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7w plus laetis animas reponis 
Sedibus 
So that, you fee, the. moft diftinguiftied 
literati, in an age when human genius feems 
to have reached its ne plus ultra, were pow- 
erfully impreffed with a belief of future ex- 
iftence and of reward and punifhment. They 
faw the unequal diftribution of good and 
evil on Earth.' They were convinced of 
the power and benevolence of the Creator. 
It was impoflible to fuppofe him an unjuft 
Being: therefore they were under the ne- 
cefllty of concluding, that virtue muft be 
rewarded in another life. 
But, we are told, that Virtue is its own 
reward. So it is, to a certain degree. In 
equal fituations the virtuous man will be 
incomparably the moft happy ; but this does 
not fecure him from the gripe of penury, 
from the heart-rending pangs of a Lear, in- 
flifted by a tbanklefs child! No, thefe are 
fufferings which no virtue could fupport, 
without the foqthing expectation of a hap- 
pier eternity. 
That virtue is its own reward in our iri- 
tercourfe with mankind, is moft true. Vi- 
cious men are miftrufted and defpifed, even 
by 
