Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

[32] From the Latin, _convertere_--that is, by an act of the WILL _to turn towards_ the true pole, _at the same time_ (for this is the force of the prepositive _con_) that the understanding is convinced and made aware of its existence and direction.

APHORISM XXIX.

Awakened by the cock-crow, (a sermon, a calamity, a sick bed, or a providential escape) the Christian pilgrim sets out in the morning twilight, while yet the truth (the νομος τελειος ὁ της ἑλευθεριας) is below the horizon. Certain necessary _consequences_ of his past life and his present undertaking will be _seen_ by the refraction of its light: more will be apprehended and conjectured. The phantasms, that had predominated during the hours of darkness, are still busy. Though they no longer present themselves as distinct forms, they yet remain as formative motions in the pilgrim's soul, unconscious of its own activity and overmastered by its own workmanship. Things take the signature of thought. The shapes of the recent dream become a _mould_ for the objects in the distance; and these again give an outwardness and a sensation of reality to the shapings of the dream. The bodings inspired by the long habit of selfishness, and self-seeking cunning, though they are now commencing the process of their purification into that fear which is the _beginning_ of wisdom, and which, as such, is ordained to be our guide and safeguard, till the sun of love, the perfect law of liberty, is fully arisen--these bodings will set the fancy at work, and haply, for a time, transform the mists of dim and imperfect knowledge into determinate superstitions. But in either case, whether seen clearly or dimly, whether beholden or only imagined, the _consequences_, contemplated in their bearings on the individual's inherent[33] desire of happiness and dread of pain, become _motives_: and (unless all distinction in the words be done away with, and either prudence or virtue be reduced to a superfluous synonyme, a redundancy in all the languages of the civilized world), these motives, and the acts and forbearances directly proceeding from them, fall under the head of PRUDENCE, as belonging to one or other of its four very distinct species.

I. It may be a prudence, that stands in opposition to a higher moral life, and tends to preclude it, and to prevent the soul from ever arriving at the hatred of sin for its own exceeding sinfulness (Rom. vii. 13): and this is an EVIL PRUDENCE.

II. Or it may be a _neutral_ prudence, not incompatible with spiritual growth: and to this we may, with especial propriety, apply the words of our Lord, "What is not _against_ us is for us." It is therefore an innocent, and (being such) a proper, and COMMENDABLE PRUDENCE.

III. Or it may lead and be subservient to a higher principle than itself. The mind and conscience of the individual may be reconciled to it, in the foreknowledge of the higher principle, and with a yearning towards it that implies a foretaste of future freedom. The enfeebled convalescent is reconciled to his crutches, and thankfully makes use of them, not only because they are necessary for his immediate support, but likewise, because they are the means and conditions of EXERCISE; and by exercise, of establishing, _gradatim paulatim_, that strength, flexibility, and almost spontaneous obedience of the muscles, which the idea and cheering presentiment of health hold out to him. He finds their _value_ in their present necessity, and their _worth_ as they are the instruments of finally superseding it. This is a faithful, a WISE PRUDENCE, having indeed, its birth-place in the world, and the _wisdom of this world_ for its father; but naturalized in a better land, and having the wisdom from above for its sponsor and spiritual parent. To steal a dropt feather from the spicy nest of the Phœnix, (the fond humour, I mean, of the mystic divines and allegorizers of Holy Writ,) it is the _son of Terah from Ur of the Chaldees_, who gives a tithe of all to the King of Righteousness, without father, without mother, without descent, (Νομος αυτονομος), and receives a blessing on the remainder.

IV. Lastly, there is a prudence that co-exists with morality, as morality co-exists with the spiritual life: a prudence that is the organ of both, as the understanding is to the reason and the will, or as the lungs are to the heart and brain. This is A HOLY PRUDENCE, the steward faithful and discreet, (οικονομος πιστος και φρονιμος, Luke xii. 42), the "eldest servant" in the family of faith, _born in the house_, and "made the ruler over his lord's household."

Let not, then, I entreat you, my purpose be misunderstood; as if, in _distinguishing_ virtue from prudence, I wished to divide the one from the other. True morality is hostile to that prudence only, which is preclusive of true morality. The teacher, who _subordinates_ prudence to virtue, cannot be supposed to _dispense_ with it; and he who teaches the proper connexion of the one with the other, does not depreciate the lower in any sense; while by making it a link of the same chain with the higher, and receiving the same influence, he raises it.

In general, Morality may be compared to the consonant, Prudence to the vowel. The former cannot be _uttered_ (reduced to practice) but by means of the latter.

[33] The following extract from Leighton's 'Theological Lectures,' sect. II. may serve as a comment on this sentence:

"The human mind, however stunned and weakened by the fall, still retains some faint idea of the good it has lost; a kind of languid sense of its misery and indigence, with affections suitable to these obscure notions. This at least is beyond all doubt and indisputable, that all men wish well to themselves; nor can the mind divest itself of this propensity, without divesting itself of its being. This is what the schoolmen mean, when in their manner of expression they say, that 'the will (voluntas, _not_ arbitrium) is carried towards happiness not simply as _will_, but as _nature_."

