Ch. X. Of the Direction of our Charity. 363 



encourage indolence and check industry ; and in 

 the most marked manner subtract from the sum 

 of human happiness. 



Our experience has, indeed, informed us that 

 the impulse of benevolence is not so strong as 

 the passion between the sexes, and that, generally 

 speaking, there is much less danger to be appre- 

 hended from the indulgence of the former than of 

 the latter ; but independently of this experience 

 and of the moral codes founded upon it, we should 

 be as much justified in a general indulgence of 

 the former passion as in following indiscrimi- 

 nately every impulse of our benevolence. They 

 are both natural passions, excited by their appro- 

 priate objects, and to the gratification of which we 

 are prompted by the pleasurable sensations which 

 accompany them. As animals, or till we know 

 their consequences, our only business is to follow 

 these dictates of nature ; but, as reasonable beings, 

 we are under the strongest obligations to attend 

 to their consequences ; and if they be evil to our- 

 selves or others, we may justly consider it as an 

 indication, that such a mode of indulging these 

 passions is not suited to our state or conformable 

 to the will of God. As moral agents, therefore, 

 it is clearly our duty to restrain theii* indulgence 

 in these particular directions ; and by thus care- 

 fully examining the consequences of our natural 

 passions, and frequently bringing them to the test 

 of utility, gradually to acquire a habit of gratify- 

 ing them only in that way, which, being unat- 

 tended with evil, will clearly add to the sum of 



