CHAP. III.

NO INNATE PRACTICAL PRINCIPLES.

§1. No moral Principles fo clear and fo generally received, as the forementioned fpeculative Maxims.

IF

F thofe fpeculative maxims, whereof we difcourfed in the foregoing chapter, have not an actual univerfal affent from all mankind, as we there proved, it is much more visible concerning practical principles, that they come fort of an univerfal reception: And I think it will be hard to inftance any one moral rule, which can pretend to fo general and ready an affent, as, What is, is; or to be fo manifest a truth as this, That it is impoffible for the fame thing to be, and not to be. Whereby it is evident, that they are farther removed from a title to be innate; and the doubt of their being native impreffions on the mind, is ftronger against these moral principles than the other. Not that it brings their truth at all in question; they are equally true, though not equally evident. Those speculative maxims carry their own evidence with them: But moral principles require reasoning and difcourfe, and fome exercise of the mind, to discover the certainty of their truth. They lie not open as natural characters engraven on the mind; which, if any fuch were, they must needs be visible by themselves, and by their own light be certain and known to every body. But this is no derogation to their truth and certainty, no more than it is to the truth or certainty of the three angles of a triangle being equal to two right ones; because it is not fo evident, as, The whole is bigger than a part, nor fo apt to be affented to at first hearing. It may fuffice, that these moral rules are capable of demonftration; and therefore it is our own fault, if we come not to a certain knowledge of them. But the ignorance wherein many men are of them, and the flownefs of affent wherewith others receive them, are manifeft proofs that they are not innate, and fuch as offer themfelves to their view without fearching.

§ 2.

Faith and Juftice not owned as Principles by all

Men.

WHETHER there be any fuch moral principles, wherein all men do agree, I appeal to any who have been but moderately converfant in the hiftory of mankind, and looked abroad beyond the smoke of their own chimneys. Where is that practical truth, that is univerfally received without doubt or question, as it must be if innate? Justice, and keeping of contracts, is that which most men feem to agree in. This is a principle which is thought to extend itself to the dens of thieves, and the confederacies of the greatest villains; and they who have gone fartheft towards the putting off of humanity itself, keep faith and rules of juftice one with another. I grant that outlaws themselves do this one amongft another, but it is without receiving thefe as the innate laws of nature; they practise them as rules of convenience within their own communities; but it is impoffible to conceive, that he embraces juftice as a practical principle, who acts fairly with his fellow-highwaymen, and at the fame time plunders or kills the next honest man he meets with. Juftice and truth are the common ties of fociety; and therefore even outlaws and rebbers, who break with all the world befides, muft keep faith and rules of equity amongst themselves, or elle they cannot hold together. But will any one fay, that thofe that live by fraud and rapine, have innate principles of truth and justice, which they allow and af

fent to?

§ 3. Object. Though Men deny them in their Practice, yet they admit them in their Thoughts, anfwered.

PERHAPS it will be urged, That the tacit affent of their minds agrees to what their practice contradicts. I anfwer, first, I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts. But fince it is certain that most mens practice, and fome mens open profeffions, have either questioned or denied thefe principles, it is impoffible to eftablish an univerfal confent hough we should look for it only amongst grown men),

without which it is impoffible to conclude them innate. Secondly, It is very ftrange and unreasonable, to fuppofe innate practical principles, that terminate only in contemplation. Practical principles derived from nature, are there for operation, and must produce conformity of action, not barely fpeculative affent to their truth, or elfe they are in vain diftinguished from fpeculative maxims. Nature, I confefs, has put into man a defire of happiness, and an averfion to mifery: Thefe indeed are innate practical principles, which (as practical principles ought) do continue conftantly to operate, and influence all our actions, without ceafing. These may be obferved, in all perfons and all ages, fteady and univerfal; but these are inclinations of the appetite to good, not impreffions of truth on the underftanding. I deny not, that there are natural tendencies imprinted on the minds of men; and that, from the very first instances of fenfe and perception, there are fome things that are grateful, and others unwelcome to them; fome things that they incline to, and others that they fly: But this makes nothing for innate characters on the mind, which are to be the principles of knowledge,. regulating our practice. Such natural impreffions on the understanding are so far from being confirmed hereby, that this is an argument against them; fince, if there were certain characters imprinted by nature on the understanding, as the principles of knowledge, we could not but perceive them conftantly operate in us, and influence our knowledge, as we do thofe others on the will and appetite, which never cease to be the constant fprings and motives of all our actions, to which we perpctually feel them ftrongly impelling us.

