A TREATISE OF Morality In Two Parts Written in French by F. MALBRANCH AUTHOR of The Search after Truth And Translated into English By JAMES SHIPTON M. A. LONDON Printed for Iames Knapton at the Crown in St. Paul's Church-yard 1699. THE Author's LETTER TO MONSIEUR **** SIR I Have sent you the Treatise of Morality which you desire of me with so much importunity It is divided into two Parts In the First I have examin'd wherein Vertue doth precisely consist and laid down the means of acquiring and preserving it The Second contains the Duties of it I know not what Censure you will pass on this Book you Sir who are so nice a Judge for I confess to you that there are many things in it which I have not explain'd with that exactness which you require of Authors But I desire you to consider two Things The First is that having no clear Idea of the Soul you understand what I mean the greatest part of the Terms of Morality can express only its Sensations The Second is that Books ought to be proportion'd as far as it is possible to the Capacity of the generality of Mankind and that if I had been too nice and scrupulous in explaining the signification of the Terms which I make use of I should have extremely tir'd the Attentions of my Readers for People are soon weary of reading a Book that doth not raise agreable Sensations in their Mind Perhaps I may think it necessary hereafter to add some Illustrations which may clear those Difficulties which the common Phrase of Speech cannot remove The success that this Treatise meets with will determine my Resolution in that Point I am c. THE CONTENTS OF THE FIRST PART CHAP. I. VNiversal Reason is the Wisdom of God himself All Men have some Communication with God True and False Just and Vnjust is the same in respect of all intelligent Beings and of God himself What Truth and Order is and what we must do to avoid Sin and Error God is essentially Just he loves the Creatures according as they are amiable or as they resemble him We must be Perfect to be Happy Vertue or the Perfection of Man consists in a Submission to the immutable Order and not in following the Order of Nature The Error of some of the Heathen Philosophers in this Matter grounded upon their Ignorance of the simplicity and immutability of the Divine Conduct Page 1. CHAP. II. There is no other Vertue but the Love of Order and Reason Without this Love all Vertues are false We must not confound Duties with Vertue We may discharge our Duties without Vertue 'T is for want of consulting Reason that Men approve and follow damnable Customs Faith serves or conducts to Reason For Reason is the supreme Law of all intelligent Beings p. 12. CHAP. III. The Love of Order doth not differ from Charity Two sorts of Love one of Vnion and the other of Benevolence The former is due only to Power or to God alone The latter ought to be proportion'd to persoâ—â—â— Merit as our Duties to relative Self-love enlightned is not contrary to the love of Vnion The love of Order is common to all Men. The Species of the love of Order natural and free actual and habitual Only that which is free habitual and ruling renders us just in the sight of God So that Vertue consists in nothing but a free habitual and ruling Love of the immutable Order p. 21. CHAP. IV. Two fundamental Truths belonging to this Treatise I. Acts produce Habits and Habits Acts. II. The Soul doth not always produce the Acts of its ruling Habit. The Sinner may avoid committing any particular Sin and the just Man may lose his Charity because there is no Sinner without some love for Order and no just Man without Self-love We cannot be justified in the sight of God by the strength of Free-will The means in general of acquiring and preserving Charity The method us'd in the explication of these means p. 23. CHAP. V. Of the Strength of the Mind Our Desires are the occasional Causes of our Knowledge The Contemplation of abstract Ideas is difficult The Strength of the Mind consists in an acquir'd Habit of enduring the Labour of Attention The way to acquire it is to Silence our Senses Imagination and Passions to Regulate our Studies and to Meditate only on clear Ideas p. 40. CHAP. VI. Of the Liberty of the Mind We should suspend our Assent as much as we can which is the great Rule By the Liberty of the Mind we may avoid Error and Sin as by the Strength of the Mind we free our selves from Ignorance The Liberty of the Mind as well as the Strength of it is a Habit which is confirm'd by use Some instances of its Vsefulness in Physicks Morality and Civil Life p. 51. CHAP. VII Of Obedience to Order The means of acquiring a firm and ruling Disposition to obey it It cannot be done without Grace How far the right use of our Strength and Liberty contributes toward it by the Light it produces in us by the contemptible Opinion it gives us of our Passions and by the Purity which it preserves and establishes in our Imagination p. 61. CHAP. VIII The Means which Religion furnishes us with to gain and preserve the Love of Order Jesus Christ is the occasional Cause of Grace we must call upon him with confidence When we come to the Sacraments the actual Love of Order is chang'd into habitual in consequence of the permanent desires of Christ The Proof of this Truth being essential to the Conversion of Sinners The fear of Hell is as good a Motive as the desire of eternal Happiness We must not confound the Motive with the End The desire of being Happy or Self-love should make us conformable to Order or obedient to the Law of God p. 71. CHAP. IX The Church in its Prayers Addresses its self to the Father by the Son and why We should Pray to the Blessed Virgin Angels and Saints but not as occasional causes of inward Grace The Angels and even the Devils have power over Bodies as occasional causes By this means the Devils may tempt us and the Angels promote the efficacy of Grace p. 83. CHAP. X. Of the Occasional Causes of the Sensations and Motions of the Soul which resist the Efficacy of Grace either of Light or Sense The Vnion of the Soul with God is immediate not that of the Soul with the Body An Explication of some general Laws of the Vnion of the Soul and Body necessary for the right understanding the rest of this Treatise p. 91. CHAP. XI What kind of death we must die to see God to be united to Reason and to deliver our selves from Concupiscence It is the Grace of Faith that gives us this happy death Christians are dead to Sin by Baptism and alive in Christ by his Resurrection Of the Mortification of the Senses and the use we should make of it We should
