his natural Abilities and no Man will ever pretend in his behalf that he wanted sufficient Means for making the discovery And thus it is in the first and fundamental Principles of good and evil they are so legible in the whole Contrivance and all the Appearances of Nature they are so necessary to the Being and Preservation of Mankind their Equity is so apparent and their Convenience so obvious in every Action of humane Life that no man can reflect upon any thing either within or without him but it must make him sensible of their Obligation and he that does not perceive it is guilty of the same unconceivable Stupidity as the Man that should pass through the World without ever knowing that twice two make four § III. For there are but two Rules of humane Actions either the greater or the smaller Morals as the Platonists divide them The first takes in all the great and fundamental Principles of Morality whose evidence is so notorious that it is not possible for an Upright man not to discern their Goodness and Obligation and whose Usefulness is so common and diffusive and so necessary to the good of all Mankind that it is not so much as possible for any Society to subsist without some regard to their Authority and in these great and fundamental Measures of good and evil all Men and all Nations agree the most civil and the most barbarous People consent in the first Principles of natural Religion and the first Provisions of natural Justice We have no reason to believe there are any Corners in the World void of all Notices of a Deity and all sense of Humanity and though some men that may tell us any thing what they please are pleased to tell us that there are yet they give us very little ground to credit their Report because their Converse in those places was so very short and their Entercourse with those People so very imperfect and withall their Languages so utterly unintelligible to one another it is easy enough to suppose the Inhabitants might have divers Notions of which Strangers were not capable of making the least Observation no nor so much as any Enquiry at least it is sufficient to destroy the Credit of their Testimony concerning their Manners and Customs when the best Information they were capable of was so imperfect and so incompetent But however suppose there were any part of Mankind so desperately debaucht as to live without all sense of God and good Manners yet there are none so much as suspected of so great a degeneracy but such as give us too manifest Tokens of extreme Sottishness and Stupidity as to all the other Necessities and Conveniencies of Life and that live altogether like the brute-Beasts heedless and regardless of themselves and their own Natures without making any reflections upon their own Minds or emproving any observations from their own Experience Now I will not deny but that it is possible for Creatures so utterly supine and negligent to be ignorant of the most common and most obvious Notions of things For all Knowledge is the effect of some Attention and if Men will not attend they deprive themselves of all means of Information If they will not make use of their Faculties it is not the certainty nor the evidence of Truth that can force or obtrude an Impression upon their Minds and though perchance it is possible that the Almighty Power of God may overcome their Dulness yet this is violent and preternatural and it is not to be expected that he should alter the course of Nature only to repair our wilfull Sottishness for that were to destroy the Principles of all Morality and to make us uncapable of all practice of Good and Evil by forcing i. e. destroying our Wills And therefore humane Kind must be govern'd in an humane way and not be overpowred by any such forcible and vehement means as may offer violence to its Liberty So that when the Divine Providence has done all that is fit or necessary to bring them to the knowledg of their Duty it must after all be left to their own Power and the freedom of their own Choice whether they will or will not make use of the means that he has left them for that purpose And therefore as to this it matters not whether the natural Law be written upon the Mind of Man or the nature of Things For wheresoever it may be recorded or howsoever collected it cannot be drawn forth into use and practice without the help of Reflection And though it were properly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a certain number of Propositions imprinted upon the Heart or Conscience of Man yet he may as easily take no notice of what is legible within him as not observe what is plainly deducible from the whole frame and constitution of Nature without him in that the knowledg of both depends entirely upon his own Animadversion So that if the Author of Nature have made any sufficient discovery of his Will and Pleasure either by Instinct or by the Order of Nature that is a sufficient Provision for the due government of Mankind and the common welfare of the World and though there are some few in it so monstrously dull and sottish as not to take the least notice of the most obvious Truths yet that is meerly the defect of their own Will and not any default of his Wisdom and it is enough to secure the common good that their usefulness is so great and notorious that it cannot but be observed by all that make any use of their Understandings And thus is the Consent of Nations a great proof and confirmation of the Laws of Nature for though their differences are numberless as to casual and arbitrary Customs and as to their municipal Laws and their more remote and less usefull Rules of Morality yet as for the great and fundamental Laws of Justice and Religion they are vouch't by the Catholick Consent and Practice of all known Nations both Civil and Savage The belief of a Deity the obligation of Oaths love to Parents and gratitude to Benefactors and to doe to all Men as we would be done to our selves are catholick and obligatory all the World over and are the Laws of Nations as well as Nature or as Aristotle expresses it are of the same force in all places as fire burns every where alike and is of the same use in Greece and in Persia. And these if attended to will provide competently for the great necessities and the main duties of Mankind and from them may easily be derived all other emergent and subordinate Rules of Good and Evil though it is not to be expected they should be ratified with the same consent of Nations and require an equal Obligation in all times and all places because their Usefulness is neither so great nor so certain and by consequence not so likely to be attested with the same agreement of Voices For where the Evidence is not
bare proposal and prosecution of this design immediately brings every Man into a sense of all the main duties of Morality For upon the serious consideration of the nature of Things he cannot but discern in the result of all that Justice and Benevolence has a more effectual tendency to procure his Happiness than Fraud and Oppression And then if upon the force of that perswasion he set himself upon resolutions of Vertue and Honesty he will by a little care and experience gain such a skill in their practice as Men usually do prudence and dexterity in the management of those Affairs that they choose for the serious employment of their Lives For they according to the sagacity of their minds quickly grow subtil and curious in their own proper business so as to be able to perceive the less discernible degrees of advantage and disadvantage and to follow them with greater readiness and to improve them with greater art And so is it if they make it any part of the design of the business of their Lives to look after and obtain their own Contentment and so betake themselves to those courses and manners of life as are most apparently serviceable to that end they cannot but arrive at a competent knowledge and sufficiency not onely in the great and fundamental rules of Morality but in all the subordinate measures and less observable circumstances of good and evil So that it is made almost unavoidable even from the very first instinct of Nature but that all Men must have some sense and notion of their Duty because it is impossible but they must sometimes have some thoughts and some designs of being happy and then if they act in order