tisfaction of it does not interfere with our true happiness, and mislead us from it. This, as feems to me, is the great privilege of finite intellectual beings; and I defire it may be well confidered, whether the great inlet and exercife of all the liberty men have, are capable of, or can be ufeful to them, and that whereon depends the turn of their actions, does not lie in this, that they can fufpend their defires, and ftop them from determining their wills to any action, till they have duly and fairly examined the good and evil of it, as far forth as the weight of the thing requires. This we are able to do; and when we have done it, we have done our duty, and all that is in our power, and indeed all that needs: For fince the will fuppofes knowledge to guide its choice, all that we can do, is to hold our wills.undetermined, till we have examined the good and evil of what we defire. What follows after that, follows in a chain of confequences Jinked one to another, all depending on the laft determination of the judgment, which, whether it fhall be upon a hafty and precipitate view, or upon a due and mature examination, is in our power; experience howing us, that in most cafes we are able to fufpend the prefent fatisfaction of any defire.

$53. Government of our Paffions, the right Improvement of Liberty.

BUT if any extreme disturbance (as fometimes it happens) poffeffes our whole mind, as when the pain of the rack, an impetuous uneafinefs, as of love, anger, or any other violent paffion running away with us, allows us not the liberty of thought, and we are not masters enough of our own minds to confider thoroughly and examine fairly, God, who knows our frailty, pities our weakness, and requires of us no more than we are able to do, and fees what was and what was not in our power, will judge as a kind and merciful Father. But the forbearance of a too hafty compliance with our defires, the moderation and restraint of our paffions, fo that our understandings may be free to examine, and reafon unbiassed give its judgment, being that whereon a right direction of our conduct to true happiness de-.

pends, it is in this we should employ our chief care and endeavours: In this we fhould take pains to fuit the relifh of our minds to the true intrinfic good or ill that is in things, and not permit an allowed or fuppofed poffible great and weighty good to flip out of our thoughts, without leaving any relish, any defire of itself there, till, by a due confideration of its true worth, we have formed appetites in our minds fuitable to it, and made ourfelves uneafy in the want of it, or in the fear of lofing it. And how much this is in every one's power, by making refolutions to himself, fuch as he may keep, is eafy for every one to try. Nor let any one fay, he cannot govern his paffions, nor hinder them from breaking out, and carrying him into action; for what he can do before a prince, or a great man, he can do alone, or in the prefence of God, if he will.

54. How Men come to purfue different Courfes. FROM what has been faid, it is eafy to give account how it comes to pafs, that though all men defire hap-piness, yet their wills carry them fo contrarily, and con-fequently fome of them to what is evil. And to this I fay, that the various and contrary choices that men make in the world, do not argue that they do not all purfue good, but that the fame thing is not good to every man alike. This variety of pursuits fhows, that every one does not place his happinefs in the fame thing, or choose the fame way to it. Were all the concerns of man terminated in this life, why one followed study and knowledge, and another hawking and hunting; why one chofe luxury and debauchery, and another fobriety and riches; would not be, becaufe every one of thefe did not aim at his own happiness, but because their happiness was placed in different things; and therefore it was a right anfwer of the phyfician to his patient that had fore eyes, If you have more pleafure in the taste of wine than in the ufe of your fight, wine is good for you; but if the pleasure of feeing be greater to you than that of drinking, wine is naught.

§ 55

THE mind has a different relifh, as well as the palate;