it Thus there is a mutual Correspondence between certain Thoughts of the Soul and certain Modifications of the Body in consequence of those natural Laws which God hath establish'd and which he condantly observes Herein consists the Union of the Soul and Body The Imagination may raise other Ideas of all this But this Correspondence is undeniable and is sufficient for my purpose So that I neither do nor ought to build on uncertain Foundations XIV Secondly I suppose it to be known that the Soul is not join'd immediately to all the parts of the Body but only to one part which answers to all the rest and which I call without knowing what it is the Principal Part so that notwithstanding the Laws of the Union of the Soul and Body a Man may have his Arm cut off and yet have no thought arise in his Soul Correspondent to it but it is not possible that the least change should happen in the Principal Part of the Brain without causing also some alteration in the Soul This is verified by Experience for sometimes parts of the Body are cut off without being felt because then the Motion of the Amputation doth not communicate it self to the Principal Part. As on the contrary those that have lost an Arm often feel a real pain in that very Arm which they have not because there is the same Motion in the Principal Part of the Brain as if the Arm was hurt XV. The first Man before his Sin had an absolute power over his Body at least he could when he pleas'd hinder the Motion or Action of Objects from communicating it self to the principal part of the Brain from the Organs of the Senses which might be touch'd by those Objects and this he did probably by a kind of revulsion somewhat like that which we make in our selves when we would fix our Attention on those Thoughts which disappear in the presence of sensible Objects XVI But I suppose in the Third place that we have not now that power and therefore to obtain some Liberty of Mind to think on what we will and love what we ought it is necessary that the principal part should be calm and without agitation or at least that we should still be able to stop and turn it which way we please Our Attention depends on our Will but it depends much more on our Senses and Passions It is a very difficult thing not to look upon that which touches not to love that which pleases that which touches I say and pleases the Heart The Soul is never sooner tir'd than when it fights against Pleasure and makes it self actually Miserable XVII Fourthly I suppose it to be known that the principal part is never touch'd or shaken in an agreeable or disagreeable manner but it excites in the animal Spirits some Motion proper to carry the Body toward the Object which acts upon it or to separate it from it by flight so that those Motions of the Fibres of the Brain which relate to Good or Evil are always follow'd by such a course of the Spirits as disposes the Body rightly with relation to the present Object and at the same time those sensations of the Soul which are correspondent to those agitations of the Brain are follow'd by such motions of the Soul as answer to this course of the Spirits For the impressions or motions of the Brain are in respect of the course of the Spirits what the sensations of the Soul are in respect of the Passions and these Impressions are to the Sensations what the motion of the Spirits is to the motion of the Passions XVIII Fifthly I suppose that Objects never strike the Brain without leaving some marks of their Action nor the animal Spirits without leaving some Tracks of their Course that these Tracks or Wounds are not easily clos'd up or effac'd when the Brain hath been often or forcibly struck and when the Course of the Spirits hath been violent or hath often begun again in the same manner That Memory and corporeal Habits consist in nothing else but those Tracks or Impressions which cause in the Brain and other parts of the Body a particular facility of obeying the Course of the Spirits and that by this means the Brain is hurt and the Imagination polluted when we have had the enjoyment of Pleasures without apprehending the danger of Familiarity with sensible Objects XIX Lastly I suppose that we conceive distinctly that when many of these Tracks have been made at the same time we cannot open any one of them without opening all the rest in some Measure whence it comes to pass that there are always many accessory Ideas which present themselves confusedly to the Mind having a Relation to the principal Ideas to which the Mind particularly applies it self There are also many confus'd Sensations and indirect Motions that accompany the principal Passion which moves the Soul and carries it toward some particular Object There is nothing more certain than this connection of Impressions with one another and with the Senses and Passions Any one that hath but the least Knowledge of the Nature of Man and will