3. CHAPTER IV[1]
THE CHARACTERS OF MEN ORIGINATE IN THEIR EXTERNAL CIRCUMSTANCES.
Thus far we have argued from historical facts, and from them have collected
a very strong presumptive evidence that political institutions have a more
powerful and extensive influence than it has been generally the practice
to ascribe to them.
But we can never arrive at precise conceptions relative to this part of
the subject without entering into an analysis of the human mind,[2] and
endeavouring to ascertain the nature of the causes by which its operations
are directed. Under this branch of the subject I shall attempt to prove two
things: first, that the actions and dispositions of mankind are the offspring
of circumstances and events, and not of any original determination that they
bring into the world; and, secondly, that the great stream of our voluntary
actions essentially depends, not upon the direct and immediate impulses of
sense, but upon the decisions of the understanding. If these propositions
can be sufficiently established, it will follow that the happiness men are
able to attain is proportioned to the justness of the opinions they take
as guides in the pursuit; and it will only remain, for the purpose of applying
these premises to the point under consideration, that we should demonstrate
the opinions of men to be, for the most part, under the absolute control
of political institution.
First, the actions and dispositions of men are not the off-spring of any
original bias that they bring into the world in favour of one sentiment or
character rather than another, but flow entirely from the operation of circumstances
and events acting upon a faculty of receiving sensible impressions.
There are three modes in which the human mind has been conceived to be
modified, independently of the circumstances which occur to us, and the sensations
excited: first, innate principles; secondly, instincts; thirdly, the original
differences of our structure, together with the impressions we receive in
the womb. Let us examine each of these in their order.
First, innate principles of judgement. Those by whom this doctrine has
been maintained have supposed that there were certain branches of knowledge,
and those perhaps of all others the most important, concerning which we felt
an irresistible persuasion, at the same time that we were wholly unable to
trace them through any channels of external evidence and methodical deduction.
They conceived therefore that they were originally written in our hearts;
or perhaps, more properly speaking, that there was a general propensity in
the human mind suggesting them to our reflections, and fastening them upon
our conviction. Accordingly, they established the universal consent of mankind
as one of the most infallible criterions of fundamental truth. It appeared
upon their system that we were furnished with a sort of sixth sense, the
existence of which was not proved to us, like that of our other senses, by
direct and proper evidence, but from the consideration of certain phenomena
in the history of the human mind, which cannot be otherwise accounted for
than by the assumption of this hypothesis.
There is an essential deficiency in every speculation of this sort. It
turns entirely upon an appeal to our ignorance. Its language is as follows:
"You cannot account for certain events from the known laws of the subjects
to which they belong; therefore they are not deducible from those laws;
therefore you must admit a new principle into the system for the express
purpose of accounting for them." But there cannot be a sounder maxim
of reasoning than that which points out to us the error of admitting into
our hypotheses unnecessary principles, or referring the phenomena that occur
to remote and extraordinary sources, when they may with equal facility be
referred to sources which obviously exist, and the results of which we daily
observe. This maxim alone is sufficient to persuade us to reject the doctrine
of innate principles. If we consider the infinitely various causes by which
the human mind is perceptibly modified, and the different principles, argument,
imitation, inclination, early prejudice and imaginary interest, by which
opinion is generated, we shall readily perceive that nothing can be more
difficult than to assign any opinion, existing among the human species, and
at the same time incapable of being generated by any of these causes and
principles.
A careful enquirer will be strongly inclined to suspect the soundness
of opinions which rest for their support on so ambiguous a foundation as
that of innate impression. We cannot reasonably question the existence of
facts; that is, we cannot deny the existence of our sensations, or the series
in which they occur. We cannot deny the axioms of mathematics; for they exhibit
nothing more than a consistent use of words, and affirm of some idea that
it is itself and not something else. We can entertain little doubt of the
validity of mathematical demonstrations, which appear to be irresistible
conclusions deduced from identical propositions. We ascribe a certain value,
sometimes greater and sometimes less, to considerations drawn from analogy.
But what degree of weight shall we attribute to affirmations which pretend
to rest upon none of these grounds? The most preposterous propositions, incapable
of any rational defence, have in different ages and countries appealed to
this inexplicable authority, and passed for infallible and innate. The enquirer
that has no other object than truth, that refuses to be misled, and is determined
to proceed only upon just and sufficient evidence will find little reason
to be satisfied with dogmas which rest upon no other foundation than a pretended
necessity impelling the human mind to yield its assent.