to it according to the dictates of their own minds and the directions suggested to them by the nature of things they must determin themselves to pursue it in such ways as are agreeable to both i. e. by living according to the Laws of Nature and the Principles of Integrity Or by being sincere in their pretences of Kindness and Benevolence to all Men and faithfull to this Principle in their Entercourses and Transactions with them which alone will easily leade them into the knowledge and bring them under the obligation of all the Duties of Morality because they so naturally arise out of this Principle or are rather so apparently contain'd in it that whoever embraces it as the best Rule of his Actions and the most usefull Instrument of his Happiness cannot as occasion is offer'd but acknowledge himself bound to act according to the rules and prescriptions of all the particular Vertues that are but so many ways and means of pursuing this one general End And in whatsoever capacity we consider Mankind if we are resolved to seek our own happiness in conjunction with the common good and yet nothing is more manifest than that it is not to be compast upon any other terms this will secure a worthy and honest behaviour in all regards and towards all Relations Thus take them in their greater or their lesser Societies this still enforces them to pursue what is usefull or necessary to the good of all some things there are necessary to the welfare of Mankind in general and these take in the fundamental Rules of Morality and the Laws of Nations which are nothing else than the Law of Nature as exercised between Nation and Nation and some things there are that are usefull to one City or a certain Body of Men united under one civil Government and these are provided for by national and municipal Laws and some things there are that have a peculiar Influence upon the good of particular Families and these direct to us the performance of all oeconomical Duties as we stand engaged in our several domestick Relations and lastly some things there are that relate onely to the concernments of single Persons and by these is every Man obliged to deal justly and candidly in all his affairs and transactions So that if Men have any sense of or design for their own Happiness and if they will be upright in the use of those means that they cannot but understand to be most effectual to procure it this alone will irresistibly drive them into a sense and acknowledgment of all their respective obligations And in the same manner might I proceed to draw forth the whole System of all moral Vertues from this natural appetite of Happiness but that is too large an undertaking and more than is necessary to our present purpose it is enough that if Men will follow their own natural Instinct of self-love and take those courses as cannot but appear to themselves most agreeable to it that this alone will guide them into a sufficient knowledge of all the rules of Good and Evil. § IX Thirdly The observation of this Law is farther recommended and in some measure secured by its agreeableness with all the Appetites and Inclinations of humane Nature all our natural desires are not onely just and reasonable in themselves but they incline us to such designs and actions as naturally tend to the good and welfare of Mankind And if there be any practices that have a more remarkable consonancy to our Reasons and are of a greater necessity to our Happiness they are peculiarly gratefull and acceptable to our strongest Instincts and Appetites So that before a Man can cast off his Obedience to the Laws of Nature he must doe violence to all its Inclinations and pervert the bent of its first Impressions as well as affront the dictates of his Understanding i. e. Injustice and Cruelty are Unnatural as well as Unreasonable and all Men are guarded and prejudiced against such attempts by the temper and constitution of their Natures that recoils at an unjust or an unkind action and has some affections so tender that they cannot naturally endure to entertain injurious or wicked designs and withall so strong and vehement that they force him to a prosecution of the most commendable acts of love and kindness So that though they were not establish't into Laws nor received any Sanction from the meer inclinations of Nature though that they must if we suppose an Authour of Nature yet are they thereby endear'd to our care and observation and that is a very considerable advantage to secure their credit and reputation in the world in that it is impossible for any humour to keep up its esteem for any time that is not acceptable to Nature and therefore how much soever Men may labour to debauch their Minds by wicked Customs and affected Impieties yet in spite of all their sturdy Resolutions natural Affection will at last overcome and there are very few if any that can so far harden themselves as to shake off or vanquish all natural Endearments But for a more satisfactory account of this Principle it is necessary to specifie some particular Passions that incline Mankind to a love of Society and Good-nature or in other words to Justice and
and do grant that they were very witty and acute Men but if they will presume so extravagantly upon their own wit as to think themselves such almighty Conjurers as to be able not onely to raise all the parts of dead Matter into Life and Motion but so to inspire them as to make them dance of their own accord into exact Order and Symetry I think the greatest right that their Friends can do them is to tell the World that much Learning has made them mad for it is scarce to be imagin'd that any Man in his right wits could ever so much as dream of so wild a design It is just as if a Person famous for Architecture should grow so odly conceited of his skill as to take upon him with the greatest gravity to instruct the World how to build Houses and Palaces without Work-men by teaching his Art to the Materials themselves whereby Stone Morter Timber Lead Iron Glass shall be enabled to work and contrive themselves into a regular Building his Friends certainly could never take it unkindly if any Man should conclude him a little beside himself And yet this is the very case of all our Mechanick Philosophers that they will be building of stately Worlds without an Artificer For in that alone lies all their folly and it is so enormous in it self that no Man's wit can ever help or mend it Whereas if they would but take the Divine Wisedom into their Mechanicks and make their several ways of mechanism the effects of his contrivance and not the results of blind and stupid Matter for me they might play at mechanising as long and as variously as they please But till then I must beseech them not to take it unkindly if some splenetick People cannot hold and if after this they shall persevere in their complaint the next thing they can doe will be to pity them And thus having removed this poor but plausible Objection that I found spitefully thrown in my way I may now proceed where I broke off Well then if the physical Ends of things are so obvious in the whole contrivance of Nature and if they are laid for the ground-work by the Divine Providence the great lines of Morality that are so plainly interwoven with them must so much the more evidently appear to have been drawn by the same hand For things Moral are not so plain and visible in their own nature as things Physical or the Rules of Good and Evil so easily observable as the Contrivances of Art and Wisedom and therefore when those are drawn out of and connected with these they cannot but derive a greater light from them than they are able to give themselves Thus for example there is nothing more evident than that the Sun whatever other uses it may have is design'd to give Light and Comfort to this lower World and that the regular motions of one or both are so artificially contrived as to be most serviceable to this design insomuch that if any the least alteration were made it must prove a considerable prejudice to this whole Globe Now if the same cause that contrived this exact harmony between the Sun and the Earth has in any part of this Contrivance intimated any Laws of Life then is it as certain that he as much intends that Mankind should govern themselves by those Laws as that the Sun should give light to this World This