that the obedience to arbi- trary power which war exacts, possesses more of the charac- ter of servility, and even of slavery, than we are accustomed to suppose. I will acknowledge that when I see a company of men in a stated dress, and of a stated colour, ranged, rank and file, in the attitude of obedience, turning or walking at the word of another, now changing the position of a limb and now altering the angle of a foot, I feel that there is something in the system that is wrong — something incongruous with the proper dignity, with the intellectual station of man. I do not know whether I shall be charged with indulging in idle senti- ment or idle affectation. If I hold unusual language upon the subject, let it be remembered that the subject is itself unusual. I will retract my affectation and sentiment, if the reader will show me any case in life parallel to that to which I have ap- plied it. No one questions whether military power he arbitrary. And what are the customary feelings of mankind with respect to a subjection to arbitrary power? How do we feel and think, when we hear of a person who is obliged to do what- ever other men command, and who, the moment he refuses, is punished for attempting to be free 1 If a man orders his servant to do a given action, he is at liberty, if he think the action improper, or if, from any other cause, he choose not to do it, to refuse his obedience. Far other is the nature of military subjection. The soldier is compelled to obey, what- ever be his inclination or his will. It matters not whether he have entered the service voluntarily or involuntarily. Be- ing in it, he has but one alternative — submission to arbitrary power, or punishment — the punishment of death perhaps — for refusing to submit. Let the reader imagine to himself any other cause or purpose for which freemen shall be sub- jected to such a condition, and he will then see that condi- tion in its proper light. The influence of habit and the gloss of public opinion make situations that would otherwise be loathsome and revolting, not only tolerable but pleasurable Take away this influence and this gloss from the situation of , 528 CONSEQUENCES OF WAR. [eSSAY III. a soldier, and what should we call it ? We should call it a state of degradation and of bondage. But habit and public opinion, although they may influence notions, cannot alter things. It is a state intellectually, morally, and politically, of bondage and degradation. But the reader will say that this submission to arbitrary power is necessary to the prosecution of war. I know it ; and that is the very point for observation. It is because it is necessary to war that it is noticed here : for a brief but clear argument results : — That custom to which such a state of mankind is necessary, must inevitably be bad ; — it must in- evitably be adverse to rectitude and to Christianity. So de- plorable is the bondage which war produces, that we often hear, during a war, of subsidies from one nation to another, for the loan, or rather for the purchase of an army. — To bor- row ten thousand men who know nothing of our quarrel and care nothing for it, to help us to slaughter their fellows ! To pay for their help in guineas to their sovereign ! Well has it been exclaimed, " War is a game, that, were their subjects wise, Kings would not play at." A prince sells his subjects as a farmer sells his cattle ; and sends them to destroy a people, whom, if they had been higher bidders, he would perhaps have sent them to defend. The historian has to record such miserable facts, as that a poten- tate's troops were, during one war, " hired to the king of Great Britain and his enemies alternately, as the scale of conveni- ence happened to preponderate !"* That a large number of persons with the feelings and reason of men, should coolly listen to the bargain of their sale, should compute the guineas that will pay for their blood, and should then quietly be led to a place where they are to kill people towards whom they have no animosity, is simply wonderful. To what has invet- eracy of habit reconciled mankind ! I have no capacity of supposing a case of slavery, if slavery be denied in this. Men have been sold in another continent, and philanthropy has been shocked and aroused to interference ; yet these men were sold not to be slaughtered but to work : but of the pur- chases and sales of the world's political slave-dealers, what does philanthropy think or care ? There is no reason to doubt that, upon other