CHAPTER XXIX.

ON EPICTETUS AND MONTAIGNE.

EPICTETUS is one of those philosophers of this world, who have best known the duties of man. He would have him before all things, to regard God as his chief object, to be persuaded that he governs all things with justice, to submit to him cordially, and to follow him willingly as infinitely wise, and he affirms that this disposition would stay all his complaints and miseries, and prepare him to endure patiently the most distressing events.

returns restlessly upon itself in a circle perpetually, opposing equally those who affirm that every thing is uncertain, and those who affirm that nothing is; for he does not wish to give certainty in any thing. In this doubt which doubts itself, and in this ignorance which is ignorant of itself, consists the essense of his opinions. He cannot express it in posi tive terms; for, if he says, he doubts, he betrays himself by making it certain that he doubts; which being in form contrary to his intention, he is reduced to the necessity of explaining himself by a ques tion; so that not wishing to say, I do not know; he asks, What do I know? And on this idea he has framed his device, in which he has written this motto, Que sais je," under the scales of a balance, each containing a contradictory proposition, and consequently hanging in equilibrium. In fact, he is a pure Pyrrhonist. All his discourses, all his essays, proceed on this principle; and it is the only thing which he professess thoroughly to establish. He insensibly destroys all that passes for certain among men; not to establish the contrary with certainty; for to certainty he is chiefly hostile; but merely to make it appear that the evidence being equal on both sides, it is impossible to know where our confidence should be reposed.

Never say, he enjoins, "I have lost that." Say rather, "I have restored it. My son is dead; have surrendered him. My wife is dead; I have given her up." And so of every other good. "But he who deprived me of this good is a wicked man." Why distress yourself about him, by whom He who lent the blessing, sent to seek it again? While the use of it is permitted to you, regard it as a good belonging to others, as a traveller does in an inn.' "You should not wish," he continues, "that things should be as you desire, but you should wish that they may be as they are. Remember that you are here as an actor, and that you play that part which your master is pleased to appoint. If he gives you a short part, play short; if a long part, play long; remain on the stage as long as he pleases; appearance. on it rich or poor, according to his command. It is your duty to play well the part assigned; but to choose it is the part of God. Set always before your eyes death and the evils which seem least bearable, and you would never think slightingly of any thing, nor desire any thing excessively.' He shows in many ways what man should do. He wishes him to be humble, to hide his good resolutions, especially in their commencement, and to fulfil them secretly, for that nothing so much injures them as exposure. He never wearies of repeating that all the study and the desire of men should be to know and to do the will of God.

Such was the light of this great mind, who so well understood the duties of man; happy if he had as well known his weakness. But after having so well understood what man ought to do, he loses himself in the presumption of that for which he thinks him equal. "God," he says, "has given to every man the means of acquitting himself of all his obligations; these means are always in his power. We should only seek happiness by the means that are in our power. Since God has given them for that end, we ought to ascertain what is our liberty. Wealth, life, respect, are not in our power, and do not lead to God; but the mind cannot be forced to believe that which it knows to be false; nor the will to love that which it knows will make it miserable. These two powers then are perfectly free; and by these only can we make ourselves perfect-know God perfectly, love him, obey him, please him, vanquish all vices, attain all virtues, and thus, make ourselves the holy companions of God."

These proud notions lead Epictetus to other errors, such as, that the soul is a portion of the Divine essence; that pain and death are not evils; that we may kill ourselves when we are oppressed; that we may believe that God calls us, &c.

2. Montaigne, born in a Christian land, made a profession of the Roman Catholic religion; and so far there was nothing peculiar about him. But as he wished to seek a system of morals, founded on reason, independently of the illuminations of faith, he laid down his principles according to this supposition, and considered man as entirely destitute of a revelation. He places all things, therefore, in a state of doubt so general and universal, that man doubts even that he doubts; and this uncertainty

