Towards God; as piety, reverence, refignation, gratitude, &c.

Towards other men (or relative duties ;) as justice, charity, fidelity, loyalty, &c.

Towards ourselves; as chastity, fobriety, temperance, preservation of life, care of health, &c.

More of these diftinctions have been propofed, which it is not worth while to fet down.

I fhall proceed to state a few obfervations, which relate to the general regulation of human conduct; unconnected indeed with each other, but very worthy of attention; and which fall as properly under the title of this Chapter as of any other.

I. Mankind act more from habit than reflection.

It is on few, only, and great occafions that men deliberate at all; on fewer ftill, that they institute any thing like a regular inquiry into the moral rectitude or depravity of what they are about to do; or wait for the refult of it. We are for the moft part determined at once; and by an impulse, which is the effect and energy of pre-established habits. And this conftitution seems well adapted to the exigencies of human life, and to the imbecility of our moral principle. In the current occafions and rapid opportunities of life, there is afttimes little leifure for reflection; and were there more, a man, who has to reafon about his duty, when the temptation to tranfgrefs is upon him, is almost fure to reafon himself into an er

ror.

If we are in fo great a degree paffive under our habits, where, it is afked, is the exercise of virtue, the guilt of vice, or any use of moral and religious. knowledge? I anfwer, in the forming and contracting of these habits.

And from hence refults a rule of life of confiderable importance, viz. that many things are to be done, and abftained from, folely for the fake of habit. We will explain ourselves by an example or two. A beggar, with the appearance of extreme diftrefs, afks our charity. If we come to argue the matter, whether the diftrefs be real, whether it be not brought upon himself, whether it be of public advantage to admit fuch applications, whether it be not to encourage idleness and vagrancy, whether it may not invite impoftors to our doors, whether the money can be well fpared, or might not be better applied; when thefe confiderations are put together, it may appear very doubtful, whether we ought or ought not, to give any thing. But when we reflect, that the mifery before our eyes excites our pity, whether we will or not; that it is of the utmost confequence to us to cultivate this tenderness of mind; that it is a quality, cherished by indulgence, and foon ftifled by oppofition: when this, I fay, is confidered, a wife man will do that for his own fake, which he would have hefitated to do for the petitioner's; he will give way to his compaffion, rather than offer violence to a habit of fo much general use.

A man of confirmed good habits will act in the fame manner, without any confideration at all.

This may ferve for one inftance: another is the following. A man has been brought up from his infancy with a dread of lying. An occafion prefents itself where, at the expenfe of a little veracity, he may divert his company, fet off his own wit with advantage, attract the notice and engage the partiality of all about him. This is not a fmall temptation. And when he looks at the other fide of the question, he fees no mischief that can enfue from this liberty, no flander of any man's reputation, no prejudice likely to arife to any man's intereft. Were there nothing further to be confidered, it would be difficult to show why a man under fuch circumstances

might not indulge his humour. But when he reflects that his fcruples about lying have hitherto prefer ved him free from this vice; that occafions like the prefent will return, where the inducement may be equal ly strong, but the indulgence much lefs innocent; that his fcruples will wear away by a few tranfgref fions, and leave him subject to one of the meaneft and most pernicious of all bad habits, a habit of lying whenever it will ferve his turn: when all this, I fay, is confidered, a wife man will forego the prefent, or a much greater pleasure, rather than lay the founda, tion of a character fo vicious and contemptible.

From what has been faid may be explained alfo the nature of habitual virtue. By the definition of virtue, placed at the beginning of this Chapter, it appears, that the good of mankind is the fubject, the will of God the rule, and everlasting happiness the motive and end of all virtue. Yet in fact a man fhall perform many an act of virtue, without having either the good of mankind, the will of God, or everlasting happiness in his thoughts. How is this to be understood? In the fame manner as that a man may be a very good fervant, without being confcious at every turn of a particular regard to his master's will, or of an exprefs attention to his master's intereft; indeed your best old fervants are of this fort; but then he must have served for a length of time under the actual direction of these motives to bring it to this in which fervice his merit and virtue confift.

