self, is entirely forgotten, both practically and consciously. The effort of the mind is not to remove the idea or the immediate feeling of pain as an abstract impression of the individual, but as it represents the pain which another feels, and is connected with the idea of another's pain. So long then as this imaginary idea of what another feels excites my sympathy with him, as it fixes my attention on his sufferings, however painful, as it impels me to his relief, and to employ the necessary means for that purpose, at the expense of my ease and satisfaction, that is, so long as I am interested for others, it is not true that my only concern is for myself, or that I am governed solely by the principles of self-interest. Abstract our sympathy as it were from itself, and resolve it into another principle, and it will no longer produce the effects which we constantly see it produce wherever it exists. Let us suppose, for a moment, that the sensations of others were embodied by some means or other with our own, that we felt for them exactly as for ourselves, would not this give us a real sympathy in them, and extend our interests and identity beyond ourselves? Would the motives and principles by which we are actuated be the same as before? But the imagination, though not in the same degree, produces the same

effects it modifies and overrules the impulses of self-love, and binds us to the interests of others as to our own. If the imagination gives us an artificial interest in the welfare of others, if it determines my feelings and actions, and if it even for a moment draws them off from the pursuit of an abstract principle of self-interest, then it cannot be maintained that self-love and benevolence are the same. The motives that give birth to our social affections are by means of the understanding as much regulated by the feelings of others as if we had a real communication and sympathy with them, and are swayed by an impulse altogether foreign to self-love. should be said, that after all we are as selfish as we can be, and that the modifications and restrictions of the principle of self-love are only a necessary consequence of the nature of a thinking being, I answer, that this is the very point I wish to establish; or that it is downright nonsense to talk of a principle of entire selfishness in connexion with a power of reflection, that is, with a mind capable of perceiving the consequences of things beyond itself, and of being affected by them.

If it

Should any desperate metaphysician persist in affirming that my love of others is still the

love of myself, because the impression exciting my sympathy must exist in my mind, and so be a part of myself, I would answer that this is using words without affixing any distinct meaning to them. The love or affection excited by any general idea existing in my mind, can no more be said to be the love of myself, than the idea of another person is the idea of myself, because it is I who perceive it. This method of reasoning, however, will not go a great way to prove the doctrine of an abstract principle of self-interest; for, by the same rule, it would follow that in hating another person I hate myself. Indeed, upon this principle, the whole structure of language is a continued absurdity. It is pretended by a violent assumption, that benevolence is only a desire to prolong the idea of another's pleasure in one's own mind, because the idea exists there: malevolence must, therefore, be a disposition to prolong the idea of pain in one's own mind for the same reason, that is, to injure oneself, for by this philosophy no one can have a single idea which does not refer to, nor any impulse which does not originate in, self. But the love of others cannot be built on the love of self, considering this last as the effect of "physical sensibility;" and the moment

we resolve self-love into the rational pursuit of a remote object, it has been shown that the same reasoning applies to both, and that the love of others has the same necessary foundation in the human mind as the love of ourselves.

I have endeavoured to prove that there is no real, physical, or essential difference between the motives by which we are naturally impelled to the pursuit of our own welfare and that of others. The truth of this paradox, great as it seems, may be brought to a very fair test: namely, the being able to demonstrate that the doctrine of self-interest, as it is commonly understood, is in the nature of things an absolute impossibility; and, the being able to account for that hypothesis,—that is, for the common feeling and motives of men from habits, and a confused association of ideas aided by the use of language. If others cannot answer my reasons, and if I can account for their prejudices, I should not be justified in hastily relinquishing my opinion, merely on account of its singularity. It may not be improper briefly to recapitulate the former argument as far as it proceeded. I am far from denying that there is a difference between real or physical impulses and ideal motives, but I contend that this distinction is quite beside the present

purpose. For self-love properly relates to action, and all action relates to the future, and all future objects are ideal, and the interest we take in all such objects, and the motives to the pursuit of them are ideal too. The distinction between self-love and benevolence, therefore, as separate principles of action, cannot be founded on the difference between real and imaginary objects, between physical and rational motives, inasmuch as the motives and objects of the one and the other are equally ideal things. Whether we voluntarily pursue our own good or that of another, we must inevitably pursue that which is at a distance from us, something out of ourselves, abstracted from the being that acts and wills, and that is incompatible always with our present sensation or physical existence. Self-love, therefore, as the actuating principle of the mind, must imply the efficacy and operation of the imagination of the remote ideas of things, as connected with voluntary action, and the most refined benevolence, the greatest sacrifices of natural affection, of sincerity, of friendship, or humanity, can imply nothing more. The notion of the necessity of actual objects or impressions as the motives to action could not so easily have gained ground as an article of philosophical faith, but from a perverse distinction of the