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In this spirit he derides every thing like assurHe combats, for instance, those who have thought to establish a grand remedy against legal processes by the multitude and the professed justice of the laws, as if it were possible to annihilate the region of doubt in which litigation originates; as if we could throw a dam across the torrent of uncertainty, and restrain conjecture. He says on this matter, that he would as soon commit his cause to the first passer by, as to the judges armed with law and precedent. He does not aim to change the order of the state; he does not pretend that his advice is better; he considers none good. He aims only to show the vanity of the best received opinions, showing that the annulling of all laws would sooner diminish the number of differences, than the multitude of laws which serve only to augment them; because the difficulties increase the more they are considered; the obscurities are multiplied by multiplied comments; and the surest way of understanding the sense of the passage is, not to examine it, but to determine on it at the first glance; for that the instant you look into it, all its clearness disappears. On this plan he judges at hap-hazard all human actions and historical facts, sometimes after one manner, sometimes after another, following freely the first impression, without controlling his thoughts by the rules of reason, which, according to him, are all false guides. Delighted with showing, in his own example, the contrarieties of the same mind in this illimitable field, it is the same to him whether he grows warm or not in a dispute, having always the means by one example or another, of showing the weakness of any opinion whatever; being so far elevated by the system of universal doubt, he strengthens himself equally by his triumph or his defeat.

It is from this position, fluctuating and variable as it is, that he combats with invincible firmness the heretics of his time, on the ground that they assumed to themselves the exclusive knowledge of the true sense of Scripture; and from thence also he thunders against the horrible impiety of those who dare to say, that there is no God. He attacks them, especially in the apology of Raimond de Sebonde, and finding them entirely stripped of the support of a revelation, and abandoned to their natural light, independent of faith, he demands of them on what authority they pretend to judge of this Sovereign Being, whose specific definition is Infinity-they who do not thoroughly know the smallest thing in

that real rank which belongs to it, and of which it is ignorant; threatening, if it rebels, to place it beneath every thing else, which appears, at least, as easy as the reverse; and not allowing it power to act, except to recognize, with real humility, its feebleness, instead of elevating itself by a false and foolish vanity. We cannot behold but with joy, that in this writer, haughty reason has been so completely battered by its own weapons-to see this deadly struggle between man and man, which, from the association with God, to which he had raised himself by the maxims of feeble reason, hurls him headlong to the level of the brutes: and we would cordially love the minister of this mighty vengeance, if, as an humble, believing disciple of the church, he had followed the rules of its morality, and taught man whom he had so beneficially humbled, no longer to irritate, by fresh crimes, Him who alone could redeem him from those already committed, and which evils God had already convinced him that man had not the power to discover. But, on the contrary, he acts like a heathen. Look at his moral system.

From this principle, that independent of faith, all is uncertainty; and from the consideration, how large a portion of time has been spent in seeking the true good, without any progress towards tranquillity; he concludes, that we should leave this care to others; resting, in the meantime, in a state of repose, and touching lightly on these subjects lest we sink by pressure; that we should admit truth and the true good upon the first glance, without examining too closely, because they are so far from solid, that however little we grasp the hand, they escape between our fingers, and leave it empty. He follows, then, the report of the senses, and the prevailing notions, because to deny them, would be to do violence to himself, and he knows not in his ignorance of truth, if he would be the gainer by it. He avoids also pain and death, because his instinct shuns them, and yet for the same reason as before, he would not resist them. But he does not trust himself too much to these emotions of fear, and does not venture to conclude that pain and death are real evils; since we discover also emotions of pleasure which we condemn as evil, though nature

