bring forth his natural, his first sentiments about them; for he shall find that even the most illiterate have a strong moral sense. Quae enim natio non comitatem, non benignitatem, non gratum animum & beneficii memorem diligit, quae superbos, quae maleficos, quae crudeles, quae ingratos non aspernatur non odit?45
It is absurd to suppose a moral sense not to be from nature.
Art cannot create.
Indeed, if these sentiments of virtue and vice common to all men, and which none can fully extirpate from their minds, are not from nature, but are the offspring of flattery upon pride, and begot by the devices of cunning politicians; we are, that is, society is much more indebted to such politics than to nature: for such sentiments are the bond, the cement which holds society together, without which nothing that is truly great or noble could subsist in human life. But how ridiculous is it to ascribe them to any thing else but nature? For how can custom, education, example, or study, give us new ideas? “They might make us see private advantage<137> in actions whose uselessness did not at first appear; or give us opinions of some tendency of actions to our detriment, by some nice deductions of reason; or by a rash prejudice, when upon the first view of the action we should have observed no such thing: but they never could have made us apprehend actions as amiable or odious, without any consideration of our own advantage.”a Let such philosophers consider, that it must be a determination previous to reason, which makes us pursue even private good as our end. No end can be intended without desire or affection, and it is nature alone can implant any appetite, any affection or determination in our nature, whether toward private good or publick good; whether toward pleasure of outward sense, or pleasure of inward approbation. It is equally absurd in the natural and moral world, to suppose that art can create; it can only work upon subjects according to their original properties, and the laws of nature’s appointment, agreeably to which certain effects may be produced upon them. No art can therefore educe from our natures an affection or determination that is not originally there, no more than art can give bodies a property which they have not.
A moral sense does not suppose innate ideas.
But moral ideas are continually haunting our mind.
To assert a determination in our mind to receive the sentiments or simple ideas of approbation or disapprobation from actions so soon as they are presented, antecedent to any opinions of advantage or loss to redound to ourselves from them, is not to assert innate ideas, or innate knowledge; it is only to assert an aptitude or determination in our nature to be affected in a certain manner so soon as they occur to the mind. And this must be true with regard to the mind in respect of every pleasure it receives, that it is fitted by nature to receive it. But it is well worth observing, “That though we have no innate ideas, in the sense now commonly affixed to these words; yet as in the sensible kinds of objects, the <138>species, the images of bodies, colours and sounds are perpetually moving before our eyes, and actinga on our senses, even when we sleep, so in the moral and intellectual kind, the forms and images are no less active and incumbent on the mind at all seasons, and even when the real objects themselves are absent. But in these vagrant characters or pictures of manners, which the mind of necessity figures to itself, and carries still about with it, the heart cannot remain neutral, but constantly takes part with one or other: however false and corrupt it may be within itself, it finds the difference as to beauty and comeliness between one heart and another, one turn of affection, one sentiment, one behaviour from another; and accordingly, in all disinterested cases must approve in some manner what is natural and honest, and disapprove what is dishonest and corrupt.” Whether we will or not, moral ideas are always haunting and assaulting us: we must not only shun the world, but shun and avoid ourselves to get entirely rid of them. And let the most hardened, callous wretch, the most abandoned to all sense of honour, shame and integrity that ever existed say, if he dares in a serious conversation with himself approve one vice, or disapprove one virtue, however profitable the one, or disadvantageous the other may be.
Nature therefore hath not left us quite indifferent to virtue and vice.
Thus then we see how we are constituted, with regard to a rule and standard of action, and that nature has not left us quite indifferent to virtue and vice,b but hath planted in us a natural sense,<139> which as often as consulted, will not fail to tell us our duty and set us right; and which, let it be opposed or born down with ever so much violence, or lulled asleep by whatever delusive arts, will often uncalled upon, tell the villain to his face he is such, and bitterly tear his guilty mind with agonizing remorse, terrible beyond expression. And who can bear the horrid pangs of a guilty, self-condemning heart, conscious of the worth and excellence of abandoned virtue, and of the baseness, the enormous baseness of every vice, whatever advantages it may bring? We had therefore good reason to say with respect to knowledge, in the first chapter, that nature hath kindly provided us with a natural sense which leads and prompts us to enquire after good, final causes in the administration of nature, and thus directs us to an enquiry the most assistant to virtuous temper, and of the most pleasing kind; and which at the same time directs us in every case, if we will but consult it, to our duty, or to what is excellent, laudable and praise-worthy in itself, independently of all computations with respect to private good, or interest. This sense is therefore justly said to be engraven on our hearts, innate, original, and universal.
But our moral sense, like all our other faculties, must depend on our own culture or care to improve it.
Conclusion.
But then such is our excellent make in general, that this rational sense or moral conscience common to all men, must, like all our other faculties, depend for its strength and improvement upon our culture; <140>a upon our care to preserve, to nourish and improve it. Such, as has been observed, is our frame in general; and therefore, though this sense can no more be produced by education, where it is wanting, than an ear for music; yet as the latter, so the former is greatly improveable by instruction and exercise: both may be rendered less delicate, nay, almost quite dead and insensible; or at least they may be considerably vitiated by wrong practice, by unnatural associations of ideas, through the influence of bad example, and other depraving methods; but both are improveable to a great pitch of perfection by proper pains, and both require cultivation to their improvement. And certainly, with regard to the latter, it is the great business of education, and the great business throughout the whole life of every one, to keep it in due exercise, to preserve it from being corrupted by bad opinions and wrong associations of ideas, or over-powered by contrary, corrupt, head-strong affections: and for this reason very often to reflect seriously upon it, as the dignity of our nature, and to recal to our mind all the motives and considerations which tend to uphold and corroborate it; to accustom ourselves to review our actions, and to pass judgments, not only upon what we have done, but upon what we ought to do in circumstances that may occur: and in fine, thus to accustom our moral sense to work and act, that it<141> may be rendered by the law of habits habitual to us, and may become larger, and more comprehensive than it can be at first; that is, abler to take in complex ideas, and so to judge of wide and extensive objects: till like a well formed ear or eye, it is capable to judge easily and readily, as well as truly, of any the most complicated piece of harmony. Now nothing is more conducive to such improvement of it, next to exercising it about examples, in judging and pronouncing sentence, (which must be the chief thing) than the philosophical consideration of its analogy to our sense of beauty in material forms, and of the connexion in both cases between beauty and utility. In this sense, and in this sense only, can the love of virtue be taught. But this leads me to enquire, how interest and virtue agree, according to the constitution and laws of our nature. For if it shall be found, that in the moral world, as well as in the natural, utility or advantage is inseparately connected with beauty; then must our frame be an excellent whole. “For hitherto we have found our nature to be admirably well constituted, with regard to virtue and vice, or moral conduct.”
Another
