A Friend of mine inclin'd to the Sentiments which I labour to refute is wont to insist much on the glorious saying That a good Man loves Virtue for its own sake When I press him to explain clearly what he means he is wont to enlarge elegantly and well upon the agreableness and fitness of Virtue for instance of Justice Charity and Mercy and thus far he is very right Justice Charity and Mercy are the most agreable and fit things in the World for a rational Man to practise But now let me ask What is it which makes these Virtues so agreable to human Nature and so fit to be practis'd by rational Man or I am strangely mistaken or all that can be assign'd is the natural Tendency which they have to benefit Mankind and to establish the Foundations of Society firm and sure If so then I must observe that every good Man who loves Virtue for its own sake i. e. for its agreableness to human Nature i. e. for its tendency to benefit Mankind and establish the Foundations of Society he loves Virtue mercenarily for he himself is a Member of the Society and his private Benefit is included in that of the publick But my Friend tells me and I believe him that in Acts of Justice which he always in Acts of Charity and Mercy which he frequently performs he has no regard to any advantage upon those accounts likely to accrue to him either in this present or a future State I answer that to a Man in easy Circumstances the practice of these Virtues yields an immediate and a very great Pleasure and they may be practis'd by an habitual good Man such as I reckon my Friend without any regard had to the future Advantage and farther Pleasure which may accompany them An habitual good Man may be so taken up with the present Satisfaction of virtuous Deeds as that he shall be frequent in the practice of them without giving himself time to consider whether he may not reasonably hope for a future Compensation But then it ought to be taken notice of that a great part perhaps much the greatest part of Virtue consists in doing good at the price of suffering Evil and few very few in my poor opinion would practise Virtue under severe present Discouragements if they had no Hope beyond this Life I am not surpriz'd to read in antient Story that Men of the fairest Fame as soon as advanc'd under some Princes have chang'd their Manners and lost their Reputation For when there 's no keeping an honest Reputation and a gainful Post of Honour both it must be Hope in a future State or nothing that can perswade them to take care of the former and let the latter go I confess it is easy for a Man to be good in easy Circumstances to be just when he is not very poor to be charitable when he has more than a Competence to be merciful when he is likely to gain Friends and Fame by it but he that is content that Virtue should never be practis'd but in such Cases is content that the World should be much more wicked than it is and every good Man more uneasy and more unable to do the Good to which he is inclin'd In this place I think it proper to transcribe some Lines from Bishop Taylor in his Ductor Dub. not that I hope to gain my Point by his Authority tho I can't but be pleas'd to find so wise a Man in my Sentiments yet let the Reader only weigh what is said It is impossible a Man should do great things or suffer nobly without consideration of a Reward and since much of Virtue consists in suffering evil things Virtue it self is not a Happiness but the way to one He does a thing like a Fool that does it for no end and if he does not choose a good one he is worse and Virtue it self would in many Instances be unreasonable if for no material Consideration we should undertake her Drudgery I omit his Quotation from St. Austin and give his next words with some little addition Sensual Pleasures those sensual Pleasures which trespass on the Rights of others are while they can be made to consist with the safety of our Persons and the health of our Bodies highly eligible and all difficult Virtue to be avoided if in this Life only we have hope The Author I have quoted assigns two Causes of Amability and says there are no more viz. Perfection and Usefulness I think there is but one Cause of Amability and that is Usefulness for Perfections which do not relate to me I may admire but nothing can attract my Love and prompt my Desires but that which I know to be useful to me at present or hope to find so hereafter The Reason why a thinking Person loves and desires to practise Virtue is because he tastes Pleasure now or expects it hereafter Perhaps the present Pleasure may effectually recommend some easier Instances of Virtue in happy and blessed times to the practice of well-dispos'd Men but in most Cases and to the Many Virtue will ever need to be recommended by the reasonable Hopes of a better Portion in a future State Let me put a Case which I fancy does sometimes tho but rarely happen A married Man loves his Wife first for the sake of her Friends or her Fortune or her agreable Features or his own solemn Vow but afterwards he loves her for her own sake finding her to be good-natur'd and fruitful obedient and wise Now meaning no more than that he admires these great Perfections that is not in strict speaking loving them or the Wife because she possesses