But there is a still more irresistible argument proving to us the absurdity
of the supposition of innate principles. Every principle is a proposition:
either it affirms, or it denies. Every proposition consists in the connection
of at least two distinct ideas, which are affirmed to agree or disagree with
each other. It is impossible that the proposition can be innate, unless the
ideas to which it relates be also innate. A connection where there is nothing
to be connected, a proposition where there is neither subject nor conclusion,
is the most incoherent of all suppositions. But nothing can be more incontrovertible
than that we do not bring pre-established ideas into the world with us.
Let the innate principle be that "virtue is a rule to which we are
obliged to conform." Here are three principal and leading ideas, not
to mention subordinate ones, which it is necessary to form, before we can
so much as understand the proposition. What is virtue? Previously to our
forming an idea corresponding to this general term, it seems necessary that
we should have observed the several features by which virtue is distinguished,
and the several subordinate articles of right conduct, that taken together
constitute that mass of practical judgements to which we give the denomination
of virtue. These are so far from being innate that the most impartial and
laborious enquirers are not yet agreed respecting them. The next idea included
in the above proposition is that of a rule or standard, a generical measure
with which individuals are to be compared, and their conformity or disagreement
with which is to determine their value. Lastly, there is the idea of obligation,
its nature and source, the obliger and the sanction, the penalty and the
reward.
Who is there in the present state of scientifical improvement that will
believe that this vast chain of perceptions and notions is something that
we bring into the world with us, a mystical magazine, shut up in the human
embryo, whose treasures are to be gradually unfolded as circumstances shall
require? Who does not perceive that they are regularly generated in the mind
by a series of impressions, and digested and arranged by association and
reflection?
But, if we are not endowed with innate principles of judgement, it has
nevertheless been supposed by some persons that we might have instincts to
action, leading us to the performance of certain useful and necessary functions,
independently of any previous reasoning as to the advantage of these functions.
These instincts, like the innate principles of judgement we have already
examined, are conceived to be original, a separate endowment annexed to our
being, and not anything that irresistibly flows from the mere faculty of
perception and thought, as acted upon by the circumstances, either of our
animal frame, or of the external objects, by which we are affected. They
are liable therefore to the same objection as that already urged against
innate principles. The system by which they are attempted to be established
is a mere appeal to our ignorance, assuming that we are fully acquainted
with all the possible operations of known powers, and imposing upon us an
unknown power as indispensable to the accounting for certain phenomena. If
we were wholly unable to solve these phenomena, it would yet behove us to
be extremely cautious in affirming that known principles and causes are inadequate
to their solution. If we are able upon strict and mature investigation to
trace the greater part of them to their source, this necessarily adds force
to the caution here recommended.
An unknown cause is exceptionable, in the first place, inasmuch as to
multiply causes is contrary to the experienced operation of scientifical
improvement. It is exceptionable, secondly, because its tendency is to break
that train of antecedents and consequents of which the history of the universe
is composed. It introduces an action apparently extraneous, instead of imputing
the nature of what follows to the properties of that which preceded. It bars
the progress of enquiry by introducing that which is occult, mysterious and
incapable of further investigation. It allows nothing to the future advancement
of human knowledge; but represents the limits of what is already known, as
the limits of human understanding.
Let us review a few of the most common examples adduced in favour of human
instincts, and examine how far they authorize the conclusion that is attempted
to be drawn from them: and first, some of those actions which appear to rise
in the most instantaneous and irresistible manner.
A certain irritation of the palm of the hand will produce that contraction
of the fingers which accompanies the action of grasping. This contraction
will at first take place unaccompanied with design, the object will be grasped
without any intention to retain it, and let go again without thought or observation.
After a certain number of repetitions, the nature of the action will be perceived;
it will be performed with a consciousness of its tendency; and even the hand
stretched out upon the approach of any object that is desired. Present to
the child, thus far instructed, a lighted candle. The sight of it will produce
a pleasurable state of the organs of perception. He will probably stretch
out his hand to the flame, and will have no apprehension of the pain of burning
till he has felt the sensation.