I venture to remark that this position, if not more _certainly_ would be more _evidently_ true, if instead of _beatitudo_, the word _indolentia_ (that is, freedom from pain, negative happiness) had been used. But this depends on the exact meaning attached to the term _self_, of which more in another place. One conclusion, however, follows inevitably from the preceding position, namely, that this propensity can never be legitimately made the _principle_ of morality, even because it is no part or appurtenance of the moral will; and because the proper object of the moral principle is to limit and control this propensity, and to determine in what it _may_ be, and in what it _ought_ to be gratified; while it is the business of philosophy to instruct the understanding, and the office of religion to convince the whole man, that otherwise than as a _regulated_, and of course therefore a _subordinate_, end, this propensity, innate and inalienable though it be, can never be realized or fulfilled.

APHORISM XXX.

What the duties of MORALITY are, the apostle instructs the believer in full, comprising them under the two heads of negative and positive; negative, to keep himself pure from the world; and positive, beneficence from loving-kindness, that is, love of his fellow-men (his kind) as himself.

APHORISM XXXI.

Last and highest, come the _spiritual_, comprising all the truths, acts, and duties that have an especial reference to the Timeless, the Permanent, the Eternal: to the sincere love of the True, _as_ truth; of the Good, _as_ good: and of God as both in one. It comprehends the whole ascent from uprightness (morality, virtue, inward rectitude) to _godlikeness_, with all the acts, exercises, and disciplines of mind, will, and affection, that are requisite or conducive to the great design of our Redemption from the form of the evil one, and of our second creation or birth in the divine image.[34]

[34] It is worthy of observation, and may furnish a fruitful subject for future reflection, how nearly this scriptural division coincides with the Platonic, which, _commencing_ with the prudential, or the habit of act and purpose proceeding from enlightened self-interest, [_qui animi imperio, corporis servitio, rerum auxilio, in proprium sui commodum et sibi providus utitur, hunc esse prudentem statuimus_] _ascends_ to the moral, that is, to the _purifying_ and _remedial_ virtues; and seeks its _summit_ in the imitation of the Divine nature. In this last division, answering to that which we have called the Spiritual, Plato includes all those inward acts and aspirations, waitings, and watchings, which have a growth in godlikeness for their immediate purpose, and the union of the human soul with the Supreme Good as their ultimate object. Nor was it altogether without grounds that several of the Fathers ventured to believe that Plato had some dim conception of the necessity of a Divine Mediator, whether through some indistinct echo of the patriarchal faith, or some rays of light refracted from the Hebrew prophets through a Phoenician medium, (to which he may possibly have referred in his phrase, θεοπαραδοτος σοφια, the wisdom delivered from God), or by his own sense of the mysterious contradiction in human nature between the will and the reason, the natural appetences and the not less innate law of conscience (_Romans_ ii. 14, 15.), we shall in vain attempt to determine. It is not impossible that all three may have co-operated in partially unveiling these awful truths to this plank from the wreck of paradise thrown on the shores of idolatrous Greece, to this Divine Philosopher,

Che 'n quella schiera andó più presso al segno
Al qual aggiunge, a chi dal cielo è dato.

_Petrarch: Del Trionfo della Fama, Cap. III. 5, 6._

APHORISM XXXII.

It may be an additional aid to reflection, to distinguish the three kinds severally, according to the faculty to which each corresponds, the part of our human nature which is more particularly its organ. Thus: the prudential corresponds to the sense and the understanding; the moral to the heart and the conscience; the spiritual to the will and the reason, that is, to the finite will reduced to harmony with, and in subordination to, the reason, as a ray from that true light which is both reason and will, universal reason, and will absolute.

REFLECTIONS,

INTRODUCTORY TO

MORAL AND RELIGIOUS APHORISMS.

ON SENSIBILITY.

If Prudence, though practically inseparable from Morality, is not to be confounded with the Moral Principle; still less may Sensibility, that is, a constitutional quickness of Sympathy with Pain and Pleasure, and a keen sense of the gratifications that accompany social intercourse, mutual endearments, and reciprocal preferences, be mistaken, or deemed a Substitute for either. Sensibility is not even a sure pledge of a GOOD HEART, though among the most common meanings of that many-meaning and too commonly misapplied expression.

So far from being either Morality, or one with the Moral Principle, it ought not even to be placed in the same rank with Prudence. For Prudence is at least an offspring of the Understanding; but Sensibility (the Sensibility, I mean, here spoken of), is for the greater part a quality of the nerves, and a result of individual bodily temperament.

Prudence is an _active_ Principle, and implies a sacrifice of Self, though only to the same Self _projected_, as it were, to a distance. But the very term Sensibility, marks its _passive_ nature; and in its mere self, apart from Choice and Reflection, it proves little more than the coincidence or contagion of pleasurable or painful Sensations in different persons.

Alas! how many are there in this over-stimulated age, in which the occurrence of excessive and unhealthy sensitiveness is so frequent, as even to have reversed the current meaning of the word, _nervous_. How many are[35] there whose sensibility prompts them to remove those evils alone, which by hideous spectacle or clamorous outcry are present to their senses and disturb their selfish enjoyments. Provided the dunghill is not before their parlour window, they are contented to know that it exists, and perhaps as the hotbed on which their own luxuries are reared. Sensibility is not necessarily Benevolence. Nay, by rendering us tremblingly alive to trifling misfortunes, it frequently prevents it, and induces an effeminate Selfishness instead,

---- pampering the coward heart,
With feelings all too delicate for use.
Sweet are the Tears, that from a Howard's eye
Drop on the cheek of one, he lifts from earth:
And he, who works me good with unmoved face,
Does it but half. He chills me, while he aids,
My Benefactor, not my Brother Man.
But even this, this _cold_ benevolence,
Seems Worth, seems Manhood, when there rise before me,
The sluggard Pity's vision-weaving tribe,
Who sigh for wretchedness yet shun the wretched,
Nursing in some delicious solitude,
Their slothful Loves and dainty Sympathies.[36]

Lastly, where Virtue is, Sensibility is the ornament and becoming Attire of Virtue. On certain occasions it may almost be said to _become_[37] Virtue. But Sensibility and all the amiable qualities may likewise become, and too often _have_ become, the panders of Vice and the instruments of Seduction.

