duty is to its fulfilment, and how close and immediate the connexion between correct moral sentiments and a well-regulated conduct, it rises to a dignity and importance commensurate only with "the vast concerns of an eternal scene." The whole subject of moral science may be divided into three great parts. The first, under the title of Theoretic Morality, will include those inquiries which relate to the origin of our moral sentiments, and the nature and obligations of virtue in general. The second, under the title of Practical Morality, will comprehend the detail and description of all the particular dispositions, feelings, and modes of conduct, which respectively constitute virtue and vice, together with such representations of their several tendencies, as may serve to recommend the one and dissuade from the other. The last will treat of the means of cultivating and improving the moral principle, and will include that particular class of duties which are called instrumental duties. This part may be distinguished by the title of Disciplinary Morality. BOOK I. THEORETIC MORALITY. PLAIN and simple as the subject of moral duty may at first appear, the theory of morals has nevertheless afforded an ample field for controversy; and no sooner have we entered upon the inquiries it involves, than we find ourselves perplexed amidst the variety of contending systems offered to our notice.* This diversity of opinion, however, will be found, on more attentive examination, to be generally more apparent than real; and a discriminating judgment will perceive, that the subject of dispute has not been always kept distinctly in view; that several questions of a very different nature have been confounded; and that writers have, in some instances, appeared to differ, only be * For a brief review of the leading theories of morals, see Belsham's Elements of Moral Philosophy.-Section 12-15. cause they have regarded different subjects of inquiry, which they have not been sufficiently careful to distinguish. In the theory of morals there are three distinct questions, which, though often confounded, require a separate discussion. They are as follows: I. What is the origin of our moral sentiments? II. What is the essential characteristic, or best criterion of virtue? III. What is the nature and ground of moral obligation? CHAP. I. OF THE ORIGIN OF MORAL SENTIMENTS, AND OF HUMAN AFFEC TIONS IN GENERAL. What is the origin of our moral sentiments? or how, in other words, have we learned to make the distinction between right and wrong; to regard some actions and dispositions as worthy of approbation, others as deserving of blame? On this question there is a wide and real diversity of opinion among ethical writers; some maintaining that our moral sentiments are acquired by the natural exercise of our powers of perception, under the varying influence of circumstances and education; while others contend that they are instinctive or intuitive, being either the self-evident dictates of untaught reason,* by which, independently of, and antecedently to all experience of their tendency, we are led to approve of virtue and to condemn vice; or the perceptions of a certain internal faculty called a moral sense,† which informs us of the moral character of actions in the same manner as the eye informs us of colours, the ear of sounds, or any other external sense of its appropriate objects. There is another class of writers who take a middle course, resolving our moral sentiments into some remoter principle, but expressly contending that that principle is such as cannot be itself resolved into self-love; I allude particularly to Mr. Hume and Dr. Adam Smith. The former of these maintains that there is implanted by nature in the human breast a principle of humanity or disinterested benevolence, which causes us to take delight in whatever tends to the happiness of mankind; that it is this prin * According to Clarke, Price, Beattie, Stewart, &c. † According to Hutcheson, Reid, &c. } ciple which renders virtue an object of regard on account of its utility, and vice an object of abhorrence on account of its pernicious tendency; but he expressly maintains that this principle of humanity is an original, instinctive principle, which cannot be deduced from a selfish origin.* The latter ascribes the formation of our moral sentiments to a somewhat different process. He urges in objection to the doctrine of Hume, that the consideration of utility or beneficial tendency is not what first prompts us to approve of virtue, but an after-thought derived from mature reflection, and only serving to confirm the sentiments to which we have been led by a different principle. That principle, according to him, is Sympathy, which, leading us to transfer ourselves in imagination into the situation of others, compels us to approve or blame their conduct according as we find ourselves disposed or averse to participate in the feelings from which it springs. But, in like manner with the writer first mentioned, he claims for this principle of sympathy the character of an original, instinctive * Hume's Inquiry concerning the principles of Morals.-See note A at the end of the volume. † See Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments.-Part iv. ch. 2. |