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together, and their grave plentifully watered by the tears of the keeper, and his loudly lamenting family. But to return.

When our company were on their way from the Tower to their lodgings, "Sir," aid Harry, "what we have just seen reminds me of the opinion of my friend Peter Patience, that one who is fearless cannot be provoked. You saw how that little teasing petulant wretch had the insolence to fly in the face of his benefactor, without offending or exciting in him any kind of resentment." "True, Harry, for the lion was sensible that his testy companion was little and impotent, and depended upon him, and had confidence in his clemency, and therefore he loved him with all his faults. Anger, however, in some cases, is not only allowable, but becomes a duty. The Scripture says, ' Be angry, but sin not.' We ought to feel and fear for thers; and lust, violence, and oppression of every sort, will excite the indignation of a generous and benevolent person, though he may not fear for himself."

After supper, Harry appeared to ruminate, and said, "How comes it, sir, that creatures not endued with reason or conscience, shall yet, in the affections that are peculiarly called humane, exceed even most of the human species? You have seen that it was the case between the lion and little dog."

"It was the opinion, my Harry, of an ancient philosopher, that God was the soul and spirit of brutes; and this he judged from observing, that what we call instinct was incomparably wiser, more sagacious, and more accomplishing for attaining its end, throughout its sphere of action, than the most perfect human reason. Now, had this philosopher, instead of saying that God was the soul of brutes, barely alleged that he ruled and dictated within them, he would not have gone a little wide of the truth. God, indeed, is himself the beauty and the benefit of all his works. As they cannot exist but in him and by him, so his impression is upon them, and his impregnation is through them.

"Though the elements, and all that we know of nature and creation, have a mixture of natural and physical evil, God is, however, throughout, an internal though often a hidden principle of good, and never wholly departs from his right of dominion and operation in his creatures; but is, and is alone, the beauty and beneficence, the whole glory and graciousness, that can possibly be in them.

"As the Apostle says, 'The invisible things of God are made manifest by the things that are seen.' He is the secret and central light that kindles up the sun, his dazzling representative; and he lives, enlightens, and comforts in the diffusion of his beams.

"His spirit inspires and actuates the air, and is in it a breath of life to all his creatures. He blooms in the blossom, and unfolds in the rose. He is fragrance in flowers, and flavour in fruits. He holds infinitude in the hollow of his hand, and opens his world of wonders to the minims of nature. He is the virtue of every heart that is softened by a sense of pity, or touch of benevolence. He coos in the turtle, and bleats in the lamb; and, through the paps of the stern bear, and implacable tigress, he yields forth the milk of loving-kindness to their little ones. Even, my Harry, when we hear the delicious enchantment of music, it is but an external sketch, a distant and faint echo of those sentimental and rapturous tunings that rise up, throughout the immensity of our God, from eternity to eternity.

"Thus all things are secretly pregnant with their God. And the Lover of sinners, the universal Redeemer, is a principle of good within them, that contends with the malignity of their lapsed state. And thus, as the Apostle speaks, 'All Nature is in travail, and groaning to be delivered from the evil;' till the breath of the love of God shall kindle upon the final fire, out of which the new heavens and new earth shall come forth, like gold seven times refined, to shine for ever and ever!"

189. THE CHRISTIAN REVELATION THE SURE STANDARD OF MORALITY. LOCKE.

[JOHN LOCKE, whose writings half a century ago were regarded as the text-book of sound philosophy, has now passed into comparative neglect. This is not the place to examine into the causes of this revolution of opinion, which may be equally traced in the poetry and the theology of our own day. His Essay on the Human Understanding' will, however, always command attention for the clearness of its style, and the perspicuity of its reasoning. As a political writer, Locke is to be admired for his consistent advocacy of freedom and toleration, in an age when such opinions were more than unfashionable--were absolutely dangerous. He was born in 1632; was employed in various public offices under the famous Lord Shaftesbury, and shared the disgrace of that statesman; returned from exile at the Revolution of 1688, and was employed by the government of William III. The following extract is from his 'Reasonableness of Christianity'-an attempt to show what points of belief were common to all Christians. The latter years of Locke's life were passed in retirement, and his studies were confined to the Holy Scriptures. He died in 1704.]

