determination of what is morally right, yet is it in every man, from his childhood, fitted to apprize him, that it is his duty to act according to his sense of right, whatever it may be, and this sense of right is what we call Conscience.

DCCLXII.

Self-Will.-Men who are self-willed, are in their demeanour perverse and froward, stiff and stubborn, with much inconvenience to others, and commonly with more to themselves. It must be just as they will have it; what, if ten to one think otherwise; what, if generally, the wisest men are agreed to the contrary; what, if the most pressing necessity of affairs do not admit it; what, if public authority does not allow it?-Yet so it must be, because they fancy it, otherwise they will not be quiet; so do they sacrifice the greatest benefits of society, public order and peace, mutual love and friendship, common safety and prosperity, to their private will and humour.Barrow.

DCCLXIII.

Experience.-By what strange fatality is it, that having examples before our eyes, we do not profit by them? Why is our experience, with regard to the misfortunes of others, of so little use? In a word, why is it, that we are to learn wisdom and prudence at our own expense? Yet such is the fate of man! Surrounded by misfortunes, we are supplied with means to escape them; but blinded by caprice, prejudice, and pride, we neglect the proffered aid, and it is only by the tears we shed, in consequence of our own errors, that we learn to detest them.-Maxims and Observations.

DCCLXIV.

Self-Knowledge.-To know one's self, one would think, could be no very difficult lesson;-for who, you will say, can be truly ignorant of himself and the true disposition of his own heart? If a man thinks at all, he cannot be a stranger to what passes there; he must be conscious of his own thoughts and desires, he must remember his past pursuits, and the true springs and motives which in general have directed the actions of his life: he may hang out false colours and deceive the world; but how can a man deceive himself? That a man can is evident, because he daily does so. Though man is the only creature endowed with reflection, and consequently qualified to know the most of himself, yet so it happens, that he generally knows the least. Of all the many revengeful, covetous, false, and ill-natured, persons which we complain of in the world, though we all join in the cry against them, what man amongst us singles out himself as a criminal, or ever once takes it into his head that he adds to the number? What other man speaks so often and so vehemently against the vice of pride, sets the weakness of it in a more odious light, or is more hurt with it in another, than the proud man himself? It is the same with the passionate, the designing, the ambitious, and some other common characters in life. Most of us are aware of, and pretend to detest, the bare-faced instances of that hypocrisy by which men deceive others; but few of us are upon our guard, or see that more fatal hypocrisy by which we deceive and over-reach our own hearts.Maxims and Observations.

DCCLXV.

Names. All names being imposed to signify our conceptions, and all our affections being but conceptions, when we conceive the same things differently, we can hardly avoid different meanings of them. Since, though the nature of what we conceive be the same, yet the diversity of our reception of it, in respect of different constitutions of body and prejudices of opinion, gives every thing a tincture of our different passions, and, therefore, in reasoning, a man must take heed of words, which, besides their proper signification, have a signification also of the character, disposition, and interest of the speaker, such are the names of virtues and vices; for one man calleth wisdom, what another calleth fear; and one cruelty, what another justice; one prodigality, what another munificence, magnanimity, &c.-Hobbes.

DCCLXVI.

Force of Habit.-Habit hath so vast a prevalence over the human mind, that there is scarcely any thing too strange or too strong to be asserted of it.

The story of

cheat others,

the miser, who, from long accustoming to came at last to cheat himself, and with great delight and triumph picked his own pocket of a guinea to convey to his hoard, is not impossible or improbable. In like manner it fares with the practisers of deceit, who from having long deceived their acquaintance, gain at last a power of deceiving themselves, and acquire that very opinion, however false, of their own abilities, excellences, and virtues, into which they have for years, perhaps, endeavoured to betray their neighbours.-Maxims and Observations.

DCCLXVII.

Real Existence.-If any one will be so sceptical as to distrust his senses, and to affirm, that all we see and hear, feel and taste, think and do, during our whole being, is but the series and deluding appearances of a long dream; and, therefore, will question all things, or our knowledge of any thing, I must desire him to consider, that if all be a dream, then he doth but dream that he makes the question, and so it is not much matter that a waking man should answer him; however, if he please, he may dream that I make him this answer, that the certainty of things existing in rerum naturâ, when we have the testimony of our senses for it, is not only as great as our frame can attain to, but as our condition needs, and no man requires greater certainty to govern his actions by, than what is as certain as his actions themselves. And if our dreamer likes to try whether the glowing heat of a glass furnace be barely a wandering imagination in a drowsy man's fancy, he may, by putting his hand into it, perhaps, be awakened into a greater certainty than he could wish, He most assuredly never could be put into such exquisite pain by a bare idea, or phantom, unless that the pain be a fancy too, but this pain he cannot, when the burn is well, bring upon himself again by the merc force of imagination. So that this evidence is as strong as we can desire, being as certain to us as our pleasure or pain, i. e., happiness or misery, beyond which we have no concernment either of knowing or being.-Locke.

DCCLXVIII.

Anecdote of a Chinese Emperor.-Vouti, Emperor of China, was passionately fond of the occult sciences. An

impostor availed himself of this foible, brought him an elixir, exhorting him to drink it, and assuring him that it would render him immortal. One of his ministers, who was present, having in vain attempted to undeceive him, hastily snatched the cup, and drank the liquor. The emperor, enraged at this insult, ordered the mandarin to be put to death. The honest minister, not in the least disconcerted, said to him, "If the elixir bestows immortality, all your efforts to put me to death will be useless; and if it does not, surely you will not be guilty of such an act of injustice for so insignificant a theft."-This speech paci fied the emperor, who afterwards highly commended him for his fortitude in the cause of truth, in opposition to imposture.-Elegant Anecdotes.

DCCLXIX.

The Prejudiced. The prejudiced are apt to converse but with one sort of men, to read but one sort of books, to come in hearing but of one sort of notions; the truth is, they canton out to themselves a little Goshen in the intellectual world, where light shines, and as they conclude, day blesses them: but the rest of the vast expansum they give up to night and darkness, and so avoid coming near it. They confine themselves to some little creek, not venturing out into the great ocean of knowledge, to survey the riches that nature has stored other parts with, no less genuine, no less solid, no less useful, than what is to be found within their own little spot.-Barrow.

DCCLXX.

Punishments.-Voltaire is of opinion that hanging is an advantage only to the executioner, who is paid for put. ting men openly to death: if punishments are invented