make but the least reflection on the inward Sense he hath of what passes within himself may discover more of these Truths in an Hour than I can tell him in a Month provided he doth not confound the Soul with the Body in making the Union betwixt them and carefully distinguishes the Properties of which the thinking Substance is capable from those which belong to the extended Substance And I think it necessary to Advertise the Reader That this kind of Truths is of very great importance not only for the distinct Conception of what I have hitherto said and shall hereafter say but generally for all the Sciences that have any Relation to Man Having handled this Subject at large in the Search of Truth particularly in the Second Book I thought not to have said any thing of it here and if these Suppositions seem obscure to the Reader and do not give him light enough to comprehend clearly what I shall say in the remaining part of this Treatise I must refer him to that Book for I cannot persuade my self to give a long Explication of the same thing over and over CHAP. XI What kind of death we must die to see God to be united to Reason and to deliver our selves from Concupiscence It is the Grace of Faith that gives us this happy death Christians are dead to Sin by Baptism and alive in Christ by his Resurrection Of the Mortification of the Senses and the use we should make of it We should unite our selves to corporeal Objects or separate our selves from them without loving or fearing them But the surest way is to break off all Correspondence with them as far as is possible I. DEath is a compendious way to be deliver'd from Concupiscence and to break off at once that unhappy Union which hinders us from being reunited to our Head
Bodies and by their means in the Souls wihch are united to them certain effects which may promote the efficacy of Grace and keep Men from those Stumbling-blocks which the Devils continually lay in their way For as the Psalmist saith Psal 91.11 12. He hath given his Angels charge over thee to keep thee in all thy ways They shall bear thee up in their Hands lest thou dash thy Foot against a Stone XIII So then we may pray to the Angels and desire their protection against that roaring Lion who as St. Peter saith walketh about seeking whom he may devour Eph. 6.12 Or to use St. Paul's words Against those Principalities and Powers against the Rulers of the Darkness of this World those Princes of the World full of Darkness and Error against spiritual Wickedness in high places those evil Spirits which are scatter'd through the Air For we wrestle not against Flesh and Blood only But we must not look upon the Angels as distributive Causes of Grace nor give them that Worship which is due to Christ alone Col. 2.18 19. Be not deceiv'd saith St. Paul by those who in a voluntary Humility pay a superstitious Worship to Angels who meddle with those things which they do not understand being dazled by the vain Imaginations of their fleshly Mind and not keeping themselves united to the Head from which the whole body of the Church receives the Spirit which gives it Growth and Life v. 15. even to Jesus Christ who having spoil'd Principalities and Powers which he had vanquish'd by his Cross made a shew of them openly triumphing over them in it CHAP. X. Of the Occasional Causes of the Sensations and Motions of the Soul which resist the Efficacy of Grace either of Light or Sense The Vnion of the Soul with God is immediate not that of the Soul with the Body An Explication of some general Laws of the Vnion of the Soul and Body necessary for the right understanding the rest of this Treatise I. IN the Fifth Sixth and Seventh Chapters I have spoken at large of the occasional Cause of Light and in the two last I have endeavoured to shew what is the occasional Cause of the Grace of Sense and what we must do to obtain it And therefore seeing there is nothing beside Light and Sense which determines the Will or the tendency which the Soul hath toward Good in general all that now remains in relation to the Means of acquiring or preserving the habitual and ruling Love of the immutable Order is to explain the Laws of the Union of the Soul and Body or the occasional Causes of all those lively and confus'd Sensations and those indeliberate Motions which unite us to our Body and by that to all the Objects which are about us For to make us love Order and to acquire Vertue it is not sufficient to obtain the Grace of Sense which alone can stir the Soul and put it in Motion toward the true Good but we must also manage our selves so that this Grace may work in our Hearts with its full Efficacy For this end we must carefully avoid the occasional Causes of those Sensations and Motions which resist the Operation of Grace and sometimes render it altogether ineffectual This is the most general Principle of all that I shall say in the First Part of this Discourse II. The Soul of Man hath two essential and natural Relations one to God the true Cause of all that passes within him the other to his Body the occasional Cause of all those Thoughts which relate to sensible Objects When God speaks to the Soul it is to unite it to himself when the Body speaks to it it is only for the Body to unite the Soul to sensible Good God speaks to the Soul to enlighten and render it perfect the Body only to darken and corrupt it in favour of it self God by the Light conducts the Soul to its Happiness the Body by Pleasure involves the whole Man in its ruin and throws him headlong into Misery In a word tho' it is God that doth every thing and tho' the Body cannot act upon the Soul no more than the Soul can upon the Body but as an occasional Cause in consequence of the Laws of their Union and for