connexion between the physical and moral ends of things being thus firmly knit the first Observation of Nature will direct us to one great end of Morality and that is universal and mutual Love Kindness and Benevolence between all rational Creatures in that the nature of Things is so laid as to make it appear that he that made it first design'd the Happiness of all and then secondly to oblige us all to prosecute his own design has so ordered the natural course of things as to make every single Man's Happiness to depend upon their honest and sincere endeavours to promote that of the Community And that is all that is requisite to make a Law or enact an Obligation the first declaring the Will of the Law-maker to all his Subjects that are capable of observing it the second engaging their Obedience to it by the Sanctions of Rewards and Punishments But though this be all that the Philosophers think requisite to be proved upon this Argument yet here also as I began higher and founded my Argument of the Law of Nature not upon the bare supposition but the evident demonstration of a Deity so have I proceeded farther to the certain inference of a future State For though that be the natural course of things as they are settled by the Divine Providence and as far as our Actions are in our own power that Interest should be connected with Honesty yet it may and often does so happen that by the voluntary wickedness of other Men they are opposed What then is to be done in that case If interest ought to be preferred then there is no such thing as Honesty for then are we cast upon the Principle of all Wickedness that is not to care what we doe so it be in order to our own particular Self-design and if that be once taken up for our Resolution nothing can ever bring us under any true obligations of Vertue and Goodness If Honesty must be preferred what recompence shall we receive for the conscientious discharge of our Duty For in this Life it is supposed that in this case they run counter and therefore unless the Providence of God have some reserve for it in a Life to come he has obliged us to a Duty without any sufficient Reward that is to say he has obliged us without a sufficient Obligation So that from hence it is as evident that the same Providence that made the World and has interwoven in the make of it the Laws of mutual Justice for the attaintment of our common Happiness has withall secured a future state of Reward for all that uprightly comply with his design because without it they may when they have discharged their Duty be defeated of their Happiness by the default of bad Men. For as all moral Goodness is resolved into that one Principle of seeking the common Good in the first place so is all Wickedness and Immorality into the contrary Principle of neglecting or opposing it Seeing then that all Men have some power over their own Actions for without the supposition of that all Morality sinks into non-sense and nothing and seeing we find by too common experience in the Affairs of the World that good Men when they have done all they can as to the discharge of their Duty and Obligation may be defeated in this Life of their Reward by the wickedness of bad Men what can more evidently follow than that the same Providence that has obliged them to their Duty should secure their Reward in a Life to come These things are so inseparably connected that
of the Law of Nature must first casheir the Being of a God and then indeed as I observed at first our work is done for it is in vain to vindicate the Goodness and Wisdom of his Providence if there be no such thing at all for that destroys the matter of Enquiry and the Supposition upon which we argue and then we must betake our selves to a new dispute and prove the Existence of a Deity and when that is granted we may then and not till then proceed to demonstrate from all the Effects of his Providence the Obligation of his Laws And that is all that can be demanded or need to be performed upon supposition of a Supreme Governour of the World to assign by what Laws he governs it and he is a very unreasonable Man that requires greater Evidence of the Being of a Law than can be given of the Being of the Lawgiver himself and if we have so much we have enough and all that we can justly desire and he that would have more is not to be satisfied without a contradiction This then being granted that there is a Sovereign Cause of the Universe which must be supposed in the order of Nature before we can proceed to any farther Enquiry the best and easiest way to find out the rules and methods of his Government is to reflect upon the naturall order and tendency of things for that being altogether contrived and design'd by himself it manifestly discovers to all that are able to observe the connection between causes and effects what he principally intends and aims at So that all things in Nature being so order'd as to inform every Man that the happiness of all Mankind and every member thereof is to be obtain'd by mutuall Benevolence and by nothing else that is a clear and satisfactory evidence to them all that as it is the end of all his purposes so it is his intention to oblige all his Subjects to act in pursuance of the same design And what could be done more effectually to engage them to it than to let them know if they will know any thing at all not onely that it is his own will and pleasure by that order that he has establish't in the world but also that he expects that they should comply with it as they intend to enjoy all the comforts and escape all the miseries of life and that he has done to purpose when he has made every Man's private Good so manifestly to depend upon his sincere and serious Endeavours to promote the Good of all with the same necessary connexion as naturall Effects do upon their naturall Causes and therefore seeing we have such an ample assurance of the nature of our Duty and such vehement Enforcements to perform it we have all the conditions that can be required to bring us under the Power of a Law or an Obligation to Obedience § V. Now this sense of mutuall Benevolence as it contains in it all the duties of Justice and Equity and is able if attended to without any other direction to preserve men honest and vertuous in all their entercourses of life so it erects without any train of Consequences the two things that are the most necessary to the happiness and security of mankind Society and Propriety in that it consists in nothing else than a just and reasonable Division of every Man's Love between himself and the publick i. e. between himself and all others to whom his Power and Concernment reaches Now if there be a common interest in which every Man is concern'd as he is concern'd in his own that is it that makes Society and if no Man from the naturall condition of his faculties be able to carry on either the one or the other without having a peculiar share divided and appropriated to himself for the exercise and employment of his industry it is that that assigns and settles propriety so that both these result immediately from the constitution of nature and are as evident to any Man that observes the natural frame of things as any experiments in naturall Philosophy or problems in Mathematicks and resolve themselves into such propositions as these that those causes that preserve the whole preserve its parts also and that those that preserve the parts preserve the whole but for a fuller and more distinct demonstration of both we shall prove and consider them apart And first as for Society it is absolutely necessary to the support and comfort of the life of Man for were this once dissolved and should Mankind once betake themselves to the Woods and the Deserts and imitate the manners of wild and unsociable Creatures they must subsist by destroying and preying upon each other and then the most innocent would always be the least secure as never being apt to invade other mens rights and lying always exposed to other mens wrongs and injuries and on the contrary the most injurious would always upon that account be the least unhappy ever studying to enlarge the bounds of their Power by wily and unjust Invasions and then the wanton and the violent Leviathan must at length devour all as being the cruelest and so more apt the strongest and so more able to oppress the