At the age of maturity, the eyelids instantaneously close when any substance
from which danger is apprehended is advanced towards them; and this action
is so constant as to be with great difficulty prevented by a grown person,
though he should explicitly desire it. In infants there is no such propensity;
and an object may be approached to their organs, however near and however
suddenly, without producing this effect. Frowns will be totally indifferent
to a child, who has never found them associated with the effects of anger.
Fear itself is a species of foresight, and in no case exists till introduced
by experience.
It has been said that the desire of self-preservation is innate. I demand
what is meant by this desire? Must we not understand by it a preference of
existence to nonexistence? Do we prefer anything but because it is apprehended
to be good ? It follows that we cannot prefer existence, previously to our
experience of the motives for preference it possesses. Indeed the ideas of
life and death are exceedingly complicated, and very tardy in their formation.
A child desires pleasure and loathes pain long before he can have any imagination
respecting the ceasing to exist.
Again, it has been said that self-love is innate. But there cannot be
an error more easy of detection. By the love of self we understand the approbation
of pleasure, and dislike of pain: but this is only the faculty of perception
under another name. Who ever denied that man was a percipient being? Who
ever dreamed that there was a particular instinct necessary to render him
percipient?
Pity has sometimes been supposed an instance of innate principle; particularly
as it seems to arise with greater facility in young persons, and persons
of little refinement, than in others. But it was reasonable to expect that
threats and anger, circumstances that have been associated with our own sufferings,
should excite painful feelings in us in the case of others, independently
of any laboured analysis. The cries of distress, the appearance of agony
or corporal infliction, irresistibly revive the memory of the pains accompanied
by those symptoms in ourselves. Longer experience and observation enable
us to separate the calamities of others and our own safety, the existence
of pain in one subject and of pleasure or benefit in others, or in the same
at a future period, more accurately than we could be expected to do previously
to that experience.
If then it appear that the human mind is unattended either with innate
principles or instincts, there are only two remaining circumstances that
can be imagined to anticipate the effects of institution, and fix the human
character independently of every species of education: these are, the qualities
that may be produced in the human mind previously to the era of our birth,
and the differences that may result from the different structure of the greater
or subtler elements of the animal frame.
To objections derived from these sources the answer will be in both cases
similar.
First, ideas are to the mind nearly what atoms are to the body. The whole
mass is in a perpetual flux; nothing is stable and permanent; after the lapse
of a given period not a single particle probably remains the same. Who knows
not that in the course of a human life the character of the individual frequently
undergoes two or three revolutions of its fundamental stamina? The turbulent
man will frequently become contemplative, the generous be changed into selfish,
and the frank and good-humoured into peevish and morose. How often does it
happen that, if we meet our best loved friend after an absence of twenty
years, we look in vain in the man before us for the qualities that formerly
excited our sympathy, and, instead of the exquisite delight we promised ourselves,
reap nothing but disappointment? If it is thus in habits apparently the most
rooted, who will be disposed to lay any extraordinary stress upon the impressions
which an infant may have received in the womb of his mother?
He that considers human life with an attentive eye will not fail to remark
that there is scarcely such a thing in character and principles as an irremediable
error. Persons of narrow and limited views may upon many occasions incline
to sit down in despair; but those who are inspired with a genuine energy
will derive new incentives from miscarriage. Has any unfortunate and undesirable
impression been made upon the youthful mind? Nothing will be more easy than
for a judicious superintendent, provided its nature is understood, and it
is undertaken sufficiently early, to remedy and obliterate it. Has a child
passed a certain period of existence in ill-judged indulgence and habits
of command and caprice? The skilful parent, when the child returns to its
paternal roof, knows that this evil is not invincible, and sets himself with
an undoubting spirit to the removal of the depravity. It often happens that
the very impression which, if not counteracted, shall decide upon the pursuits
and fortune of an entire life might perhaps under other circumstances be
reduced to complete inefficiency in half an hour.
It is in corporeal structure as in intellectual impressions. The first
impressions of our infancy are so much upon the surface that their effects
scarcely survive the period of the impression itself. The mature man seldom
retains the faintest recollection of the incidents of the two first years
of his life. Is it to be supposed that that which has left no trace upon
the memory can be in an eminent degree powerful in its associated effects?
Just so in the structure of the animal frame. What is born into the world
is an unfinished sketch, without character or decisive feature impressed
upon it. In the sequel there is a correspondence between the physiognomy
and the intellectual and moral qualities of the mind. But is it not reasonable
to suppose that this is produced by the continual tendency of the mind to
modify its material engine in a particular way? There is for the most part
no essential difference between the child of the lord and of the porter.