the Punishment of Sin which without medling with those Laws hath chang'd the Union into a Dependence yet we may say that it is the Body which darkens the Mind and corrupts the Heart for the Relation which the Soul hath to the Body is the Cause of all our Errors and Disorders III. Notwithstanding we should be throughly convinc'd of this and never forget it that the Soul can have no immediate Relation but to God alone and that it cannot be united directly to any thing but to him for the Soul cannot be united to the Body but as it is united to God himself It is certain for very many Reasons that if I feel for instance the pain of a Scratch it is God that acts in me tho' in consequence of the Laws of the Union of the Soul and Body for those Laws derive their force from the Operation of the Divine Will which alone is capable of acting in me But the Body by it self cannot be united to the Soul nor the Soul to the Body They have no Relation to one another nor any one Creature to another I speak of Relations of Causality such are those which depend on the Union of the Soul and Body It is God that doth every thing his Will is the Union of all Unions the Modifications of Substances depend on him alone who gives and preserves their Being This is an essential Truth which I think I have sufficiently prov'd in another place IV. But tho' the Soul cannot be united immediately to any Thing but God yet it may be united to the Creatures by the Will of God who communicates his Power to them in making them occasional Causes for the production of certain Effects My Soul is united to my Body because on one side my Will is made the occasional Cause of some changes which God alone produces on it and in the other because the changes which happen in my Body are made occasional Causes of some of those which happen in my Soul V. Now God hath establish'd these Laws for many Reasons which are unknown to us But of those which we do know one is that God in following them acts in a uniform and constant manner by general Laws by the most simple and wisest ways in a word he Acts in such a manner as admirably bears the Character of his Attributes Another Reason is because the Body of Man is his proper Sacrifice for it seems to Sacrifice it self by Pain and to be Annihilated by Death The Soul is in a State of Probation in the Body and God who desires in some measure to be merited and to proportion Rewards to Merits doth by the Laws of the Union of the Soul and
But it is needless to prove here that to procure our own Death is a Crime which will be so far from reuniting us to God that it will for ever separate us from him It is lawful to despise Life and even to wish for Death that we may be with Christ as St. Paul does Having a desire to be dissolv'd Phil. 1.23 and to be with Christ But we are oblig'd to preserve our Health and Life and it is the Grace of Christ that must deliver us from Concupiscence or that Body of Death which joyns us to the Creatures The same Apostle cries our O wretched Man that I am Rom. 7.24 who shall deliver me from this Body of Death The Grace of God through Jesus Christ II. It is certain Exod 33.20 that we must die before we can see God and be united to him for no Man can see him and live saith the Scripture But we truly die so far as we quit the Body as we separate our selves from the World and silence our Senses Imagination and Passions by which we are united to our Body and by that to all those that surround us We die to the Body and to the World when we retire into our selves when we consult the inward Truth when we unite our selves and are obedient to Order Job 28.21 The eternal Wisdom is hid from the Eyes of all Living But those who are Dead to the World and to Themselves who have crucified the Flesh with its disorder'd Lusts who are crucified with Christ and to whom the World is crucified Blessed are the pure in Heart for they shall see God Mat. 5.8 1 Cor. 13.12 in a word those who have a clean Heart a pure Mind and an unspotted Imagination are capable of beholding Truth Now they see God but confusedly and imperfectly in Part through a Glass in a Riddle but they see him truly they are closely and immediately united to him and shall one day see him Face to Face for we must know and love God in this Life to enjoy him in the next III. But those who live not only the Life of the Body but also the Life of the World who live in the enjoyment of Pleasures and spread themselves as it were over all the Objects that are about them can never find out Truth Job 28.13 For as the Scripture saith Wisdom doth not dwell with those that live Voluptuously Non invenitur in terra suaviter viventium We must then procure our selves not that Death which kills the Body and puts an end to Life but that which brings the Body under and weakens Life I mean the Union of the Soul with the Body or its dependence on it We must begin and continue our Sacrifice and expect from God the Consummation and Reward of it For the Life of a Christian here on-Earth is a constant Sacrifice by which he continually offers up his Body his Concupiscence and Self-love to the Love of Order and his Death which is precious in the Sight of God is the day of his Victories and Triumphs in Jesus Christ raised from the dead the forerunner of our Glory and the model of our eternal Reformation IV. Rom. 6.6 St. Paul tells us That our old Man is already crucified with Christ for by the Sacrifice which Christ hath offer'd on the Cross he hath merited for us for us I say particularly who have been washed in his Blood by Baptism all the Graces necessary to balance and even to diminish by degrees the weight of Concupiscence so that Sin no longer reigns in us but by our own Fault Let us not therefore