upon the person addressed. And as a falsification or distortion of the real state of the case, often seems likely to answer their purpose, better than a true representation, the natural impulses of Truth are checked and overpowered by other Springs of Action. Now the Moral Culture of the Principle of Truth in us, requires that all such working of our desires should be suppressed. To lie, to deceive, for any purpose whatever, is utterly inconsistent with any care for our moral progress.

It is impossible that the Operative Principle of Truth should acquire that place in our character which morality requires, if we allow it to be thrust aside by the desire of pleasure, or gain, or power, or the like. The only way in which we can advance towards the moral standard, at which it is our Duty constantly to aim, is by a steady and solemn determination, under no circumstances, to be guilty of falsehood. A man earnestly aiming at his own moral progress, will be true in his assertion, true to his promises, true to his implied engagements, true in what he says, true in what he does. No prospect of any object of desire, or of any advantage, can sway him to any deceit or fraud; for objects of desire have no necessary tendency to further his purpose; whereas deceit and fraud are in direct contradiction to it.

318. We have spoken of a steady and solemn determination not to be guilty of falsehood, as means of moral culture. This expression supposes, that which our consciousness as moral beings assures us of, that we have the power of making such determinations of our future course of action. We can determine and resolve upon a future act or course of actions. We must do this, in order that we may promise, and fulfil our promise. But we may combine a greater than ordinary degree of earnestness and self-watchfulness with this determination; a more than ordinary degree of dis

tinctness and gravity with the promise, or declaration in which we express the determination. We may solemnly resolve, and solemnly promise. If we do this, we connect the fulfilment of our resolution and promise more thoroughly with the progress of our moral culture. We entwine the two, so that the one cannot be broken, without great damage to the other. We embark a larger portion than usual of the moral treasure of our lives in one bottom, and risk a more ruinous wreck. If we break a solemn resolution, a solemn promise, what hope can we have of any steadiness or vigour in our future moral course? How can we retain the moral hopes and aspirations which are to carry us forwards? The growth of the Principle of Truth is arrested; the Principle itself seems to be eradicated. The interruption and reverse in our moral progress is marked and glaring, and hence (304) the offense is grievous. The violation of a solemn promise is a moral offense of the highest kind.

There may be some cases in which there may be at first a doubt what course this Rule of the Duty of Truth directs us to take; but these cases we shall consider, when we have taken a view of the remaining Classes of Duties.

CHAPTER X.

DUTIES CONNECTED WITH PURITY.

319. THE Duties connected with Purity, are those which result from the Principle of Purity; that the Lower Parts of our Nature are to be governed by and subservient to the Higher Parts. Thus the Appetites and Desires, which find their gratification in meat and drink, with the accompaniments of a decent table, are to be indulged as subservient to the support of life, strength, and cheerful

ness, and the cultivation of the social affections; the indulgence is to be limited by these purposes, and these purposes by moral rules. In like manner, other desires, mingled of bodily and mental elements, are to be indulged only in subservience to the affections and hopes which belong to them; and the affections and hopes are to be regulated by conditions which morality and law prescribe. In the gradation of the parts of human nature, we place bodily appetite, and all merely selfish desires, below affection; but mere blind affection we place below the moral affection which approves of goodness. The affections of the heart in some measure refine the desires of the body; but the affections of the heart may be greatly impure, if they are not regulated by the law of the heart, which morality teaches. Affection alone does not make actions moral, or remove that stain of impurity which they derive from bodily appetite. The nature of man is purified, by having a moral character given to it. This moral character purifies the affections; and the affections, thus purified, communicate their purity to the desires which are subservient to them. And thus, Morality does not require us to extinguish the desires, or to reject the pleasures arising from their gratification. Still, she directs us not to dwell on this gratification in our thoughts, as an object; but to accept from it that influence, which it can exercise in giving energy to our affections, without being itself a direct object of contemplation. The bodily desires are made the instruments and evidences of the affections; and are thus absorbed into the affections, and made conformable to the Principle of Purity.

320. The distinction of the Lower and Higher Parts of our Nature, by means of which we express the Principle of Purity, has been rejected by some moralists, and has been termed Declamation. Such moralists contend that

pleasure is universally and necessarily the object of human action; and that human pleasures do not differ in kind, but only in intensity and duration: so that, according to these teachers, there is no difference of superior and inferior, between the pleasures of appetite, the pleasures of affection, and the pleasure of doing good. Hence, say

they, the only difference in the character of actions, is their being better or worse means of obtaining pleasure. But the universal reason of man assents to the opposite doctrine, delivered by Butler: who maintains that our principles of action do not differ in degree merely, but in kind also; some being, by the constitution of human nature, superior to others, and their natural governors. Thus, as he teaches, the Rule of our nature is, that Prudence shall control Appetite, and that the Moral Sentiments shall control the Affections. If we take the opposite view, we obliterate the difference between man and brute beasts. We make no distinction between the blame which we bestow upon Errour, and upon Crime; for on this supposition, Crime is only miscalculation; and merely means an erroneous way of seeking pleasure. If we follow this view, we make a bad heart the same thing as a bad head. According to this doctrine, we can have no Supreme Rule of Action; for if pleasure be the highest object of action, it is also the lowest. With such opinions, we deprive the words right and wrong of their common meaning; for to men in general, they do not mean right and wrong roads to enjoyment, which this view makes them mean.

321. The Duties of Purity are those which follow from such an operation of the Principle. They prohibit indulgence in the pleasures of the Table for the sake of bodily gratification alone; though they allow our meals to be so conducted, that they may not only satisfy the bodily wants of nature, but also minister to the cheerful and

social flow of spirits and thought, which is a condition favourable to moral action. They prohibit, in like manner, the gratification of other bodily appetites when sought for their own sake; though they allow such gratification under the sanction of the conjugal tie, and with the hope of that extension of family affections, and family duties, which the birth of children brings.

322. As it is our Duty to regulate our actions by these Rules it is our Duty also to acquire and possess an inward Principle, from which such a course of action will spring. It is our Duty to acquire and possess within us an Operative Principle, or Spirit, of Purity, which may of itself, and without the recollection of express Rules, direct us from all that is impure. A good man has dispositions, and habits of mind, which not only restrain him from acts of intemperance and unchastity, but repress and banish intemperate and unchaste desires and wishes.

And though it may sometimes be difficult for a man to arrive at this state of Purity of Heart and Mind; it is always the Duty of every man to aim at it. A moral Self-culture in such Purity, is a constant and universal Duty, of which the obligation can never relax nor terminate. A Moral Progress in this, as in other respects, must be the constant aim of a good man.

323. Offenses against the Duties of which we are now speaking, more distinctly than in other Classes of Duties, produce their effect, of impeding our Moral Progress, and turning our course backwards. The intemperate and unchaste person becomes, by every vicious act and every vicious purpose, plainly more and more prone to Vice. These Vices affect his habits of mind in a very direct manner. The Glutton and the Epicure, eager and curious respecting the pleasures of the palate, can hardly give due weight in their thoughts to higher objects; and they often stimu