and you will as fruitlessly endeavour to delight all men with riches or glory (which yet fome men place their happiness in), as you would to fatisfy all mens hunger with cheese or lobsters; which, though very agreeable and delicious fare to fome, are to others extremely nau feous and offenfive; and many people would with reafon prefer the griping of an hungry belly to those dishes which are a feast to others. Hence it was, I think, that the philofophers of old did in vain inquire, whether fummum bonum confifted in riches, or bodily delights, or virtue, or contemplation. And they might have as reafonably difputed, whether the best relith were to be found in apples, plums, or nuts; and have divided themselves into fects upon it: For as pleasant tastes depend not on the things themselves, but their agreeablenefs to this or that particular palate, wherein there is great variety; fo the greatest happinefs confifts in the having thofe things which produce the greatest pleasure, and in the abfence of thofe which caufe any disturbance, any pain. Now these to different men, are very different things. If, therefore, men in this life only have hope, if in this life they can only enjoy, it is not ftrange nor unreafonable, that they should feek their happiness by avoiding all things that disease them here, and by purfuing all that delight them, wherein it will be no wonder to find variety and difference: For if there be no profpect beyond the grave, the inference is certainly right, Let us eat and drink, let us enjoy what we delight in, for to-morrow we fhall die. This, I think, may serve to show us the reafon, why, though all mens defires tend to happiness, yet they are not moved by the fame object. Men may choofe different things, and yet all choose right; fuppofing them only like a company of poor infects, whercof fome are bees, delighted with flowers and their fweetnefs; others beetles, delighted with other kinds of viands; which having enjoyed for a feafon, they fhould ceafe to be, and exift no more for ever.

$56. How men come to choose Ill.

THESE things duly weighed, will give us, 25 I think, a

253 clear view into the state of human liberty. Liberty, it is plain, confists in a power to do or not to do, to do or forbear doing as we will. This cannot be denied; but this feeming to comprehend only the actions of a man confecutive to volition, it is farther inquired, whether he be at liberty to will or no? And to this it has been answered, That in most cases a man is not at liberty to forbear the act of volition; he must exert an act of his will, whereby the action propofed is made to exist or not to exift; but yet there is a cafe wherein a man is at liberty in refpect of willing, and that is the choofing of a remote good as an end to be purfued. Here a man may fufpend the act of his choice from being determined for or against the thing propofed, till he has examined whether it be really of a nature in itself and confequences to make him happy or no; for when he has once chofen it, and thereby it is become a part of his happinefs, it raifes defire, and that proportionably gives him uneafinefs, which determines his quill, and fets him at work in purfuit of his choice on all occafions that offer. And here we may see how it comes to pafs that a man may justly incur punishment, though it be certain that in all the particular actions that he wills, he does, and neceffarily does will that which he then judges to be good; for though his will be always determined by that which is judged good by his understanding, yet it excufes him not, because, by a too hatly choice of his own making, he has impofed on himself wrong measures of good and evil, which, however falfe and fallacious, have the fame influence on all his future conduct as if they were true and right. He has vitiated his own palate, and must be anfwerable to himself for the fickness and death that follows from it. The eternal law and nature of things muft not be altered, to comply with his ill-ordered choice. If the neglect or abuse of the liberty he had to examine what would really and truly make for his happiness misleads him, the miscarriages that follow on it must be imputed to his own election. He had a power to fufpend his determination; it was given

him that he might examine and take care of his own happinefs, and look that he were not deceived; and he could never judge that it was better to be deceived than not, in a matter of fo great and near concern

ment.

What has been said may also discover to us the reafon why men in this world prefer different things, and purfue happinefs by contrary courfes; but yet, fince men are always conftant and in earnest in matters of happiness and mifery, the question ftill remains, How "men come often to prefer the worse to the better, and to choose that which, by their own confeflion, has made them miferable.

$ 57.

To account for the various and contrary ways men take, though all aim at being happy, we must confider whence the various uneafinees that determine the will in the preference of each voluntary action have their

rife!

1. From bodily Pain.

. Some of them come from caufes not in our power, fuch as are often the pains of the body, from want, dif-. eafe, or outward injuries, as the rack, &c. which, when. prefent and violent, operate for the most part forcibly on the will, and turn the courfes of mens lives from virtue, piety, and religion, and what before they judged to lead to happinefs; every one not endeavouring, or through difufe not being able, by the contemplation of remote and future good, to raise in himself defires of them ftrong enough to counterbalance the uneafinefs he feels in those bodily torments, and to keep his will fteady in the choice of those actions which lead to future happiness. A neighbour country has been of late a tragical theatre, from which we might fetch inftances, if there needed any, and the world did not in all countries and ages furnish examples enough to confirm that received obfervation, Neceffitas cogit ad Turpia; and therefore there is great reafon for us to pray, Lead us not into temptation.