rest Whence that saying of one of the Ancients that Laws and Societies were established for the sake of wise and good men viz. to preserve them from the injuries and oppressions of the bad for as much as if these would but be content to prescribe bounds to their appetites and moderate their desires by the capacities of Nature they would never be disposed nor invited to encroach upon other mens enjoyments but whilst their Appetites are unbridled and exorbitant and not restrain'd within the necessities and conveniencies of Nature they must be invading the Shares and Proprieties of their honest and harmless Neighbours to satisfy their wanton and unreasonable Humours This then is the proper end and usefulness of Society to institute a common Amity and Friendship amongst men to unite multitudes together into combinations of Friendship to endear them to each other by mutuall Offices of love and kindness and by a joynt defence of their common welfare against all foreign Injuries and Invasions so that to be just and honest is onely to be true and faithfull to our Friends and were Mankind as faithfull to one another as the condition of their Nature requires and the Author of it expects there would be no need of civil Laws and Penalties that are onely a second and subsidiary help to force a few bad men to preserve that amity and friendship which were they good and vertuous they would choose of their own accord as most reasonable in it self and most agreeable to humane nature So that this is plain that if Men will but reflect upon the Condition of their Natures consider the insufficiency of their own personal Strength to their own Security observe the necessity of a publick Concern in order to the preservation of
they would all run raving and foming up and down the World and every Man fall upon every Man he meets with and that for no other reason than because they are an equall match so that if he did not give he must take the first blow But if we suppose them in their right minds with any sense of humanity or discretion about them able to reflect upon the great advantages of mutuall Benevolence and the horrible mischiefs of a perpetuall Hostility it is easie to imagine how ready and forward such sober People would be to oblige one another by kind and civill Treatments and to rejoyce in any opportunities of doing good Offices to others for the Comfort and Cheerfulness of their own lives So that the result of all this dispute viz. what use men would naturally make of their Power upon one another from the consideration of its Equality is onely to enquire whether Mankind be by nature in or out of their wits if the former may be taken for granted the case is very plain that men unless they are alter'd by preter-naturall distempers are creatures tame and civill enough but if it must be presumed that they are all naturally frantick and void of all principles of reason and sobriety that indeed will be a proper foundation for the Hobbian Politicks and upon that supposition it is possible they may be allowed I am sure they never can upon any other And as for what is farther pretended of the passion of fear the desire of Glory and some other affections of humane Nature that they naturally dispose men into a posture of mutuall violence This too is onely credible upon the former supposition for if all Mankind were acted purely by unaccountable humours and whimseys and were driven upon the wildest and most extravagant attempts without their own consent and deliberation then indeed we might suppose they might be hurried upon rash and fool-hardy actions they know neither why nor how But if these passions how vehement soever are or may be brought under the conduct of reason and discretion and if we have so much power over them as that we may if we please not indulge them any farther than may be consistent with our own quiet and tranquility then the Question is what course a prudent man would take to gratifie these inclinations And that is answer'd from the premises that any Man in his wits whatever he designes would endeavour to carry on all his projects in ways of peace and civility and especially if he were afraid of all other Men he would think it his wisest course rather to court them by offers of friendship than to provoke them by injuries and ill-turns So that the inclination of these passions can onely be accounted for in conjunction with the Reasons and Understandings of Men and then what way a prudent man would naturally determine himself that must be supposed their naturall tendency They are not capable of any certain determination from themselves but receive their Biass from the bent of Mens designs and resolutions and may be inclined either way as they choose to act rashly or advisedly and the same passions that make Fools and Mad-men turbulent make all Men in their wits modest and peaceable And here to this purpose it is pretty to observe that when Mr. Hobbs treats of War and the causes of War it is then manifest in that Chapter that Men are forced into it by the violent passions of Fear and Hope and Glory but then when he proceeds to discourse of Peace and the inducements to Peace the same passions are ready to serve his purpose thereto and the very same naturall causes may be assign'd either for War or Peace as it pleases him and serves his turn and his cause But after this rate of talking it is an easie matter to prove any thing out of any thing it is no more than first to lay two propositions together and proceed to say this follows that though there be no other reason for it than because it did not go before it and that is an Hobbian Demonstration But this may suffice to shew that as mutuall Benevolence is necessary to the happiness of Mankind so is society necessary to the exercise of mutuall Benevolence and if so then if there be a supreme Governour of the World that is an unquestionable proof of its Institution by virtue of his Authority in that without it it is manifest he can never obtain the end of his Creation which if it be any at all must be the happiness of his Creatures a thing plainly impossible to be hoped for without the benefit of Society Especially when he has vested all Mankind in an equall and common Right to the comfort and felicity of their Lives and when we know that he desires and intends the well-fare of all his Off-spring and when he has made that to depend so unavoidably upon the care and the safety of a common Interest all that is a sufficient declaration of his will to all his Creatures that are able to observe and reflect upon that order of things that he has instituted and establish't in the frame of his Creation that he expects they should pursue the same end with himself which is the good of all and make use of such means as are absolutely necessary to its attainment which is Society especially when he has farther enforced it by such powerfull Rewards and Penalties as to annex every single Man's Happiness to the performance and his Misery to the neglect of this Duty § VI. Secondly as for Propriety it is as plainly instituted and injoined by Nature or the Authour of Nature as Society and that upon these two accounts in that every Man 's naturall power and capacity is limited and that unavoidably and by it self introduces a limited use and enjoyment of things for no Man can claim a greater right from Nature than he is capable of enjoying and therefore seeing that is fully provided for by a parcell that is proportion'd to it self and its necessities he cannot challenge by virtue of his naturall Right any power over the Remainder but will be content to leave whatsoever he cannot enjoy himself to other Mens use and advantage and certainly that is very reasonable to allow our Neighbours to challenge their share of happiness when our own turn is fully served and satisfied So that Nature by setting bounds to the capacities of our Appetites and Enjoyments thereby plainly determines the limits of our Rights without setting them forth by any other lines and descriptions For the right of Nature neither is nor can be as some Lawyers and Philosophers have wildly enough defined it any such state of life in which Mankind may be supposed free from all manner of Laws and Obligations because this very supposition is made inconsistent and impossible from the Nature of created Beings which can never be supposed to exist without depending upon and being subject to some superiour Power and
