MEMOIR OF ARISTOTLE. 83 



Ethics as a practical system, coming home with 

 gentle yet resistless conviction to the hearts and un- 

 derstandings of men. His morality is neither too 

 rigid nor over-indulgent. In many respects, indeed, 

 it is imperfect, as every thing must he that rests on 

 no higher authority than the sanction of reason or na- 

 ture ; but it gives juster views, and lays down nobler 

 principles of duty, than any other system of antiquity. 

 From not having clear light as to the real immor- 

 tality of man, he was compelled to determine the 

 excellence of human virtue and happiness from a 

 view of his present condition only ; but, at the same 

 time, whilst he recommends the active discharge of 

 those duties and virtues which are within our reach, 

 and which belong to us as men, he directs us to pur- 

 sue that happiness which is beyond our attainment, 

 and which he himself describes as an immortalizing 

 of our nature a living according to what is divine 

 in man, and what renders him most god-like, and 

 most dear to the Divinity. Considering his disad- 

 vantages, it must excite our wonder that a philoso- 

 pher living, as Aristoile did, amidst the darkm>s 

 and disorder resulting from the want of a purer re- 

 ligion, should have given such sound practical ob- 

 servations on human nature, and formed such accurate 

 conceptions of the perfection of human virtue. 



The work on Politics, comprising eight books, was 

 a necessary sequel to that on Ethics, inasmuch as 

 the precepts of the one, to have a moral effect on 

 man, require to be enforced by the external sanction 