nature. He asks them on what principles they rest, and presses them to disclose them. He examines all that they can produce; and he goes so deeply by that talent, in which he peculiarly excels, that he shows the vanity of those principles which pass for the clearest and the most established. He inquires if the soul knows any thing; if it knows itself; if it is a substance or an accident, body or spirit; what each of these things is, and if there are not some things which belong not to either of these orders; if the soul knows its own body; if it knows what matter is; how it can reason if it is matter, and how it can be united to a material frame, and feel its passions, if it is purely immaterial? When did its existence commence; with or before the body? Will it terminate with it or not? Does it never deceive itself? Does it know when it is in error? seeing that the very essence of error is not being aware of it. He asks also, If brutes reason, think, or speak? Who can say what is time or space; extension, motion, or unity; all being things by which we are surrounded, but utterly inexplicable? What are health, sickness, death, life, good or evil, justice or transgression: things of which we speak continually? If we have within us the principles of truth, and if those that we believe to be such, and that we call axioms, or notions common to all men, are really conformed to essential truth? Since we cannot know but by the light of faith, that an infinitely Good Being has really given us these principles, and formed us so as to comprehend truth: who could know, without the light of faith, whether we may not be formed by accident; and that consequently, all our notions are uncertain; or, whether we may not be created by a false and wicked being, who has given us these false principles expressly to lead us astray? And thus, he shows that God and the truth are inseparable, and that if one is or is not, if one is certain or uncertain, the other is necessarily the same. Who knows that common sense which we generally regard as the judge of truth, has been appointed to this office by Him who made it? Who knows what is truth? and how can we be sure of possessing it without knowing it? Who knows, in fact, what being is, since it is impossible so to define it, but that there must be something more general; and since it re-affirms the contrary. "So that," says he, "I have quires, even in the explanation of it, to use the very idea of Being, saying it is such or such a thing? Since we know not what the soul, the body, time, space, motion, truth, and good are, and even what being is, nor how to explain the idea that we have formed of them; how can we know that the idea is the same in all men? We have no other mark than the uniformity of results, which is not always arides, because the horse allows it, but without resign of uniformity of principles; for they may be garding it as a matter of right; on the contrary, he very different, and yet lead to the same conclusions; does not know but that the horse has a right to ride every one knowing that truth may be concluded him. He even does violence to himself, in order from falsehood. to avoid certain vices; he preserves matrimonial Then Montaigne examines very deeply the sci-fidelity, on account of the annoyance resulting from ences:-Geometry, the uncertainty of which he irregularities, the real object of all his actions being points out in its axioms, and in its terms which it does convenience and tranquillity. He utterly rejects not define, as extension, motion, &c.; physics and that stoical virtue, which is delineated with a sour medicine, which he depresses in a variety of ways; countenance, and a frowning brow, with hair dishehistory, politics, morals, jurisprudence, &c. Sovelled, and her forehead wrinkled with care, and that, without revelation, we might believe accord-sitting in a painful attitude, in solitude and in silence ing to him, that life is a dream, from which we do not wake till death, and during which, we have as few principles of truth as in natural sleep. In this way he attacks so fiercely and so cruelly reason when unaided by faith, that causing it to doubt whether it is rational or not, and whether the brutes are so or not, or more or less so than men, he brings it down from the excellence that is attributed to it, and places it as a matter of favor on a level with the brutes, without permitting it to rise above that level, till it shall be instructed by its Creator, as to

nothing extravagant in my conduct. I do as others do: and all that they do under the foolish notion that they are seeking the true good, I do from another principle, which is that the probabilities on both sides being equal, example and my own convenience lead me." He adopts the manners of his country, because custom leads him; he mounts his horse and

on the top of a rock, an object fit only, as he says, to frighten youth, and doing nothing but seeking with unremitted toil for rest, where rest can never come; whilst, on the other hand, virtue, according to his notion, is ingenuous, open, pleasant, gay, and even sportive; she follows that which pleases her, and negligently trifles with the events of life, whether good or bad; she nestles luxuriously in the bosom of a quiet indolence, from whence she teaches those who seek so restlessly after happiness, that it is to be found no where but in the shrine where

she reposes; and that, as he says, ignorance and indifference are the downy pillows for a well-made head.

3. On reading Montaigne, and comparing him with Epictetus, we cannot dissemble a conviction, that they were the two greatest defenders of the two most celebrated sects of the unbelieving world, and that they are the only persons among the varieties of men destitute of the light of true religion, who are in any degree rational and consistent. In fact, without revelation, what could we do but follow one or other of these systems? The first system is, There is a God, then he has created man; he has created him for himself; he has made him such as he ought to be, to be just, and to become happy. Then man may attain to the knowledge of truth; and it is within his range to elevate himself by wisdom, even to God himself who is the sovereign good. The other system is, Man cannot elevate himself to God; his native tendencies are contrary to God's law; his tendency is to seek happiness in visible things, and even in those which are most disgraceful. Every thing then appears uncertain, even the true good itself; and we are reduced to such a state, that we appear to have neither a fixed rule for morals, nor certainty in matters of science.

There is much pleasure in observing in these different lines of reasoning, in what respects men on either side have discovered any traces of that truth which they have endeavored to seek. For it is pleasant to observe in nature, the effort to show forth God in the works of his hands, where some marks of him are seen, because those works are his image; how much more justifiable are the efforts of the human mind to arrive at truth, and the endeavor to ascertain in what respects they attain to it, and in what they go astray. This is the chief benefit to be derived from reading Montaigne's writings.

other his weakness, they cannot possibly be reconoiled; they cannot subsist alone because of their defects; nor together, because of the contrariety of their opinions.