So must it needs be with all qualities that have their rise only in _parts_ and _fragments_ of our nature. A man of warm passions may sacrifice half his estate to rescue a friend from prison; for he is naturally sympathetic, and the more social _part_ of his nature happened to be uppermost. The same man shall afterwards exhibit the same disregard of money in an attempt to seduce that friend's wife or daughter.

All the evil achieved by Hobbes, and the whole School of Materialists will appear inconsiderable, if it be compared with the mischief effected and occasioned by the sentimental Philosophy of STERNE, and his numerous imitators. The vilest appetites and the most remorseless inconstancy towards their objects, acquired the titles of _the Heart, the irresistible Feelings, the too tender Sensibility;_ and if the Frosts of Prudence, the icy chains of Human Law thawed and vanished at the genial warmth of Human _Nature_, who _could help it_? It was an amiable Weakness!

About this time, too, the profanation of the word Love, rose to its height. The French Naturalists, Buffon and others, borrowed it from the sentimental Novelists: the Swedish and English Philosophers took the contagion; and the Muse of Science condescended to seek admission into the Saloons of Fashion and Frivolity, _rouged_ like a harlot, and with the harlot's wanton leer. I know not how the Annals of Guilt could be better forced into the service of Virtue, than by such a Comment on the present paragraph, as would be afforded by a selection from the sentimental correspondence produced in Courts of Justice within the last thirty years, fairly translated into the true meaning of the words, and the actual Object and Purpose of the infamous writers.

Do you in good earnest aim at Dignity of Character? By all the treasures of a peaceful mind, by all the charms of an open countenance, I conjure you, O youth! turn away from those who live in the Twilight between Vice and Virtue. Are not Reason, Discrimination, Law, and deliberate Choice, the distinguishing Characters of Humanity? Can aught, then, worthy of a human Being, proceed from a Habit of Soul, which would exclude all these and (to borrow a metaphor from Paganism) prefer the den of Trophonius to the Temple and Oracles of the God of Light? Can any thing _manly_, I say, proceed from those, who for Law and Light would substitute shapeless feelings, sentiments, impulses, which as far as they differ from the vital workings in the brute animals, owe the difference to their former connexion with the proper Virtues of Humanity; as dendrites derive the outlines, that constitute their value above other clay-stones, from the casual neighbourhood and pressure of the plants, the names of which they assume? Remember, that Love itself in its highest earthly Bearing, as the ground of the marriage union,[38] becomes Love by an inward FIAT of the Will, by a completing and sealing Act of Moral Election, and lays claim to permanence only under the form of DUTY.

[35] This paragraph is abridged from the _Watchman_, No. IV. March 25, 1796; respecting which the inquisitive Reader may consult my 'Literary Life.'--_Author's note_ in editions 1 (1825) and 1836, since suppressed.--ED.

[36] Coleridge's 'Reflections On Having Left a Place of Retirement,' l. 48, &c. ('Sibylline Leaves,' 1797).--ED.

[37] There sometimes occurs an apparent _play_ on words, which not only to the Moralizer, but even to the philosophical Etymologist, appears more than a mere Play. Thus in the double sense of the word, _become_. I have known persons so anxious to have their dress _become_ them, as to convert it at length into their proper self, and thus actually to _become_ the dress. Such a one, (safeliest spoken of by the _neuter_ pronoun), I consider as but a suit of _live_ finery. It is indifferent whether we say--It _becomes_ he, or, he _becomes_ it.

[38] It might be a mean of preventing many unhappy marriages, if the youth of both sexes had it early impressed on their minds, that Marriage contracted between Christians is a true and perfect Symbol or Mystery; that is, the actualizing Faith being supposed to exist in the Receivers, it is an outward Sign co-essential with that which it signifies, or a living Part of that, the whole of which it represents. Marriage, therefore, in the Christian sense (Ephesians v. 22-33), as symbolical of the union of the Soul with Christ the Mediator, and with God through Christ, is perfectly a _sacramental_ ordinance, and not retained by the Reformed Churches as one of THE Sacraments, for two reasons; first, that the Sign is not _distinctive_ of the Church of Christ, and the Ordinance not peculiar nor owing its origin to the Gospel Dispensation; secondly, it is not of universal obligation, not a means of Grace enjoined on all Christians. In other and plainer words, Marriage does not contain in itself an open Profession of Christ, and it is not a Sacrament of the _Church_, but only of certain Individual Members of the Church. It is evident, however, that neither of these reasons affect or diminish the _religious_ nature and dedicative force of the marriage Vow, or detract from the solemnity in the Apostolic Declaration: THIS IS A GREAT MYSTERY.

The interest which the state has in the appropriation of one woman to one man, and the civil obligations therefrom resulting, form an altogether distinct consideration. When I meditate on the words of the Apostle, confirmed and illustrated as they are, by so many harmonies in the Spiritual Structure of our proper Humanity, (in the image of God, male and female created he the man), and then reflect how little claim so large a number of legal cohabitations have to the name of Christian marriages--I feel inclined to doubt whether the plan of celebrating marriages universally by the Civil Magistrate, in the first instance, and leaving the _religious_ Covenant and sacramental Pledge to the election of the parties themselves, adopted during the Republic in England, and in our own times by the French Legislature, was not _in fact_, whatever it might be in intention, _reverential_ to Christianity. At all events, it was their own act and choice, if the parties made bad worse by the profanation of a Gospel Mystery.

