of gratifying any of our fenfes; as thofe which give us the ideas that we call beautiful or fublime, particularly thofe that occur in works of genius, ftrokes of wit, and in the polite arts of mufic, painting, and poetry. Our capacity for enjoying pleafures of this kind, depending upon the affociation of our ideas, and requiring fuch advances in intellectual life as brutes are incapable of, they are, therefore, claffed under the general denomination of intellectual pleasures (a name which we give to all our pleasures, except those of fenfe) and more particularly under the head of pleasures of imagination; because the greater part of them are founded on those resemblances of things, which are perceived and recollected by that modification of our intellectual powers which we call fancy.

3. Another clafs of our paffions may be termed the focial, because they arise from our connections with our fellow creatures of mankind; and these are of two D 4 kinds,

kinds, confifting either in our defire of their good opinion, or in our wifhing their happiness or mifery. In this latter fpecies of the clafs, we alfo comprize gratitude for the favours, and a refentment of the wrongs we receive from them.

Thofe affections of the mind which respect the divine being belong to this class, the object of them being one with whom we have the most intimate connection, to whom we are under the greatest obligation, and whofe approbation is of the greatest importance to us. All the difference there is between our affections, confidered as having God or man for their object, arifes from the difference of their fituation with respect to us. The divine being, standing in no need of our services, is, therefore, no object of our benevolence, properly fo called; but the fentiments of reverence, love, and confidence, with refpect to God, are of the fame nature with those which we exercife towards our fellow creatures, only infinitely ex

ceeding

ceeding them in degree, as the divine power, wisdom, and goodness, infinitely exceed every thing of the fame kind in man.

Some of the brutes, living in a kind of imperfect fociety, and particularly domeftick animals, are capable of several of the paffions belonging to this clafs, as grati-, tude, love, hatred, &c. but having only a small degree of intellect, they are hardly capable of those which have for their object the esteem or good opinion of others; which seem to require a confiderable degree of refinement. We fee, however, in horses, and fome other animals, the strongest emulation, by which they will exert themselves to the utmoft in their endeavours to furpafs, and overcome others.

4. A fourth fet of paffions is that which has for its object our own intereft in general, and is called felf love. This feems to require a confiderable degree of refinement, and therefore it is probable that D 5 brute

brute animals have no idea of it. Their chief object is the gratification of their appetites or paffions, without reflecting upon their happiness in general, or having any fuch thing in view in their actions.

There is a lower kind of felf interest, or rather felfishness, the object of which is the means of procuring thofe gratifications to which money can be fubfervient; and from loving money as a means of procuring a variety of pleafures and conveniences, a man may at length come to purfue it as an end, and without any regard to the proper use of it. It then becomes a new kind of paffion, quite diftinct from any other; infomuch, that, in order to indulge it, many perfons will deprive themselves of every natural gratification.

5. Laftly, as foon as we begin to diftinguish among our actions, and are sensible that there are reasons for fome of them, and against others, we get a some of them as what ought

notion of

to be performed

formed, and of others of them as what are, or ought to be refrained from. In this manner we get the abstract ideas of right and wrong in human actions, and a variety of pleafing circumstances attending the former, and difagreeable ones accompanying the latter, we come in time to love fome kinds of actions, and to abhor others, without regard to any other confideration. For the fame reafon certain tempers, or difpofitions of mind, as leading to certain kinds of conduct, become the objects of this moral approbation, or difapprobation; and from the whole, arifes what we call a moral fenfe, or a love of virtue and a hatred of vice in the abstract. This is the greatest refinement of which we are capable, and in the due exercise and gratification of it confifts the highest perfection and happiness of

our natures.

D 6

SECTION