that implies or at least inferrs their Obnoxiousness to Duty and Obligation and then his will or pleasure by whatsoever means it is reveal'd and discover'd becomes the measure both of their Duty and their Liberty And therefore it must needs be a wild account of things that supposes any right of Nature antecedent to the Law of Nature because it is so flat a contradiction to the naturall state of things that carry conscience of Duty and engagements to Obedience in their very existence and therefore to suppose them to be and not to be subject to the law of Nature or the will of its Author is to suppose them both to be and not to be at the same time And though Man be made a free Agent that is endued with a Power to doe whatsoever pleases him yet Power is not Right but the right use of Power is and when he does or desires such things as are fit and consonant to his Nature he observes its Laws and maintains its Rights because he is allowed every thing that is naturall and forbid nothing but what is not So that the Law of Nature is no restraint superinduced upon the desires and liberties of Nature as it is generally conceived but it is such a rule of life as is most agreeable to the naturall state of things and it is onely a regard to that that determines the measures of our Duty and from thence the bounds of our Liberty Naturall Justice consists in restraining our desires to our naturall Appetites all that exceeds them it forbids that is the Law of Nature all that does not it permits and that is the right of Nature so that it is plain that Nature sets bounds to it self by the limitedness of its own Being and that it is impossible there should ever be any state of Nature capable of an unlimited Right for its Liberty can never be greater than its Capacities and therefore if its Powers are confined within certain measures its Rights must be restrained to the same allowances for it is apparently absurd to say that any Man has a right or a licence to doe more than he can doe So vain a conceit is it to suppose that in the state of Nature every Man has a Right to all things when it is so contradictory both to the nature of things and so inconsistent with the reasonable claims of all other Persons and supposes no less absurdity than that Nature and right Reason advise a Man to engross to himself whatsover he can though it be of no advantage to himself and injurious to all the world beside than which nothing can be conceived more disagreeing with the state of Nature and the dictates of right Reason for that being of a limited capacity every Man's understanding cannot but inform him that he ought to challenge no more by virtue of its Right than what it is capable of enjoying and if he do that then he claims it in vain and to no real purpose and that certainly agrees neither with the dictates of Nature nor of right Reason So that though we should remove the Divine Providence out of the world yet notwithstanding the Right or at least the Necessity of Propriety would arise from the naturall constitution of things which will direct every Man to confine his desires to his Appetites and when he has his own share of happiness to content himself with its enjoyment and not to disturb himself or defraud his Neighbours without encreasing his own felicity a thing so apparently absurd that nothing can be more so than to suppose that this is the naturall humour of Mankind and especially of the wiser part of it But then if we suppose a Divine Providence as here we must do we must suppose too that he has given us all a naturall Right and Claim to our portion of happiness from whence it follows that it is but just and reasonable and agreeable to his will that every Man should be willing that others should have Liberty to enjoy their own proper share of Felicity as well as he desires to enjoy his because the same Providence that vests me in a Right to my own Propriety has granted the same Right to all Mankind beside and therefore naturall equity and regard to his Sovereign will commands me to be content with my own allowance and to suffer them to enjoy what is allotted to their share So unavoidable is the Institution of Propriety from the limitedness of our Natures and their naturall Capacities And therefore following the supposition that there was once no Propriety and that all the World lay in common to all its Inhabitants yet the Nature of things would have directed them to a division it being so plainly necessary both to the preservation of the whole species and of every individual Man And so all rational Creatures would be obliged by the same Law and with the same Sanctions to establish Propriety by which they are obliged in obedience to their Creatour's will to promote the publick good And yet this very supposition is a flat contradiction to the naturall condition of Mankind every Man being born in a state of Society and limited use of things for as Mr. Hobbs himself states it we are no sooner born but we are actually under the Power and Authority of our Parents so that it is as naturall to Man to be in subjection as to be born Neither for the Proof hereof is it needfull to appeal to the Testimony of the sacred History or any other ancient Record concerning the Original of Mankind humane Nature it self is a demonstration of its own beginning for seeing it cannot subsist but in individuals and seeing every individual Man is mortall there must be some other cause of the whole race of Mankind And he having so disposed the natural condition of Men as that no Man can come into the World but in a limited state of things that is a demonstrative evidence of its Divine Institution 2. But then Secondly we are forced upon it in that as single Persons cannot enjoy their own Lot so neither can they contribute their Assistance to the publick good but by a limited and appropriated use of things for their naturall Powers being of a finite and contracted force as well as their naturall Appetites they can serve the Common-wealth onely according to the proportion of their Abilities and therefore seeing one man cannot do all things it is necessary every Man should take some particular task for the carrying on of the publick Welfare And if right reason i. e. the mind of Man guiding it self by an upright observation of the Nature of things commands every Man to seek and endeavour the happiness of all Men it commands us to confine our endeavours within the reach of our own Activity for it can require nothing but what is possible by Nature and therefore its Obligation must stint it self to the bounds of every Man's Power and so it promotes the Interest of
the Community by engaging every single Member of it to do his own work and mind his own business So that whoever performs the duty of his Station and Employment serves both himself and the Common-wealth in that the Prosperity of the whole arises from the Industry of the several Parts and their Industry cannot be employed without assigning them distinct Offices and divided Interests for till that be done it will be impossible to prevent those eternall Quarrels and Contentions that must arise about the limits of every Man 's Right and the proportion of every Man's Work and whilst they are taken up with their own picques and animosities the Earth must lye uncultivated and the publick Weal neglected from whence nothing else can naturally follow but perpetuall want and misery And the most common experience informs us that there is no way of avoiding or ending Contentions but by dividing the common Interest into particular shares and setting out every Man his own Propriety so plainly does there follow from the fundamental principle of seeking the publick Good an Obligation upon every Man to accept his own Lot and to leave all others undisturbed in theirs whereby he fully acquits himself as to all the duties of Justice or Honesty whether publick or private And for this Reason has the Divine Providence distributed among the Sons of men variety of Abilities whether naturall or artificiall suitable to all the needs and conveniencies of humane life that so by a joynt contribution of every Man's Talent and Faculty all our wants may some way or other be tollerably supplied so that to do good Offices cannot