PRUDENTIAL APHORISMS.

APHORISM I.

LEIGHTON AND COLERIDGE.

With respect to any final aim or end, the greater part of mankind live at hazard. They have no certain harbour in view, nor direct their course by any fixed star. But to him that knoweth not the port to which he is bound, no wind can be favourable; neither can he who has not yet determined at what mark he is to shoot, direct his arrow aright.

It is not, however, the less true, that there is a proper object to aim at; and if this object be meant by the term happiness, (though I think that not the most appropriate term for a state, the perfection of which consists in the exclusion of all _hap_ (that is, chance)), I assert that there is such a thing as human happiness, as _summum bonum_, or ultimate good. What this is, the Bible alone shows clearly and certainly, and points out the way that leads to the attainment of it. This is that which prevailed with St. Augustine to study the Scriptures, and engaged his affection to them. "In Cicero, and Plato, and other such writers," says he, "I meet with many things acutely said, and things that excite a certain warmth of emotion, but in none of them do I find these words, _Come unto me, all ye that labour, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest_."[39]

COMMENT.

Felicity, _in its proper_ sense, is but another word for fortunateness, or happiness; and I can see no advantage in the improper use of words, when proper terms are to be found, but, on the contrary, much mischief. For, by familiarizing the mind to _equivocal_ expressions, that is, such as may be taken in two or more different meanings, we introduce confusion of thought, and furnish the sophist with his best and handiest tools. For the juggle of sophistry consists, for the greater part, in using a word in one sense in the premise, and in another sense in the conclusion. We should accustom ourselves to _think_, and _reason_, in precise and stedfast terms; even when custom, or the deficiency, or the corruption of the language will not permit the same strictness in speaking. The mathematician finds this so necessary to the truths which he is seeking, that his science begins with, and is founded on, the definition of his terms. The botanist, the chemist, the anatomist, &c., feel and submit to this necessity at all costs, even at the risk of exposing their several pursuits to the ridicule of the many, by technical terms, hard to be remembered, and alike quarrelsome to the ear and the tongue. In the business of moral and religious reflection, in the acquisition of clear and distinct conceptions of our duties, and of the relations in which we stand to God, our neighbour, and ourselves, no such difficulties occur. At the utmost we have only to rescue words, already existing and familiar, from the false or vague meanings imposed on them by carelessness, or by the clipping and debasing misusage of the market. And surely happiness, duty, faith, truth, and final blessedness, are matters of deeper and dearer interest for all men, than circles to the geometrician, or the characters of plants to the botanist, or the affinities and combining principle of the elements of bodies to the chemist, or even than the mechanism (fearful and wonderful though it be!) of the perishable Tabernacle of the Soul can be to the anatomist. Among the _aids to_ reflection, place the following maxim prominent: let distinctness in expression advance side by side with distinction in thought. For one useless subtlety in our elder divines and moralists, I will produce ten sophisms of equivocation in the writings of our modern preceptors: and for one error resulting from excess in _distinguishing_ the indifferent, I would show ten mischievous delusions from the habit of _confounding_ the diverse. Whether you are reflecting for yourself, or reasoning with another, make it a rule to ask yourself the precise meaning of the word, on which the point in question appears to turn; and if it may be (that is, by writers of authority _has been_) used in several senses, then ask which of these the word is at present intended to convey. By this mean, and scarcely without it, you will at length acquire a facility in detecting the _quid pro quo_. And believe me, in so doing you will enable yourself to disarm and expose four-fifths of the main arguments of our most renowned irreligious philosophers, ancient and modern. For the _quid pro quo_ is at once the rock and quarry, on and with which the strong-holds of disbelief, materialism, and (more pernicious still) epicurean morality are built.

[39] _Apud Ciceronem et Platonem, aliosque ejusmodi scriptores, multa sunt acute dicta, et leniter calentia, sed in iis omnibus hoc non invenio, Venite ad me_, &c. [Matt. xii. 28.]

APHORISM II.

LEIGHTON.

If we seriously consider what religion is, we shall find the saying of the wise king Solomon to be unexceptionably true: _Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace_.[40]

Doth religion require anything of us more than that we live _soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world_? Now what, I pray, can be more pleasant or peaceable than these? Temperance is always at leisure, luxury always in a hurry: the latter weakens the body and pollutes the soul; the former is the sanctity, purity, and sound state of both. It is one of Epicurus's fixed maxims, "That life can never be pleasant without virtue."

COMMENT.

In the works of moralists, both Christian and Pagan, it is often asserted (indeed there are few common-places of more frequent recurrence) that the happiness even of this life consists solely, or principally, in virtue; that virtue is the only happiness of this life; that virtue is the truest _pleasure_, &c.