4. But it was needful that they should come into collision and destroy each other, in order to give place to the truth of revelation, which alone can harmonize, by a principle truly divine, such manifest contrarieties. Uniting all that is true, and setting aside all that is false, she indicates by a wisdom evidently " from above," that point at which those opposing principles unite, which, as stated in doctrines merely human, appear perfectly incompatible with each other. And here is the reason of it. The wise men of this world have placed these contrarieties in the same subject; the one side attributing strength to human nature; the other, weakness to this same nature; which things cannot be true together. Faith, however, teaches us to regard these two qualities as residing in different subjects, all the infirmity belonging to man, and all his might to divine assistance. There is the novel and surprising union which God only could teach uswhich God only could accomplish, and which is only an image and an effect of the ineffable union of the two natures in the one person of the God-man Mediator. In this way philosophy leads insensibly to theology. In fact it is difficult not to enter upon it whenever we treat of truth, because it is the centre of all truth, a fact which appears here unquestionably, because it so evidently unites in itself whatever there is of truth in these contrary opinions. Moreover, we can see no reason why either party should refuse to follow it. If they are filled with notions of human greatness, what is there in all that they have imagined, that does not yield to the gospel promises, which are a purchase worthy of the inestimable price of the death of the Son of God. And if they take delight in the infirmity of It would seem that the source of error in Epic- human nature, no notion of theirs can equal that tetus and the Stoics on one side, and of Montaigne of the real weakness induced by sin, of which that and the Epicureans on the other, is the not having same death is the remedy. Each party finds in the known that the present state of man differs from gospel, more even than it has wished; and what is that state in which he was created. The former, wonderful, they find there the means of solid union observing in man some remnant traces of his former-even they who could not of themselves approxigreatness, and ignorant of his corruption, have treated human nature as in a healthy state, and without need of reparation-an error which has led to the most unbounded pride The latter, sensible of man's present misery, and ignorant of his former dignity, have treated our nature as if it were necessarily impure and incurable, and have thus been led to despair of ever attaining the true good, and have sunk from thence to the lowest moral degradation. These two states, which ought to be taken cognizance of together, in order to ascertain the whole truth, being looked at separately, have led necessarily to one or other of these vices, either pride or immorality, in one of which all unconvert-lieve that, independently of the existence and pered men are infallibly plunged; since either from the power of corruption, they do not avoid irregular indulgence, or if they escape, it is only through pride; so that they are always in one way or other, the slaves of the spirit of wickedness, to whom, as St. Augustine says, sacrifice is offered in many different ways.

mate in an infinitely lower degree.

5. Christians in general have little need of these philosophical lectures. Yet Epictetus has an ad mirable talent for disturbing those who seek for repose in external things, and for compelling them to discover that they are really slaves and miserably blind, and that it is impossible to escape the error and the distress from which they endeavor to fly, unless they give themselves up unreservedly to God. Montaigne is equally successful in confounding the pride of those, who, without the aid of faith, boast themselves of a real righteousness; in correcting those who value their own opinion, and who be

fections of God, they shall find in the sciences in frangible truth. He exhibits to reason so convincingly the poverty of its light, and the multitude of its errors, that it is difficult afterwards to feel even the temptation to reject the mysteries of religion, on the ground that they may be contradicted; for the spirit is so humbled, that it does not even preAnd hence it follows, as the result of this imper-sume to judge if mysteries are possible, a point fect light, that one class of men, knowing their powerlessness, and not their duty, sink down in sin; the other knowing their duty, but not their weakness, lift themselves up with pride. One might suppose, that, by uniting these two classes, a perfect system of morals might be produced; but instead of peace, nothing would result from the meeting but conflict and destruction: for, since the one aimed to establish certainty, and the other universal doubt; the one, the dignity of man, and the

which ordinary men debate too readily. But Epictetus, in his reprehension of indifference, leads to pride, and may be most injurious to those who are not convinced of the corruption of all righteousness, but that which is of faith. Montaigne, on the other hand, is positively evil in his influence on those whose bias is to impiety and vice. And hence, these authors should be read with great care and discretion, and with peculiar regard to the condition and morals of those who look into them. It

seems, however, that the union of them can only have a beneficial influence, as the evil of the one corrects the evil of the other. It is true that they do not impart virtue, but they disturb men in their vices. For man finds himself assailed by contrarieties, one of which attacks his pride, and the other his carelessness, and ascertains that all his reason will not enable him either to obtain peace in the indulgence of his vices, or altogether to avoid them.

CHAPTER XXX.