them then only the Husband may be properly said to love these amiable Perfections and his Wife who is Mistress of them when he considers that he is delighted and pleased with the Perfections of his Wife and made happy by her In short let us speak strictly and properly and then we must affirm that Love is Relative I may admire what I am never like to be the better for but what I love I love because I find great Satisfaction in it at present or hope to do so hereafter The present Pleasures of Virtue are not sufficient to recommend it so much as but a tolerable Condition of the World does necessarily require and if we endeavour to disprove the reasonableness of future Hopes we open a Flood-gate to a world of Iniquity more than abounds at present and trouble our own Enjoyments and Ease as well as the Welfare of the Publick I would be glad to be taught how Men may be perswaded to difficult Virtue for instance to do their Country Service to preserve it or deliver it from Slavery when they are like to ruin themselves and their Families by it Indeed I read of one Codrus who by his own death purchas'd a happy Victory to his People But the Historian says Athens never had another King after him because they never expected another Codrus
to their Innocence neither For instance I presume it were an injurious evil thing for a Physician to try an Experiment upon a poor Patient without the Knowledg and Consent of his Patient merely to improve his own Knowledg but this a Physician may have many Opportunities of doing and that with all imaginable safety to himself so that not so much as his Skill shall be call'd in question tho the Experiment fails and the Patient miscarries for so Patients every day do under the ablest Physicians proceeding by common Methods and yet a Physician that has no fears from without to restrain him from trying an Experiment may be restrain'd by the fears of doing a base thing by the fears of that Uneasiness which his considering Mind conscious to the evil Deed may create him and whenever such Fears keep a Man free from the evil Act his Abstinence from it is praise-worthy and he is of right to be deemed innocent Upon the same score a due regard had to the Pleasures of a good Conscience has a great Influence to keep a Man in such like Circumstances plac'd innocent and does not depretiate the Innocence which it preserves Our Author should not talk in general of Punishments and Advantages the Objects of our Hopes and Fears without specifying what kind of Punishments and Advantages he means when he lays down such and such Propositions I am of the mind that when we act rationally we are always influenc'd by some one or other Hope or Fear Indeed a Man may arrive at a habit of well or ill-doing and then not advert to the special Motive in every particular Act but all momentous Actions and the Original of the good or ill Habit proceeds from some Hope or Fear What signifies the Decor facti so much talk'd of the comliness and fitness of the Action call'd virtuous but the advantageousness thereof to one's Self Country Neighbourhood near Relation Friend Acquaintance From hence the Action has its Comliness and Fitness from hence it is denominated virtuous and he that does it does it with this prospect What I would conclude hence is That Hope and Fear which are the Springs of all Action render an Action good or ill according to the Nature of that thing which is the Object of our Hope and Fear But our Author seems to lay a stress upon that distinguishing Epithet private private Pleasure or Advantage which otherwhere he calls private Good Self-good but in this matter he does not deal distinctly enough neither for I will grant him that there are some kind of private Pleasure or Advantage private Good Self-good such as Profit Pleasure Honour all secular Satisfactions which if they are the chief Designs and Purposes of the Agent they depreciate that Action which is really advantageous to the Publick and perhaps to the Doer also farther than he might hope but a regard had to the private chief Good of every Man is that which sets the high value upon his Actions and gives them that Excellence because of which they may fitly be called virtuous To speak my sense in every thing as plain as I can A Man 's chief good I allow to consist in just and equal Affections whereby he is dispos'd to take a wise care of his Health a duly proportion'd regard of his secular Interests and to imploy a constant study and labour to do good to all Mankind as far as his Abilities can reach and in the order as this or that Society or Person most reasonably calls for a prior regard These just and equal Affections create to a Man greater Happiness than can accrue to him from secular Satisfactions Now if the Mind of man shall exist again as we think it most probable and mean to give our Reasons it shall exist with these just and equal Affections in beneficent degrees still improving more useful to others and more happy in it self for even in this Life as a good Man increases in his good Affections so his Fervour and his Joys daily advance A regard had to this Hope is proper to regulate our Judgment and Affections and dispose us to Virtue more powerfully than the Consideration of the Happiness which Virtue creates