subjects of horror, similar familiarity of habit would produce similar 3ffects ; or that he who heedlessly contemplates the purchase of an army, wants nothing but this * Smollett's England, v. 4, p, 330. CRAP. XIX.] CONSEQUKNCBS OF WAR. 529 familiarity to make him heedlessly look on at the commission of parricide. Yet I do not know whether, in its effects on the military character, the greatest moral evil of war is to be sought. Upon the community its effects are indeed less apparent, be- cause they who are the secondary subjects of the immoral influence, are less intensely affected by it than the immediate agents of its diffusion. But whatever is deficient in the de- gree of evil, is probably more than compensated by its extent. The influence is like that of a ct>ntinuai and noxious vapour : we neither regard nor perceive it, but it secretly undermines the moral health. Every one knows that vice is contagious. The depravity of one man has always a tendency to deprave his neighbours , and it therefore requires no unusual acuteness to discover, that the prodigious mass of immorality and crime which is accumulated by a war, must have a powerful effect in •' de- moralizing" the public- But there is one circumstance con- nected with the injurious influence of war, which makes it peculiarly operative and malignant. It is, that we do not hate or fear the influence, and do not fortify ourselves against it. Other vicious influences insinuate themselves into our minds by stealth ; but this we receive with open embrace. Glory, and patriotism, and bravery, and conquest, are bright and glittering things. Who, when he is looking, delighted, upon these things, is armed against the mischiefs which they veil ? The evil is, in its own nature, of almost universal opera- tion. During a war, a whole people become familiarized with the utmost excesses of enormity — with the utmost in- tensity of human wickedness — and they rejoice and exult in them; so that there is probably not an individual in a hundred who does not lose something of his Christian principles by a ten years' war. " It is, in my mind," said Fox, " no small misfortune to live at a period when scenes of horror and blood are frequent." — " One of the most evil consequences of war is, that it tends to render the hearts of mankind callous to the feelings and sentiments of humanity,"* Those who know what the moral law of God is, and who feel an interest in the virtue and the happiness of the world, will not regard the animosity of Party and the restlessness of resentment which are produced by a war, as trifling evils. If any thing be opposite to Christianity, it is retaliation and revenge. In the obligation to restrain these dispositions, * FcU's Life of C. J. Fox. iO 530 coNSEQUETJ-cirs OF WAX, Iesbjiy n«- much of the characteristic placability of Christianity conf?ist». The very essence and spirit of our religion are abhorrent from resentment. — Th€ very essence and spirit of war a^re promotive- of resentment ; and what, then, must be their mutual adverse- xi-ess ? That war excites tliese passions,, needs not to be proved-. When a war is in contemplation,, or when it lias been begun^ what are the endeavours of its promoters? They animate us by every artifice of excitement to hatred and animosity. Pam- phlets, Placards, Newspapers^ Caricatures — every agent is in requisition to irritate us into malignity. Nay, dreadful as it isy the pulpit resounds with declamations to stimulate our too sluggish resentment, and to invite us to slaughter. — And thus the most unchristianiike of all our passions, the passion which it is most the object of our religion to repress, is excited and fostered. Christianity cannot be flourishing under circum^ stances like these. The more effectually we are animated to war, the more nearly we extinguish the dispositions of our religion. War and Christianity are like the opposite ends of a balance^ of which one is depressed by the elevation of the other. These are the consequences which make War dreadful to a state. Slaughter and devastation are sufficiently terrible, but their collateral evils are their greatest. It is the immoral feeling that war diffuses — it is tlie depravation of Principle, which forms the mass of its mischief. To attempt to pursue the consequences of war through all their ramifications of evil, w^ere, however, both endless and vain. It is a moral gangrene, which diffuses its humours through the whole political and social system. To expose its mischief, is to