Next to the knowledge of one God, Maker of all things, a clear knowledge of their duty was wanting to mankind. This part of knowledge, though cultivated with some care by some of the heathen philosophers, yet got little footing among the people. All men indeed, under pain of displeasing the gods, were to frequent the temples: every one went to their sacrifices and services; but the priests made it not their business to teach them virtue. If they were diligent in their observations and ceremonies, punctual in their feasts and solemnities, and the tricks of religion, the holy tribe assured them the gods were pleased; and they looked no further.

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We see how unsuccessful in this the attempts of philosophers were before our Saviour's time. How short their several systems came of the perfection of a true and complete morality is very visible. And if, since that, the Christian philosophers have much outdone them, yet we may observe, that the first knowledge of the truths they have added are owing to revelation; though, as soon as they are heard and considered, they are found to be agreeable to reason, and such as can by no means be contradicted. Every one may observe a great many truths, which he receives at first from others, and readily consents to as consonant to reason, which he would have found it hard, and perhaps beyond his strength, to have discovered himself. Native and original truth is not so easily wrought out of the mine, as we who have it delivered ready dug and fashioned into our hands, are apt to imagine. And how often at fifty or threescore years old are thinking men told what they wonder how they could miss thinking of! which yet their own contemplations did not and possibly never would have helped them to. Experience shows that the knowledge of morality, by mere natural light, (how agreeable soever it be to it,) makes but a slow progress and little advance in the world. And the reason of it is not hard to be found in men's necessities, passions, vices, and mistaken interests, which turn their thoughts another way. And the designing leaders, as well as the following herd, find it not to their purpose to employ much of their meditations this way. Or, whatsoever else was the cause, it is plain in fact, human reason, unassisted, failed men in its great and proper business of morality. It never, from unquestionable principles, by clear deductions, made out an entire body of the law of nature. And he that shall collect all the moral rules of the philosophers, and compare them with those contained in the New Testament, will find them to come short of the morality delivered by our Saviour and taught by his apostles: a college made up for the most part of ignorant but inspired fishermen.

Though yet, if any one should think, that, out of the sayings of the wise heathens before our Saviour's time, there might be a collection made of all those rules of morality which are to be found in the Christian religion; yet this would not at all

