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ally understand some passages of Scripture either without such expectation.

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Therefore, let thought be free among us in detail, as long as we can agree on the sum of the question, v. g. respecting the agreement of subjective and objective characteristics; or of good to good, and evil to evil. Let us, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing” (Phil, iii. 15, 16). In attending to the sphere or locality of happiness and of its forerunner, righteousness, which is only a relation, we should not forget the subject; neither should we suffer ourselves to be led much beyond the test of experience in speculating on a subject that is future to all men living as yet, consequently unknown to all: and very properly. For when a master has any design to promote by the help or instrumentality of servants, he generally keeps the main of it to himself, and only signifies to them the means and manner by which it is to be effected with sufficient motives for acting thereon. Just so does Providence by us in relation to the grand design which occupies the period of our earthly existence. Believing the general end of such existence to include the happiness of the subject, we are still as ignorant as the creatures that we employ below us of its specific purposes, being sufficiently informed at the same time of the means necessary thereto, and stimulated by sufficient motives; the means being our righteousness, and the motives our wisdom.

Indeed, it does not appear as if the general subject of happiness had ever been reduced even to the certainty of which it is capable, though there is no other matter in which men are so deeply interested. It is, unquestionably every man's first and highest concern; but few will stay to comprehend it; they are so eager in the pursuit that they cannot stay to consider their object. And it is

not always that its votaries have any particular object either to consider in their habitual pursuit of happiness: there are numbers-we may say, a majority, of mankind, who never pursue any thing beyond the medium of that which they account happiness: retracting their gratification continually from one stage back to another, as first from the highest to an inferior object, and next from this inferior object to the means of attaining it; as for example, from the first necessary, life itself, to a fleeting portion of life; from that portion to a few fleeting incidentals belonging to the same, and from these incidentals to the means of procuring them. But if we will rejoice in the medium of happiness, we should rejoice, too, in that which is its highest object at the same time, and which we may always enjoy under all circumstances, setting our affections on things above, not on things on the earth (Col. iii. 2); even if the earth, or a good number of its restless inhabitants, and still more the spirits by which they are troubled, should be subject to us; as our Saviour once told some of his apostles, when they seemed to pride themselves on a triumph of this sort, "Notwithstanding, in this rejoice not, (said he,) that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice because your names are written in Heaven" (Luke x. 20).

Still, however, as earthly happiness seems worth considering, and its general subject does not seem to require any farther observations, let us now proceed to dissect the same, and review its several kinds, or things so reported, in succession: which will lead us in the first place to consider a species of good characteristics, that may almost be called indifferent; being the least good in themselves, also outermost in relation to the subject, and therefore, according to our method, fittest to begin with; namely, the good characteristics of incidentals; or, simply speaking, good incidentals; or, speaking more properly, incidentals so reported.

§ 1. For these good incidentals, or externals, as they

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are oftener called, have for one general characteristic a degree of indifference, however inconsistent it may appear with their character for goodness. Which characteristic, though few men will care to admit, having resolutely made up their minds to a contrary opinion, it would not be difficult to prove by a deduction of consequences originating in experience; but a shorter way will be, to suppose a case on two opposite endowments, one in incidentals or externals, the other in worth or constituents. Suppose then, for example, first a man noble and rich in himself, but poor in externals, and also doomed to spend his days in a solitary exile; and suppose another poor in himself, but noble and rich in the other respect, and also surrounded with a choice of congenial acquaintance; and then, applying on either part the test of real enjoyment, you will find, that one man can be happier without such externals than another with them: which proves their natural indifference. We will not say that such an one must be happier without these characteristics: for that would be asserting their opposition to good, and making them worse than they are, which does not seem necessary; but there would be no incongruity in saying, that he may be happier without advantages of this class. And of such a liability we shall find farther evidence as we proceed in considering these good incidentals more particularly, and somewhat after the order that has been led by their corresponding essentials. Accordingly,

1. The first good incidental to be here noticed, as it also still appears to be regarded foremost in its class by some old fashioned people, is one founded on nearly the first named among the same class of essentials, to wit, birth and station: which by a very trifling change of expression is for want of another word here, designated as Ancestry or Gentility. And certainly no one can condemn a proper esteem for this circumstance. Such esteem is like a part of the fifth commandment; which requires the honouring of father and mother, à duty that has no bounds

in respect of object through all the ages that are past, though there may be distinctions in it arising from different peculiarities. Among these a personal acquaintance may be named for one: as they who have the advantage of remembering their father and mother, may honour their memory more distinctly than they who have not such advantage; and they who can also remember some good qualities in the same, or only a freedom from evil, will have the additional advantage of reverencing as well as honouring their memory. Some may have the somewhat singular advantage of remembering their whole parentage for the past and one preceding generation, including two worthy grandfathers, with a father and mother, who were no disparagement to either. Such may truly be called MEN OF GOOD FAMILY; at the same time that such advantage is nothing for them to be proud of, as their ancestry, however good or enviable, can do no credit to their choice.

The want of the advantage in some of a personal acquaintance with their forefathers, which others enjoy as aforesaid may be compensated to them, partly by the effect of tradition, whether oral or written. And sometimes a few words in print, perhaps some lying or very partial record, shall be more esteemed, than the memory of a thousand obligations which might have been retained: but that is not honouring father and mother so much as the world; it is mere vanity and family pride, a failing which ought to be exposed in its place, that the honouring of our parents and theirs may be enlightened by a proper consideration of family dignity, or the dignity of this relation, and guarded at the same time from that very unworthy extreme.

2. Equal to the noblest birth and station in honour and enjoyment is the good characteristic, Liberty: which consists in the entire use of such means and abilities as have been either granted to us by Nature and Providence, or acquired by art, subject only to the law of God and to

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such authorities as may be agreeable to the same. It may seem inconsistent to regard two properties so opposite in appearance as freedom and subjection in the light of helpmates: but this is not the only instance of two subjects supporting each other by counter-position; and here they are really the making of each other, v. g. freedom of subjection, and subjection of freedom: the same being part of a reciprocity that begins with the meanest of his creatures, and ends only with Him "whose service is perfect freedom." "And I will walk at liberty; (says the Psalmist) for I seek thy commandments” (Ps. cxix. 45). And so these two properties, freedom and subjection, may be said to walk in unity, or in mutual subservience to each other through the whole kingdom of God properly so called. For there properties of every sort are free, being subject only to those on which they ought to depend; as the incidental sort, on earthly government; and the constituent, on heavenly; the lower sort among constituents being also subject in some degree to the higher; as the material to the spiritual, by which they are kept and replenished; and the spiritual again to the intellectual, by which they are, or ought to be directed under the Supreme Intelligence. The several properties of the kingdom being subject in this manner with only such a reciprocity as cannot be avoided in combinations may then, and only then, be considered free. And wherever a chasm in the course of dependence, or any disorder, or derangement occurs, there will be mere slavery, or subjection without freedom in that respect; though in other respects the subject may be free. For example, a man may be free in his incidentals (fortune or circumstances), and captive in his constituents (substance or self); or vice versâ, free in these, and captive in those or he may be free in one incidental or constituent, and not in another; or in more than one of either sort, and not in one of the other. He may be free, for example, in his place and habitation, but not in his

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