I doubt not that the meaning, which the writers intended to convey by these and the like expressions, was true and wise. But I deem it safer to say, that in all the outward relations of this life, in all our outward conduct and actions, both in what we should do, and in what we should abstain from, the dictates of virtue are the very same with those of self-interest, tending _to_, though they do not proceed _from_, the same point. For the outward object of virtue being the greatest producible sum of happiness of all men, it must needs include the object of an intelligent self-love, which is the greatest possible happiness of one individual; for what is true of all, must be true of each. Hence, you cannot become better (that is, more virtuous), but you will become happier: and you cannot become worse (that is, more vicious), without an increase of misery (or at the best a proportional loss of enjoyment) as the consequence. If the thing were not inconsistent with our well-being, and known to be so, it would not have been classed as a _vice_. Thus what in an enfeebled and disordered mind is called prudence, is the voice of nature in a healthful state: as is proved by the known fact, that the prudential duties, (that is, those actions which are commanded by virtue _because_ they are prescribed by prudence), the animals fulfil by natural instinct.

The pleasure that accompanies or depends on a healthy and vigorous body will be the consequence and reward of a temperate life and habits of active industry, whether this pleasure were or were not the chief or only determining _motive_ thereto. Virtue may, possibly, add to the pleasure a good of another kind, a higher good, perhaps, than the worldly mind is capable of understanding, a spiritual complacency, of which in your present sensualized state you can form no idea. It may _add_, I say, but it cannot detract from it. Thus the reflected rays of the sun that gave light, distinction, and endless multiformity to the mind, afford at the same time the pleasurable sensation of _warmth_ to the body.

If then the time has not yet come for any thing higher, act on the maxim of seeking the most pleasure with the least pain: and, if only you do not seek where you yourself _know_ it will not be found, this very pleasure and this freedom from the disquietude of pain may produce in you a state of being directly and indirectly favourable to the germination and up-spring of a nobler seed. If it be true, that men are miserable because they are wicked, it is likewise true, that many men are wicked because they are miserable. Health, cheerfulness, and easy circumstances, the ordinary consequence of Temperance and Industry, will at least leave the field clear and open, will tend to preserve the scales of the judgment even: while the consciousness of possessing the esteem, respect, and sympathy of your neighbours, and the sense of your own increasing power and influence, can scarcely fail to give a tone of dignity to your mind, and incline you to hope nobly of your own Being. And thus they may prepare and predispose you to the sense and acknowledgment of a principle, differing not merely in degree but in _kind_ from the faculties and instincts of the higher and more intelligent species of animals, (the ant, the beaver, the elephant), and which principle is therefore your proper humanity. And on this account and with this view alone may certain modes of pleasurable or _agreeable_ sensation, without confusion of terms, be honoured with the title of refined, intellectual, ennobling pleasures. For Pleasure (and happiness in its proper sense is but the continuity and sum-total of the pleasure which is allotted or happens to a man, and hence by the Greeks called ευτυχια, that is, good-hap, or more religiously ευδαιμονια, that is, favourable providence)--pleasure, I say, consists in the harmony between the specific excitability of a living creature, and the exciting causes correspondent thereto. Considered therefore exclusively in and for itself, the only question is, _quantum_, not _quale_? _How much on the whole?_ the contrary, that is, the painful and disagreeable having been subtracted. The quality is a matter of _taste_: _et de gustibus non est disputandum_. No man can judge for another.

This, I repeat, appears to me a safer language than the sentences quoted above, (that virtue alone is happiness; that happiness consists in virtue, &c.) sayings which I find it hard to reconcile with other positions of still more frequent occurrence in the same divines, or with the declaration of St. Paul: "If in this life only we have hope, we are of all men most miserable."

At all events, I should rely far more confidently on the converse, namely, that to be vicious is to be _miserable_. Few men are so utterly reprobate, so imbruted by their vices, as not to have some lucid, or at least quiet and sober, intervals; and in such a moment, _dum desæviunt iræ_, few can stand up unshaken against the appeal to their own experience--what have been the wages of sin? what has the devil done for you? What sort of master have you _found_ him? Then let us in befitting _detail_, and by a series of questions that ask no loud, and are secure against any _false_, answer, urge home the proof of the position, that to be vicious is to be wretched: adding the fearful corollary, that if even in the body, which as long as life is in it can never be _wholly_ bereaved of pleasurable sensations, vice is found to be misery, what must it not be in the world to come? There, where even the _crime_ is no longer possible, much less the gratifications that once attended it--where nothing of vice remains but its guilt and its misery--vice must be misery itself, all and utter misery.--So best, if I err not, may the motives of prudence be held forth, and the impulses of self-love be awakened, in alliance with truth, and free from the danger of confounding things (the Laws of Duty, I mean, and the Maxims of Interest) which it deeply concerns us to keep distinct, inasmuch as this distinction and the faith therein are essential to our moral nature, and this again the ground-work and pre-condition of the spiritual state, in which the Humanity strives after Godliness, and, in the name and power, and through the prevenient and assisting grace, of the Mediator, will not strive in vain.

The _advantages_ of a life passed in conformity with the precepts of virtue and religion, and in how many and various respects they recommend virtue and religion, even on grounds of prudence, form a delightful subject of meditation, and a source of refreshing thought to good and pious men. Nor is it strange if, transported with the view, such persons should sometimes discourse on the charms of forms and colours to men whose eyes are not yet _couched_; or that they occasionally seem to invert the relations of cause and effect, and forget that there are acts and determinations of the will and affections, the _consequences_ of which may be plainly foreseen, and yet cannot be made our proper and primary _motives_ for such acts and determinations, without destroying or entirely altering the distinct nature and character of the latter. Sophron is well informed that wealth and extensive patronage will be the consequence of his obtaining the love and esteem of Constantia. But if the foreknowledge of this consequence were, and were _found out_ to be, Sophron's main and determining motive for seeking this love and esteem; and if Constantia were a woman that merited, or was capable of feeling, either the one or the other; would not Sophron find (and deservedly too) aversion and contempt in their stead? Wherein, if not in this, differs the friendship of worldlings from true friendship? Without kind offices and useful services, wherever the power and opportunity occur, love would be a hollow pretence. Yet what noble mind would not be offended, if he were thought to value the love for the sake of the services, and not rather the services for the sake of the love?