think to excuse our Slothfulness by imagining that we are not able to resist the Law of the Flesh which continually rebels against the Law of the Mind The Law of Sin would have an absolute Dominion over the Motions of our Heart if Christ had not destroy'd it by his Cross But we who are dead and buried to Sin by Baptism Rom. 6.4 v. 11. who are justified and rais'd to life again in Jesus Christ glorified who are animated by the influence of our Head by the Spirit of Christ and by a Power wholly Divine we I say ought not to believe that Heaven forsakes us in our Combats and that if we are overcome it is for want of Succours Christ never neglects those that call upon him 't is impious to believe it for all the Scriptures say Act. 2. â—1 Rom 10.13 Joel 2.34 That whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be sav'd V. It is certain that we could never be glorified and seated in Heaven with Jesus Christ we could not have eternal Life abiding in us we could not be Heirs of God and Joint-heirs with Christ Citizens of the holy City and adopted Children of God himself all which things the Apostles say of Christians if God were not faithful in his Promises if he suffer'd us to be tempted above our Strength 1 Cor. 10.13 which St. Paul also forbids us to believe But we may truly say That we are already glorified in Christ c. because in effect it depends only on our selves to preserve by Grace the Right which the same Grace gives us to future Blessings and it is a kind of brutish stupidity in a Man which one would think should astonish a rational and spiritual Being to lose infinite Happiness by his own Fault and incurr eternal Damnation through his own Negligence VI. This Truth being suppos'd as undeniable let us awaken our Faith and Hope let us search after the Means to secure our Salvation and let us Act in such sort that the Grace which God cannot infuse into us with any other design but to sanctify and save us may effectually sanctify us and make us worthy to enjoy the true Good Ye are dead saith St. Paul 〈…〉 and your life is hid with Christ in God Mortify therefore your Members which are upon the Earth We are dead to Sin because living in Christ our Head we should and by his influence may kill the old Man it lies in our own power to do it But to put this Design in execution according to the Advice which St. Paul here gives we must labour all our life in the Mortification of our Senses we must endeavour with the utmost Diligence to keep our Imagination pure and undefil'd we must regulate all the Motions of our Passions by Order in a word we must diminish the weight of Sin which by the actual Efforts of Concupiscence provok'd and stir'd up is able to balance the strongest Graces and to separate us from God Mortify therefore your Members which are upon the Earth If we do what depends on us Grace will work in our Heart with its full Efficacy we shall die in the sense of St. Paul and our life being hid with Christ in God shall appear with Glory when Christ himself shall appear cloth'd with Majesty and Honour Col. 3.4 When Christ
who is our life shall appear then shall ye also appear with him in Glory VII Of all the Exercises proper to promote the Efficacy of Grace there is no one more necessary than that of the Mortification of the Senses for it is our own Body alone that unites us to all other Bodies It is chiefly by the Senses that the Soul stretches it self as I may say to all the parts of the Body and by the Imagination and Passions it is carried abroad and extends it self to all the Creatures But as Objects are presented to the Mind by the Senses the Imagination and Passions suppose and depend on them For it is certain that the corporeal Image of a sensible Object I do not here speak of Mathematical Figures is nothing but the Impression and Motion which that Object hath made in the Brain by means of the Senses which Impression is renewed by the Action of the Imagination or the Course of the Spirits And as for the Passions they cannot be excited but by the Motion of the animal Spirits which always supposes that the Brain the Magazene of these Spirits is shaken either by the Senses or the Imagination So that he who mortifies his Senses attacks the very Foundation of the Union of the Soul with the Body or rather of its dependence on it he weakens the animal Life and diminishes the weight of Sin Concupiscence he promotes the Efficacy of Grace which alone can reunite us to our first Principle Finally he procures himself that kind of Death without which as the Scripture speaks it is not possible to see God VIII The most capacious of all the Senses that which ministers to all the rest and without which the Imagination and Passions would be but faint and languishing is the Sight We need but reflect a little on our selves and on the use we may make of our Eyes to be convinc'd that they expose us daily to a thousand Dangers One indiscreet look is certainly sufficient to throw us into Hell It made David fall into an Adultery which afterwards engag'd him in a Murder Eve suffer'd her self to be seduc'd by the Devil because she ventur'd to look fixedly on the forbidden Fruit and found it pleasant to the Eyes Gen. 3.6 If they had distrusted their Senses as fallacious and rejected their Testimony they had both of them preserv'd their Innocence I think it not much to my present purpose to enlarge on the mischievous effects of the Sight and from thence to prove the necessity of shutting our Eyes in many Cases I rather choose to examine Things in their first Principles and to shew the use we may lawfully make of all our Senses in general which I shall confine within the straitest Bounds that can possibly be set to it IX One of the Principles which