I
send you a dictionary.
3. Moral Philosophy. I think it lost time to attend lectures on this
branch. He who made us would have been a pitiful bungler, if he had
made the rules of our moral conduct a matter of science. For one man
of science, there are thousands who are not. What would have become of
them? Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be
formed to this object. He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong,
merely relative to this. This sense is as much a part of his nature,
as the sense of hearing, seeing, feeling; it is the true foundation of
morality, and not the [Greek: no alon]
[Illustration: Greek phrase page216]
truth, &c, as fanciful writers have imagined. The moral sense, or
conscience, is as much a part of man, as his leg or arm. It is given to
all human beings, in a stronger or weaker degree, as force of members
is given them in a greater or less degree. It may be strengthened
by exercise, as may any particular limb of the body. This sense is
submitted, indeed, in some degree, to the guidance of reason; but it is
a small stock which is required for this: even a less one than what we
call common sense.
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