Provided he do not come into the world infected with any ruinous distemper,
the child of the lord, if changed in the cradle, would scarcely find any
greater difficulty than the other in learning the trade of his softer father,
and becoming a carrier of burthens. The muscles of those limbs which are
most frequently called into play are always observed to acquire peculiar
flexibility or strength. It is not improbable, if it should be found that
the capacity of the skull of a wise man is greater than that of a fool, that
this enlargement should be produced by the incessantly repeated action of
the intellectual faculties, especially if we recollect of how flexible materials
the skulls of infants are composed, and at how early an age persons of eminent
intellectual merit acquire some portion of their future characteristics.
In the meantime it would be ridiculous to question the real differences
that exist between children at the period of their birth. Hercules and his
brother, the robust infant whom scarcely any neglect can destroy, and the
infant that is with difficulty reared, are undoubtedly from the moment of
parturition very different beings. If each of them could receive an education
precisely equal and eminently wise, the child labouring under original disadvantage
would be benefited, but the child to whom circumstances had been most favourable
in the outset would always retain his priority. These considerations however
do not appear materially to affect the doctrine of the present chapter; and
that for the following reasons.
First, education never can be equal. The inequality of external circumstances
in two beings whose situations most nearly resemble is so great as to baffle
all power of calculation. In the present state of mankind this is eminently
the case. There is no fact more palpable than that children of all sizes
and forms indifferently become wise. It is not the man of great stature or
vigorous make that outstrips his fellow in understanding. It is not the man
who possesses all the external senses in the highest perfection. It is not
the man whose health is most vigorous and invariable. Those moral causes
that awaken the mind, that inspire sensibility, imagination and perseverance,
are distributed without distinction to the tall or the dwarfish, the graceful
or the deformed, the lynx-eyed or the blind. But, if the more obvious distinctions
of animal structure appear to have little share in deciding upon their associated
varieties of intellect, it is surely in the highest degree unjustifiable
to attribute these varieties to such subtle and imperceptible differences
as, being out of our power to assign, are yet gratuitously assumed to account
for the most stupendous effects. This mysterious solution is the refuge
of indolence or the instrument of imposture, but incompatible with a sober
and persevering spirit of investigation.
Secondly, it is sufficient to recollect the nature of moral causes to
be satisfied that their efficiency is nearly unlimited. The essential differences
that are to be found between individual and individual originate in the opinions
they form, and the circumstances by which they are controlled. It is impossible
to believe that the same moral train would not make nearly the same man.
Let us suppose a being to have heard all the arguments and been subject to
all the excitements that were ever addressed to any celebrated character.
The same arguments, with all their strength and all their weakness, unaccompanied
with the smallest addition or variation, and retailed in exactly the same
proportions from month to month and year to year, must surely have produced
the same opinions. The same excitements, without reservation, whether direct
or accidental, must have fixed the same propensities. Whatever science or
pursuit was selected by this celebrated character must be loved by the person
respecting whom we are supposing this identity of impressions. In fine, it
is impression that makes the man, and, compared with the empire of impression,
the mere differences of animal structure are inexpressibly unimportant and
powerless.
These truths will be brought to our minds with much additional evidence
if we compare in this respect the case of brutes with that of men. Among
the inferior animals, breed is a circumstance of considerable importance,
and a judicious mixture and preservation in this point is found to be attended
with the most unequivocal results. But nothing of that kind appears to take
place in our own species. A generous blood, a gallant and fearless spirit
is by no means propagated from father to son. When a particular appellation
is granted, as is usually practised in the existing governments of Europe,
to designate the descendants of a magnanimous ancestry, we do not find, even
with all the arts of modern education, to assist, that such descendants are
the legitimate representatives of departed heroism. Whence comes this difference?
Probably from the more irresistible operation of moral causes. It is not
impossible that among savages those differences would be conspicuous which
with us are annihilated. It is not unlikely that if men, like brutes, were
withheld from the more considerable means of intellectual improvement, if
they derived nothing from the discoveries and sagacity of their ancestors,
if each individual had to begin absolutely de novo in the discipline and
arrangement of his ideas, blood or whatever other circumstances distinguish
one man from another at the period of his nativity would produce as memorable
effects in man as they now do in those classes of animals that are deprived
of our advantages. Even in the case of brutes, education and care on the
part of the man seem to be nearly indispensable, if we would not have the
foal of the finest racer degenerate to the level of the cart-horse. In plants
the peculiarities of soil decide in a great degree upon the future properties
of each. But who would think of forming the character of a human being by
the operations of heat and cold, dryness and moisture upon the animal frame?
