Creator made him and designed him to be, LECT. II. they pursue their investigations, and deduce their conclusions, accordingly. They discover in man a variety of principles of action, which, according to their customary phraseology," the Author of his being has implanted in his nature;”—and, from the existence of these principles they infer the intentions and the character of the Being by whom the constitution of his nature has been adjusted, and elicit their theories respecting the essential elements of moral rectitude. Now, this would be a procedure altogether satisfactory, were the creature, who is the subject of the analytical process of investigation in the state in which it came from its Creator's hand; were it, according to its appropriate nature, perfect, and so a fair specimen of the moral productions of Deity ;-or, as it has been briefly and happily enough expressed, "if in man that which is were the same with that which ought to be.* But if the human nature be indeed in the condition in which revelation affirms it to be,if it be a nature in a state of estrangement from God, and of moral corruption, it is needless to say how delusive all this necessarily becomes. How can any thing but error and confusion, or, at best, mingled and partial truth, be the result of an attempt to discover the principles of moral rectitude from the constitution of a depraved nature?-to extract a pure system of Ethics * Dr. Payne.

LECT. II. from the elements of corruption ?-to found the superstructure of moral science on the scattered and unstable rubbish of fallen humanity?

Let me illustrate my meaning by a simple comparison. Suppose a chemist were desirous to ascertain the ingredients of water. What estimate should we form of his judgment, if, with this view, he were to subject to his analysis a quantity of what had just passed, in the bed of a sluggish river, through the midst of a large manufacturing city, from whose common sewers, and other outlets of impurity, it had received every possible contamination which, either by simple admixture or by chemical affinity, had become incorporated with the virgin purity of the fountain; and if, proceeding on such analysis, he were to publish to the world his thesis on the composition of water? Little less preposterous must be the conduct of those philosophers, who derive their ideas of what constitutes rectitude in morals from human nature as it is. They analyse the water of the polluted river; and refuse the guide that would conduct them to the mountain spring of its native purity.

It may perhaps be alleged, that the comparison is not fair: that these philosophers should rather be likened to the chemist, who, in analysing the water of the river, takes care to separate all such ingredients as are merely adventitious, and so to arrive at the true nature and composition of (I use the term of course

in its popular acceptation) the pure element. LECT. II. Should this be alleged, I answer, that such a comparison will be found to involve a manifest petitio principii. The chemist who proceeds thus, must of course, have a previous knowledge of the composition of water; else of the various ingredients, found by him in the portion taken from the river, how could he possibly be aware which were adventitious, and which belonged to its primitive nature? According to the comparison, therefore, as thus stated, the philosopher, with whom the chemist is compared, must, in like manner, be in possession of a previous knowledge of the elementary principles of rectitude; from which, in his process of moral analysis, he refines away all the foreign and adventitious corruptions which, in the nature of man, have mingled with and debased them :—that is, he must be already in possession of the very knowledge of which he is supposed to be in quest. This will not do. To render the comparison legitimate, we must, in both cases, suppose a state of previous ignorance, and a process of investigation instituted with the view of obtaining correct information. In both, the source from which the information is sought is fallacious; and in both, therefore, the conclusions are unavoidably uncertain or wrong.

tions of the

In the brief remarks which it is my purpose Exemplificato offer on some of the principal theories of omission in

question.

LECT. II. morals, the influence of the source of error I

have now adverted to may be made sufficiently apparent; yet it may not be amiss to present you with an exemplification or two of what I mean when I speak of philosophers taking human nature, according to its present phenomena, as a standard of their moral estimates, in their speculations on the principles of rectitude. I give the following, not according to any principle of selection, but as the first that have recently presented themselves, and only as a specimen of much to the same purpose, to be found in almost all the writers on moral science. Others will occur in our comments on different systems, which, to avoid repetition, I do not introduce here.

The writer of the article MORAL PHILOSOPHY, in the Encyclopædia Britannica, gives the following statement of the specific nature of the science; and I quote it, because it presents a clear view of the fallacious principle of which I have been speaking: "Moral philosophy has "this in common with natural philosophy, that "it appeals to nature, or to fact; depends on "observation; and builds its reasonings on plain, uncontroverted experiments, or upon "the fullest induction of particulars of which "the subject will admit. We must observe, in "both these sciences, how nature is affected, "and what her conduct is in such and such "circumstances; or, in other words, we must

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"collect the appearances of nature in any given_LECT. II. "instance, trace them to some given principles "or terms of operation, and then apply these

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principles or laws to the explaining of other ' phenomena. Therefore, moral philosophy "inquires, not how man might have been, but "how he is, constituted; not into what principles and dispositions his actions may be artfully resolved, but from what principles and dispositions they actually flow; not what he

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may, by education, habit, or foreign influence, "come to be, or to do, but what by his nature, "or original constituent principles, he is formed "to be and to do. We discover the office, use, "or distinction, of any work, whether natural or artificial, by observing its structure, the

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parts of which it consists, their connexion, or joint action. It is thus we understand the "office and use of a watch, a plant, an eye, "or a hand. It is the same with a living "creature of the rational or brute kind. "Therefore, to determine the office, duty, or "distinction of man; or, in other words, what "his business is, or what conduct he is obliged to pursue, we must inspect his consti"tution, take every part to pieces, examine "their mutual relations one to the other, and "the common effect or tendency of the whole."

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According to this statement, we are to pursue our investigations in morals, as we do our researches in physics; regarding the present