of one; the interest of others to
our own. To fortify us in this hard lesson two different schemes have
been proposed; one to increase our feelings for others, the other to
diminish our feelings for ourselves. The first is prescribed by the
whining and melancholy moralists, who will never allow us to be happy,
because at every moment many of our fellow-beings are in misery. The
second is the doctrine of the Stoics, who annihilate self-interest in
favour of the vast commonwealth of nature; on that the author bestows a
lengthened comment and correction, founded on his theory of regulating
the manifestations of joy or grief by the light of the impartial judge.
He gives his own panacea for human misery, namely, the power of nature
to accommodate men to their permanent situation, and to restore
tranquillity, which is the one secret of happiness.

Chapter IV. handles Self-Deceit, and the Origin and Use of General
Rules. The interference of our passions is the great obstacle to our
holding towards ourselves the position of an impartial spectator. Prom
this notorious fact the author deduces an argument against a special
moral faculty, or moral sense; he says that if we had such a faculty,
it would surely judge our own passions, which are the most clearly laid
open to it, more correctly than the passions of others.

To correct our self-partiality and self-deceit is the use of general
rules. Our repeated observations on the tendency of particular acts,
teach us what is fit to be done generally; and our conviction of the
propriety of the general rules is a powerful motive for applying them
to our own case. It is a mistake to suppose, as some have done, that
rules precede experience; on the contrary, they are formed by finding
from experience that all actions of a certain kind, in certain
circumstances, are approved of. When established, we appeal to them as
standards of judgment in right and wrong, but they are not the original
judgments of mankind, nor the ultimate foundations of moral sentiment.

Chapter V. continues the subject of the authority and influence of
General Rules, maintaining that they are justly regarded as laws of the
Deity. The grand advantage of general rules is to give steadiness to
human conduct, and to enable us to resist our temporary varieties of
temper and disposition. They are thus a grand security for human
duties. That the important rules of morality should be accounted laws
of the Deity is a natural