STUDY XII. 369 



our natural reafon >.they exhibit to us the juft and 

 the unjuft, only as they (land related to our per- 

 fonal interefts, and to our ambition ; they ufually 

 attach us to the fortune of fome powerful and re- 

 putable corps, and render us> as it may happen, 

 atheifts or devotees, debauched or continent, Car- 

 tefjans or Newtonians, juft as it affects the caufe 

 which has become our only moving principle. 



Good caufe, then, we have to miftruft reafon, 

 as, from the very firft ftep, it milleads us in our 

 refearches after truth and happinefs. Let us en- 

 quire, whether there is not in Man fome faculty 

 more noble, more invariable, and of greater ex- 

 tent. Though, in profecuting this enquiry, I have 

 to prefent only views vague and indeterminate, I 

 hope that men more enlightened than I can pre- 

 tend to be, may one day fix them, and carry them 

 much farther. In this confidence, with the feeble 

 powers which 1 poflefs, I am going to engage in a 

 career, well worthy of the Reader's moft ferions 

 attention. 



Defcartes lays this down as the bafis of the firflr 

 natural truths : / think* therefore I exiji. As this 

 Philofopher has acquired a very high degree of 

 reputation, which he merited, befides, by his know- 

 ledge in Geometry, and, above all, by his virtues, 

 his argument in proof of exiftence has been greatly 



vol. in. b b extolled. 