ON THE CONDITION OF THE GREAT.

once established, it is unjust to violate them. And here there is a slight distinction between you and the man of whom we have spoken, whose only right to the kingdom, was founded in an error of the people; for God would not sanction his possession, and, in fact, requires him to renounce it, whilst he authorizes yours. But the point in which the two cases completely coincide is this, that neither your right nor his is founded in any quality or merit whatever in you, or which renders you deserving of it. Your soul and your body are of themselves no more allied to the state of a duke, than to that of a laborer; there is no natural tie which binds you to the one condition, rather than to the other.

A MAN was thrown by a tempest on an unknown Then what follows from this? that you ought to island, the inhabitants of which were seeking their have, as this man of whom we have spoken, a twoking, whom they had lost; and as he had acci- fold habit of thought; and that, if you act outwardly dentally some resemblance to him, both in face and towards men, according to your rank in life, it befigure, he was mistaken for him, and recognized as comes you, at the same time, to cherish a sentiment such by all the people. At first he knew not how more concealed, but more true, that you are in no to act but he resolved, at length, to yield to his respect naturally above them; and if the more osgood fortune. He received, therefore, all the re-tensible thought elevates you above men in general, spect with which they honored him, and allowed himself to be treated as their king.

But since he could not altogether forget his former condition, he thought even while he received their homage, that he was not the king whom this people sought, and that the kingdom did not really belong to him. His thoughts, consequently, were two-fold. One, by which he played the king; the other, which recognized his true condition, and that chance only had placed him in this extraordinary position. He hides this last thought, whilst he discloses the other. According to the former, he deals with the people; according to the latter, he deals with himself.

this secret conviction should lower you, and reduce you to a perfect equality with all men; for this is your natural condition.

The people who admire you, are perhaps not aware of this secret. They believe that nobility is a real natural superiority; and they regard the great, as being of a different nature from others. You are not required to correct this error, if you do not wish it; but see that you do not insolently misuse this elevation, and, above all, do not mistake yourself, and imagine that there is in your nature something more elevated than in that of others.

What would you say of him who had been made Think not, that by a less extraordinary chance king, through the mistake of the people, if he so you possess your wealth, than that by which this far forgot his original condition, as to imagine that man became a king. You have not in yourself any this kingdom was properly his, that he deserved it, personal or natural right, more than he; and not and that it belonged to him as a matter of right? only does your being the son of a duke, but your You would wonder at his folly. But is there less being in the world at all, depend upon a variety of folly in men of rank, who live in such strange forcontingencies. Your birth depended on a mar-getfulness of their native condition? riage, or rather on all the marriages of a long line How important is this advice! For all the arroof ancestry. But on what did these marriages de-gance, violence, and impatience of the great, springs pend on an accidental meeting! on a morning's conversation! on a thousand unforeseen occur

rences!

but from this ignorance of what they really are. For it would be difficult for those who inwardly consider themselves on a level with all men, and who are thoroughly convinced that there is in them nothing that merits the little advantages which God has given them above others, to treat their fellowcreatures with insolence. To do this, they must forget themselves, and believe that there is in them some essential superiority to others. And in this consists the delusion which I am anxious to expose to you.

You hold, say you, your riches from your forefathers; but was it not the result of a thousand contingencies, that your forefathers acquired or preserved them? A thousand others as clever as they, have not been able to acquire wealth, or have lost it when they had. You conceive, that by some natural channel, this wealth descended from your ancestry to you: No such thing. This order is founded solely on the will of those who made the 2. It is desirable that you should know what is laws, and who might have had divers good reasons really due to you, that you may not attempt to refor so framing them; but none of which, most as-quire of men that which is not your due, for that suredly, was formed in the notion of your natural right in those possessions. If they had chosen to ordain that this wealth, after having been possessed by the father during his life, should return at his death to the public treasury, you would have had no reason to complain.

Thus then, the whole title by which you possess your property, is not a title founded in nature, but in human appointment. Another train of thought in those who made the laws, would have made you poor; and it is only this favorable contingency, by which you are born in accordance with the whim of law, which has put you in possession of your present wealth.

I do not mean to say that your goods are not yours legitimately, and that others are at liberty to rob you of them; for God, our great master, has given to society the right of making laws for the division of property; and when these laws are

were a manifest injustice; and yet to act thus, is very common in men of your condition, because they are not aware of their real merit.