hinder, but that the world nevertheless stood as much in need of our Saviour, and the morality delivered by him. Let it be granted (though not true) that all the moral precepts of the Gospel were known by somebody or other, amongst mankind, before. But where, or how, or of what use, is not considered. Suppose they may be picked up here and there; some from Solon and Bias in Greece; others from Tully in Italy; and, to complete the work, let Confucius, as far as China, be consulted; and Anacharsis the Scythian contribute his share. What will all this dc to give the world a complete morality, that may be to mankind the unquestionable rule of life and manners? I will not here urge the impossibility of collecting from men so far distant from one another in time, and place, and languages. I will suppose there was a Stobæus in those times, who had gathered the moral sayings from all the sages of the world. What would this amount to towards being a steady rule, a certain transcript of a law that we are under ? Did the saying of Aristippus or Confucius give it an authority? Was Zeno a lawgiver to mankind? If not, what he or any other philosopher delivered, was but a saying of his. Mankind might hearken to it, or reject it, as they pleased, or as it suited their interest, passions, principles, or humours; they were under no obligation; the opinion of this or that philosopher was of no authority: and if it were, you must take all he said under the same character. All his dictates must go for law, certain and true, or none of them. And then, if you will take any of the moral sayings of Epicurus (many whereof Seneca quotes with esteem and approbation) for precepts of the law of nature, you must take all the rest of his doctrine for such too, or else his authority ceases; and so no more is to be received from him, or any of the sages of old, for parts of the law of nature, as carrying with it an obligation to be obeyed, but what they prove to be so. But such a body of ethics, proved to be the law of nature, from principles of reason, and reaching all the duties of life, I think nobody will say the world had before our Saviour's time. It is not enough that there were up and down scattered sayings of wise men conformable to right reason. The law of nature was the law of convenience too; and it is no wonder that those men of parts, and studious of virtue, (who had occasion to think on any particular part of it,) should by meditation light on the right, even from the observable convenience and beauty of it, without making out its obligation from the true principles of the law of nature, and foundations of morality. But these incoherent apophthegms of philosophers and wise men, however excellent in themselves, and well intended by them, could never make a morality whereof the world could be convinced; could never rise to the force of a law that mankind could with certainty depend on. Whatsoever should thus be universally useful, as a standard to which men should conform their manners, must have its authority either from reason or revelation. It is not every writer of morals, or compiler of it from others, that can thereby be erected into a lawgiver to mankind; and a dictator of rules, which are therefore valid because they are to be found in his books, under the authority of this or that philosopher. He that any one will pretend to set up in this kind, and have his rules pass for authentic directions, must show that either he builds his doctrines upon principles of reason, self-evident in themselves, and that he deduces all the parts of it from thence, by clear and evident demonstration; or must show his commission from heaven, that he comes with authority from God to deliver his will and commands to the world. In the former way nobody that I know before our Saviour's time, ever did or went about to give us a morality. It is true, there is a law of nature: but who is there that ever did or undertook to give it us all entire, as a law; no more nor no less than what was contained in, and had the obligation of, that law? Who ever made out all the parts of it, put them together, and showed the world their obligation? Where was there any such code, that mankind might have recourse to as their unerring rule, before our Saviour's time?

If there was not, it is plain there was need of one to give us such a morality; such a law, which might be the sure guide of those who had a desire to go right; and, if they had a mind, need not mistake their duty; but might be certain when they had performed, when failed in it. Such a law of morality Jesus Christ hath given, in the New Testament; but by the latter of these ways, by revelation, we have from him a full and sufficient rule for our direction, and conformable to that of reason. But the truth and obligation of its precepts have their force, and are put past doubt to us, by the evidence of his mission. He was sent by God: his miracles show it; and the authority of God in his precepts cannot be questioned. Here morality has a sure standard, that revelation vouches, and reason cannot gainsay nor question; but both together witness to come from God, the great Lawmaker. And such an one as this, out of the New Testament, I think the world never had, nor can any one say is anywhere else to be found. Let me ask any one who is forward to think that the doctrine of morality was full and clear in the world at our Saviour's birth-Whither would we have directed Brutus and Cassius (both men of parts and virtue, the one whereof believed, and the other disbelieved, a future being), to be satisfied in the rules and obligations of all the parts of their duties, if they should have asked him where they might find the law they were to live by, and by which they should be charged or acquitted, as guilty or innocent? If to the sayings of the wise, and the declarations of philosophers, he sends them into a wild wood of uncertainty, to an endless maze, from which they should never get out; if to the religions of the world, yet worse: and if to their own reason, he refers them to that which had some rule and certainty, but yet had hitherto failed all mankind in a perfect rule; and, we see, resolved not the doubts that had arisen amongst the studious and thinking philosophers; nor had yet been able to convince the civilized parts of the world that they had not given, nor could without a crime take away, the lives of their children by exposing them.

If any one should think to excuse human nature, by laying blame on men's negligence, that they did not carry morality to a higher pitch, and make it out entire in every part, with that clearness of demonstration which some think it capable of, he helps not the matter. Be the cause what it will, our Saviour found mankind under a corruption of manners and principles, which ages after ages had prevailed, and, must be confessed, was not in a way or tendency to be mended. The rules of morality were, in different countries and sects, different. And natural reason nowhere had cured, nor was like to cure, the defects and errors in them. Those just measures of right and wrong, which necessity had anywhere introduced, the civil law prescribed, or philosophy recommended, stood not on their true foundations. They were looked on as bonds of society, and conveniences of common life, and laudable practices. But where was it that their obligation was thoroughly known and allowed, and they received as precepts of a law, the highest law, the law of nature? That could not be, without a clear knowledge and acknowledgment of the lawmaker, and the great rewards and punishments for those that would or would not obey him.