exhibit all evil ; for there is no evil which it does not occasion, and it has much that is peculiar to itself. That, together with its multiplied evils, war produces some good, I have no wish to deny. I know that it sometimes elicits valuable qualities which had otherwise been concealed, and that it often produces collateral and adventitious, and some- times immediate advantages. If all this could be denied, it would be needless to deny it ; for it is of no consequence to the question whether it be proved. That any v/ide-extended system should not produce some benefits, can never happen. In such a system, it were an unheard-of-purity of evil, which was evil without any mixture of good. — But, to compare the ascertained advantages of war with its ascertained mischiefs, and to maintain a question as to the preponderance of the balance, implies, not ignorance, but disingenuousness, not ir - capacity to decide, but a voluntary concealment of truth. OHAP. XIX.] LAWFULNESS OF WAR. 531 And why do we insist upon these consequences of Warl — Because the review prepares the reader for a more accu rate judgment respecting its lawfulness. Because it reminda him what War is, and because, knowing and remembering what it is, he will be the better able to compare it with the Standard of Rectitude. LAWFULNESS OF WAR. I WOULD recommend to him who would estimate the moral character of war, to endeavour to forget that he has ever pre- sented to his mind the idea of a battle, and to endeavour to contemplate it with those emotions which it would excite in the mind of a being who had never before heard of human slaughter. The prevailing emotions of such a being would be astonishment and horror. If he were shocked by the hor- ribleness of the scene, he would be amazed at its absurdity. That a large number of persons should assemble by agreement, and deliberately kill one another, appears to the understanding a proceeding so preposterous, so monstrous, that I think a being such as I have supposed would inevitably conclude that they were mad. Nor is it likely, if it were attempted to ex- plain to him some motives to such conduct, that he would be able to comprehend how any possible circumstances could make it reasonable. The ferocity and prodigious folly of the act would, in his estimation, outbalance the weight of every conceivable motive, and he would turn unsatisfied away, " Astonished at the madness of Mankind." There is an advantage in making suppositions such as these ; because when the mind has been familiarized to a practice, however monstrous or inhuman, it loses some of its sagacity of moral perception; the practice is perhaps veiled in glittering fictions, or the mind is become callous to its enormities. But if the subject is, by some circumstance, pre- sented to the mind unconnected with any of its previous asso- ciations, we see it with a new judgment and new feelings ; and wonder, perhaps, that we have not felt so or thought so before. And such occasions it is the part of a wise man to seek ; smce, if they never happen to us, it will often be diffi- cult for us accurately to estimate the qualities of human ac- tions, or to determine whether we approve them from a deci- sion of our judgment, or whether we yield to them only the acquiescence of habit. It may properly be a subject of wonder that the arguments 532 LAWFULNESS OF WAR. [esSAY III. which are brought to justify a custom such as war receive so little investigation. It must be a studious ingenuity of mis- chief which could devise a practice more calamitous or horri- ble ; and yet it is a practice of which it rarely occurs to us to enquire into the necessity, or to ask whether it cannot be, or ought not to be avoided. In one truth, however, all will ac- quiesce — that the arguments in favour of such a practice should be unanswerably strong. Let it not be said that the experience and the practice of other ages have superseded the necessity of enquiry in our own ; that there can be no reason to question the lawfulness of that which has been sanctioned by forty centuries ; or that he who presumes to question it, is amusing himself with schemes of visionary philanthropy. " There is not, it may be," says Lord Clarendon, " a greater obstruction to the investigation of truth or the improvement of knowledge, than the too fre- quent appeal, and the too supine resignation of our under- standing to antiquity." * Whosoever proposes an alteration of existing institutions, will meet, from some men, with a sort