Some Remains (hitherto unpublished) of Joseph Butler, LL.D. | Page 4

of your
Life, and that I might claim the same right to your Instructions with
others; notwithstanding which, I should not have mentioned it to you
had I not thought (which is natural when one fancies one sees a thing
clearly) that I could easily express it with clearness to others. However
I should by no means have given you a second trouble upon the subject
had I not had your particular leave. I thought proper just to mention
these things that you might not suspect me to take advantage from your
Civility to trouble you with any thing, but only such objections as seem
to me of Weight, and which I cannot get rid of any other way. A
disposition in our natures to be influenced by right motives is as
absolutely necessary to render us moral Agents, as a Capacity to
discern right motives is. These two are I think quite distinct perceptions,
the former proceeding from a desire inseparable from a Conscious
Being of its own happiness, the latter being only our Understanding, or
Faculty of seeing Truth. Since a disposition to be influenced by right
motives is a sine qua non to Virtuous Actions, an Indifferency to right
motives must incapacitate us for Virtuous Actions, or render us in that

particular not moral agents. I do indeed think that no Rational Creature
is strictly speaking Indifferent to Right Motives, but yet there seems to
be somewhat which to all intents of the present question is the same,
viz. a stronger disposition to be influenced by contrary or wrong
motives, and this I take to be always the Case when any vice is
committed. But since it may be said, as you hint, that this stronger
disposition to be influenced by Vicious Motives may have been
contracted by repeated Acts of Wickedness, we will pitch upon the first
Vicious Action any one is guilty of. No man would have committed this
first Vicious Action if he had not had a stronger (at least as strong)
disposition in him to be influenced by the Motives of the Vicious Action,
than by the motives of the contrary Virtuous Action; from whence I
infallibly conclude, that since every man has committed some first Vice,
every man had, antecedent to the commission of it, a stronger
disposition to be influenced by the Vicious than the Virtuous motive.
My difficulty upon this is, that a stronger natural disposition to be
influenced by the Vicious than the Virtuous Motive (which every one
has antecedent to his first vice), seems, to all purposes of the present
question, to put the Man in the same condition as though he was
indifferent to the Virtuous Motive; and since an indifferency to the
Virtuous Motive would have incapacitated a Man from being a moral
Agent, or contracting guilt, is not a stronger disposition to be
influenced by the Vicious Motive as great an Incapacity? Suppose I
have two diversions offered me, both of which I could not enjoy, I like
both of them, but yet have a stronger inclination to one than to the
other, I am not indeed strictly indifferent to either, because I should be
glad to enjoy both; but am I not exactly in the same case, to all intents
and purposes of acting, as though I was absolutely indifferent to that
diversion which I have the least inclination to? You suppose Man to be
endued naturally with a disposition to be influenced by Virtuous
Motives, and that this Disposition is a sine qua non to Virtuous Actions,
both which I fully believe; but then you omit to consider the natural
Inclination to be influenced by Vicious Motives, which, whenever a
Vice is committed, is at least equally strong with the other, and in the
first Vice is not affected by Habits, but is as natural, and as much
out of
a man's power as the other. I am much obliged to your offer of writing
to Mr. Laughton, which I shall very thankfully accept of, but am not

certain when I shall go to Cambridge; however, I believe it will be
about the middle of the next month.
I am, Rev. Sir, Your most obliged humble Servant,
J. BUTLER.
Oriel, Oct. the 6th.
THE ANSWER.
Your objection seems indeed very dexterous, and yet I really think that
there is at bottom nothing in it. But of this you are to judge, not from
my assertion, but from the reason I shall endeavour to give to it.
I think then, that a disposition to be influenced by right motives being
what we call rationality, there cannot be on the contrary (properly
speaking) any such thing naturally in rational creatures as a disposition
to be influenced by wrong motives. This can be nothing but mere
perverseness of