[40] Proverbs iii. 17.--ED.

APHORISM III.

Though prudence in itself is neither virtue nor spiritual holiness, yet without prudence, or in opposition to it, neither virtue nor holiness can exist.

APHORISM IV.

Art thou under the tyranny of sin? a slave to vicious habits? at enmity with God, and a skulking fugitive from thy own conscience? O, how idle the dispute, whether the listening to the dictates of _prudence_ from prudential and self-interested motives be virtue or merit, when the _not_ listening is guilt, misery, madness, and despair! The best, the most _Christianlike_ pity thou canst show, is to take pity on thy own soul. The best and most acceptable service thou canst render, is to do justice and show mercy to _thyself_.

MORAL AND RELIGIOUS APHORISMS.

APHORISM I.

LEIGHTON.

What the Apostles were in an extraordinary way, befitting the first annunciation of a Religion for all Mankind, this all Teachers of Moral Truth, who aim to prepare for its reception by calling the attention of men to the Law in their own hearts, may, without presumption, consider themselves to be, under ordinary gifts and circumstances; namely, Ambassadors for the Greatest of Kings, and upon no mean employment, the great Treaty of Peace and Reconcilement betwixt him and Mankind.

APHORISM II.

_On the Feelings Natural to Ingenuous Minds towards those who have first led them to Reflect._

LEIGHTON.

Though Divine Truths are to be received equally from every Minister alike, yet it must be acknowledged that there is something (we know not what to call it) of a more acceptable reception of those which at first were the means of bringing men to God, than of others; like the opinion some have of physicians, whom they love.

APHORISM III.

LEIGHTON AND COLERIDGE.

The worth and value of Knowledge is in proportion to the worth and value of its object. What, then, is the best knowledge?

The exactest knowledge of things, is, to know them in their causes; it is then an excellent thing, and worthy of their endeavours who are most desirous of knowledge, to know the best things in their highest causes; and the happiest way of attaining to this knowledge, is, to possess those things, and to know them in experience.

APHORISM IV.

LEIGHTON.

It is one main point of happiness, that he that is happy doth know and judge himself to be so. This being the peculiar good of a reasonable creature, it is to be enjoyed in a reasonable way. It is not as the dull resting of a stone, or any other natural body in its natural place; but the knowledge and consideration of it is the fruition of it, the very relishing and tasting of its sweetness.

REMARK.

As in a Christian land we receive the lessons of Morality in connexion with the Doctrines of Revealed Religion, we cannot too early free the mind from prejudices widely spread, in part through the abuse, but far more from ignorance, of the true meaning of doctrinal Terms, which, however they may have been perverted to the purposes of Fanaticism, are not only scriptural, but of too frequent occurrence in Scripture to be overlooked or passed by in silence. The following extract, therefore, deserves attention, as clearing the doctrine of Salvation, in connexion with the divine Foreknowledge, from all objections on the score of Morality, by the just and impressive view which the Archbishop here gives of those occasional revolutionary moments, that _Turn of the Tide_ in the mind and character of certain Individuals, which (taking a religious course, and referred immediately to the Author of all Good) were in his day, more generally than at present, entitled EFFECTUAL CALLING. The theological interpretation and the philosophic validity of this Apostolic Triad, Election, Salvation, and Effectual Calling, (the latter being the intermediate), will be found among the Comments on the Aphorisms of Spiritual Import. For our present purpose it will be sufficient if only I prove, that the Doctrines are in themselves _innocuous_, and may be both holden and taught without any practical ill-consequences, and without detriment to the moral frame.

APHORISM V.

LEIGHTON.

Two Links of the Chain (namely, Election and Salvation) are up in heaven in God's own hand; but this middle one (that is, Effectual Calling) is let down to earth, into the hearts of his children, and they laying hold on it have sure hold on the other two: for no power can sever them. If, therefore, they can read the characters of God's image in their own souls, those are the counterpart of the golden characters of his love, in which their names are written in the book of life. Their believing writes their names under the promises of the revealed book of life (the Scriptures) and thus ascertains them, that the same names are in the secret book of life which God hath by himself from eternity. So that finding the stream of grace in their hearts, though they see not the fountain whence it flows, nor the ocean into which it returns, yet they know that it hath its source in their eternal election, and shall empty itself into the ocean of their eternal salvation.

If _election_, _effectual calling_, and _salvation_ be inseparably linked together, then, by any one of them a man may lay hold upon all the rest, and may know that his hold is sure; and this is the way wherein we may attain and ought to seek, the comfortable assurance of the love of God. Therefore _make your calling sure_, and by that your _election_; for that being done, this follows of itself. We are not to pry immediately into the decree, but to read it in the performance. Though the mariner sees not the _pole-star_, yet the needle of the compass which points to it, tells him which way he sails: thus the heart that is touched with the loadstone of divine love, trembling with godly fear, and yet still looking towards God by fixed believing, interprets the fear by the love _in_ the fear, and tells the soul that its course is heavenward, towards the haven of eternal rest. He that loves may be sure he was loved first; and he that chooses God for his delight and portion, may conclude confidently, that God has chosen him to be one of those that shall enjoy him, and be happy in him for ever; for that our love and electing of him is but the return and repercussion of the beams of his love shining upon us.