of instinctive opposition, which appears to be influenced by no process of reasoning, by no considerations of propriety or •:)rinciples of rectitude, which defends the existing system be- cause it exists, and which would have equally defended its opposite if that had been the oldest. " Nor is it out of mod- esty that we have this resignation, or that we do, in truth, think those who have gone before us to be wiser than our- selves ; we are as proud and as peevish as any of our pro- genitors ; but it is out of laziness ; we will rather take theii words than take the pains to examine the reason they gov- erned themselves by." t To those who urge objections from the authority of ages, it is, indeed, a sufficient answer to say, that they apply to every long-continued custom. Slave-dealers urged them against the friends of the abolition: Papists urged them against Wickliffe and Luther, and the Athenians proba- bly thought it a good objection to an apostle, "that he seemed to be a setter forth of strange gods." It is some satisfaction to be able to give on a question of this nature, the testimony of some great minds against the lawfulness of war, opposed, as these testimonies are, to the general prejudice and the general practice of the world. It has been observed by Beccaria, that " it is the fate of great truths to glow only like a flash of lightning amidst the dark clouds in which error has enveloped the universe ;" and if our testimonies are few or transient, it matters not, so that * Lord Clarendon's Essays. t Id. CHAP. XIX.] LAWFULNESS OF WAR. 533 their light be the light of truth. There are, indeed, many, who in describing the horrible particulars of a siege or a bat- tle, indulge in some declamation on the horrors of war, such as has been often repeated, and often applauded, and as often forgotten. But such declamations are of little value and of little effect ; he who reads the next paragraph finds, probably, that he is invited to follow the path to glory and to victory ; — to share the hero's danger and partake the herd's praise ; and he soon discovers that the moralizing parts of his author are the impulse of feelings rather than of principles, and thinks that though it may be very well to write, yet it is better to forget them. There are, however, testimonies, delivered in the calm of reflection, by acute and enlightened men, which may reason- ably be allowed at least so much weight as to free the present enquiry from the charge of being wild or visionary. Chris- tianity indeed needs no such auxiliaries ; but if they induce an examination of her duties, a wise man will not wish them to be disregarded. " They who defend war," says Erasmus, " must defend the dispositions which lead to war : and these dispositions are ab- solutely forbidden by the gospel. — Since the time that Jesus Christ said. Put up thy sword into its scabbard. Christians ought not to go to war. — Christ suffered Peter to fall into an error in this matter, on purpose that, when he had put up Pe- ter's sword, it might remain no longer a doubt that war was prohibited, which, before that order had been considered as allowable." — " Wickliffe seems to have thought it was wrong to take away the life of man on any account, and that war was utterly unlawful."* — "I am persuaded," says the Bishop of Landaff, " that when the spirit of Christianity shall exert its proper influence war will cease throughout the whole Christian world." j " War," says the same acute prelate, " has practices and principles peculiar to itself, which but ill quadrate with the rule of moral rectitude, and are quite abhorrent from the benig- nity of Christianity." ^ A living writer of eminence bears this remarkable testimony: — "There is but one community of Christians in the world, and that unhappily of all commu- nities one of the smallest, enlightened enough to understand the prohibition of war by our Divine Master, in its plain, literal, and undeniable sense, and conscientious enough to obey it, subduing the very instinct of nature to obedience," § Dr. Vicessimus Knox speaks in language equally specific : * PriePtley. t Life of Bishop Watson. t Id. § Southey's History of Brazil. 