With us moral considerations swallow up the effects of every other accident.
Present a pursuit to the mind, convey to it the apprehension of calamity
or advantage, excite it by motives of aversion or motives of affection, and
the slow and silent influence of material causes perishes like dews at the
rising of the sun.
The result of these considerations is that at the moment of birth man
has really a certain character, and each man a character different from his
fellows. The accidents which pass during the months of percipiency in the
womb of the mother produce a real effect. Various external accidents, unlimited
as to the period of their commencement, modify in different ways the elements
of the animal frame. Everything in the universe is linked and united together.
No event, however minute and imperceptible, is barren of a train of consequences,
however comparatively evanescent those consequences may in some instances
be found. If there have been philosophers that have asserted otherwise, and
taught that all minds from the period of birth were precisely alike, they
have reflected discredit by such an incautious statement upon the truth they
proposed to defend.
But, though the original differences of man and man be arithmetically
speaking something, speaking in the way of a general and comprehensive estimate
they may be said to be almost nothing. If the early impressions of our childhood
may by a skilful observer be as it were obliterated almost as soon as made,
how much less can the confused and unpronounced impressions of the womb be
expected to resist the multiplicity of ideas that successively contribute
to wear out their traces? If the temper of the man appear in many instances
to be totally changed, how can it be supposed that there is anything permanent
and inflexible in the propensities of a new-born infant? and, if not in the
character of the disposition, how much less in that of the understanding?
Speak the language of truth and reason to your child, and be under no
apprehension for the result. Show him that what you recommend is valuable
and desirable, and fear not but he will desire it. Convince his understanding,
and you enlist all his powers animal and intellectual in your service. How
long has the genius of education been disheartened and unnerved by the pretence
that man is born all that it is possible for him to become? How long has
the jargon imposed upon the world which would persuade us that in instructing
a man you do not add to, but unfold his stores? The miscarriages of education
do not proceed from the boundedness of its powers, but from the mistakes
with which it is accompanied. We often inspire disgust, where we mean to
infuse desire. We are wrapped up in ourselves, and do not observe, as we
ought, step by step the sensations that pass in the mind of our hearer. We
mistake compulsion for persuasion, and delude ourselves into the belief
that despotism is the road to the heart.
Education will proceed with a firm step and with genuine lustre when those
who conduct it shall know what a vast field it embraces; when they shall
be aware that the effect, the question whether the pupil shall be a man of
perseverance and enterprise or a stupid and inanimate dolt, depends upon
the powers of those under whose direction he is placed and the skill with
which those powers shall be applied. Industry will be exerted with tenfold
alacrity when it shall be generally confessed that there are no obstacles
to our improvement which do not yield to the powers of industry. Multitudes
will never exert the energy necessary to extraordinary success, till they
shall dismiss the prejudices that fetter them, get rid of the chilling system
of occult and inexplicable causes, and consider the human mind as an intelligent
agent, guided by motives and prospects presented to the understanding, and
not by causes of which we have no proper cognisance and can form no calculation.
Apply these considerations to the subject of politics, and they will authorize
us to infer that the excellencies and defects of the human character are
not derived from causes beyond the reach of ingenuity to modify and correct.
If we entertain false views and be involved in pernicious mistakes, this
disadvantage is not the offspring of an irresistible destiny. We have been
ignorant, we have been hasty, or we have been misled. Remove the causes of
this ignorance or this miscalculation, and the effects will cease. Show me
in the clearest and most unambiguous manner that a certain mode of proceeding
is most reasonable in itself or most conducive to my interest, and I shall
infallibly pursue that mode, as long as the views you suggested to me continue
present to my mind. The conduct of human beings in every situation is governed
by the judgements they make and the sensations that are communicated to them.
