s new relation. It is
impossible to refute a system, which has never yet been explained. In
such a manner of fighting in the dark, a man loses his blows in the air,
and often places them where the enemy is not present.

I must, therefore, on this occasion, rest contented with requiring the
two following conditions of any one that would undertake to clear up
this system. First, As moral good and evil belong only to the actions
of the mind, and are derived from our situation with regard to external
objects, the relations, from which these moral distinctions arise, must
lie only betwixt internal actions, and external objects, and must not be
applicable either to internal actions, compared among themselves, or to
external objects, when placed in opposition to other external objects.
For as morality is supposed to attend certain relations, if these
relations coued belong to internal actions considered singly, it would
follow, that we might be guilty of crimes in ourselves, and independent
of our situation, with respect to the universe: And in like manner, if
these moral relations coued be applied to external objects, it would
follow, that even inanimate beings would be susceptible of moral beauty
and deformity. Now it seems difficult to imagine, that any relation can
be discovered betwixt our passions, volitions and actions, compared
to external objects, which relation might not belong either to these
passions and volitions, or to these external objects, compared among
themselves. But it will be still more difficult to fulfil the second
condition, requisite to justify this system. According to the principles
of those who maintain an abstract rational difference betwixt moral good
and evil, and a natural fitness and unfitness of things, it is not only
supposed, that these relations, being eternal and immutable, are the
same, when considered by every rational creature, but their effects are
also supposed to be necessarily the same; and it is concluded they have
no less, or rather a greater, influence in directing the will of the
deity, than in governing the rational and virtuous of our own species.
These two particulars are evidently distinct. It is one thing to know
virtue, and another to conform the will to it. In order, therefore, to
prove, that the measures of right and wrong are eternal laws, obligatory
on every rational mind, it is not sufficient to shew the relations upon
which they are founded: We must also point out th