greatest men of antiquity seem to have been sensible, that neither bare reason and philosophy, nor a mere human authority, is sufficient to bind laws upon mankind. Accordingly, the last mentioned author, who was eminent for his political knowledge, has observed, that "the most celebrated philosophers and lawgivers, did enforce their doctrines and laws "by a divine authority, and call in a higher principle to "the assistance of philosophy and bare reason. He instances "in Zoroaster, Hostanes, the Magi, Minos, Numa, Pythagoras, and all those who framed and formed religions and commonwealths, who made these pretensions, and passed for "men divinely inspired and commissioned."* And these pretensions, though not vouched by sufficient credentials, gave their laws and institutions a force with the people, which otherwise they would not have had. But as the several sects of philosophers in succeeding ages, among the Greeks and Romans, only stood upon the foot of their own reasoning, and could not pretend to a divine authority, this very much weakened the effect of their moral lessons and precepts. And, indeed, the best and wisest among them, acknowledged on several occasions, the need they stood in of a divine revelation and instruction. That the philosophers in general had no great weight with the people, appears from what is observed in the first volume of this work, chap. 10. To which it may be added, that Cicero, after having given the highest encomiums on philosophy, especially as the best guide in morals, adds, that "it is so far from being esteemed and praised, according to what it merits of human life, that it "is by the most of mankind neglected, and by many even "reproached.-Philosophia quidem tantum abest, ut proinde "ac de hominum est vitâ merita, laudetur, ut à plerisque neglecta, à multis etiam vituperetur."+

* Bolingbroke's Works, vol. V. p. 227.

+ Tuscul. Disput. lib. v. cap. 2. p. 344. edit. Davis.

4

CHAP. VI.

Many of the philosophers were fundamentally wrong in the first principles of morals. They denied that there are any moral differences of things founded in nature and reason, and resolved them wholly into human laws and customs. Observations on those philosophers who made man's chief good consist in pleasure, and proposed this as the highest end of morals, without any regard to a divine law. The moral system of Epicurus considered. His high pretences to virtue examined. The inconsistency of his principles shown, and that, if pursued to their genuine consequences, they are really destructive of all virtue and good morals.

Cicero says,

"he was

MORAL philosophy, properly speaking, had its beginning among the Greeks with Socrates. "the first that called down philosophy from heaven, and "introduced it into cities and private houses, and obliged it "to make life and manners the subject of its enquiries.-Pri

mus philosophiam devocavit à cœlo, et in urbibus colloca"vit, et in domus etiam introduxit, et coegit de vitâ et mori

"bus, rebusque bonis et malis quærere."* Not that he was the first philosopher that ever treated of morals, but, as the same great man elsewhere observes, Socrates was the first that, quitting abstruse disquisitions into natural things, and curious speculations about the heavenly bodies (which had principally employed all the philosophers before him), as being things too remote from our knowledge, or if known, of little use to direct men's conduct, brought philosophy into common life, and made virtues and vices, things good and evil, the only object of his philosophy.+ From his time the science of morals was cultivated. All the different sects of philosophers treated of morality, but they went upon very different principles.

Some of the philosophers were wrong in the very fundamental principles of morals. And since the foundation was wrong, they could not build upon it a proper system, nor be

*Tuscul. Disput. lib. v. cap. 4.

† Academic. lib. i. cap. 4.

depended upon for leading mankind into right notions of their duty. Such were those who maintained, that nothing is just or unjust by nature, but only by law and custom. This was the opinion, as Laërtius informs us, of Theodorus, Archelaus, Aristippus, and others. This way also went Pyrrho, and all the sceptics, who denied that any thing is in itself, and by its own nature, honest or dishonest, base or honourable, but only by virtue of the laws and customs which have obtained among men: for which they are deservedly exposed by Epictetus.* Plato represents it as a fashionable opinion, which very much prevailed in his time, and was maintained and propagated by many that were esteemed wise men and philosophers, "That the things which are accounted just, are "not so by nature: for that men are always differing about "them, and making new constitutions: and as often as they "are thus constituted, they obtain authority, being made just "by art and by the laws, not by any natural force or "virtue."+

Thus did many of the philosophers resolve all moral obligations into merely human laws and constitutions, making them the only measure of right and wrong, of good and evil. So that if the people had a mind to be instructed what they should do or forbear, they sent them to the laws of their several countries, and allowed them to do whatsoever was not forbidden by those laws. And in this those philosophers agreed with the politicians. When Alcibiades asked Pericles, What is law? he answered, That all those are laws which are prescribed with the consent and approbation of the people, declaring what things ought to be done or ought not to be done : and intimated, that whatsoever things are appointed by legal au

