lmsgiving. Or again, on a wider scale, we can remark that ages
of Heroism are not ages of Moral Philosophy; Virtue, when it can be
philosophised of, has become aware of itself, is sickly and beginning
to decline. A spontaneous habitual all-pervading spirit of Chivalrous
Valour shrinks together, and perks itself up into shrivelled Points of
Honour; humane Courtesy and Nobleness of mind dwindle into punctilious
Politeness, "avoiding meats;" "paying tithe of mint and anise,
neglecting the weightier matters of the law." Goodness, which was a
rule to itself, must now appeal to Precept, and seek strength from
Sanctions; the Freewill no longer reigns unquestioned and by divine
right, but like a mere earthly sovereign, by expediency, by Rewards
and Punishments: or rather, let us say, the Freewill, so far as may
be, has abdicated and withdrawn into the dark, and a spectral
nightmare of a Necessity usurps its throne; for now that mysterious
Self-impulse of the whole man, heaven-inspired, and in all senses
partaking of the Infinite, being captiously questioned in a finite
dialect, and answering, as it needs must, by silence,--is conceived as
non-extant, and only the outward Mechanism of it remains acknowledged:
of Volition, except as the synonym of Desire, we hear nothing; of
"Motives," without any Mover, more than enough.

So too, when the generous Affections have become well-nigh paralytic,
we have the reign of Sentimentality. The greatness, the
profitableness, at any rate the extremely ornamental nature of
high feeling, and the luxury of doing good; charity, love,
self-forgetfulness, devotedness and all manner of godlike
magnanimity,--are everywhere insisted on, and pressingly inculcated in
speech and writing, in prose and verse; Socinian Preachers proclaim
"Benevolence" to all the four winds, and have TRUTH engraved on their
watch-seals: unhappily with little or no effect. Were the limbs in
right walking order, why so much demonstrating of motion? The
barrenest of all mortals is the Sentimentalist. Granting even that he
were sincere, and did not wilfully deceive us, or without first
deceiving himself, what good is in him? Does he not lie there as a
perpetual lesson of despair, and type of bedrid valetudinarian
impotence? His is emphatically a Virtue that has become, through every
fibre, conscious of itself; it is all sick, and feels as if it were
made of glass, and durst not touch or be touched: in the shape of
work, it can d