tions on the ways of his providence, and by the due exercise of reason, men may hope to develop some of his less obvious dispensations; yet we may suspend our wonder, if philosophers ancient and modern, who have attempted (and the attempt conducted by humility and discretion does honour to human nature), to look with a more searching eye into the deeper counsels of the Almighty, to scan the secrets of his will, and reduce them to the formalities of system, have been disappointed in their object, and that in subjects of morality, error has frequently assumed the face of truth. They have failed in their researches from an inadequate knowledge of God, as the foundation of morals, and from a misconception of man, as the subject of morals, above all,-from their ignorance of the doctrine of the fall, and of that inestimable remedy, which has been provided by the gospel for our sins and infirmities.

Though the Deity has never been wanting in the discovery of himself to the meanest of his rational creatures, the sublimer parts of his divine economy are reserved as mys

teries too exalted for the natural faculties of the highest to investigate, and even for their largest capacities to comprehend1, however competent to embrace some parts when discovered, or to acquiesce in others. Our great philosopher and reformer of all learning human and divine, has therefore referred reason in respect of the whole of the divine law, moral as well as positive, to revelation, as affording that clear and certain light, on which it can firmly and securely rely3.

Besides the stupendous mysteries it unveils, which are positive and doctrinal, it delivers a new and more perfect system of moral duties, founded on their true and proper principle, as the directory of our lives and actions—a divine philosophy unconscious of all error, and free from imperfection, and which is carried to that height of purity and sublimity

Nec illud dubitandum est, magnam partem legis moralis sublimiorem esse, quam quo lumen naturæ ascendere possit. -Bacon. De Augm. Scient. lib. ix.

Particeps est anima lucis nonnullæ ad perfectionem intuendam et discernendam legis moralis; quæ tamen lux non prorsus clara sit, sed ejusmodi ut potius vitia quodatenus redarguat, quam de officiis plane informet.-Ibid.

3 Quare religio, sive mysteria sive mores spectes, pendet de revelatione divina.-Ibid.

No

of which reason is lost in admiration. code of ethics, ancient or modern, is so full or precise, none so clear or consistent, none so practical, none so practicable, and above all none so authoritative, as the morality of the eternal gospel, This is the new law, as distinguished from the old, or the law of nature, not only as being more perfect than any other moral system; but as conveyed to man by a new and living way. Thus the new law constitutes the perfection of moral virtue.

To this code of evangelical ethics the philosopher should look up, as the polar star, whether to direct his studies or regulate his conduct. And here he will receive an admonition from the mouth of One, who was far wiser than all philosophers-" If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them which instructive benediction, with clear and elegant precision, divides moral science into its two distinct and general parts--the knowledge and the practices.

✦ John, xiii. 17.

5 Partiemur igitur ethicam in doctrinas principales duas; alteram de exemplari sive imagine boni; alteram de regi

The former, under the luminous precepts of the Gospel, being a work of more obvious and easy execution, and admitting of a more florid and popular display, has been cultivated by moralists and divines with competent success". The latter, which gives

to it operation and effect, and which constitutes the life of all morality, requiring a deeper investigation into particulars and a more philosophical research, has been at all times too much neglected". The necessity of this part was felt and acknowledged by the

mine et cultura animi, quam etiam partem georgica animi appellare consuevimus: illa naturam boni describit, hæc regulas de animo ad illam conformando præscribit.-Bacon. De Augm. Scient. lib. vii. cap. 1.

Hanc igitur partem (quando præstantiam ejus in animo recolo) in corpus doctrinæ nondum redactam, non possum non vehementer mirari. Eam igitur, ex more nostro, cum inter desiderata collocemus, aliqua ex parte adumbrabimus. —Ibid. lib. vii. cap. 3.

See this part of morality opened by Lord Bacon.

• Proposuerunt nobis exemplaria bella et luculenta atque descriptiones sive imagines accuratas, boni, virtutis, officiorum, felicitatis, tanquam vera objecta, et scopos voluntatis et appetitus humani: verum quomodo quis possit optime ad hos scopos (excellentes sane et bene ab illis positos) collimare; hoc est, quibus rationibus et institutis animus ad illa assequenda subigi et componi possit, aut nihil præcipiunt, aut perfunctorie et minus utiliter.—Ibid. lib. vii. cap. 1.

' Delegerunt sibi philosophi in ethica massam quandam

Peripatetic, whose large and comprehensive mind embraced the confines and marked the dependencies of all learning, and who gave a promise to descend to the execution of this interesting work 8. This promise however does not appear to have been performed, unless very incidentally in his book of rhetoric, in any of those works which have descended to us9.

This is the philosophy of the human heart, which, by a nice and judicious search inquires into its secret springs and motions, discovering the latent seeds of all those passions and affections which are the issues and elements of moral life. This philosophy

materiæ splendidam et nitentem, in qua potissimum vel ingenii acumen, vel eloquentiæ vigorem venditare possint: quæ vero practicam maxime instruunt, quandoquidem tam belle ornari non possint, maxima ex parte omiserunt.— Ibid.

8 Δεῖ ἄρα ὡς ἔοικε πρῶτον ὑπὲρ ἀρετῆς εἰπεῖν, τί τέ ἐσι, καὶ ἐκ τίνων γίνεται. οὐθὲν γὰρ ἴσως ὄφελος εἰδέναι μὲν τὴν ἀρετὴν, πῶς δὲ ἂν, καὶ ἐκ τίνων, μὴ ἐπαΐειν. οὐ γὰρ μόνον ὅπως εἰδή σομεν τί ἐςι, σκοπεῖσθαι δεῖ, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐκ τίνων ἐπὶ, σκέψασθαι. ἅμα γὰρ εἰδῆσαι βουλόμεθα, καὶ αὐτοὶ εἶναὶ τοῦτοι. τῦτο δὲ οὐ δυνησόμεθα, ἐὰν μὴ εἰδῶμεν καὶ ἐκ τίνων, καὶ πῶς ἄν. ἀναγκαῖον μὲν οὖν εἰδῆσαι τί ἐσιν ἀρετή. οὐ γὰρ ῥᾴδιον εἰδέναι τὸ ἐκ τίνων ἂν, καὶ πῶς ἂν, ἀγνοοῦντα τὸ τί ἐςι, ὥσπερ ἐδ ̓ ἐπὶ τῶν ἐπισημῶν. Aristot. Mag. Mor. lib. i. cap. 1.

› We have some good ground to believe that he reserved