I think I have demonstrated several ways in the First Book of the Search of Truth is this That our Senses are given us only for the preservation of our sensible Being In relation to this end they are perfectly well regulated but with respect to the use which the World makes of them there is nothing more false deceitful and irregular To prove this we must consider that we are compos'd of a Soul and a Body and that we have two sorts of Good to look after that of the Soul and that of the Body The Good of the Soul is found out by the Light for it is the true Good That of the Body is discover'd by Sense for it is a false Good or rather no Good at all If Men knew sensible Objects only as they are in themselves and without a sensible perception of that which is not really in them they could not possibly seek after them and fill themselves with them without regret and a kind of detestation and if they had a sense of the true Good different from what it really is and without knowing the true Nature of it they would love it sensually and not meritoriously For the Soul neither can nor ought to live but by the intellectual Substance of Reason and the Body cannot receive Nourishment and Growth but from Bodies Intellectual Goods do not suit with the mechanical Frame of the Body and sensible Goods disorder the Soul Thus Light and Evidence are to the Goods of the Soul what Sense and Instinct are to those of the Body This I think cannot be denied X. The reason of all this is that God created the Soul only for himself He did not make it that it should employ it self about sensible Objects nor that it should preserve and govern by Reason the Body which it Informs If we would know distinctly and rationally the infinite Relations that are between the Bodies which surround us and that which we animate if we would know for instance when we ought to eat how much and what kind of Food is precisely necessary to preserve our Health and Life we must do nothing else but study Physicks and certainly we should not live very long at least Children would not because they want Experience But Hunger informs us of the necessity of Food and thereby regulates the quantity of it pretty near the matter Once it did it truly and exactly and would do so still if we would eat the Fruits of the Earth just as God provides them for us The Taste is a short and unquestionable Tryal whether such and such Bodies are proper for Nourishment or not Without knowing the Texture of a Stone or a strange Fruit we need only present it to the Tongue the faithful Door-keeper at least before Sin of all that ought to enter into the House to be assur'd whether it will make any disturbance within The same may be said of all the other Organs of our Senses Nothing is quicker than the Touch to inform us that we are burnt when we touch a hot Iron without our Knowledge Thus the Soul leaving the Government of the Body to the Senses may apply it self to the search of the true Good contemplate the Perfections and works of its Maker study the Law of God and govern all its motions by that The Senses should only inform it with respect and cease to interrupt it when it imposes Silence on them Thus it was once but the Sin of our first Parent hath chang'd that admirable Order and the union of the Soul and Body remaining still the same the Soul is reduc'd to a dependence on the Senses and is check'd and controul'd by them because as I have often said it hath lost the power to command them XI The Senses then were ordain'd to furnish us with short and certain ways to distinguish Bodies with respect to the preservation of our Health and Life Therefore we may make use of them to unite our selves by the Body to sensible Objects or to separate our selves from them this is agreable to Order I say to unite or separate our selves Not to love or fear them For Love and Hatred are Motions of
hurries him away But Christ very rarely bestows such Favours and that Man is very senseless who throws himself into a Precipice in expectation that God should work a Miracle to save him from death XII What then must we do to moderate our Passions I have already spoke of this in the Seventh Chapter and elsewhere but I shall sum it up here in few words I. We should avoid the Objects which excite them and mortify our Senses II. We should keep our Imagination within the bounds of that respect which it ows to Reason or makes a continual revulsion in the animal Spirits which by their Course keep up and fortify the sinful Impressions III. We should seek after the means to make our Passions appear ridiculous and contemptible we should examine them by the Light confront them with Order and use our utmost endeavours to discover the foulness injustice and irregularity of them and their fatal consequences as well in respect of this life as the other IV. We should form no Design when they are excited nor ever enter upon any Business by their direction or influence V. We should get a Habit and lay an Obligation on our selves of consulting Reason in every thing and whenever we have neglected to do it either by surprize or for any other reason we should change our manner of proceeding and at least take upon us the shame we deserve for having acted like Brutes by the construction and motion of the Machine much less should we justify the foolish step we have made by continuing in a vitious and sinful Course VI. We should labour to augment the strength and liberty of our Mind that we may be able to undergo the labour of Attention and to suspend our Assent till Evidence forces it from us Without these two Qualifications we cannot receive from Reason any certain Rules for the Government of our selves VII Lastly that we may be in a capacity to follow