which is removing me from the wicked? Death is dreadful to the man whose all is extinguished with his life; but not to him whose glory never can die. Exile is terrible to those who have, as it were, a circumscribed habitation; but not to those who look upon the whole globe but as one city. Troubles and miseries oppress thee who thinkest thyself happy and prosperous. Thy lusts torment thee, day and night thou art upon the rack; for whom that which thou possessest is not sufficient, and who art ever trembling lest even that should not continue; the consciousness of thy misdeeds tortures thee; the terrors of the laws and the dread of justice appal thee; look where thou wilt, thy crimes, like so many furies, meet thy view and suffer thee not to breathe.* Therefore, as no man can be happy if he is wicked, foolish, or indolent; so no man can be wretched, if he is virtuous, brave, and wise. Glorious is the life of that man whose virtues and practice are praiseworthy; nor indeed ought that life to be escaped from which is deserving of praise, though it might well be if it were a wretched one. We are therefore to look upon whatever is worthy of praise as at once happy, pros perous, and desirable.

PARADOX III.

THAT ALL MISDEEDS ARE IN THEMSELVES EQUAL, AND GOOD DEEDS THE SAME.

THE matter it may be said is a trifle, but the crime is enormous; for crimes are not to be measured by the issue of events, but from the bad intentions of men.† The fact in

"Though," says South, in the sermon from which we have several times quoted," company may reprieve a man from his melancholy, yet it cannot secure him from his conscience, nor from sometimes being alone. And what is all that a man enjoys from a week's, a month's, or a year's converse, comparable to what he feels for one hour, when his conscience shall take him aside and rate him by himself."

The ethical principle of Cicero, so far from having been improved upon in modern times, shows in favourable contrast beside that of the eminent Christian moralist, Paley. "The method," he says, " of coming at the will of God, concerning any action, by the light of nature, is to inquire into the tendency of that action to promote or diminish the general happiness.

So then actions are to be estimated by their tendency. Whatever is

which the sin consists may be greater in one instance and less in another, but guilt itself, in whatsoever light you behold it, is the same. A pilot oversets a ship laden with gold or one laden with straw: in value there is some difference, but in the ignorance of the pilot there is none. Your illicit desire has fallen upon an obscure female. The mortification affects fewer persons than if it had broken out in the case of some high born and noble virgin; nevertheless it has been guilty, if it be guilty to overstep the mark. When you have done this, a crime has been committed; nor does it matter in aggravation of the fault how far you run afterwards ; expedient, is right. It is the utility of any moral rule alone which constitutes the obligation of it. But to all this there seems a plain objection, viz. that many actions are useful, which no man in his senses will allow to be right. There are occasions in which the hand of the assassin would be very useful. The present possessor of some great estate employs his influence and fortune, to annoy, corrupt, or oppress, all about him. His estate would devolve, by his death, to a successor of an opposite character. It is useful, therefore, to despatch such a one as soon as possible out of the way; as the neighbourhood will exchange thereby a pernicious tyrant for a wise and generous benefactor. It might be useful to rob a miser, and give the money to the poor; as the money, no doubt, would produce more happiness by being laid out in food and clothing for half a dozen distressed families, than by continuing locked up in a miser's chest. It may be useful to get possession of a place, a piece of preferment, or of a seat in Parliament, by bribery or false swearing: as by means of them we may serve the public more effectually than in our private station. What then shall we say? Must we admit these actions to be right, which would be to justify assassination, plunder, and perjury; or must we give up our principle, that the criterion of right is utility? It is not necessary to do either. The true answer is this; that these actions, after all, are not useful, and for that reason, and that alone, are not right. To see this point perfectly, it must be observed that the bad consequences of actions are twofold, particular and general. The particular bad consequence of an action, is the mischief which that single action directly and immediately occasions. The general bad consequence is, the violation of some necessary or useful general rule. Thus, the particular bad consequence of the assassination above described, is the fright and pain which the deceased underwent ; the loss he suffered of life, which is as valuable to a bad man as to a good one, or more so; the prejudice and affliction, of which his death was the occasion, to his family, friends, and dependants. The general bad consequence is the violation of this necessary general rule, that no man be put to death for his crimes but by public authority. Although, therefore, such an action have no particular bad consequences, or greater particular good consequences, yet it is not useful, by reason of the general consequence, which is of more importance, and which is evil."-Moral and Political Philo sophy.