Although from present unsanctification, a man cannot infer that he is not _elected_; for the decree may, for part of a man's life, run (as it were) underground; yet this is sure, that that estate leads to death, and unless it be broken, will prove the black line of reprobation. A man hath no portion amongst the children of God, nor can read one word of comfort in all the promises that belong to them, while he remains unholy.

REMARK.

In addition to the preceding, I select the following paragraphs, as having nowhere seen the terms, Spirit, the Gifts of the Spirit, and the like, so effectually vindicated from the sneers of the Sciolist on the one hand, and protected from the perversions of the Fanatic on the other. In these paragraphs the Archbishop at once shatters and precipitates the only draw-bridge between the fanatical and the orthodox doctrine of Grace, and the Gifts of the Spirit. In Scripture the term Spirit, as a power or property seated in the human soul, never stands singly, but is always _specified_ by a genitive case following; this being a Hebraism instead of the adjective which the writer would have used if he had _thought_, as well as _written_, in Greek. It is "the Spirit of Meekness" (a meek Spirit), or "the Spirit of Chastity," and the like. The moral Result, the specific Form and Character in which the Spirit _manifests_ its presence, is the only sure pledge and token of its presence; which is to be, and which safely may be, inferred from its practical effects, but of which an _immediate_ knowledge or consciousness is impossible; and every pretence to such knowledge is either hypocrisy or fanatical delusion.

APHORISM VI.

LEIGHTON.

If any pretend that they have the Spirit, and so turn away from the straight rule of the Holy Scriptures, they have a spirit indeed, but it is a fanatical spirit, the spirit of delusion and giddiness; but the Spirit of God, that leads his children in the way of truth, and is for that purpose sent them from Heaven to guide them thither, squares their thoughts and ways to that rule whereof it is author, and that word which was inspired by it, and sanctifies them to obedience. _He that saith I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him._ (1 John ii. 4.)

Now this Spirit which sanctifieth, and sanctifieth to obedience, is within us the evidence of our election, and the earnest of our salvation. And whoso are not sanctified and led by this Spirit, the Apostle tells us what is their condition: _If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his._[41] The stones which are appointed for that glorious temple above, are hewn, and polished, and prepared for it here; as the stones were wrought and prepared in the mountains, for building the temple at Jerusalem.

COMMENT.

There are many serious and sincere Christians who have not attained to a fulness of knowledge and insight, but are well and judiciously employed in preparing for it. Even these may study the master-works of our elder Divines with safety and advantage, if they will accustom themselves to translate the theological terms into their _moral_ equivalents; saying to themselves--This may not be _all_ that is meant, but this _is_ meant, and it is that portion of the meaning, which belongs to _me_ in the present stage of my progress. For example: render the words, sanctification of the Spirit, or the sanctifying influences of the Spirit, by Purity in Life and Action from a pure Principle.

We need only reflect on our own experience to be convinced, that the man makes the _motive_, and not the motive the man. What is a strong motive to one man, is no motive at all to another. If, then, the man determines the motive, what determines the man--to a good and worthy act, we will say, or a virtuous Course of Conduct? The intelligent Will, or the self-determining Power? True, _in part_ it is; and therefore the Will is pre-eminently the _spiritual_ Constituent in our Being. But will any reflecting man admit, that his own Will is the only and sufficient determinant of all he _is_, and all he does? Is nothing to be attributed to the harmony of the system to which he belongs, and to the pre-established Fitness of the Objects and Agents, known and unknown, that surround him, as acting _on_ the will, though, doubtless, _with_ it likewise? a process, which the co-instantaneous yet reciprocal action of the air and the vital energy of the lungs in breathing may help to render intelligible.

Again: in the world we see every where evidences of a Unity, which the component parts are so far from explaining, that they necessarily pre-suppose it as the cause and condition of their existing _as_ those parts; or even of their existing at all. This antecedent Unity, or Cause and Principle of each Union, it has since the time of Bacon and Kepler been customary to call a law. This crocus, for instance: or any other flower the reader may have in sight or choose to bring before his fancy. That the root, stem, leaves, petals, &c. cohere to one plant, is owing to an antecedent Power or Principle in the Seed, which existed before a single particle of the matters that constitute the _size_ and visibility of the crocus, had been attracted from the surrounding soil, air, and moisture. Shall we turn to the seed? Here too the same necessity meets us. An antecedent Unity (I speak not of the parent plant, but of an agency antecedent in the order of operance, yet remaining present as the conservative and reproductive Power) must here too be supposed. Analyze the seed with the finest tools, and let the Solar Microscope come in aid of your senses, what do you find? Means and instruments, a wondrous Fairy-tale of Nature, magazines of food, stores of various sorts, pipes, spiracles, defences--a house of many chambers, and the owner and inhabitant invisible! Reflect further on the countless millions of seeds of the same name, each more than numerically differenced from every other: and further yet, reflect on the requisite harmony of all surrounding things, each of which necessitates the same process of thought, and the coherence of all of which to a System, a World, demands its own adequate Antecedent Unity, which must therefore of necessity be present _to_ all and _in_ all, yet in no wise excluding or suspending the individual Law or Principle of Union in each. Now will Reason, will common Sense, endure the assumption, that in the material and visible system, it is highly reasonable to believe a Universal Power, as the cause and pre-condition of the harmony of all particular Wholes, each of which involves the working Principle of its own Union--that it is reasonable, I say, to believe this respecting the Aggregate of _Objects_, which without a _Subject_ (that is, a sentient and intelligent Existence) would be purposeless; and yet unreasonable and even superstitious or enthusiastic to entertain a similar Belief in relation to the System of intelligent and self-conscious Beings, to the moral and personal World? But if in _this_ too, in the great Community of _Persons_, it is rational to infer a One universal Presence, a One present to all and in all, is it not most irrational to suppose that a finite Will can exclude it?