those Rules which destroy the Passions we should above all things have recourse to Prayer and with confidence and humility draw near to him who came to deliver us by the strength of his Grace from that Body of Death or that Law of the Flesh which rebels every moment against the Law of the Spirit For I have often said already and do not stick to repeat it here again because I think there is no fear of reflecting on it too much That neither Reason by it self nor all the helps which Philosophy affords us can without the influence of the second Adam deliver us from the malignity of the first XIII The sum of what hath been said relating to the First Part of this Moral Essay is this First I shew'd that Vertue consists precisely in an habitual and ruling Love of the immutable Order Then I spoke of the two principal Qualities necessary for the acquisition of Vertue After that I laid open the occasional Causes of Light and inward Sense without which we cannot acquire or preserve the Love of Order And lastly I examin'd into the occasional Causes of certain Sensations which are contrary to those of Grace and abate the Force and Efficacy of them that we may avoid them So that I think I have omitted nothing necessary for the acquisition and conservation of Vertue in general I come now to the Second Part which treats not of Vertues but of the Duties of Vertue For I know of but one single Vertue which renders those that possess it truly and substantially Vertuous namely an habitual and ruling Love of the immutable Order A TREATISE OF Morality PART II. Of DVTIES CHAP. I. Good Men often do wicked Actions The Love of Order must be enlightned to make it regular Three Conditions requir'd to make an Action perfectly Vertuous We should study the Duties of Man in general and take some time every day to examine the Order and Circumstances of them in particular I. THE Actions of those that have attain'd to the true and solid Vertue are not therefore all solidly and substantially Vertuous There is in a manner always some deficiency or imperfection in them nay many times they are really sinful The reason of this is because a Man doth not always Act by the influence of his predominant Habit but sometimes by the operation of the Passion which is actually excited in him For if the predominant Habit be asleep as I may say and the rest awake the Actions of a good Man may be many ways sinful But besides tho' the predominant Habit of the Love of Order be actually excited in a good Man yet at the same time his Actions may be defective and imperfect and even directly opposite to Order which he actually loves and designs to follow For beside the difficulty of paying an exact Obedience to the Order which we do know indiscreet and ill govern'd Zeal often makes us Act contrary to the Order which we do not know Wherefore that an Action may be compleatly Vertuous it is not sufficient that it proceed from a good Man nor from a Man actually mov'd by the Love of Order but it must also be conformable to Order in all its Circumstances and that too not by a kind of Chance luckily determining the actual Motion of the Soul but by the strength of Reason guiding and governing us in such a manner as to make us fulfill all our Duties II. So then tho' it be sufficient to make us just and acceptable to God that the Love of Order be our predominant Habit yet if we would be perfect and compleat we must be able to govern this Love by an exact Knowledge of our Duties Nay I may say that he who neglects or slights this Knowledge what Zeal soever he may find within himself for Order his Heart is by no means rightly dispos'd For Order would be lov'd by Reason and not altogether by the Heart and fervency of Instinct which often fills with indiscreet Zeal those whose Imagination is too brisk and lively who are not us'd to retire into themselves but are continually apt to mistake the secret inspirations of their Passions for the infallible Answers of the inward Truth III. Indeed those whose Mind is so weak and their Passions so strong that they are not capable of giving Counsel to themselves or rather of taking Counsel of him who enlightens all Men are excusable before God if they sincerely desire and follow the Advice of such as they believe to be the best and wisest Men. But those who have or pretend to have Wit and Sense are guilty in the sight of God if they undertake any Design without consulting him that is without consulting Reason how fervent soever the Zeal may be which transports them For we must distinguish the Answers of the inward Truth which illuminates the Mind by the Evidence of its Light from the Language and secret Inspirations of the Passions which confound and deceive it by such Sensations as are indeed lively and agreeable but always obscure and
The Mind clearly sees all this And what then must our Self-love enlightned our invincible and insatiable desire of Happiness conclude from hence but that if we would be solidly happy we must submit our selves entirely to the divine Law This is evident in the highest degree V. Our Self-love then is the motive which being assisted by Grace unites us to God as our Good or the cause of our Happiness and subjects us to Reason as our Law or the model of our Perfection But we must not make the motive our End or our Law We must truly and sincerely love Order and unite our selves to God by Reason We must prefer the divine Law before all things Because we cannot slight it and cease to conform our selves to it without losing the liberty of access to God which we enjoy by it We must not desire that Order should accommodate it self to our Will It is impossible to be done for Order is immutable and necessary We must not wish that God would not punish