LET A то TER LORD * S HALLI venture to say, my Lord, that in our late Converfation, you were inclined to the Party which you adopted rather by the Feelings of your good Nature, than by the Conviction of your Judgment? We laid open the Foundations of Society; and you feared, that the Curiofity of this Search might endanger the Ruin of the whole Fabrick. You would readily have allowed my Principle, but you dreaded the Confequences; you thought that, having once entered upon these Reafonings, we might be carried infenfibly and irrefiftibly farther than at firft we could either have imagined or wifhed. But for my Part, my Lord, I then thought, and am ftill of the fame Opinion, that Error, and not Truth, of any kind, is dangerous; that ill Conclufions can only flow from falfe Propofitions; and that, to know whether any Propofition be true or or false, it is a prepofterous Method to examine it by its apparent Confequences. These were the Reasons which induced me to go fo far into that Enquiry; and they are the Reasons which direct me in all my Enquiries. I had indeed often reflected on that Subject before I could prevail upon myself to communicate my Reflexions to any body. They were generally melancholy enough; as thofe ufually are which carry us beyond the mere Surface of Things; and which would undoubtedly make the Lives of all thinking Men extremely miferable, if the fame Philofophy which caufed the Grief did not at the fame Time adminifter the Comfort. On confidering political Societies, their Origin, their Constitution, and their Effects, I have fometimes been in a good deal more than Doubt, whether the Creator did ever really intend Man for a State of Happiness. He has mixed in his Cup a Number of natural Evils (in spite of the Boast of Stoicifm they are Evils); and every Endeavour which the Art and Policy of Mankind has used from the Beginning of the World to this Day, in order to alleviate or cure them, has only ferved to introduce new Mischiefs, or to aggravate and inflame the old. Befides this, the Mind of Man itself is too active and restless a Principle ever to fettle on the true Point of Quiet. It difcovers every Day fome craving Want in a Body, which really wants but little. It every Day invents fome new artificial Rule to guide that Nature which, if left to itself, were the beft and fureft Guide. It finds finds out imaginary Beings prefcribing imaginary Laws; and then it raises imaginary Terrors to fupport a Belief in the Beings, and an Obedience to the Laws. Many Things have been faid, and very well undoubtedly, on the Subjection in which we should preferve our Bodies to the Government of our Underftanding; but enough has not been faid upon the Refraint which our bodily Neceffities ought to lay on the extravagant Sublimities and excentrick Rovings of our Minds. The Body, or, as fome love to call it, our inferior Nature, is wifer in its own plain. Way, and attends its own Bufiuefs more directly than the Mind with all its boasted Subtilty. In the State of Nature, without question, Mankind was fubjected to many and great Inconveniences; Want of Union, Want of mutual Affistance, Want of a common Arbitrator to refort to in their Differences. These were Evils which they could not but have felt pretty feverely on many Occafions. The original Children of the Earth lived with their Brethren of the other Kinds in much Equality. Their Diet must have been confined almost wholly to the vegetable kind; and the fame Tree, which in its flourithing State produced them Berries, in its Decay gave them an Habitation. The mutual Defires of the Sexes uniting their Bodies and Affections, and the Children, which were the Refults of these Intercourfes, introduced firft the Notion of Society, and taught its Conveniences. This Society, founded in natural Appetites and Inftincts, and not in any pofitive Inftitution, I fhall call Natural Society. Thus far far Nature went, and fucceeded; but Man would go farther. The great Error of our Nature is, not to know where to ftop; not to be satisfied with any reasonable Acquirement; not to compound with our Condition; but to lofe all we have gained by an infatiable Purfuit after more. Man found a confiderable Advantage by this Union of many Persons to form one Family; he therefore judged that he would find his Account proportionably in an Union of many Families into one body politick. And as Nature has formed no Bond of Union to hold them together, he fupplied this defe by Laws. This is Political Society. And hence the Sources of what are usually called States, civil Societies, or Governments; into fome Form of which, more extended or reftrained, all Mankind have gradually fallen. And, fince it has fo happened, and that we owe an implicit Reverence to all the Inftitutions of our Ancestors, we fhall confider thefe Inftitutions with all that Modefty with which we ought to conduct ourselves in examing a received Opinion; but with all that Freedom and Candour which we owe to Truth wherever we find it, or however it may contradict our own Notions, or oppofe our own Interests. There is a moft abfurd and audacious Me thod of Reafoning avowed by fome Bigots and Enthufiafts, and through Fear affented to by fome wifer and better Men; it is this: They argue againft a fair Difcuffion of popular Prejudices, because, fay they, though they would be found without any reafonable Support, yet the Difcovery might be pro ductive |