so properly be said to give as to exchange Favours and they are duties of Justice rather than Charity every Man stands endebted by the bonds and engagements of Nature to cast his Symbol into the publick Stock and therefore if he expect to enjoy the industry of other Men without making any return of some service of his own he does not onely cheat them but he robs and defrauds the whole Society And he that carries on no designs of good but purely for himself is not onely wretched and nigardly but he is false and injurious In short all the Laws of Justice and Society are contain'd in that one excellent and comprehensive Rule Whatsoever ye would that Men should doe unto you even so doe unto them And therefore unless a Man would be content which no Man can be that all other Men should mind nothing but their own meer selves and that in opposition both to his own and the publick Interest he is unjust or does not as he would be done by if he perform not to others the same Offices that he expects from them in all his respective capacities but if he does he is an honest man a good Neighbour and a good Subject and discharges all that can be required of him towards all Relations So that Propriety and Commerce are so far from being of any positive Institution that Mankind are forced upon it by the first necessities of Nature and naturally fall into it for their own subsistence and preservation It s benefit is so obvious and its practice so unavoidable that Men betake themselves to it almost antecedently to their Reasonings The limitedness of every Man 's own Nature confines him to a certain Propriety and the convenience of his own life invites him to trade and transact with others thereby to partake the use of their Proprieties as well as his own for that is the proper advantage of Commerce to emprove and enlarge the comforts of life by mutuall Exchanges whereby every Man enjoys what every Man possesses And this is the naturall Originall of dominion too that is nothing else but a lasting and continued Propriety for if at present I have a Right to a divided use of things both for my own preservation and the common Good their future enjoyment has the same Relation to the future security of both as their present has to the present and therefore it is as naturall and as necessary that I should be vested with a perpetuall Power to hold my Estate against all other claims and pretences hereafter as it is that I should use or enjoy it at present and that is all that we mean by Dominion This may suffice in general to shew how plainly Nature and God by Nature informs Mankind of these great and fundamental Duties of Justice and Morality their Knowledge is so obvious as to make their Obligation unavoidable § VII But beside this undoubted signification of his Will that he has given from the Constitution of all things without us he has farther secured our regard and obedience to it from the Constitution of all things within us there is no Faculty or Passion in humane Nature that does not incline us to or rather enforce us upon their Observation insomuch that we cannot neglect them without doing violence to all our own Inclinations as well as affronting all the dictates of Reason and the directions of Nature I shall not insist upon all Particulars but shall content my self with onely these Three 1. The natural Activity of the Mind of Man 2. It s natural Sense and Appetite of Happiness 3. Some natural Instincts and Inclinations of humane Nature All which necessarily leade to the Knowledge and engage to the Practice of the Laws of Nature All which will amount to no inconsiderable proof of the abundant care that the divine Providence has taken to acquaint us with the nature of our Duty and to endear it to our Regard 1. The natural Activity of the Mind of Man it cannot avoid to reflect upon its own Nature and observe its own Inclinations and Faculties and by that means it immediately perceives it self to be a thinking or a reasonable Being and then it is as natural to it to act suitably to the condition of its Nature as it is to all other Creatures to follow the Instincts and Appetites of theirs for as the brute-Beasts are prompted to pursue agreeable Objects by an inward Sense of their own Desires and Necessities so is Man inclined to act rationally by that inward Assurance he has that he is endued with Reason and Understanding and that alone is sufficient to bring an Obligation upon him without any other express and positive Command For as by this Reflection he is lead into the Knowledge of Himself and his Nature so by that Knowledge is he instructed in the Rule of his Duty which is onely to live and behave himself as becomes a reasonable Creature and in that consists the morality of his Actions so that from the Nature of Man and from the Knowledge of his own Nature of which yet it is impossible for him to be ignorant results the Sense and the Conscience of his Duty because he cannot so much as reflect upon himself and yet that he cannot avoid without being conscious of the Faculties of his Mind and when he is so it is not more
easie matter the Law is forced to pass Judgment on the wrong side But beside the injuries of Fraud the greatest miseries brought upon Mankind by Injustice are supported by Power and Greatness and in such cases the Tyrant and Oppressour defies all discovery and though he cares not if all the World sees his Wickedness yet if any Man shall pretend to have his Eyes open he shall forfeit his head for the boldness of his Eye-sight So that if this were the onely state of things the Governour of the World has provided neither sufficient rewards for Justice and Honesty nor restraints from Fraud and Oppression And if he has not then he has laid no effectual obligation upon Mankind to be Just and Honest for the force of every Command depends upon its Sanction and therefore if he have injoin'd this Duty and have not backt it with sufficient motives of Obedience he has onely enacted useless and ineffectual Laws In short the onely difference between the Man that is Honest and the Man that is not is meerly this that the one prefers his Duty before his present Interest and the other his present Interest before his Duty For if he observe the Rules of Justice onely so far as they conduce to his own ends then whenever they happen to thwart he is obliged to quit his Duty rather than his Interest And when he does so he is so far destitute of all Principles of Honesty that he is entirely govern'd by the fundamental Maximes of Fraud and Oppression And if this be the onely difference that distinguishes Good and Bad Men I would fain know what motive or reason a good Man has to pursue his Duty when contrary to his Interest or a bad Man has to quit his Interest out of respect to his Duty if there be no other state of things than the present And therefore without Immortality Justice is so far from deserving our regard in all cases that in many it is a contradiction to the first Instinct of Nature that is self-love in that it obliges a Man to act cross to that without any reason or recompence for his so doing And therefore seeing the Providence of God has prescribed to us those many and plain Laws of Justice that I have discover'd from the Nature of Things in the precedent Discourse it unavoidably follows that upon that Supposition those Laws that he has prescribed must be abetted with the Rewards and Punishments of a future State because those of this if taken alone and separate from those of that are not of sufficient force and validity And as Justice the most necessary so Fortitude the most noble of all Vertues will have no Foundation upon the Epicurean Principles or rather will sink together with them For if there be no such thing as Justice to what purpose should any Man run himself into hazards and hardships for the sake of it and yet that is the onely Office of Magnanimity which when separated from a good Cause is no more than folly and fool-hardiness and in a bad Cause is no better than cruelty and oppression And beside this as every Vertue must have some Principle to warrant its Wisedom and Reasonableness so above all others Magnanimity because it puts us upon the severest and hardest Service and does more than any Vertue beside endanger our own Interest for the sake of Duty But if there be no other Interest than