It has appeared that the characters of men are determined in all their
most essential circumstances by education. By education in this place I would
be understood to convey the most comprehensive sense that can possibly be
annexed to that word, including every incident that produces an idea in the
mind, and can give birth to a train of reflections. It may be of use for
a clearer understanding of the subject we here examine to consider education
under three heads: the education of accident, or those impressions we receive
independently of any design on the part of the preceptor; education commonly
so called, or the impressions which he intentionally communicates; and political
education, or the modification our ideas receive from the form of government
under which we live. In the course of this successive review we shall be
enabled in some degree to ascertain the respective influence which is to
be attributed to each.
It is not unusual to hear persons dwell with emphasis on the wide difference
of the results in two young persons who have been educated together; and
this has been produced as a decisive argument in favour of the essential
differences we are supposed to bring into the world with us. But this could
scarcely have happened but from extreme inattention in the persons who have
so argued. Innumerable ideas, or changes in the state of the percipient being,
probably occur in every moment of time. How many of these enter into the
plan of the preceptor? Two children walk out together. One busies himself
in plucking flowers or running after butterflies, the other walks in the
hand of their conductor. Two men view a picture. They never see it from the
same point of view, and therefore strictly speaking never see the same picture.
If they sit down to hear a lecture or any piece of instruction, they never
sit down with the same degree of attention, seriousness or good humour. The
previous state of mind is different, and therefore the impression received
cannot be the same. It has been found in the history of several eminent men,
and probably would have been found much oftener had their juvenile adventures
been more accurately recorded, that the most trivial circumstance has sometimes
furnished the original occasion of awakening the ardour of their minds and
determining the bent of their studies.
It may however reasonably be suspected whether the education of design
be not, intrinsically considered, more powerful than the education of accident.
If at any time it appear impotent, this is probably owing to mistake in the
project. The instructor continually fails in wisdom of contrivance, or conciliation
of manner, or both. It may often happen, either from the pedantry of his
habits, or the impatience of his temper, that his recommendation shall operate
rather as an antidote than an attraction. Preceptors are apt to pique themselves
upon disclosing part and concealing part of the truth, upon a sort of common
place, cant exhortation to be addressed to youth, which it would be an insult
to offer to the understandings of men. But children are not inclined to consider
him entirely as their friend whom they detect in an attempt to impose upon
them. Were it otherwise, were we sufficiently frank and sufficiently skilful,
did we apply ourselves to excite the sympathy of the young and to gain their
confidence, it is not to be believed but that the systematical measures of
the preceptor would have a decisive advantage over the desultory influence
of accidental impression. Children are a sort of raw material put into our
hands, a ductile and yielding substance, which, if we do not ultimately mould
in conformity to our wishes, it is because we throw away the power committed
to us, by the folly with which we are accustomed to exert it. But there is
another error not less decisive. The object we choose is an improper one.
Our labour is expended, not in teaching truth, but in teaching falsehood.
When that is the case, education is necessarily and happily maimed of half
its powers. The success of an attempt to mislead can never be complete. We
continually communicate in spite of ourselves the materials of just reasoning;
reason is the genuine exercise, and truth the native element of an intellectual
nature; it is no wonder therefore that, with a crude and abortive plan to
govern his efforts, the preceptor is perpetually baffled, and the pupil,
who has been thus stored with systematic delusions, and partial, obscure,
and disfigured truths, should come out anything rather than that which his
instructor intended him.
It remains to be considered what share political institution and forms
of government occupy in the education of every human being. Their degree
of influence depends upon two essential circumstances.
First, it is nearly impossible to oppose the education of the preceptor,
and the education we derive from the forms of government under which we live,
to each other; and therefore, however powerful the former of these may be,
absolutely considered, it can never enter the lists with the latter upon
equal terms. Should anyone talk to us of rescuing a young person from the
sinister influence of a corrupt government by the power of education, it
will be fair to ask who is the preceptor by whom this talk is to be effected?
Is he born in the ordinary mode of generation, or does he descend among us
from the skies? Has his character been in no degree modified by that very
influence he undertakes to counteract? It is beyond all controversy that
men who live in a state of equality, or that approaches equality, will be
frank, ingenuous and intrepid in their carriage; while those who inhabit
where a great disparity of ranks has prevailed will be distinguished by coldness,
irresoluteness, timidity and caution. Will the preceptor in question be altogether
superior to these qualities? Which of us is there who utters his thoughts
in the fearless and explicit manner that true wisdom would prescribe? Who,
that is sufficiently critical and severe, does not detect himself every hour
in some act of falsehood or equivocation that example and early habits have
planted too deeply to be eradicated? But the question is not what extraordinary
persons can be found who may shine illustrious exceptions to the prevailing
degeneracy of their neighbours. As long as parents and teachers in general
shall fall under the established rule, it is clear that politics and modes
of government will educate and infect us all. They poison our minds before
we can resist, or so much as suspect their malignity. Like the barbarous
directors of the Eastern seraglios, they deprive us of our virility, and
fit us for their despicable employment from the cradle. So false is the opinion
that has too generally prevailed that politics is an affair with which ordinary
men have little concern.