45* 634 LAWFULNESS OF WAR. [eSSAY III, • — " Morality and religion forbid war, in its motives, conduct^ and consequences y * Those who have attended to the mode in which the Moral Law is instituted in the expressions of the Will of God, will have no difficulty in supposing that it contains no specific pro- hibition of war. Accordingly, if we be asked for such a pro- hibition, in the manner in which Thou shalt not kill is directed to murder, we willingly answer that no such prohibition exists ; — and it is not necessary to the argument. Even those who would require such a prohibition, are themselves satisfied respecting the obligation of many negative duties on which there has been no specific decision in the New Testament. They believe that suicide is not lawful : yet Christianity never forbade it. It can be shown, indeed, by implication and inference, that suicide could not have been allowed, and with this they are satisfied. Yet there is, probably, in the Christian Scriptures, not a twentieth part of as much indirect evidence against the lawfulness of suicide as there is against the lawfulness of war. To those who require such a com- mand as Thou shalt not engage in war, it is therefore sufficient to reply, that they require that, which, upon this and upon many other subjects, Christianity has not seen fit to give. We have had many occasions to illustrate, in the course of these disquisitions, the characteristic nature of the Moral Law as a Law of Benevolence. This benevolence, this good -will and kind affections towards one another, is placed at the basis of practical morality — it is " the fulfilling of the law" — ^it is the test of the validity of our pretensions to the Christian character. We have had occasion, too, to observe, that this law of Benevolence is universally applicable to public affairs as well as to private, to the intercourse of nations as well as of men. Let us refer, then, to some of those requisitions of this law which appear peculiarly to respect the question of the moral character of war. Have peace one with another. — By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. Walk with all lovdiness and meekness, with long-suffering, forhearing one another in love. Be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another ; love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous : not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing. * Essays — The Paterines or Gazari of Italy in the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries " held that it wixs not lawful to bear arms or to kill niaa- kind." CHXP. XIX.] LAWFULNESS OF WAR. 535 Be at peace among yourselms. See that none render evil for ^vil unto any mari. — G4»d hath called us to peace. Follow after love^ patience, meekness, — Be gentle, showing king — " Shall the sword devour for ever ?" and of those who, * Falkland's Islauds. t 2 Sam. xxiv. 16 4» 566 coNCLUsiojf. [essay m. whatever be the opinions or the practice of others, are openly- saying, " I am for Peace."* It will perhaps be asked, what then are the duties of a subject who believes that all war is incompatible with his religion, but whose governors engage in a war and demand his service 1 We answer explicitly. It is his duty, mildly and temperately, yet firmly to refuse to serve. — Let such as these remember, that an honourable and an awful duty is laid upon them. It is upon their fidelity, so far as human agency is concerned, that the Cause of Peace is suspended. Let them then be willing to avow their opinions and to defend them. Neither let them be contented with words if more than words, if suffering also, is required. It is only by the unyielding fidelity of virtue that corruption can be extirpated. If you be- lieve that Jesus Christ has prohibited slaughter, let not the opinions or the commands of a world induce you to join in it. By this " steady and determinate pursuit of virtue," the bene- diction which attaches to those who hear the sayings of God and do them, will rest upon you ; and the time will come when even the world will honour you, as contributors to the work of Human Reformation. CONCLUSION. That hope which was intimated at the commencement of this volume — that a period of greater moral purity would eventually arrive — ^has sometimes operated as an encourage- ment to the writer, in enforcing the obligations of morality to an extent which few who have written such books have ven- tured to advocate. In exhibiting a standard of rectitude such as that which it has been attempted to exhibit here — a standard to which not many in the present day are willing to conform, and of which many would willingly dispute the authority, some encouragement was needed ; and no human encouragement could be so efficient as that which consisted in the belief, that the principles would progressively obtain more and more of the concurrence and adoption of mankind. That there are indications of an advancement of the hu- man species towards greater purity in principle and in prac- tice, cannot, I think, be disputed. There is a manifest ad- * Ps. exx. 7. CHAP. XIX.] CONCLUSION. 