to us in this Life Now no Man's chief private Good can be separated from the Good of others tho his secular private Good may whatsoever is of honest advantage to one's Acquaintance Friend Relation Neighbourhood Country Mankind in general has a tendency to one's own chief Advantage and many times to some inferiour Advantages of one's own also but no Man could at all endeavour the advantage of others if it tended to his own greatest loss There is implanted in Mankind a strong Principle of Self-love prior to all kind respect towards others we cannot but love our own honest secular Interest before the honest secular Interest of another Man our private Self-good future more ardently than the private Self-good future of another Man We do ill only when we prefer a small secular Interest of our own before a weighty Interest of another whose condition is sad and piteable or before a weighty certain Interest of the Publick or before a probability that we may happen to have in our hands of promoting the Interests of Virtue And this I think is speaking something more distinctly than our Author has done and more according to verity I said I would assign my Reasons why I thought it most probable that the Mind of Man should exist again after Death at what time as to me is most probable his regular or irregular Affections shall create his Happiness or Misery I will not defer the making good that promise only let it be consider'd 't is high Probability not sensible Demonstration that I pretend to tho I have a Temptation to pretend even to that which Temptation I have from the Reasoning of that noble Philosopher Mr. Lock I quote it in the words of Mr. Wynn's Abridgment p. 200. The Idea of a Supreme Being infinite in Power Goodness and Wisdom whose Workmanship we are and on whom we depend and the Idea of our selves as understanding rational Creatures would I suppose if duly consider'd afford such Foundations of our Duty and Rules of Action as might place Morality among the Sciences capable of Demonstration wherein I doubt not but from Principles as incontestable as those of the Mathematics by necessary Consequences the measure of right and wrong might be made out to any one that will apply himself with the same Indifferency and Attention to the one as he does to the other of these Sciences But of what I have to say let the Reader judg I will use the word Mind or Man promiscuously for it is the reasoning Principle which we call Mind that does distinguish and constitute us what we are If in the Universe every thing is according to a good Order and the most agreable to a general Interest that is possible so that nothing could have bin contriv'd more wisely
of an Instance or two from antient Story Cesar was in many a Conspiracy against the Liberty of his Country at last he absolutely inslav'd it to his own Arbitrary Will and three years injoy'd the success of his unrighteous Usurpation At the end of that term Brutus and Cassius c. dispatch'd him of a sudden If this was adequate Punishment then subjugating a free People is a light Injury Orestes slew his Mother and was all his life-time troubled in Conscience for it suppose this now was adequate Punishment But Nero slew his Mother by whose means he got the Empire and never was troubled for the matter He dispatch'd also his Wife Octavia and his Master Seneca he spar'd no Person that gave him offence his end indeed was tragical but it was sudden and quick no way adequate to his horrid Life I presume I have now made it appear to an impartial equal Considerer that there are some Sins which as it often happens do not meet with Punishment or Pain adequate in this Life I hope to make it appear as plainly that the most difficult Instances of Virtue which ever and anon call for our Practice do not create present Joys equal to the Labours and Dangers thereof Generally speaking such is the nature of Virtue that it is fitted not only to promote the good as our Author phrases it of the private System but also of the publick Virtue naturally tends to the benefit of every particular Man and also of all Mankind united in Societies Temperance conduces to the health of the temperate Man to the health of his Body and to the health of his Mind from the health of both which arises the greatest good which he is capable of at present and also to the enrichment of the Publick for the less is consum'd at home of any thing serviceable to Life the more remains to be exported abroad by way of Trade Justice and Charity are immediately visibly beneficial to Society and they purchase to the just and charitable Person not only the agreable Comforts of a good Reputation but great measures of Security to be treated with Justice again and reasonable hopes to find a return of Charity in time of need Now such being the nature of Virtue so proportion'd and fitted to all the honest Desires and nobler Ends of Mankind in this state it would become a wise Man in some cases to practise it even tho he were sure there were no Reward nothing to be got by it hereafter but then there are other cases in which Virtue tho always serviceable to Society may accidentally happen to be unserviceable to a private Man and wholly unable to create him present Joys equal to the Labours and Dangers