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A great many things which we have been bred up in the belief of from our cradles, and are notions grown familiar, (and, as it were, natural to us under the gospel,) we take for unquestionable obvious truths, and easily demonstrable, without considering how long we might have been in doubt or ignorance of them had revelation been silent. And many are beholden to revelation who do not acknowledge it. It is no diminishing to revelation that reason gives its suffrage too to the truths revelation has discovered. But it is our mistake to think, that because reason confirms them to us, we had the first certain knowledge of them from thence, and in that clear evidence we now possess them. The contrary is manifest in the defective

morality of the Gentiles before our Saviour's time, and the want of reformation in the principles and measures of it as well as practice. Philosophy seemed to have spent its strength, and done its utmost; or if it should have gone further, as we see it did not, and from undeniable principles given us ethics in a science like mathematics, in every part demonstrable, this yet would not have been so effectual to man in this imperfect state, nor proper for the cure. The greatest part of mankind want leisure or capacity for demonstration, nor can carry a train of proofs, which in that way they must always depend upon for conviction, and cannot be required to assent to till they see the demonstration. Whenever they stick, the teachers are always put upon truth, and must clear the doubt by a thread of coherent deductions from the first principle, how long or how intricate soever that be. And you may as soon hope to have all the day-labourers and tradesmen, the spinsters and dairymaids, perfect mathematicians, and to have them perfect in ethics this way: hearing plain commands is the only course to bring them to obedience and practice: the greatest part cannot know, and therefore they must believe. And, I ask, whether one coming from heaven in the power of God, in full and clear evidence and demonstration of miracles, giving plain and direct rules of morality and obedience, be not likelier to enlighten the bulk of mankind, and set them right in their duties, and bring them to do them, than by reasoning with them from general notions and principles of human reason. And were all the duties of human life clearly demonstrated, yet I conclude, when well considered, that method of teaching men their duties would be thought proper only for a few who had much leisure, improved understandings, and were used to abstract reasonings: but the instruction of the people were best still to be left to the precepts and principles of the gospel. The healing of the sick, the restoring sight to the blind by a word, the raising and being raised from the dead, are matters of fact which they can without difficulty conceive; and that he who does such things must do them by the assistance of a divine power. These things lie level to the ordinariest apprehension; he that can distinguish between sick and well, lame and sound, dead and alive, is capable of this doctrine. To one who is once persuaded that Jesus Christ was sent by God to be a king, and a saviour of those who do believe in him, all his commands become principles; there needs no other proof for the truth of what he says, but that he said it: and then there needs no more but to read the inspired books to be instructed; all the duties of morality lie there clear and plain, and easy to be understood. And here I appeal, whether this be not the surest, the safest, and most effectual way of teaching; especially if we add this further consideration, that, as it suits the lowest capacities of reasonable creatures, so it reaches and satisfies, nay, enlightens the highest. The most elevated understandings cannot but submit to the authority of this doctrine as divine; which coming from the mouths of a company of illiterate men, hath not only the attestation of miracles, but reason to confirm it, since they delivered no precepts but such, as though reason of itself had not clearly made out, yet it could not but assent to when thus discovered, and think itself indebted for the discovery. The credit and authority our Saviour and his apostles had over the minds of men, by the miracles they did, tempted them not to mix (as we find in that of all the sects of philosophers and other religions) any conceits, any wrong rules, any thing tending to their own by interest, or that of a party, in their morality; no tang of prepossession or fancy; no footsteps of pride or vanity, no touch of ostentation or ambition appears to have a hand in it: it is all pure, all sincere; nothing too much, nothing wanting; but such a complete rule of life as the wisest men must acknowledge tends entirely to the good of mankind, and that all would be happy if all would practise it.

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