not obligatory, authoritative, or binding; it is purely
voluntary, and is termed merit, virtuous and noble conduct.

In this department, the members of the community, in their unofficial
capacity, are the chief agents and administrators. The Law of the Land
occupies itself with the enforcement of its own obligatory rules,
having at its command a perfect machinery of punishment. Private
individuals administer praise, honour, esteem, approbation, and
reward. In a few instances, the Government dispenses rewards, as in
the bestowal of office, rank, titles, and pensions, but this function
is exceptional and limited.

The conduct rewarded by Society is chiefly resolvable into
Beneficence. Whoever is moved to incur sacrifices, or to go through
labours, for the good of others, is the object, not merely of
gratitude from the persons benefited, but of approbation from society
at large.

Any remarkable strictness or fidelity in the discharge of duties
properly so called, receives general esteem. Even in matters merely
ceremonial, if importance be attached to them, sedulous and exact
compliance, being the distinction of the few, will earn the
approbation of the many.[2]

5. The Ethical End, or Morality, _as it has been_, is founded partly
on Well-being, or Utility: and partly on Sentiment.

The portions of Morality, having in view the prevention of human
misery and the promotion of human happiness, are known and obvious.
They are not the whole of Morality as it has been.

Sentiment, caprice, arbitrary liking or disliking, are names for
states of feeling that do not necessarily arise from their objects,
but may be joined or disjoined by education, custom, or the power of
the will. The revulsion of mind, on the part of the Jews, against
eating the pig, and on our own part, as regards horse flesh, is not a
primitive or natural sensibility, like the pain of hunger, or of cold,
or of a musical discord; it is purely artificial; custom has made it,
and could unmake it. The feeling of fatigue from overwork is natural;
the repugnance of caste to manual labour is factitious. The dignity
attached to the military profession, and the indignity of the office
of public executioner, are capricious, arbitrary, and sentimental. Our
prospective regard to the comforts of our declining years points to a
real interest; our feelings as to the disposal of the body after death
are purely factitious and sentimental. Such feelings are of the things