Secondly, supposing the preceptor had all the qualifications that can
reasonably be imputed, let us recollect for a moment what are the influences
with which he would have to struggle. Political institution, by the consequences
with which it is pregnant, strongly suggests to everyone who enters within
its sphere what is the path he should avoid, as well as what he should pursue.
Under a government fundamentally erroneous, he will see intrepid virtue proscribed,
and a servile and corrupt spirit uniformly encouraged. But morality itself
is nothing but a calculation of consequences. What strange confusion will
the spectacle of that knavery which is universally practised through all
the existing classes of society produce in the mind? The preceptor cannot
go out of the world, or prevent the intercourse of his pupil with human beings
of a character different from his own. Attempts of this kind are generally
unhappy, stamped with the impression of artifice, intolerance and usurpation.
From earliest infancy therefore there will be two principles contending for
empire, the peculiar and elevated system of the preceptor, and the grovelling
views of the great mass of mankind. These will generate confusion, uncertainty
and irresolution. At no period of life will the effect correspond to what
it would have been if the community were virtuous and wise. But its effect,
obscure and imperceptible for a time, may be expected to burst into explosion
at the period of puberty. When the pupil first becomes master of his own
actions, and chooses his avocations and his associates, he will necessarily
be acquainted with many things of which before he had very slender notions.
At this time the follies of the world wear their most alluring face. He can
scarcely avoid imagining that he has hitherto laboured under some species
of delusion. Delusion, when detected, causes him upon whom it was practised
to be indignant and restive. The only chance which remains is that, after
a time, he should be recalled and awakened: and against this chance there
are the progressive enticements of society; sensuality, ambition, sordid
interest, false ridicule and the incessant decay of that unblemished purity
which attended him in his outset. The best that can be expected is that he
should return at last to sobriety and truth, with a mind debilitated and
relaxed by repeated errors, and a moral constitution in which the seeds of
degeneracy have been deeply and extensively sown.
[ [1]]
In the plan of this work it was originally conceived that it was advisable
not to press matters of close and laborious speculation in the outset. It
appeared as if moral and political philosophy might assume something more
than had been usual of a popular form, without deducting from the justness
and depth of its investigation. Upon revisal however, it was found that the
inferences of the First Book had been materially injured by an overscrupulousness
in that point. The fruit of the discovery was this and the following chapter,
as they now stand. It is recommended, to the reader who finds himself deterred
by their apparent difficulty, to pass on to the remaining divisions of the
enquiry.
[ [2]]
Some persons have of late suggested doubts concerning the propriety
of the use of the word mind. An accurate philosophy has led modern enquirers
to question the existence of two classes of substances in the universe, to
reject the metaphysical denominations of spirit and soul, and even to doubt
whether human beings have any satisfactory acquaintance with the properties
of matter. The same accuracy, it has been said, ought to teach us to discard
the term mind. But this objection seems to be premature. We are indeed wholly
uncertain whether the causes of our sensations, heat, colour, hardness and
extension (the two former of these properties have been questioned in a very
forcible manner by Locke, Human Understanding, the two latter by Berkeley
and Hume) be in any respect similar to the ideas they produce. We know nothing
of the substance or substratum of matter, or of that which is the recipient
of thought and perception. We do not even know that the idea annexed to the
word substance is correct, or has any counterpart in the reality of existence.
But, if there be any one thing that we know more certainly than another,
it is the existence of our own thoughts, ideas, perceptions or sensations
(by whatever term we may choose to express them), and that they are ordinarily
linked together so as to produce the complex notion of unity or personal
identity. Now it is this series of thoughts thus linked together, without
considering whether they reside in any or what substratum, that is most aptly
expressed by the term mind; and in this sense the term is intended to be
used throughout the following work.