567 vancement in intellectual concerns : — Science of almost every kind is extending her empire ; — Political Institutions are becoming rapidly ameliorated ;* — and Morality and Religion, if their progress be less perceptible, are yet advancing with an onward pace.f Lamentations over the happiness or excellence of other times, have generally very little foundation in justice or rea- son.J In truth they cannot be just, because they are per- petual. There has probably never been an age in which mankind have not bewailed the good times that were departed, and made mournful comparisons of them with their own. If these regrets had not been ill-founded, the world must have perpetually sunk deeper and deeper in wickedness, and retired further and further towards intellectual night. But the intellectual sun has been visibly advancing towards its noon ; and I believe there never was a period in which, speaking collectively of the species, the power of religion was greater than it is now : at least there never was a period in which greater efforts were made to diffuse the influence of religion amongst mankind. Men are to be judged of by their fruits ; and why should men thus more vigorously exert themselves to make others religious, if the power of religion did not possess increased influence upon their own minds ? The increase of crime — even if it increased in a progression more rapid than that of population, and the state of society * " The degree of scientific knowledge which would once have con- ferred celebrity and immortality, is now, in this country, attained by thousands of obscure individuals." — Fox's Lectures. " To one who con- siders coolly of the subject, it will appear that human nature in general, really enjoys more liberty at present, in the most arbitrary governments of Europe, than it ever did during the most flourishing period of ancient times." — Hume. t Not that the present state, or the prospects of the world, afford any countenance to the speculations — favourite speculations with some men — ■ respecting " human perfectibility." In the sense in which this phrase is usually employed, I fear there is little hope of the perfection of man ; at least there is little hope, if Christianity be true. Christianity declares that man is not perfectible except by the immediate assistance of God ; and this immediate assistance the advocates of " human perfectibility " are not wont to expect. The question in the sense in which it is ordina- rily exhibited, is in reality a question of the truth of Christianity. X " This humour of complaining proceeds from the frailty of our na- tures ; it being natural for man to complain of the present, and to com- mend the times past." — Sir Josiah Child, 1665. This was one hundred and fifty years ago. The same frailty appears to have subsisted two or three thousands of years before : " Say not thou what is the cause that the former days were better than these? for thou dost not enquire wisely cone«rnlng this." — £ccl«6. vii. 10. 56S CONCLUSION. |es9ay m which gives rise to crime— is a very imperfect standard of judgment. Those offences of which civil laws take cogni- zance, form not an hundredth part of the wickedness of the world. What multitudes are there of bad men who never yet were amenable to the laws ! How extensive may be the additional purity without any diminution of legal crimes ! And assuredly there is a perceptible advance in the senti- ments of good men towards a higher standard of morality. The lawfulness is frequently questioned now of actions of which, a few ages ago, few or none doubted the rectitude. Nor is it to be disputed, that these questions are resulting more and more in the conviction, that this higher standard is proposed and enforced by the Moral Law of God. Who that considers these things will hastily affirm, that doctrines in morality which refer to a standard that to him is new, are unfounded in this Moral Law ? Who will think it sufficient, to say that strange things are brought to his ears ? Who will satisfy himself with the exclamation, these are hard sayings, who can hear them ? Strange things must be brought to the ears of those who have not been accustomed to hear the truth. Hard sayings must be