8 A careful education is a great matter; for our minds are easily formed in our youth, but it is a harder business to cure ill habits. There is nothing breeds anger more than a soft and effeminate education; and it is very seldom seen that either the mother's or the schoolmaster's darling ever comes to good. But my young master, when he comes into the world, behaves himself like a choleric coxcomb; for flattery, and a great fortune, nourish petulance.

9 He that is naturally addicted to anger, let him use a moderate diet, and abstain from wine; for it is but adding fire to fire. So long as we are among men, let us cherish humanity, and so live that no man may be either in fear or in danger of us.

10 There is hardly a more effectual remedy against anger than patience and consideration. Nor is it fit that a servant should be in his power that is not his own master. Why should any one venture now to trust an angry man with a revenge, when Plato durst not trust himself? Either he must govern that, or that will undo him.

11 It is a good caution not to believe any thing until we are very certain of it; for many probable things prove false, and a short time will make evidence of the undoubted truth. If it be my duty to love my country, I must be kind also to my countrymen; if a veneration be due to the whole, so is a piety also to the parts; and it is the common interest to preserve them.

12 We are all members of one body, and it is as natural to help one another as for the hands to help the feet, or the eyes the hands. Without the love and care of the parts, the whole can never be preserved, and we must spare one another, because we are born for society, which cannot be maintained without a regard to particulars. Let this be a rule to us, never to deny a pardon that does no hurt either to the giver or receiver.

13 It is a kind of spiteful comfort, that whoever does me an injury may receive one; and that there is a power over him that is above me. A man should stand as firm against all indignities as a rock does against the waves.

14 It is not prudent to deny a pardon to any man, without first examining if we stand not in need of it ourselves; for it may be our lot to ask it, even at his feet to whom we refuse it. But we are willing enough to do what we are very unwilling to suffer. It is unreasonable to charge public vices upon particular persons; for we are all of us wicked, and

that which we blame in others we find in ourselves. It is not a paleness in one, or a leanness in another, but a pestilence that has laid hold upon all.

15 It is a wicked world, and we make part of it; and the way to be quiet is to bear one with another. "Such a man," we cry, "has done me a shrewd turn, and I never did him any hurt." Well, but it may be I have injured other people, or, at least, I may live to do as much to him as that comes to. "Such a one has spoken ill things of me;" but if I first speak ill of him, as I do of many others, this is not an injury, but a repayment.

16 Before we lay any thing to heart, let us ask ourselves if we have not done the same thing to others. We carry our neighbors' crimes in sight, and we throw our own over our shoulders. We cry out presently, "What law have we transgressed?" As if the letter of the law were the sum of our duty, and that piety, humanity, liberality, justice and faith, were things beside our business.

17 No, no; the rule of human duty is of a greater latitude; and we have many obligations upon us that are not to be found in the statute books. And, to wind up all in one word, the great lesson of mankind, as well in this as in all other cases, is, " to do as we would be done by."

PART FOURTH.

ABRIDGMENT OF THE LAW OF NATURE, AND THE
ECONOMY OF HUMAN LIFE.

CHAPTER 1.

ABRIDGMENT OF THE LAW OF NATURE, OR PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY, DEDUCED FROM THE PHYSICAL CONSTITUTION OF MANKIND AND THE UNIVERSE.

For, when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these having not the law, are a law unto themselves; which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing them witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing, or else excusing one another.-Paul.

SECTION I.

The law of nature defined, and illustrated by examples.

1 WHAT is the law of nature? It is the regular and constant order of events according to which God rules the universe; the order which his wisdom presents to the senses and reason of mankind, to serve them as an equal and general rule of action, and to conduct them without distinction of country or sect, towards happiness and perfection.

2 Now, since the actions of each individual, or of each class of beings, are subject to constant and general rules, which cannot be departed from without changing and disturbing some general or particular order of things, to these rules of action and motion, is given the name of natural laws, or laws of nature.

3 Give me examples of these laws. It is a law of nature that the sun enlightens in succession every part of the surface of the terrestrial globe; that his presence excites light and heat; that heat acting on the waters produces vapors; that these vapors raised in clouds into the higher regions of the atmosphere, form themselves into rain and snow, and supply, without ceasing, the water of springs and rivers.

4 It is a law of nature that water flows from an upper to a lower situation; that it seeks its level; that it is heavier than air; that all bodies tend towards the earth; that flame rises that which we blame in others we find in ourselves. It is not a paleness in one, or a leanness in another, but a pestilence that has laid hold upon all.

15 It is a wicked world, and we make part of it; and the way to be quiet is to bear one with another. "Such a man," we cry, "has done me a shrewd turn, and I never did him any hurt." Well, but it may be I have injured other people, or, at least, I may live to do as much to him as that comes to. "Such a one has spoken ill things of me;" but if I first speak ill of him, as I do of many others, this is not an injury, but a repayment.

16 Before we lay any thing to heart, let us ask ourselves if we have not done the same thing to others. We carry our neighbors' crimes in sight, and we throw our own over our shoulders. We cry out presently, "What law have we transgressed?" As if the letter of the law were the sum of our duty, and that piety, humanity, liberality, justice and faith, were things beside our business.

17 No, no; the rule of human duty is of a greater latitude; and we have many obligations upon us that are not to be found in the statute books. And, to wind up all in one word, the great lesson of mankind, as well in this as in all other cases, is, " to do as we would be done by."

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