pur

tion of the people, and the free choice of their suits. It is necessary for these purposes that no material interference shall have prevented such changes as the altered circumstances of the society shall have made it the interest of the people to effect. Liberty and security therefore, as just defined, are essentially conditions of the argument; and it is evident also, that the salutary consequences to be expected will bear a tolerably exact proportion to the perfection and universal prevalence of those blessings.

I shall not in this chapter, any more than in the last, enter into a minute application of the deductions to be drawn from the establishment of this truth. The statesman who is convinced of it will not be satisfied in this case, any more than in those of religion and morals, to rest in bare mediocrity. He will consider every interference with the liberty of the subject, that is not absolutely requisite for the public safety, or counterbalanced by a very superior advantage to the whole community, as so much gratuitous subtraction from the power and happiness of the state: he will consider every tax, not imperatively requisite to support the dignity or the public credit of the nation, as a species of robbery; and every increase of establishments, unaccompanied by the discharge of corresponding duties, as little better than the propagation of authorized mendicity. He will especially deprecate these encroachments, from their tendency to annihilate the very elements of prosperity by interfering with the spontaneous arrangements of the people and their pursuits, and by introducing a mischievous disproportion between the rate of their numerical increase and the industry which is necessary to support it. He will, moreover, bend all

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his efforts to ascertain what specific means can best secure to the people the general prevalence of rational liberty and substantial security of property; and he will find no difficulty in admitting that these ends are not so much to be attained by particular enactments, prohibiting certain actions or pursuits which may be thought to interfere with general liberty and security, while the disposition of the people remains prone to evil through the predominance of ignorance or vice, as by the general establishment of moral and religious sanctions.

The constant pressure of prohibition against the general prevalence of vice and ignorance is so far from ever giving liberty and security for its results, that it can only end in anarchy or tyranny. But measures directed to the fountain-head, towards diminishing the evil propensities of the people by moral and religious instruction, are really effectual means of securing personal liberty and security of property, because they are the only effectual means of anticipating those evils that must eventually end in tyranny and anarchy; viz. severe laws, or popular licence. We cannot escape from this alternative. Nor is it possible to exhibit the political expediency of moral and religious culture in a stronger or more conclusive point of view, nor to show more clearly how essentially the permanent progress of public prosperity, the immediate political interests of the community, nay, the value of each individual's title to liberty and property, depend upon a due attention to that important object.

Upon referring to the contents of this chapter, I must be permitted to remark in conclusion that, although, considering the natural and inveterate pro

pensities of human nature in all ages and nations, it would be altogether Utopian to expect to supersede the necessity of human laws or of political institutions by the general prevalence of virtuous tastes and conduct; yet I do not see that this is any valid argument against admitting that the effect, although even without any hope of rendering it complete, will always bear a proportion to the means used for producing it; which is all that I am here contending for. We may be well assured that the means will never be copious enough to produce an universal effect; but they are abundantly sufficient to establish the expediency of instituting a further inquiry, whether the connexion of religion and morals with politics has not frequently been too much overlooked: whether the former have not been argued upon too exclusively with reference to the individual as to his own personal condition with a view to eternity, while his temporal interests, and the general condition of society have been supposed to be the exclusive province of the latter. How else can we account for the ardour with which men enter into controversies purely political as the sole foundation of their worldly prosperity, while they studiously avert their minds from all reference to moral and religious considerations as foreign to the subject, if not absolutely impertinent. Yet how is it possible for a statesman or economist to be more practically concerned in any subject than in one which, though it do not set up self-interest as the expansive principle of all public virtue, does nevertheless so far connect that powerful feeling with morals and religion, as to show that an adherence to them can alone afford sufficient security for the regular

perseverance of nations or individuals in the principles of sound policy.

But perhaps the truth of these propositions will be more readily admitted than the possibility of drawing from them any practical conclusions. It may be said, and with great truth, that the great impediment to the general reception of principles of public and private conduct founded on pure morality evidently arises from the depraved tastes and habits of men; from some objects of self-indulgence, or some fancied interests, which they consider at once as paramount in their estimation, and incompatible with a strict adherence to pure morality. The objections which I have frequently heard stated to the general introduction of religious and moral customs, and to the abandonment of habits and pursuits incompatible with them, when the duty is pressed home, are-that it may be all very true, but that, if reduced to practice, the result would in the first place impede the operations of society, or, if it failed of that effect, that society would scarcely be worth enjoying upon the

terms.

Now this sort of feeling can only arise from grievous faults of education, whereby pernicious habits, pursuits, and amusements, have been intimately associated with, or at least too little dissociated from, the ideas of individual enjoyment and of political expediency. But surely this is no proof that the combination may not, by due precaution, be prevented? Once enlist these very feelings, tastes, and habits on the side of pure morals and religion, by impressing upon the mind of youth their close connexion with political expediency, public prosperity,

and the highest individual enjoyment, and the association is directly reversed. I do not mean to assert that the effects would also be fully reversed; for the new tendencies of the conduct will now be opposed by the natural dispositions of the heart, instead of running parallel with them as in the former case. But it is impossible not to suppose that very considerable effects would be produced both upon individuals and society. One of the best of our old writers observes that "the predominance of custom is every where visible, insomuch that a man would wonder to hear men profess, protest, engage, give great words, and then do just as they have done before; as if they were dead images and engines, moved only by the wheels of custom. Therefore, since custom is the principal magistrate of man's life, let men by all means endeavour to obtain good customs! Certainly custom is most perfect when it beginneth in young years this we call education, which is in effect but an early custom. But if the force of custom simple and separate" (that is, operating individually,) "be great, the force of custom copulate, conjoined, and collegiate" (that is, operating upon society)" is far greater; for there example teacheth, company comforteth, emulation quickeneth, glory raiseth; so as in such places the force of custom is in its exaltation. Certainly the great multiplication of virtues uponhuman nature resteth upon societies well ordained and disciplined;" (that is, pure churches, well regulated universities, &c. ;)" for commonwealths and good governments do nourish virtue grown, but do not much mend the seeds. But the misery is, that the most effectual means are now applied to the