An essay on immortality...

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Glass Book

AN

ESSAY

Preface

The subject of the following speculation, is the moral argument for the immortality of man.

The popular moral argument in favor of a future state, is grounded on the unequal distribution of hu man happiness ; and, with regard to it, the following remarks appear to be warranted.

First, — That it is not progressive; or, does not encrease in strength, with the general encrease of knowledge.

Secondly,— That, though it is encouraging to a considerable degree, it is yet, however, open to sceptical objections of some weight ; to overcome which must be highly desirable.

Thirdly, — That any moral argument in favor of a future state, can be ^ood only upon the supposition of a good Governor of the World: but the one in question (bevi PREFACE.

sides the last mentioned defect) grounds its hope upon human misery ; which fact, of human misery, serves the Sceptic, and the Atheist, with their strongest objection against the supposition of any good Governor.

Thus, the existing moral argument, drawn from the Human Species, is not only defective in the eyes of some of those who profess to believe in a Deity ; but, what is worse, the stronger it pleads its own cause, the stronger it urges the objection of the Atheist, and so defeats its own purpose whenever it attempts to eradicate infidelity.

Over and above these specified defects in the existing argument, I suppose, on general ground, that it must be in the highest degree estimable, had we any well founded advance made in the subject.

What circumstances have led me to presume in the matter; and whether any advance has been made ; will appear in the Sequel,

CONTENTS*

PART I. Page

Sect. I. — The Preliminary general Argument 1 Sect. II. — Of Considerations which tend to prevent a general Comparison of Human Life with Instinctive Life ----- 44

Sect. III. — Of Considerations which have operated upon those who have noticed the Comparative Fact, and prevented them from applying it - - - - - - - 90

I Sect. IV.— A Test of the Ground of the present moral Argument, — -and a general Reason for the Probation of Man - - - -123

Part II

Sect. 1.— The illustrative Moral Argument ; containing a Comparison of the two Orders of Minds 186

Sect. II. — