446 



ON HUMAN HAPPINESS. 



giv6s birth to all other virtues which unite in teaching us, that no man can 

 live happily who does not live wisely, conscientiously, and justly ; nor, on 

 the other hand, can he live wisely, conscientiously, and justly, without living 

 happily : for virtue is inseparable frorn a life of happiness, and a hfe of 

 happiness is equally inseparable from virtue. Be these, then, and maxims 

 like these, the subjects of thy meditation, by night and by day, both when 

 alone and with the friend of thy bosom ; and never, whether asleep or 

 awake, shalt thou be opprest with anxiety, but live as a god among man- 

 kind."* 



To the same effect Cassius, in an expostulatory letter to his friend 

 Cicero, who had shown some inclination to join in the general calumny 

 against thq Epicureans : " Those whom we call lovers of pleasure are 

 real lovers of goodness and justice ; they are men who practise and cul- 

 tivate every virtue ; for no true pleasure can exist without a good and 

 virtuous life." 



So Lucretius, when describing the different tribes of the sons of vice, 

 or offenders against the public law, characterizes them by the common 

 name of fools. " They are," says he, perpetually smarting, even in 

 secret, beneath a sense of their atrocious crimes, and that reward of their 

 guilt, which they well know will sooner or later overtake them : 



The scourge, the wheel, the block, the dungeon deep, 



The base-born hangman, the Tarpeian cliff, 



Which, though the villain 'scape, his conscious soul 



Still fears perpetual ; torturing aU his days, 



And still foreboding heavier pangs at death. 



Hence earth itself to fools becomes a hell.f , 



It was from the elegant and ornate moralists of the East, that the phi- 

 losophers of this school derived this figurative synonymy ; from Arabia, 

 Egypt, and India ; in all which quarters we find it still more frequent and 

 familiar. Solomon, whose early studies were derived from an Arabic 

 source, is pecuharly addicted to this use of these terms. The very com- 

 mencement of his book of Proverbs, or system of ethics, as the schools 

 would denominate it, affords us a striking instance : — 



"The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of knowledge : 

 For FOOLS despise wisdom and instruction." 



So Vishnusarman, in his Hitopadesa to the same precise effect ; " Many 

 who read the Scriptures are grossly ignorant j but he who acts well is a 

 truly LEARNED man."| 



Whatever view, therefore, we take of this subject, ia whatever way 

 v/e exercise our reason upon it, we cannot fail to approve of virtue in 

 preference to vice ; for we cannot fail to regard virtue as the only sure 

 road to happiness, and consequently as the path of wisdom, or the will of 

 <jrod. The case, indeed, is so clear, that it is seldom mankind in any part 



♦ Diog. Laert. x. 132. 135. 



1 Verbera, carcufices, robur, pij^ lamina, taedae : 

 Qui tamen et si absunf, at oiens, sibi conscia factis, 

 Prcemetuens, adhibet stiraulos, torretque flagellis 

 Nec videt interea, qui terminus esse malorum 

 Possit, quive sciet pcenarum denique finis ; 

 Atque eadem metuit magis, baec ne m morte gravescant. 

 Hinc Acherusia fit stultorum denique vita. 



Lib. iii. 1030. 



I Sir W. Jones, vi. p. 37. 