thereof Nay there are cases in which some Virtues aiming at the Service of the Publick may become effectual to the utter ruin of a Man's Fortunes Friends Health Life Now if it is ever odds against a Man that his Virtue shall not be successful to the Publick according to his desire but on the contrary prove an occasion of ruin to his Fortunes Family Friends Health Life how the Reflexion on his Virtue can create him Joy greater or but equal to the Pain which these Misfortunes will cause while he believes no future State I cannot divine If it should be objected that I suppose a Case which ought not to be suppos'd I reply that this very case has within our memory befall'n several worthy Persons in more than one Country upon their opposing the Arbitrary Designs of tyrannizing Princes Their honest Endeavours to preserve their Country from Poverty by loss of Trade from Slavery and its numerous attendant Mischiefs have cost several the loss of high Honours and valuable Profits wasted their Estates reduc'd their Families to Hardships broke their Health in close Prisons and sometimes put an end to their days by ignominious Punishments There is not one Instance of Virtue more widely beneficial and more truly glorious than a wise and resolute use of all lawful likely means to preserve to that Society whereof we are Members the safe and secure enjoyment of their Trade and Liberties The satisfaction and pleasure of Mind in labouring this thing will not be denied to be as great if not greater than that which proceeds from any other instance of Virtue but to be tho accidentally and by means of consulting the publick Good the occasion of great Misfortune not only to some Dependants Acquaintance and Friends but to Wife and Children also to the ruin of ones own Health and shortning ones days this in my opinion cannot but make the most virtuously dispos'd Man who believes no future State very uneasy and hinder him from relishing the Satisfactions which otherwise his Virtue might create to him I do now only for Argument sake suppose a Man who believes no future State capable of serving his Country at the price of these Difficulties and Sufferances but that being suppos'd I contend that these Difficulties and Sufferances cannot be more painful than the consciousness of his Virtue can be joyous And methinks this may be made out even to a full and fair Demonstration Unexpected Disappointments and Losses the Falsness of an intrusted Servant the Ingratitude of an oblig'd Friend want of many Necessaries and undeserv'd Reproach these are heavy Weights and no little power have they to disorder the thoughts of the Mind it must yet more sensibly touch a Man especially believing no future State if his Concern and Labour to serve his Country brings ruin on the Wife of his Bosom and his Children the pledges of their mutual Love and I question very much whether ever any Man who believes no future State did despise the melancholy Prospect being before him his dear Wife and Children and undauntedly practise the dangerous Virtue but a Prison has still a more afflicting Influence on the Mind of a well-dispos'd Man and by that time Restraint and barbarous Usage has broke his Health his Spirits must fail his Mind must needs languish together with his Body and when a Man is in continual Pain tho he does not utterly lose the consciousness of his Integrity yet what comfort can he take in it when he sees that it has undone not only his dearest Relatives but himself also and considers that himself undone is dying dying for ever and never like to be the better for his Virtue hereafter I think our Preachers do not exact the words of Paul literally when he wish'd that Curse on himself for the sake of his Brethren the Jews and in my Judgment as no Man can wish to be miserable hereafter that others may be happy hereafter so no Man who looks upon this Life as the end of all things to him can be content to be miserable in this Life in hopes to make others happy in this Life If any Adversary shall oppose his denial to what I have here determin'd then he must be forced to assert that Man is a Creature
Shame to the Vitious but what are of no longer duration than this short Life the mighty and the wary Sinner are really tempted to indulge their irregular Passions and Affections I dismiss our Author and now it comes into my mind to talk as I promis'd with that very learned Acquaintance who would bear me down that Tully never made the Notion of a future State an Argument for Virtue My reading has been narrow and my Memory such as to have little of what I have read at command but examining it at leisure I remember something in Tully's Tract wrote to Pomponius Atticus titled Cato Major de Senectute which if I am not greatly mistaken disproves his Assertion The Discourse is Dialogue but what is said under the Person of Cato was the sense of Tully as is plain from these words of his Ipsius Catonis sermo explicabit nostram omnem de senectute sententiam Cato's Discourse will declare my whole sense concerning old Age. Now not to take advantage of the dying Speech put into the mouth of Cyrus by Xenophon which Tully under the person of Cato recites with approbation let the Reader judg of this Passage so remarkable that it has been almost