

276 ABVANCEMEK7 OF LEARKINO. [BOOK Vll, 



auce, though it be infinitely different from the good of com- 

 munion. 



We divide passive good into conservative and perfective; 

 for everything has three kinds of appetite with regard to its 

 own individual good, — the first to preserve itself, the second 

 to perfect itself, and the third to multiply and diffuse itself. 

 The last relates to active good, of which we have spokeit 

 already; and of the other two the perfective is the most 

 excellent ; for it is a less matter to preserve a thing in its 

 state, and a greater to exalt its nature. But throughout the 

 universe are found some nobler natures, to the dignity and 

 excellence whereof inferior ones aspire, as to their origins ; — 

 whence the poet said well of mankind, that " they have an 

 ethereal vigour and a celestial origin:" 



" Igneus est ollis vigor et coelestis origo;" » 

 for the perfection of the human form consists in approaching 

 he Divine or angelic nature. The corrupt and preposterous 

 imitation of this perfective good is the pest of human life, 

 and the storm that overturns and sweeps away all things, 

 whilst men, instead of a true and essential exaltation, liy 

 Avith bhnd ambition only to a local one ; for as men in sickness 

 toss and roll from place to place, as if by change of situation 

 they could get away from themselves, or fly from the disease, 

 so in ambition, men hurried away with a false imagination of 

 exalting their own nature, obtain no more than change of 

 place or eminence of post. 



Conservative good is the receiving and enjoying things 

 agreeable to our nature ; and this good, though it be the 

 most simple and natural, yet of all others it seems the lowest 

 and most effeminate. It is also attended with a difference, 

 about which the judgment of mankind has been partly un- 

 settled and the inquiry partly neglected ; for the dignity and 

 recommendation of the good of fruition or pleasure, as it is 

 commonly called, consists either in the reality or strength 

 thereof, — the one being procured by imiformity, and the 

 other by variety. The one has a less mixture of evil, the 

 other a stronger and more lively impression of good : which 

 of these is the best, is the question; but whether human 

 nature be not capable of both at once, has not been exa- 

 mined. 



* See Virgil, -^neid, vi. 730. 



