It must, I think, in juftice, be acknowledged, that this theory, concerning the origin of our affect. ions, and of the moral fense, is a moft ingenious refinement upon the selfish fyftem, as it was formerly taught; and that, by means of it, the force of many of the common reafonings against that fyftem is eluded. Among these reafonings, particular stress has always been laid on the inftantaneousnefs with which our affections operate, and the moral sense approves or condemns; and on our total want of consciousness, in such cases, of any reference to our own happiness. The modern advocates for the felfish fyftem admit the fact to be as it is ftated by their opponents; and grant, that after the moral fense and our various affections are formed, their exercise, in particular cafes, may become completely difinterested; but ftill they contend, that it is upon a regard to our own happiness that all these principles are originally grafted. The analogy of avarice will ferve to illuftrate the fcope of this theory. It cannot be doubted that this principle of action is artificial. It is on account of the enjoyments which it enables us to purchase, that money is originally defired; and yet, in procefs of time, by means of the agreeable impreffions which are affociated with it, it comes to be defired for its own fake; and even continues to be an object of our purfuit, long after we have loft all relish for those enjoyments which it enables us to command.

Without meaning to engage in any controverfy on the subject, I fhall content myself with obferving, in general, that there must be fome limit, beyond

universality of its applications in the philosophy of mind, to that of the principle of attraction in physics. "Here," says he, “ is a "kind of attraction, which in the mental world will be found to "have as extraordinary effects as in the natural, and to shew itself "in as many and as various forms." Treat. of Hum. Nat. vol. i. P. 30

which the theory of affociation cannot poffibly be carried; for the explanation which it gives, of the formation of new principles of action, proceeds on the fuppofition that there are other principles previously existing in the mind. The great queftion then is, when we are arrived at this limit; or, in other words, when we are arrived at the fimple and original laws of our constitution.

In conducting this inquiry, philofophers have been apt to go into extremes. Lord Kaims, and fome other authors, have been cenfured, and perhaps juftly, for a difpofition to multiply original principles to an unneceffary degree. It may be queftioned, whe ther Dr. Hartley, and his followers, have not fome times been mifled by too eager a defire of abridging their number.

Of these two errors, the former is the leaft comton, and the leaft dangerous. It is the leaft com. mon, because it is not fo flattering as the other to the vanity of a theorift; and it is the leaft dangerous, because it has no tendency, like the other, to give rife to a fuppreffion, or to a misrepresentation of facts; or to retard the progrefs of the fcience, by beftowing upon it an appearance of fyftematical perfection, to which, in its prefent ftate, it is not enti

tled.

Abftracting, however, from these inconveniences, which must always refult from a precipitate reference of phenomena to general principles, it does not feem to me that the theory in queftion has any tendency to weaken the foundation of morals. It has, indeed, fome tendency, in common with the philofophy of Hobbes and of Mandeville, to degrade the dignity of human nature; but it leads to no fceptical conclufions concerning the rule of life. For, although we were to grant, that all our principles of action are acquired; fo ftriking a difference among them must ftill be admitted, as is fuflicient to diftinguifh clearly

thofe univerfal laws which where intended to regulate human conduct, from the local habits which are formed by education and fashion. It must still be admitted, that while fome active principles are confined to particular individuals, or to particular tribes of men; there are others, which, arifing from circumftances in which all the fituations of mankind muft agree, are common to the whole fpecies. Such active principles as fall under this last description, at whatever period of life they may appear, are to be regarded as a part of human nature, no less than the inftinct of fuction; in the fame manner as the acquired perception of diftance by the eye, is to be ranked among the perceptive powers of man, no lefs than the original perceptions of any of our other fenfes.

Leaving, therefore, the queftion concerning the origin of our active principles, and of the moral faculty, to be the subject of future difcuffion, I fhall conclude this Section with a few remarks of a more practical nature.

It has been fhewn by different writers, how much of the beauty and fublimity of material objects arises from the ideas and feelings which we have been taught to affociate with them. The impreffion produced on the external fenfes of a poet, by the most ftriking scene in nature, is precisely the fame with what is produced on the fenfes, of a peasant or a tradesman yet how different is the degree of pleafure refulting from this impreffion! A great part of this difference is undoubtedly to be afcribed, to the ideas and feelings which the habitual studies and amufements of the poet have affociated with his organica! perceptions.

A fimilar obfervation may be applied to all the various objects of our pursuit in life. Hardly any one of them is appreciated by any two men in the fame manner; and frequently what one man confiders as

U u

effential to his happiness, is regarded with indifference or diflike by another. Of thefe differences of opinion, much is, no doubt, to be afcribed to a diverfity of conftitution, which renders a particular employment of the intellectual or active powers agreeable to one man, which is not equally fo to another. But much is alfo to be ascribed to the effect of affociation; which, prior to any experience of human life, connects pleafing ideas and pleafing feelings with different objects, in the minds of different perfons.

In confequence of thefe affociations, every man appears to his neighbor to purfue the object of his wishes, with a zeal difproportioned to its intrinfic value; and the prilofopher (whose principal enjoyment arifes from fpeculation) is frequently apt to fmile at the ardour with which the active part of mankind pursue, what appear to him to be mere fhadows. This view of human affairs, fome writers have carried fo far, as to reprefent life as a fcene of mere illusions, where the mind refers to the objects around it, a coloring which exifts only in itself; and where, as the Poet expreffes it,

"Opinion gilds with varying rays,

"Those painted clouds which beautify our days."

It may be queftioned, if these representations of human life be useful or juft. That the cafual affociations which the mind forms in childhood, and in early youth, are frequently a fource of inconvenience and of misconduct, is fufficiently obvious; but that this tendency of our nature increases, on the whole, the fum of human enjoyment, appears to me to be indifputable; and the inftances in which it misleads us from our duty and our happiness, only prove, to what important ends it might be fubfervient, if it were kept under proper regulation.

Nor do theíe reprefentations of life (admitting them in their full extent) justify the practical infer

ences which have been often deduced from them,with respect to the vanity of our pursuits. In every cafe, indeed, in which our enjoyment depends upon affo ciation, it may be faid, in one fenfe, that it arifes from the mind itself; but it does not therefore fol. low, that the external object which cuftom has rendered the cause or the occafion of agreeable emotions, is indifferent to our happiness. The effect which the beauties of nature produce on the mind of the poet, is wonderfully heightened by affociation; but his enjoyment is not, on that account, the less exquifite nor are the objects of his admiration of the lefs value to his happiness, that they derive their principal charms from the embellishments of his fancy.

It is the business of education, not to counteract, in any inftance, the established laws of our conftitution, but to direct them to their proper purposes. That the influence of early affociations on the mind might be employed, in the most effectual manner, to aid our moral principles, appears evidently from the effects which we daily fee it produce, in reconciling men to a courfe of action which their reafon forces them to condemn; and it is no lefs obvious that, by means of it, the happiness of human life might be increased, and its pains diminished, if the agreeable ideas and feelings which children are fo apt to connect with events and with fituations which depend on the caprice of fortune, were firmly affociated in their apprehenfions with the duties of their stations, with the pursuits of science, and with those beauties of nature which are open to all.

These observations coincide nearly with the antient ftoical doctrine concerning the influence of imagination* on morals; a fubject, on which many im

* According to the use which I make of the words Imagination. and Association, in this work, their effects are obviously distinguishable. I have thought it proper, however, to illustrate the difference between them a little more fully in Note [R.]