heard by those who have not hitherto practised the purity of morality. Such considerations, I say, have affijrded encouragement in the attempt to uphold a standard which the majority of man- kind have been little accustomed to contemplate ; — and now and in time to come, they will still suffice to encourage, although that standard should be, as by many it undoubtedly will be, rejected and contemned. I am conscious of inadequacy — what if I speak the truth and say, I am conscious of unworthiness — thus to attempt to advocate the Law of God. Let no man identify the advocate with the Cause, nor imagine, when he detects the errors and the weaknesses of the one, that the other is therefore errone- ous or weak. I apologize for myself: especially I apologize for those instances in which the character of the Christian may have been merged in that of the exposer of the evils '"of the world. There is a Christian love which is paramount to all ; — a love which he only is likely sufficiently to main- tain, who remembers that he who exposes an evil and he who partakes in it, will soon stand together as suppliants for the mercy of God. And finally, having written a book which is devoted almost exclusively to disquisitions on Morality, I am solicitous lest the reader should imagine that I regard the practice of mo- rality as all that God requires of Man. I believe fai other ; CHAP. XIX.] CONCLUSION. 569 and am desirous of here expressing the conviction, that although it becomes not us to limit the mercy of God, or cu- riously to define the conditions on which he will extend that mercy — ^yet that the true and safe foundation of our hope is in "the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." 48*' I INDEX. PAGE. Advowsons, 473 Agency, immoral, 206 Amusements, public, 111,269 Antiquity, of appealing to, 532 Arbitration, 150 , courts of, 395 Armies, loan of, 528 Articles of religion, subscription to, 195 Attributes, the divine, 33 Ballot, 367 Bankrupts, 413 Bequests, charitable, 126 Bible Society,... 378 Bills of exchange, 129 Bishops, bench of, 358 Books, publication of, 207 Boxing and wrestling, 273 Bravery, 213, 223 British constitution, 353 Canvassing for votes, 369 "Catholic Question, The," ^ 320 Ceremonial institutions, 112 Ceremonials and rituals, 116 Children, provision for, 145 Christianity, benevolence of, 51 Church. — See Religious Establishments, &c 438, 50C' the primitive, 440 an established, 441 alliance of, with the state, 446, 464, 481 Civil obedience 322 Classics, the ancient, 239, 257 Clergy. — See Religious Establishments, Priesthood, the Church, &c. Commons, House of, 361 Confiscations, 135 Conscience, the nature, dictates, and authority of, 55, 58, 75, 260 Conversation, religious, 106 Courage, 213,224 Courts of Equity, 391, 398 Martial, evidence in, 193 572 INDEX. PAOR Creeds and confessions 451 Creed, the Athanasian, 478 Crime, as regarded by the Civil and by the Moral Law, 403 Crimes, (and vices,) eis they are regarded by the Moral Law, and by Public Opinion, 212 Curse, a, 180 Days, Non-Sanctity of, 107 Death, Punishment of, 428 Debts, Perpetual Obligation to Pay, 121 Minors, a wife's, 128, 129 Debtor's, Criminal, 410 Defendants, Unjust, 132 Devotion, Factitious Semblances of, 105 Distraints, 131 Drama, The, 269 Duelling, 77, 216, 275, 409 Duty, mode of applying the precepts of Scripture to questions of, 42 Ecclesiastics, Noble, 478 Education, Intellectual and Moral, 239, 250, 254 of the People, 265,377 Elective Franchise, The, 363 Executions, Public, 430 Expediency, 24, 93, 307 Extortion, 132 Falsehoods, (see also Lies,) 173 in Legal Documents, 178 Fame, 233, 309, 374 Military, not durable, 226 Farnily — " Keeping up the Family," 149 Splendour of, 382 Fualis of Great Men, 233 Fdo de Se, Verdict of, 280, 284 Field Sports, 272 Forbearance, 214,292 Fornuilaries, Devotional, 112 Fortitude, 214 Fraud, and other modes of Dishonesty, 214 Glory," Military Virtues, &c 218, 519 Government, Civil, different forms of, 333 to 341 Grammar, English, 245 Heirs, 124 Historical Works, 239 " Holy Alliance, The," 309 Holydays, Ill Houses of Infamy, , 142 Hyperbole, 177 Improvements on Estates, 140 Infanticide, 75 Inns, 210 INDEX. 