certain actions as means of
obtaining any desired good; but as my willing of these actions is only
secondary, and founded on the supposition, that they are causes of the
proposed effect; as soon as I discover the falshood of that supposition,
they must become indifferent to me.

It is natural for one, that does not examine objects with a strict
philosophic eye, to imagine, that those actions of the mind are
entirely the same, which produce not a different sensation, and are not
immediately distinguishable to the feeling and perception. Reason, for
instance, exerts itself without producing any sensible emotion; and
except in the more sublime disquisitions of philosophy, or in the
frivolous subtilties of the school, scarce ever conveys any pleasure
or uneasiness. Hence it proceeds, that every action of the mind, which
operates with the same calmness and tranquillity, is confounded with
reason by all those, who judge of things from the first view and
appearance. Now it is certain, there are certain calm desires and
tendencies, which, though they be real passions, produce little emotion
in the mind, and are more known by their effects than by the immediate
feeling or sensation. These desires are of two kinds; either certain
instincts originally implanted in our natures, such as benevolence and
resentment, the love of life, and kindness to children; or the general
appetite to good, and aversion to evil, considered merely as such. When
any of these passions are calm, and cause no disorder in the soul,
they are very readily taken for the determinations of reason, and are
supposed to proceed from the same faculty, with that, which judges of
truth and falshood. Their nature and principles have been supposed the
same, because their sensations are not evidently different.

Beside these calm passions, which often determine the will, there are
certain violent emotions of the same kind, which have likewise a great
influence on that faculty. When I receive any injury from another, I
often feel a violent passion of resentment, which makes me desire his
evil and punishment, independent of all considerations of pleasure and
advantage to myself. When I am immediately threatened with any grievous
ill, my fears, apprehensions, and aversions rise to a great height, and
produce a sensible emotion.

The common error of metaphysicians has lain in ascribing the direction
of the will entirely to one of these principles, and supposing the other