§ 4. Moral Rules need a Proof, ergo not Innate. ANOTHER reason that makes me doubt of any innate practical principles is, That I think there cannot any one moral rule be propofed, whereof a man may not justly demand a reafon: Which would be perfectly ridiculous and abfurd, if they were innate, or fo much as felf-evident, which every innate principle muft needs be, and not need any proof to afcertain its truth, nor want any rea

Book I. fon to gain its approbation. He would be thought void of common fenfe, who asked on the one fide, or on the other fide went to give a reason, why it is impoffible for the fame thing to be, and not to be. It carries its own light and evidence with it, and needs no other proof: He that understands the terms, affents to it for its own fake, or else nothing will ever be able to prevail with him to do it. But fhould that most unfhaken rule of morality, and foundation of all focial virtue, That one bould do as he would be done unto, be proposed to one who never heard it before, but yet is of capacity to understand its meaning; might he not, without any abfurdity, ask a reason why? And were not he that propofed it bound to make out the truth and reasonablenefs of it to him? Which plainly fhows it not to be innate; for if it were, it could neither want nor receive any proof, but muft needs (at least as soon as heard and understood) be received and affented to, as an unqueftionable truth, which a man can by no means doubt of. So that the truth of all these moral rules plainly depends upon fome other antecedent to them, and from which they must be deduced; which could not be, if either they were innate, or so much as felfevident.

§ 5. Inftance in keeping Compacts.

THAT men fhould keep their compacts, is certainly a great and undeniable rule in morality: But yet, if a Christian, who has the view of happiness and mifery in another life, be asked, why a man must keep his word, he will give this as a reafon, Becaufe God, who has the power of eternal life and death, requires it of us. But if an Hobbit be asked why, he will anfwer, Because the public requires it, and the Leviathan will punish you, if do not. And if one of the old Heathen philofophers had been asked, he would have answered, Because it was dishonest, below the dignity of a man, and oppofite to virtue, the highest perfection of human nature, to do otherwife.

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§ 6. Virtue generally approved, not because Innate, but because profitable.

HENCE naturally flows the great variety of opinions concerning moral rules which are to be found amongst men, according to the different forts of happiness they have a profpect of, or propofe to themselves; which could not be, if practical principles were innate, and imprinted in our minds immediately by the hand of God. I grant the existence of God is fo many ways manifeft, and the obedience we owe him fo congruous to the light of reason, that a great part of mankind give teftimony to the law of nature; but yet I think it must be allowed, that feveral moral rules may receive from mankind a very general approbation, without either knowing or admitting the true ground of morality; which can only be the will and law of a God who fees men in the dark, has in his hand rewards and punishments, and power enough to call to account the proudeft offender. For God having, by an infeparable connection, joined virtue and public happiness together, and made the practice thereof neceffary to the prefervation of fociety, and visibly beneficial to all with whom the virtuous man has to do; it is no wonder, that every one fhould not only allow, but recommend and magnify thofe rules to others, from whofe obfervance of them he is fure to reap advantage to himself. He may, out of intereft, as well as conviction, cry up that for facred, which, if once trampled on and profaned, he himself cannot be fafe nor fecure. This, though it takes nothing from the moral and eternal obligation which thefe rules evidently have, yet it shows, that the outward acknowledgment men pay to them in their words, proves not that they are innate principles; nay, it proves not so much as that men affent to them inwardly in their own minds, as the inviolable rules of their own practice; fince we find that felf-intereft, and the conveniencies of this life makemany men own an outward profeflion and approbation. of them, whofe actions fufficiently prove, that they very little confider the lawgiver that prefcribed thefe rules,