as much cited as any Text in the Bible O praeclarum diem cùm ad illud divinum animorum concilium coetúmque proficiscar cúmque ex hac turba colluvione discedam Proficiscar enim non ad eos solùm viros de quibus ante dixi sed etiam ad Catonem meum quo nemo vir melior natus est neque pietate praestantior O blessed Day when I shall arrive at the Divine Assembly of Souls when I shall leave this vile Crowd and Earth behind for there I shall meet not only those noble Romans whom I just now mention'd but also my Cato than whom a more worthy and pious Man the World has not known Now that which gave Tully the confidence of expecting to be happy after Death in the company of those gallant Men who as he had deserv'd well of the Age they liv'd in was this he was not asham'd of the Life he had led but was conscious to his own Merit Non me vixisse poenitet quoniam ita vixi ut non me frustra natum existimem Towards the end of this Book he adds Quod si in hoc erro quòd animos hominum immortales esse credam lubenter erro nec mihi hunc errorem quo delector dum vivo extorqueri volo If I mistake in thinking the Souls of Men to be immortal I mistake with delight nor would I have this Mistake with which I am pleas'd torn from me as long as I live I had almost overseen the smart Reflection which follows Sin mortuus ut quidam minuti Philosophi censent nihil sentiam non vereor ne hunc errorem meum mortui Philosophi irrideant But if when I am dead I become nothing but sensless Matter as some silly Philosophers think those silly Philosophers will become sensless Matter too and so there will be no danger of their hitting me in the teeth with this my Mistake By this it appears to me that this Prince of Philosophers and true Father of his Country this venerable Master of righteous Morals now with his dear Cato the noble Scipio's his friendly Fannius Laelius and Scaevola sustain'd his honest Mind under all the Labours and Difficulties of Virtue by contemplating the infinite Advantages he should reap in a future State And surely while he acquaints others with what Expectations he was influenc'd he may justly be look'd upon as one that seriously endeavour'd to influence them by the same It is true he does not speak of the Immortality of the Soul and the Blessedness which waits the Virtuous with that confidence which is peculiar to Christians but he speaks of it as of a thing so very probable that he thought it highly became him to express his regard to it by a Virtue so settled and firm as no Adversity could shake One thing more I desire of my Acquaintance whose singular Parts and Learning make me that I cannot argue against him without fear and suspicion of my self tho let me do what I can I am not able to complement him with submitting my Understanding i. e. that he would a little consider the Design and Purpose of Tully in that Golden Fragment of his sixth Book Somnium Scipionis the only valuable Remain of six Books de Republicâ the loss of which I should infinitely regret now as Men of Sense and Probity have done formerly were it not for the incomparable Discourses concerning Government which that Wise Learned and truly Noble Gentleman Algernon Sidney hath left us Tully's Dream in the Person of Scipio is so fine a Piece I can hardly forbear translating the whole The Reader I hope will forgive me if I take it from the beginning and go as far as the Passage I shall chiefly insist on When I came into Afric Colonel as you know of the fourth Legion under Marcus Manilius I made it my business to meet Masanissa a King who for very good reasons was much a friend to our Family I no sooner came to him but the aged Prince took me in his Arms and wept a while after recovering from his Transport he lifts up his Eyes to Heaven and breaks out into this Exclamation O thou great God the Sun and you the rest Inhabitants Celestial I bless and praise you all that once before I dy I have the happiness to behold within my own Dominions and under this Roof P. Cornelius Scipio whose very Name I love to hear so dear and so well fix'd in my Mind is the memory of that most excellent and invincible Man Then I ask'd him some Questions concerning his Kingdom he me some concerning our Commonwealth This kind of Discourse took up the whole day in the Evening we were royally entertain'd and continued our Discourse till midnight He dwelt upon the name of Africanus and talk'd much of the great things done and said by him After this we withdrew to Rest Travelling and sitting up late laid me in a profound sleep And here for it often comes to pass that the Thoughts and Discourse of the Day produce in sleep something like that which Ennius writes of Homer whom he read and studied so long till he dream'd that himself was Homer Africanus appear'd to me in that form with which not the remembrance of his Person but the Idea of his Statue made me acquainted I knew 't was he and stood amaz'd but he bid me quit my fear and with a presence of Mind heed what he should say to me See you that City showing me Carthage from a high starry radiant place which I taught to obey the Romans she the old War renews and has not the wit to be quiet You come now to fight against this City tho hardly of Age to command two years hence you shall be Consul and take it