There is in the world two sorts of greatness; there is a greatness founded in nature, and a greatness founded in appointment. That which is constituted great, depends on the will of men, who have believed with reason, that they ought to honor certain situations in life, and pay them certain respects. Of this kind are titles and nobility. In one country, the nobles are reverenced; in another, the laborers. In this, the elder son; in that, the younger. Why is this? Because men would have it so. It was a matter of indifference before it was so constituted; since then, it has become a matter of right, for it is unjust to interfere with it.

Natural greatness is that which is independent of the caprices of men, because it consists in real and effective qualities of body and mind, which

render the one or the other more estimable, as science, intellect, energy, virtue, health, or strength. We owe a duty to each of these kinds of greatness; but as they differ in nature, we owe them also a very different kind of respect. To constituted greatness, we owe the appointed reverence; that is, certain outward ceremonies, which ought to be, at the same time, accompanied as we have shown, with an internal recognition of the propriety of this arrangement; but which does not force upon us the idea of any real quality of greatness in those whom we so honor. We speak on our bended knee to kings. We must stand in the saloons of princes. It is folly and narrow-mindedness to refuse these observances.

But natural respect, which consists in esteem, we only owe to natural greatness; and we owe contempt and aversion to the opposite qualities to this greatness. It is not necessary that I should esteem you, because you are a duke; but it is that I bow to you. If you are both a duke and a virtuous man, then I will yield the reverence which I owe to both these qualities. I will not refuse you the obeisance which your ducal dignity demands; nor the esteem that your virtue merits. But if you were a duke without virtue, I would then also do you justice; for while I paid that outward respect which the laws of society have attached to your rank, I would not fail to cherish towards you that inward contempt, which your meanness of soul de

served.

lord? It is to have the command of many objects of human gratification, and to be able thus to satisfy the wants and the desires of many. It is the wants and the wishes of men which collect them round you, and render them subservient; without that, they would not look to you exclusively; but they hope, by their attentions and adulation, to obtain from you some part of those good things which they seek, and which they see that you have to bestow.

God is surrounded by people full of the need of charity, who ask of him those blessings of charity that are his to give. Hence he is appropriately called, " The king of charity."

You are in the same way surrounded with a little crowd of people, over whom you reign in your way. These people are full of sensual wants. They ask of you sensual blessings. They then are bound to you by covetousness. You are then properly the king of covetousness. Your dominion may be of small extent; but as to the kind of royalty, you are on a level with the greatest kings of the earth. They are like you, monarchs of animal wants. This it is which invests them with power, namely, the possession of things after which men greedily crave.

rule them by force, nor to treat them harshly. Satisfy their just desires; relieve their wants; find your pleasure in beneficence; help them as much as you can; and act in your true character as the king of animal necessities.

But in thus recognizing your real and natural condition, use the means which are consistent with it, and do not pretend to reign by any other way than by that which actually constitutes you a king. It is not your natural energy and power which subThis is the line that justice prescribes to such du-jects the people round you. Do not pretend then to ties, and injustice consists in paying natural respect to artificial greatness, or in requiring external reverence to natural greatness. Mr. N. is a greater geometer than I, and, on this account, he would take precedence of me. I would teli him that he does not comprehend this matter rightly. Geometry is a natural superiority-it asks the preference of esteem; but men have not appointed to it any outward acknowledgment. I take precedence of him therefore; while, at the same time, I esteem him more than myself, for his geometrical talent.

In the same way, if as a duke, and a peer of the realm, you are not satisfied that I stand uncovered before you, and you require me to esteem you also, then I must beg you to show me those qualities which deserve it. If you do this, then you gain your point, and I cannot refuse you with justice; but if you cannot do this, then you are unjust to ask it; and, most assuredly, you would not succeed, even if you were the mightiest potentate on earth. 3. I would have you, then, to know your true condition, for it is the thing, in all the world, of which you men of rank are the most ignorant. What is it, according to your notion, to be a great

What I have said to you, does not go far into the subject of duty; and if therefore you rest there, you will not fail to lose yourself, though you will then, at least, sink as a virtuous man should do. There are men who destroy their own souls by avarice, by brutality, by dissipation, by violence, by passion, by blasphemy. The path which I point out to you, is undoubtedly more virtuous than these. But in any way, it is unpardonable folly to lose one's self; and therefore, I say, you must not rest at that point. You should despise sensuality and its dominion, and aspire to that kingdom of charity, where all its subjects breathe nothing but charity, and desire no other blessings. Others will direct you better than I can in this way; it will be suffi cient for me to have turned you aside from those low and sensualizing ways, along which I see so many persons of rank hurried, from the want of a due acquaintance with their own real condition.

THE END