Whenever, therefore, the man is determined (that is, impelled and directed) to act in harmony of inter-communion, must not something be attributed to this all-present power as acting _in_ the Will? and by what fitter names can we call this than the LAW, as empowering; THE WORD, as informing; and THE SPIRIT, as actuating?

What has been here said amounts (I am aware) only to a negative conception; but this is all that is required for a mind at that period of its growth which we are now supposing, and as long as Religion is contemplated under the form of Morality. A _positive_ insight belongs to a more advanced stage; for spiritual truths can only spiritually be discerned. This we know from Revelation, and (the existence of spiritual truths being granted) Philosophy is compelled to draw the same conclusion. But though merely negative, it is sufficient to render the union of Religion and Morality _conceivable_; sufficient to satisfy an unprejudiced inquirer, that the spiritual Doctrines of the Christian Religion are not at war with the reasoning Faculty, and that if they do not run on the same Line (or Radius) with the Understanding, yet neither do they cut or cross it. It is sufficient, in short, to prove, that some distinct and consistent meaning may be attached to the assertion of the learned and philosophic Apostle, that "the Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit"[42]--that is, with _the Will_, as the supernatural in man and the Principle of our Personality--of that, I mean, by which we are responsible Agents; _Persons_, and not merely living _Things_.[43]

It will suffice to satisfy a reflecting mind, that even at the porch and threshold of Revealed Truth there is a great and worthy sense in which we may believe the Apostle's assurance, that not only doth "the Spirit aid our infirmities;"[44] that is, _act on_ the Will by a predisposing influence _from without_, as it were, though in a spiritual manner, and without suspending or destroying its freedom (the possibility of which is proved to us in the influences of education, of providential occurrences, and, above all, of example) but that in regenerate souls it may act _in_ the will; that uniting and becoming one[45] with our will or spirit, it may make "intercession for us;"[46] nay, in this intimate union taking upon itself the form of our infirmities, may intercede for us "with groanings that cannot be uttered." Nor is there any danger of Fanaticism or Enthusiasm as the consequence of such a belief, if only the attention be carefully and earnestly drawn to the concluding words of the sentence (Romans viii. 26); if only the due force and _full_ import be given to the term _unutterable_ or _incommunicable_, in St. Paul's use of it. In this, the strictest and most proper use of the term, it signifies, that the subject, of which it is predicated, is something which I _cannot_, which from the nature of the thing it is impossible that I should, communicate to any human mind (even of a person under the same conditions with myself) so as to make it _in itself_ the object of his direct and immediate consciousness. It cannot be the object of _my own_ direct and immediate Consciousness; but must be _inferred_. Inferred it may be _from_ its workings; it cannot be perceived _in_ them. And, thanks to God! in all points in which the knowledge is of high and necessary concern to our moral and religious welfare, from the _Effects_ it may safely be inferred by us, from the Workings it may be assuredly known; and the Scriptures furnish the clear and unfailing Rules for directing the inquiry, and for drawing the conclusion.

If any reflecting mind be surprised that the aids of the Divine Spirit should be deeper than our Consciousness can reach, it must arise from the not having attended sufficiently to the nature and necessary limits of human Consciousness. For the same impossibility exists as to the first acts and movements of our own will--the farthest distance our recollection can follow back the traces, never leads us to the first foot-mark--the lowest depth that the light of our Consciousness can visit even with a doubtful glimmering, is still at an unknown distance from the ground: and so, indeed, must it be with all Truths, and all modes of Being that can neither be counted, coloured, or delineated. Before and After, when applied to such Subjects, are but allegories, which the Sense or Imagination supplies to the Understanding. The Position of the Aristotelians, _nihil in intellectu quod non prius in sensu_, on which Mr. Locke's Essay is grounded, is irrefragable: Locke erred only in taking half the Truth for a whole Truth. Conception is consequent on Perception. What we cannot _imagine_, we cannot, in the proper sense of the word, conceive.

I have already given one definition of Nature. Another, and differing from the former in words only, is this: Whatever is representable in the forms of Time and Space, is Nature. But whatever is comprehended in Time and Space, is included in the Mechanism of Cause and Effect. And conversely, whatever, by whatever means, has its principle in itself, so far as to _originate_ its actions, cannot be contemplated in any of the forms of Space and Time; it must, therefore, be considered as _Spirit_ or _Spiritual_ by a mind in that stage of its developement which is here supposed, and which we have agreed to understand under the name of Morality, or the Moral State: for in this stage we are concerned only with the forming of _negative_ conceptions, _negative_ convictions; and by _spiritual_ I do not pretend to determine _what_ the Will _is_, but what it is _not_--namely, that it is not Nature. And as no man who admits a Will at all, (for we may safely presume that no man not meaning to speak figuratively, would call the shifting current of a stream the WILL[47] of the river), will suppose it _below_ Nature, we may safely add, that it is super-natural; and this without the least pretence to any positive Notion or Insight.