that of this Life it is apparent madness for any Man to hazard Life and Fortune and all that is dear to him here for any thing whatsoever when all other Motives that can be proposed to him are of less concernment to himself than his own Self-preservation Beside true Magnanimity bottoms all its Courage and Assurance upon no other Principle than the Conscience of its own Integrity It is that alone that gives a Man a sufficiency and satisfaction from himself that raises him to a contempt of all outward things that makes him searfull of all Assaults and Dangers and that supports him under all Losses and Misfortunes as esteeming all things whatsoever as mean and worthless Trifles in comparison to the Happiness of its own Reflections But then as Conscience is the onely support of Courage so is immortality of Conscience for that is nothing else but the Mind of Man acting with reference to the future Judgment of God And therefore from thence alone it derives all its Force and Authority and without that all seeming regard to it is nothing but Pretence and Pageantry For what comfort will a good Conscience afford a Man if he be to give no Account of his Actions Upon that Supposition the Guilty and the Innocent are upon equall Terms when the best Man is ne'er the better for all his Vertues nor the other the worse for all his Villanies If then Integrity of Conscience be the onely Principle of all Magnanimity and if the firmness of that depends meerly upon Immortality then that being taken away the one sinks into Crast the other into Cowardize In short there are but two Offices of Magnanimity either to doe or to suffer gallantly both which are manifest Contradictions to the Epicurean Principles For what Inducements can that Man have to put himself upon Hardships who knows no other Happiness but Ease and Lasiness And therefore upon their Supposition it was wise Advice of Metrodorus to his Brother not to concern himself in desence and preservation of his Country but to eat and drink with philosophick Wisedom and Discretion And then as for bearing up decently under Calamities I have already shewn that they have not one Principle wherewith to support themselves and without such Principles as can supply the absence of their present Happiness nothing else can relieve their Loss and therefore instead of bearing up with any chearfulness under Miseries and Afflictions they must for ever sink into insupportable Anguish and Despair And now from these Premises to mention no more Particulars because all the other Vertues depend upon these it is demonstratively evident that to root up the sentiments of Immortality out of the Minds of Men is to blast and put out the Sun and to overwhelm the World in eternal Night and Darkness Erasing all the Foundations of Happiness tearing up all the Roots of Vertue and laying wast all the Principles of humane Nature and humane Society And as Plutarch discourses where such Principles of Philosophy prevail as enervate the Laws of Vertue Men have nothing left to distinguish them from Brute-beasts but that they want the Claws of Lyons and the Teeth of Wolves the Stomachs of Oxen and the Backs of Camels In a word upon this single Principle of a future State depend all the differences of Good and Evil if this stand firm Vertue is secure but otherwise after all that care that the Divine Providence has taken to recommend it to us it is all no more than Craft or Folly § XXV And now having thus far and fairly
necessities of Kindred Friends and Neighbours What a strange variety of Ingredients is here prescribed to make up an unattainable Happiness For can any Man ever be so phantastick as to imagine he can compass all these particulars If he can he is certain to enjoy more Happiness from his Fancy than ever he can reap from his actual Enjoyment No the World is too thick crowded with Evils for any Person that passes through it to escape them all and yet one single sorrow embitters all our comforts and one disaster rifles the magazine of all our joys At least one acute Disease withers the most prosperous and flourishing condition so that suppose a Man whose Enjoyments are as great as his Desires enriched with Vertue and in favour with Fortune yet one sharp Distemper despoils him of all his Comforts and one rebellious Humour is enough to poison a whole Sea of Content and mountains of Joy are not able to counterpoise one single Misery Suppose a Man advanced to the top of all possible Prosperity and encircled with an affluence of all Delights yet a fit of the Stone disrobes him of all his Grandieur and casts him into a condition infinitely more comfortless than the most desperate and forlorn Poverty And this is the saddest proof of the inevitable misery of humane Life to consider to what innumerable sorrows we are obnoxious and how impossible it is to escape them all and yet if one single Misery do but mix it self with all our Joys how suddainly do they vanish and disappear and how fatally do we sink under the intolerable Burthen In short all the Glory and all the Happiness of Mankind is not able to support him under an ordinary Distemper To say nothing of the Gout the Cholick the Stone Pleurisies Feavours Consumptions and a thousand more Instruments of humane Miseries the Palpitation of the Heart that is scarce accounted among Diseases if we may believe Cardan who knew it very well is like the pains of the damned Nay if but a fit of the Tooth-ache make any Man miserable he can neither eat nor sleep and whilst it lasts it is not in the power of all the Wealth and all the Philosophy in the World to help or to relieve him From all which it is sufficiently evident what good reason he had to renounce his own Masters that would have every wise Man secure of his Happiness and yet make the goods of Body and Fortune part of it of which no Man can have any security And now let us see how he acquits himself upon his own new Principles § XXX First he refers us to his foregoing Disputations that if he have there concluded as he ought according to the Rules of Logick that then Vertue alone is abundantly sufficient to its own Happiness because he has there effectually taken away all perturbations both of Mind and Body which being removed every thing is avoided that is destructive of an happy Life for it is they and they onely that make him miserable so that Vertue being able to cure or remove them all 't is for that reason alone sufficient to its own Happiness But then if he have performed nothing of all this in his former Disputations then this way of arguing turns back upon himself that Mankind is fatally miserable in that it is exposed to so many Evils which it is not in our power either to fly or conquer For as himself argues how is it possible for any Man not to be miserable that fears either Death or Pain when the one is often present and the other always at hand to which if you add all the innumerable calamities of Life some whereof we feel and all we fear and if we have no remedy against all that trouble they create we are not onely not happy but in the highest degree miserable so that having shewn that he has performed nothing of what he has undertaken in his former Disputations I may now justly conclude him by his own Argument that there is no relief against the miseries of humane Life But then secondly what though we are furnished with Antidotes against Evils yet that does not place us in a condition of Happiness for it is one thing to be happy and another not to be miserable so that all miseries taken out of the way there is still something more required to give us actual content and satisfaction No says he but as the Sea is made calm onely by the ceasing of Storms so is a Man happy by the cure of his Passions This is a pretty Similitude but as most Similitudes are a very weak Argument for the calmness of the Sea is a stupid life-less and insensible thing but Man's Happiness arises from his own Sense and Reflection and therefore it is not enough for him not to be rufled with Sorrow and Discontent but to render him really happy he must enjoy some substantial and suitable Good that may gratifie his Faculties and satisfy his Mind So that though he had performed what was promised in the former Discourses yet notwithstanding that has he done nothing towards the acquisition of any real and positive Contentment