Epictet. Dissert. lib. ii. cap. 20. sect. 6. Our modern sceptics, as well as the ancients, set themselves to show the uncertainty of morals. Mr. Bayle has many passages which look that way. And this particularly is what the author of a late remarkable tract, entitled, Le Pyrrhonisme du Sage, has attempted to

thority, are to be regarded as good, and not evil. And indeed, Socrates himself and the most celebrated philosophers and moralists, though they acknowledged a real foundation in nature for the moral differences of things, yet every where inculcate it as a necessary ingredient in a good man's character, to obey, without reserve, the laws of his country. But what uncertain rules of morality the civil laws and constitutions are, and that they might often lead men into vicious and immoral practices, sufficiently appears from what hath been already observed.

Some of the philosophers, as Laërtius tells us of Theodorus, declared without disguise, that "a wise man might, "upon a fit occasion, commit theft, adultery, and sacrilege; "for that none of these things are base in their own nature, "if that opinion concerning them be taken away, which was "agreed upon for the sake of restraining fools." TÒV OTRÔION Τὸν σπεδαιον κλέψειν τε καὶ μοιχεύσειν, καὶ ἱεροσυλήσειν ἐν καιρῷ, μηδὲν γὰρ εἶναι τέτων αισχρὸν φύσει, τῆς ἐπ' αὐτοῖς δόξης αἱρομένης, ἢ σύγκειται ἕνεκα τῆς τῶν άogóvwv ovvoyйs. Aristippus, who also held, that "nothing is "by nature just, or honourable, or base, but by law and cus"tom," yet is pleased to declare, that a prudent man will not do an absurd thing, xov ȧrorov, any thing out of the common usage, because of the dangers it might bring upon him, and the censures it might expose him to. And how weak a tie this would be to a man that had nothing else to restrain him, I need not take pains to show. It is evident that, upon this scheme of things, there can be no such thing as conscience, or a fixed notion of virtue. It opens a wide door to licentiousness, and to the perpetrating all manner of vice and wickedness without scruple, if they can but escape public notice, and the punishments of human judicatories. What fine instructors in morals were those philosophers who taught such maxims !

Among those ancient philosophers who were wrong in the

* Xenoph. Memor. Socr. lib. i. cap. 2. sect. 42.

+ Diog. Laërt. lib. ii. segm. 99.

Ibid. segm. 93.

fundamental principles of morals, they may be justly reckoned who laid this down as a foundation of their moral system, that a man's chief good consists in sensual pleasure, and that this is the supreme end he is to propose to himself, to which every thing else should be subordinate. There is a remarkable passage of Cicero in his first book of laws relating to this subject, in which he represents pleasure as an enemy within us," which being intimately complicated with all the senses, lays all kinds of snares for our souls: that it hath a sem"blance of good or happiness, but is really the author of "evils: and that being corrupted by its blandishments, we do "not sufficiently discern the things which are in their own "nature good, because they want that sweetness and tickling " or itching kind of sensation it affords.—Animis omnes ten"duntur insidæ ab eâ, quæ penitus omni sensu implicata in“sidet imitatrix boni voluptas, malorum autem autor omnium, cujus blanditiis corrupti quæ naturâ bora sunt, quia "dulcedine hâc et scabie carent, non cernimus satis."* And again, speaking of those who stiffly maintained that pleasure is the greatest good, he says, that "this seems to be rather "the language of beasts than of men:-quæ quidem mihi "vox pecudum videtur esse non hominum."+ Aristippus,

66

* De Leg. lib. i. cap. 17.

De Parad. cap. 1. Some of our modern admirers of reason differ very much from Cicero in their sentiments on this subject. The author of Les six Discours sur l'Homme, said to be written by the celebrated M. de Voltaire, who sets up for a zealous advocate for natural religion, says that, "nature, attentive "to fulfil our desires, called us to God by the voice of pleasures."

"La nature attentive a remplir nos desirs,

"Nous rapelle au Dieu par le voix des plaisirs."

At this rate, men will be apt to regard all their inclinations and appetites, as the significations of the will of God concerning the duties he requireth of them. This is also the prevailing maxim of the author of the famous book De l'Esprit, who observes, that "since pleasure is the only object which men seek after, all "that is necessary to inspire them with the love of virtue, is to imitate nature. "Pleasure pronounces what nature wills, and grief or pain shows what nature forbids, and man readily obeys it. The love of pleasure, against which men, "more respectable for their probity than their judgment, have declaimed, is a "rein, by which the passions of particular persons may be always directed to