573 PAGE. Insolvency, 120, 410 Institutions, Ceremonial, 112 Intestates, 125, 384 Insurance, 139 Irony, 176 Justice, Administration of, 334 Law of the Land, 80 of Nature, 85 of Nations, 95 of Honour, 99 Laws, Fixed, 387, 394 , Useless— Bad, 310, 380, 402 Legal Injustice, 153 Practice, 154 -, Effects of, 159 , Morality, applicable to, 156 Legatees and Heirs, 124 Libels, 414 Liberty, Civil 310 , Political, 312 , Religious, 314, 453 • , Incompatible with Religious Establishments 319 Libraries, Circulating, 210 Lies, (see also Falsehoods,) 173 Lying for Particular purposes, 214 Litigation, 150 Lords, House of, 356 Lotteries, 379 Masquerades, 271 Ministerial Union, 350 Ministers, Christian, legal provisions for, 457,488 , voluntary pajonent of, 462, 496 Monarchy, Hereditary and Elective, 335 Moral Law, The, Variations in, 41 ■ Every human being possesses, 30, 70, 77 Spirit of, 47 Benevolence of, 51, 534 Nations not exempted from the obligations of, 307, 553 Effects of adhering to, in respect of War, 558 Moral Legislation, 375 Moral Obligation, Foundation of, 15 Moral Sense, Opinions respecting a, 61 Morality of the Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Christizm Dispensations,... 37 Supremacy of Christian, 39 No formal system of, in Scripture, 43 Influence of individuals upon public notions of, 213 War reverses the rules of, 523 Motives of action, 36 Murder, 435 and human destruction under other names, 214 574 INDEX. PA08 Nature, definition of the word, &c., 89 Newspapers, 237 Not at Home, 178 Oaths, their moral character, 179 their efficacy as securities for veracity, 186 effects of, 193 moral character, &c., of particular oaths, 195, 202, 331 of allegiance, 196, 3U Obligation, moral, foundation of, 15 Obligations, religious, 103 identical authority of, moral and religious, 32 Offences — created offences, 406 Oratorios, 271 Pagans, the Will of God communicated to, 30, 70 Pardons, 394 Parliaments, annual and septennial, 367 Patriotism, 214,225,502 ■ not the soldier's motive, 225, 505 Patronage and Party, 348, 350 Peculation, 162 Penal Animadversion, proper subjects of, 403, 424 Pennsylvania, colonization of, 561 Placability, 214,534 Placemen and Pensioners 373 Pleading in Courts of Justice, 162 Pluralities, 474 Political Influence, 342 • rights and obligations 294 Power, the possession of, ib the exercise of, 301, 304 Prayer, Forms of, 116 Press, the, 236, 423 Priesthood. — See Religious Establishments, the Church, &c. averse from reformation, 467 recoil from works of philanthropy, 481 Primogeniture, 380 Privateers, 134 Profaneness, 214 Promises, — Lies — Parole, 169, 170 extorted, 171 Property, Origin of. Right of, 119 Accumulation of, 383 Inequality of, 144 Literary, 143 Prosecutions, 211 Providence of God, Unconditional reliance on, 563 PubHc Money, Receivers of, 136 Public Opinion, its influence on the practice of virtue, 188 errors of, in regard to some questions of morality,... 213 Punishment, proper ends of, 423 of Death, 428 INDEX. 675 PAGE. Religious Establishments, 319,438,462 of England and Ireland 463 incompatible with Religious Liberty, 319 Rewards, 143 Resentment, 214, 536 Right and Wrong, Standard of, 16 Subordinate standards of, 31 Rights and Obligations, Private, 103 Political, 294 Rights of Self-Defence, 285 Rituals, 116 Sabbath, temporal, employments on the, 108 Sabbatical Institutions, 107 Scepticism, 117 Schools, Public, 242,253 Infant, 268 Science and Literature, 246 Scripture, 37 Self-Defence, Rights of, 285 Seduction, 161, 403, 408 Sermon on the Mount, 534 Settlements, 141 Shipments, 130 Slavery, 506 Slaves, 133 Subscription to Articles of Religion, 195,203 Suflrage, Universal, 365 Suicide, 280 " Sunday Papers," Ill Sympathy, 18 Taxes, the payment of, 543 Tests, Religious, 319, 448 Tithes, 482 Toleration, 317 Turf, the, 273 Verdicts, 394 Vices, National, 75 Virtue, 35 Virtues as they are regarded by the Moral Law, and by Public Opinion, 214 Military, 218 Unchastity, 214, 227 Untruths, (see also Lies,) 158, 177 UtUity, 18, 26, 91 War, Causes of— Consequences of, 511, 513, 521 ■ Lawfulness of, 531 Opinions and example of the early Christians, 548 Christians first engage in, 551 fi76 INDEX. PAGE. Wars, always aggressive, 556 of the Jews, 552 Wealth, accumulation of, 144 Will of God, 16 communication of, 19 ■ immediate, 54, 70 Supreme authority of, 20 \ subordinate means of discovering, 80 Wills, Legatees, and Heirs, 124 Worship, Religious, (see Religious obligations) 103 '0» THE m UNIVEBSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY BERKELEY THIS BOOK IS Dui^ THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW to $1.00 per volume after the sS T"^''^ tooreaSng demand may be renewed K.mM^,^"^-- ^""''s ""t iS expiration of loan period "PP''"'*'™'' » made before MAY 10 1519 UNoy'64S6 50m-7,'16 0)C YE 22810 J- si I 2--