But he proceeds every Creature has its proper Perfection the proper Perfection of the Mind of Man is Reason the Perfection of Reason is Vertue Vertue therefore is the Perfection that is the complete Happiness of humane Nature And it is true that every Creature excels in some peculiar Faculty but then all its Pleasure and Satisfaction consists not in the single gratification of that Faculty but beside that all its other Appetites are to be gratified in their several Sensations and if they are not that alone will overthrow all the Delight that can arise from the exercise of its supreme Faculty Thus the most accurate Sense in a Spaniel is smelling which yet can afford but little contentment if he be tortured in all his other Senses And so it is plain that the highest Faculty in a Man is his Reason but then it is plain too that the utmost emprovement of that can never place him in a state of sovereign Happiness if he endure Pain and Misery in his other inferiour Faculties so that it is not the Perfection of our highest Faculty but of our whole Nature that is our supreme Felicity And therefore that consisting of Sense as well as Reason it is not Reason alone howsoever accomplisht and emproved that can complete our Happiness And then secondly if there be no immortality not Vertue but Self-interest is the perfection of humane Reason for if Man be capable of no other but his present Happiness then his Reason will tell him that he is onely concern'd to take care of that and to value Things and Actions not as they are good and evil but onely as they are subservient to his own present Advantage And then is the very Being of Vertue overthrown which were not Vertue if it did not oblige to Duty contrary to Interest for that
is the onely difference between a good and a bad Man that one prefers Duty before Interest the other Interest before Duty Again all Happiness says he is matter of Joy all Joy delights to shew it self what delights to shew it self is glorious what is glorious is praiseworthy what is praiseworthy is honest and therefore nothing is good but what is honest Or thus whatever is good is desirable whatever is desirable deserves approbation whatever deserves approbation has worth and dignity in it self whatever has worth and dignity in it self is praiseworthy whatever is praiseworthy is honest and therefore whatever is good is honest Which Argument he pursues after the manner of the Stoicks in an hundred other ways of connexion but howsoever it is varied all the stress of it lies onely in the connexion of laudabile with honestum praise or commendation with Vertue for how great soever compass they may take that is still the last medium by which they joyn Happiness and Vertue together So that though the Stoicks wrote numberless Books of Sorites as they call'd them upon this Argument they all amounted to no more than this one short Syllogism whatever is good is praiseworthy whatever is praiseworthy is honest and therefore whatever is good is honest But this as Tully himself has elsewhere answered is a very trifling and precarious way of arguing For who says he that affirms the goods of Body and Fortune to be part of our Happiness will be so easy or so silly as to grant the first Proposition that all good is praiseworthy or that being granted there is no need of proceeding to the second for there is no doubt of it but that if all good be praiseworthy all good is honest too And therefore Aristotle and the whole School of the Peripateticks against whom they dispute will flatly deny the Assertion and tell you that Health Strength Riches Friends Authority are very good things and yet deserve not that which Men call praise and commendation that is the imputation of moral Goodness So that to pass this Proposition as they do without any farther proof is first to take what no Man will grant and then to conclude from it what themselves please And now this one false step being barr'd there is an end of all the Stoicks voluminous Disputations and of all our Oratours rhetorical Flourishes that are onely so many artificial transports and forms of Eloquence in praise of this one Proposition all which if it be false can never make it true and therefore till that is done 't is all nothing but empty Declamation And for that Reason I shall pursue him no farther here but shall return back to his foregoing Discourses and shew first that he himself after all his pains has not been able to lay better Grounds than the Epicureans for the stability of Vertue nor more effectual Motives for the obligation of its practice And secondly that when he has said all he can that Vertue alone is so far from being any sufficient ground of Happiness that it is not able to deliver us from any single Misery from both which it evidently appears that there is some farther Account to be given of the Government of the World if there be such a Providence as I have proved that has made Happiness our End and Vertue the means to attain it § XXXI And first the state of the Controversy between him and the Epicureans is whether Pleasure or Honesty be the Supreme Good That Pleasure in the sense of Epicurus is not we have already proved and now we prove that Honesty alone without some Motives and Enforcements beside it self is so weak a thing that sensual Pleasure and Self-interest must get the upper hand of it in the Minds and the Actions of Mankind And if once we can prove that we have routed the whole design of all his mortal Morality and for its proof we shall follow his own steps And first whereas he defines Honesty to be such a thing as taking away from it all other Rewards and Advantages is justly commendable for its own sake he makes it onely a glorious nothing For what does this great word Vertue signifie when separated from all other Considerations Do not all the Philosophers agree there can be no such thing without Prudence And will not common Discretion dictate to any Man not to doe much less to suffer any thing for the sake of Vertue unless upon prudential Motives and then they ought to give us some account of the Grounds and Reasons that we have to prefer Vertue for her own sake above all things else and that without any present regard to our selves for if we act with regard to that then we act not meerly for the sake of Vertue but for the sake of the present Reward But say they Vertue is its own Reward Be it so then this turns us back upon our own Principle that it is of no force of it self but by virtue of its Reward and then if we choose Vertue because it is its own Reward we choose it for the same reason as if it were recommended to us by any other Reward But how is it its own Reward For if it be true Vertue it must foregoe all things rather than it self otherwise still it is nothing else but present Design and Self-interest Now then how can Vertue taken alone give me any recompence or satisfaction for any loss that I sustain meerly upon her account How can Justice alone requite my Honesty if I lose either my own Estate because I will not violate her Laws or my Neighbours when I might have gotten it by Fraud or Oppression How can Fortitude that puts me upon all manner of Dangers even of Life it self recompence my pains if it have no other Reward beside the unaccountable Happiness of enduring them So that this Maxim that in general looks so great and glorious when applied to particulars is plainly no better than a shining and an empty bubble And then to tell us as he does that Nature alone obliges us to Vertue is to say nothing at all unless he would inform us too by what Sanctions this Nature ties her Obligations upon us For there can be no obligation that is not enforced by Rewards and Penalties so that if Nature bind Men to Honesty against present Interest it must give them some reason of the Duty that is it must propound to them some advantage on the side of Justice and then they do not choose their Duty against their Interest but foregoe a lesser for a greater advantage So that if Nature put us upon the practice of Vertue it is by virtue of some Reward but where that fails it is in vain to talk of the power and authority of Nature or any thing else And whereas he adds that other Creatures have no apprehension but of their present Necessities that yet Mankind is endued with such a vigour and sagacity of Mind as to foresee all