our Iniquities God is a Judge that cannot be corrupted These desires corrupt us These foolish and insignificant Wishes are injurious to the Purity the Justice and Immutability of God they strike at the essential Attributes of the divine Nature We should abhor our own Corruptions and fashion all the motions of our Heart by Order We should revenge on our selves the injuries done to the honour of Order or at least we should humbly submit to the divine Vengeance For he who wishes that God would not punish Theft or Drunkenness doth not love God and tho' the strength of his Self-love enlightned may keep him from Stealing or Drinking yet he is not Righteous He makes that the end which should be only the motive of his desires He must call upon the Saviour of Sinners who alone can change his Heart But he that had rather there should be no God than such an one as delights to make eternally miserable even those that truly love Order and Reason is a just Man For that chimerical Deity that unjust and cruel God is not amiable Grace it self doth not destroy Self-love but only regulates it and makes it subject to the divine Law It makes us love the true God and despise that Irregularity and Injustice which a disturb'd Imagination may attribute to the divine Nature VI. From what hath been said it is evident First that we must enlighten our Self-love to the end it may excite us to Vertue Secondly that we must never follow the motion of Self-love only Thirdly that in obeying Order inviolably we labour effectually for the contentment of our Self-love In a word since God alone is the cause of our Pleasure we ought to submit our selves to his Law and labour for our Perfection leaving it to his Justice and Goodness to proportion our Happiness to our Merits and to those of Christ in whom ours deserve an infinite Reward VII I have explain'd in the first Part of this Treatise the most material things that are necessary to make us labour for our Perfection or to acquire and preserve an habitual and ruling Love of the immutable Order in which our Duties toward our selves consist They are these in general VIII We should accustom our selves to the labour of Attention and thereby procure some strength of Mind We should never assent but to evidence and so preserve the liberty of our Mind We should continually study Mankind in general and our selves in particular that we may gain a perfect knowledge of our selves We should meditate Night and Day on the divine Law that we may obey it exactly We should compare our selves with Order to humble and despise our selves We should reflect on the divine Justice to fear it and awaken our selves We should think upon our Mediator to call upon him and comfort our selves We should look upon Christ as our Model love him as our Saviour and follow him as our Strength our Wisdom and the Fountain of our eternal Happiness The World seduces us by our Senses It troubles our Mind by our Imagination it carries us away and plunges us in the depth of Misery by our Passions We should break off the dangerous correspondence which we hold with it by our Body if we would strengthen the union which we have with God by Reason For these two unions of the Soul with God and with the Body are incompatible We cannot unite our selves perfectly to God without abandoning the interests of the Body without despising sacrificing and destroying it IX Notwithstanding we are not allow'd to procure our own Death nor to ruin our Health For our Body is not our own It belongs to God to our Country our Family and our Friends We must keep up its strength and vigour according to the use we are oblig'd to make of it But we must not preserve it contrary to the command of God and to the prejudice of other Men. We must expose it for the publick good and not fear to weaken ruin and destroy it in executing the commands of God And so likewise for our Honour and our Fortunes Every thing we have belongs to God and our Neighbour and must be preserv'd employ'd and sacrific'd to the honour of the divine Law the immutable and necessary Order and with a dependence on it I shall not enter into the particulars of this matter for my design was only to lay down those general Principles by which every Man is oblig'd to govern his Life and Actions if he would arive happily at the true and certain place of Rest and Pleasure FINIS BOOKS sold by James Knapton at the Crown in St. Paul 's Church-yard A New Voyage round the World Describing particularly the Isthmus of America several Coasts and Islands in the West-Indies the Isles of Cape Verd the Passage by Terra del Fuego the South-Sea Coasts of Chili Peru and Mexico the Isle of Guam one of the Ladrones Mindanao and other Philippine and East-India Islands near Cambodia China Formosa Luconia Celebes c. New-Holland Sumatra Nicobar Isles the Câ—pe of Good Hope and Santa Hellena Their Soil Rivers Harbours Plants Fruits Animals and Inhabitants Their Customs Religion Government Trade c. By William Dampier Illustrated with particular Maps and Draughts The Third Edition Corrected Capt. Dampier's Voyages Vol. II. in Three Parts First the Supplement of his Voyage round the World being that part that relates to Tonquin Acâ—in Malacca and other Places in the East-Indies Second his Voyage to the Bay of Campeacâ—y in the West-Indies Third his Observations about the Winds and Weather in all parts of the Ocean between the Tropicks with a General Index to both Volumes Octavo Illustrated with particular Maps A New Voyage and Description of the Isthmus of America giving an Account of the Author's abode there the Form and Make of the Country the Coasts Hills Rivers c. Woods Soil Weather c. Trees Fruit Beasts Birds Fish c. The Indian Inhabitants their Features