There are habits, not only of drinking, fwearing, and lying, and of fome other things, which are commonly acknowledged to be habits, and called fo; but of every modification of action, speech, and thought. Man is a bundle of habits. There are habits of industry, attention, vigilance, advertency; of a prompt obedience to the judgment occurring, or of yielding to the first impulfe of paffion; of extending our views to the future, or of refting upon the prefent;

of apprehending, methodizing, reafoning; of indo. lence and dilatorinefs; of vanity, felf-conceit, mel, ancholy, partiality; of fretfulness, fufpicion, captioufnefs, cenforiousness; of pride, ambition, covetoufnefs; of over-reaching, intriguing, projecting. In a word, there is not a quality, or function, either of body or mind, which does not feel the influence of this great law of animated nature,

II. The Christian religion hath not ascertained the precife quantity of virtue neceffary to falvation.

This has been made an objection to Christianity; but without reafon. For, as all revelation, however imparted originally, must be tranfmitted by the ordinary vehicle of language, it behoves those who make the objection to fhew that any form of words could be devised, which might exprefs this quantity; or that it is poffible to conftitute a standard of moral attainments, accommodated to the almoft infinite diverfity which fubfifts in the capacities and opportunities of different men.

*

It seems most agreeable to our conceptions of juftice, and is confonant enough to the language of fcripture, to fuppofe that there are prepared for us rewards and punishments, of all poffible degrees, from the most exalted happiness down to extreme mifery; fo that "our labour is never in vain;" whatever advancement we make in virtue, we procure a proportionable acceffion of future happiness; as, on the other hand, every accumulation of vice is the "treasuring up of fo much wrath against the day of wrath." It has been faid, that it can never be

* “He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully fhall reap alfo bountifully." 2 Cor. ix. 6.—“ And that fervant which knew his Lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, fhall be beaten with many fripes; but he that knew not, fhall be beaten with few ftripes." Luke xii. 47, 48-Whofoever fhall give you a cup of water to drink in my name, becaufe ye belong to Chrift, verily I fay unto you, he fhall not lofe his reward;" to wit, intimating that there is in referve a proportional reward for even the smallest act of virtue. Mark ix. 41.-See allo the parable of the pounds, Luke xix. 16, &c. where he whofe pound had gained ten pounds, was placed over ten cities; and he whole pound had gain ed five pounds, was placed over five cities.

a juft economy of Providence, to admit one part of mankind into heaven, and condemn the other to hell, fince there must be very little to choose, between the worst man who is received into heaven, and the best who is excluded. And how know we, it might be answered, but that there may be as little to choose in their conditions?

Without entering into a detail of fcripture mo rality, which would anticipate our fubject, the fol lowing general pofitions may be advanced, I think, with fafety:

1. That a state of happiness is not to be expected by those who are conscious of no moral or religious rule. I mean thofe, who cannot with truth fay, that they have been prompted to one action, or withheld from one gratification, by any regard to virtue or religion, either immediate or habitual.

There needs no other proof of this, than the confideration, that a brute would be as proper an object of reward as fuch a man; and that, if the cafe were fo, the penal fanctions of religion could have no place. For whom would you punish, if you make fuch a one as this happy?-or rather indeed religion itself, both natural and revealed, would ceafe to have either use or authority.

2. That a ftate of happiness is not to be expected by thofe, who referve to themselves the habitual practice of any one fin, or neglect of one known duty.

Because no obedience can proceed upon proper motives which is not univerfal, that is, which is not directed to every command of God alike, as they all ftand upon the fame authority.

Because, fuch an allowance would in effect amount to a toleration of every vice in the world.

And because, the strain of fcripture language excludes any fuch hope. When our duties are recited, they are put collectively, that is, as all and every of