PHILOSOPHY, MENTAL. 



have great influence in increasing or mo- 

 derating; our resentment. 



88. Cruelty arid malice are the genuine 

 and necessary eSiecty of anger indulged 

 and gratified. 'I ney are n\>.n>\ apt to rise 

 in proud, selfish, and timorous persons, 

 those who conceive highly of their own 

 merits, and of the cor.s. quent injustice of 

 all offences against them, and who have 

 an exquisite feeling and apprehension in 

 respect of private gratifications and unea- 

 sinesses. The low and unhappy condition 

 of those around him, gives a dignity to 

 a man's own ; and the inHiction of punish- 

 ment, or mere suffering, strikes a terror, 

 and so affords security and authority. 

 Add to these, the pleasures arising from 

 gratifying the will, and pel haps some from 

 mere curiosity, and from the rousing an 

 obdurate callous mind to a state of sensi- 

 bility. Thus we may perceive how near- 

 ly one ill passion is related to another ; 

 and that it is possible for men to arrive 

 at last at some degree of pure cruelly and 

 malice. 



5. Of the Pleasures and Pains ofTheopalhy. 



89. In order to form just ideas respect- 

 ing the origin and nature of the theopathe- 

 tic affections, it will be desirable to show 

 what associations are formed with the word 

 God, and with the equivalent and related 

 terms and phrases. Many of the actions 

 and attributes of men are in common lan- 

 guage applied to God ; and it is probable 

 that children, in their first attempts to de- 

 cypher the meaning of the word, suppose 

 it to stand for a man whom they have not 

 seen ; and their visible conceptions con- 

 nected with the term will therefore be 

 that of a human form. When they hear 

 or read that God resides in heaven, (that 

 i#, according to their conceptions, among 

 the stars), that he made all things, that he 

 sees, hears, knows, and can do all things, 

 vivid ideas, which surprise and agitate 

 the mind, are raised up in it ; and if they 

 have made some progress in intellect, 

 they will feel great perplexity in their en- 

 deavours to realize such ideas to them- 

 selves ; and this perplexity will add to the 

 vividness of the ideas, and all together 

 will transfer to the term God, and its equi- 

 valent, such secondary ideas as may be 

 referred to the heads of magnificence, as- 

 tonishment, and reverence. When chil- 

 dren hear that God has no visible shape, 

 that lie cannot be seen, 8tc. it adds much 

 to their perplexity and astonishment, and 

 at the same time'destroys many of their 

 former ideas ; still, however, some visible 



ideas of the heavens, the throne of God, 

 &c. seem to remain. When u child hears 

 that God is the rewarder of good actions, 

 and ihe puimher of evil actions, and that 

 the most exquisite future happiness or 

 misery, (described under a g' eat variety 

 of particular emblems) are prepared by 

 him for the good or bad, respective 1), he 

 feels strong hopes or fears rise alternately 

 in his mind, according to the judgment 

 which he passes upon his <>\\ n actions, 

 founded partly upon the prevuu-> judg- 

 ment of others, and partly upon an imper- 

 fect moral sense or conscience begun to 

 be produced in his mind. At different 

 periods of this progress, those ideas w Inch 

 have arisen from his filial relation, unite 

 and blend with all the ideas previously 

 connected with the term God, in conse- 

 quence of the frequent application of the 

 term Father to the Supreme Being ; and 

 there cannot be a reasonable doubt, that 

 the notions and feelings which he has 

 formed towards his earthly parents, at 

 first form a considerable share in, and fay 

 u long period afterwards tend to modify 

 those belonging to the term God. On the 

 whole, therefore, it is probable, that 

 among Jews and Christians, children be- 

 gin with a definite visible conception at- 

 tached to the word ; that this is by de- 

 grees obliterated, without any thing of a 

 stable precise nature succeeding in its 

 room ; and that by further degrees a great 

 variety of strong mental affections recur 

 in their turns when they think of God. 



90. The affections exerted towards 

 God, may be classed under two general 

 heads, love and fear : to the former may 

 be referred gratitude, confidence, and 

 resignation, also enthusiasm, which may 

 be considered as a degeneration of it; to 

 the latter, reverence, (which is a mixture 

 of love and fear) also superstition and 

 atheism, which are degenerations of it. 

 The love of God, with its related affec- 

 tions, is generated by the contemplation 

 of his bounty and benignity, as these ap- 

 pear from the view of the natural world, 

 the declarations of the Scriptures, or a 

 man's own observation and experience re- 

 specting the events of life. It is support- 

 ed and much increased by the conscious- 

 ness of upright intentions and sincere en- 

 deavours, with the consequent hope of 

 future reward ; and by prayer, vocal and 

 mental, public and private, inasmuch as 

 this gives a reality and force to all the 

 ideas before spoken of. Frequent conver- 

 sation and reading, in which tint devout 

 affections are excited, have great efficacy 

 also from the infectious nature of our dis- 