certainly it is not lawful for any one to commit sin, and that which is unlawful is limited by this sole condition, that it is shown to be wrong. If this guilt can neither be made greater nor less (because, if the thing was unlawful, therein sin was committed), then the vicious acts which spring out of that which is ever one and the same must necessarily be equal. Now if virtues are equal amongst themselves, it must necessarily follow that vices are so likewise; and it is most easy to be perceived that a man cannot be better than good, more temperate than temperate, braver than brave, nor wiser than wise. Will any man call a person honest, who, having a deposit of ten pounds of gold made to him without any witness, so that he might take advantage of it with impunity, shall restore it, and yet should not do the same in the case of ten thousand pounds?* Can a man be accounted temperate who checks one inordinate passion and gives a loose to another? Virtue is uniform, conformable to reason, and of unvarying consistency; nothing can be added to it that can make it more than virtue; nothing can be taken from it, and the name of virtue be left. If good oflices are done with an upright intention, nothing can be more upright than upright is; and therefore it is impossible that any thing should be better than what is good. It therefore follows that all vices are equal; for the obliquities of the mind are properly termed vices. Now we may infer, that as all virtues are equal, therefore all good actions, when they spring from virtues, ought to be equal likewise; and therefore it necessarily follows, that evil actions, springing from vices, should be also equal.

You borrow, says one, these views from philosophers. I was afraid you would have told me that I borrowed it from panders. But Socrates reasoned in the manner you do.By Hercules, you say well; for it is recorded that he was a learned and a wise person. Meanwhile as we are contending, not with blows, but with words, I ask you whether good men should inquire what was the opinion of porters and labourers, or that of the wisest of mankind? Especially too

The reader will probably be reminded by this passage of the words of the Great Teacher: "He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much. And he that is unjust in the least, is unjust also in much." -Luke, chap. xvi. 10.

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as no truer sentiment than this can be found, nor one more conducive to the interests of human life. For what influence is there which can more deter men from the commission of every kind of evil, than if they become sensible that there are no degrees in sin? That the crime is the same, whether they offer violence to private persons or to magistrates. That in whatever families they have gratified their illicit desire, the turpitude of their lust is the same.

But some one will say, what then? does it make no difference, whether a man murders his father or his slave? If you instance these acts abstractedly, it is difficult to decide of what quality they are. If to deprive a parent of life is in itself a most heinous crime, the Saguntines were then parricides, because they chose that their parents should die as freemen rather than live as slaves. Thus a case may happen in which there may be no guilt in depriving a parent of life, and very often we cannot without guilt put a slave to death. The circumstances therefore attending this case, and not the nature of the thing, occasion the distinction: these circumstances as they lean to either case, that case becomes the more favourable; but if they appertain alike to both, the acts are then equal. There is this difference-that in killing a slave, if wrong is done, it is a single sin that is committed; but many are involved in taking the life of a father. The object of violence is the man who begat you, the man who fed you, the man who brought you up, the man who gave your position in your home, your family, and the state. This offence is greater by reason of the number of sins (involved in it), and is deserving of a proportionately greater punishment. But in life we are not to consider what should be the punishment of each offence, but what is the rule of right to each individual. We are to consider everything that is not becoming as wicked, and everything which is unlawful as heinous. What! even in the most trifling matters? To be sure; for if we are unable to regulate the course of events, yet we may place a bound to our passions. If a player dances ever so little out of time, if a verse is pronounced by him longer or shorter by a single syllable than it ought to be, he is hooted and hissed off the stage. And shall you, who ought to be better regulated than any gesture, and more regular than any verso shall you be found faulty even in a syllable

of conduct? I overlook the trifling faults of a poet; but shall I approve my fellow citizen's life while he is counting his misdeeds with his fingers? If some of these are trifling, how can it be regarded as more venial when whatever wrong is committed, is committed to the violation of reason and order? Now, if reason and order are violated, nothing can be added by which the offence can seem to be aggravated.

PARADOX IV.

THAT EVERY FOOL IS A MADMAN.

I WILL now convict you, by infallible considerations, not as a fool, as I have often done, nor as a villain, as I always do, but as insane and mad. Could the mind of the wise man, fortified as with walls by depth of counsel, by patient endurance of human ills, by contempt of fortune; in short, by all the virtues-a mind that could not be expelled out of this community-shall such a mind be overpowered and taken by storm? For what do we call a community? Surely, not every assembly of thieves and ruffians? Is it then the entire rabble of outlaws and robbers assembled in one place? No; you will doubtless reply. Then this was no community when its laws had no force; when its courts of justice were prostrated; when the custom of the country had fallen into contempt; when, the magistrates having been driven away by the sword, there was not even the name of a senate in the state. Could that gang of ruffians, that assembly of villains which you headed in the forum, could those remains of Catiline's frantic conspiracy, diverted to your mad and guilty schemes, be termed a community? I could not therefore be expelled from a community, because no such then existed. I was summoned back to a community when there was a consul in the state, which

The reference here is to beating time to the quantity of syllables in a verse, and the term breviora, which is here rendered by the word “trifling," indicates the short syllables in the metre.

This paradox takes for its illustration the life of Publius Clodius, a Roman soldier of noble birth, but infamous for the corruption of his morals. He was ultimately slain by the retinue of Milo, in a rencontre which took place between the two as Milo was journeying towards Lanuvium, his native place, and Clodius was on his way to Rome.