classes than is commonly supposed, and that the whole sum of
the guilt which the practice produces is great, beyond what has perhaps
been ever conceived! It will be the writer's comfort to have solemnly
suggested this consideration, to the consciences of those by whom this
impious practice might be suppressed: If such there be, which he is
strongly inclined to believe, their's is the crime, and their's the
responsibility of suffering it to continue[79].

In the foregoing observations, it has not been the writer's intention to
discuss completely that copious subject, the love of worldly estimation.
It would be to exceed the limits of a work like this, fully to
investigate so large, and at the same time so important a topic. Enough
however may have perhaps been said, to make it evident that this
principle is of a character highly _questionable_; that it should be
brought under absolute subjection, and watched with the most jealous
care: That, notwithstanding its lofty pretensions, it often can by no
means justly boast that high origin and exalted nature, which its
superficial admirers are disposed to concede to it. What real intrinsic
essential value, it might be asked, does there appear to be in a
virtue, which had wholly changed its nature and character, if public
opinion had been different? But it is in truth of base extraction, and
ungenerous qualities, springing from selfishness and vanity, and low
ambition; by these it subsists, and thrives, and acts; and envy, and
jealousy, and detraction, and hatred, and variance, are its too faithful
and natural associates. It is, to say the best of it, a root which bears
fruits of a poisonous as well as of a beneficial quality. If it
sometimes stimulates to great and generous enterprises, if it urges to
industry, and sometimes to excellence, if in the more contracted sphere
it produces courtesy and kindness; yet to its account we must place the
ambition which desolates nations, and many of the competitions and
resentments which interrupt the harmony of social life. The former
indeed has been often laid to its charge, but the latter have not been
sufficiently attended to; and still less has its _noxious_ influence on
the vital principle, and distinguishing graces of the Christian
character, been duly pointed out and enforced.

To read indeed the writings of certain Christian moralists,[80] and to
observe how little they seem disposed to call it in question, except
where it rave