Human Nature and Other Sermons | Page 9

the present world. The nature of man considered in his
public or social capacity leads him to right behaviour in society, to that
course of life which we call virtue. Men follow or obey their nature in
both these capacities and respects to a certain degree, but not entirely:
their actions do not come up to the whole of what their nature leads
them to in either of these capacities or respects: and they often violate
their nature in both; i.e., as they neglect the duties they owe to their
fellow-creatures, to which their nature leads them, and are injurious, to
which their nature is abhorrent, so there is a manifest negligence in men
of their real happiness or interest in the present world, when that
interest is inconsistent with a present gratification; for the sake of
which they negligently, nay, even knowingly, are the authors and
instruments of their own misery and ruin. Thus they are as often unjust
to themselves as to others, and for the most part are equally so to both
by the same actions.

SERMON II., III. UPON HUMAN NATURE. ROMANS ii. 14.

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.
As speculative truth admits of different kinds of proof, so likewise
moral obligations may be shown by different methods. If the real nature
of any creature leads him and is adapted to such and such purposes only,
or more than to any other, this is a reason to believe the Author of that
nature intended it for those purposes. Thus there is no doubt the eye
was intended for us to see with. And the more complex any constitution
is, and the greater variety of parts there are which thus tend to some one
end, the stronger is the proof that such end was designed. However,

when the inward frame of man is considered as any guide in morals, the
utmost caution must be used that none make peculiarities in their own
temper, or anything which is the effect of particular customs, though
observable in several, the standard of what is common to the species;
and above all, that the highest principle be not forgot or excluded, that
to which belongs the adjustment and correction of all other inward
movements and affections; which principle will of course have some
influence, but which being in nature supreme, as shall now be shown,
ought to preside over and govern all the rest. The difficulty of rightly
observing the two former cautions; the appearance there is of some
small diversity amongst mankind with respect to this faculty, with
respect to their natural sense of moral good and evil; and the attention
necessary to survey with any exactness what passes within, have
occasioned that it is not so much agreed what is the standard of the
internal nature of man as of his external form. Neither is this last
exactly settled. Yet we understand one another when we speak of the
shape of a human body: so likewise we do when we speak of the heart
and inward principles, how far soever the standard is from being exact
or precisely fixed. There is therefore ground for an attempt of showing
men to themselves, of showing them what course of life and behaviour
their real nature points out and would lead them to. Now obligations of
virtue shown, and motives to the practice of it enforced, from a review
of the nature of man, are to be considered as an appeal to each
particular person's heart and natural conscience: as the external senses
are appealed to for the proof of things cognisable by them. Since, then,
our inward feelings, and the perceptions we receive from our external
senses, are equally real, to argue from the former to life and conduct is
as little liable to exception as to argue from the latter to absolute
speculative truth. A man can as little doubt whether his eyes were given
him to see with as he can doubt of the truth of the science of optics,
deduced from ocular experiments. And allowing the inward feeling,
shame, a man can as little doubt whether it was given him to prevent
his doing shameful actions as he can doubt whether his eyes were given
him to guide his steps. And as to these inward feelings themselves, that
they are real, that man has in his nature passions and affections, can no
more be questioned than that he has external senses. Neither can the
former be wholly mistaken, though to a certain degree liable to greater

mistakes than the latter.
There can be no doubt but that several propensions or instincts, several
principles in the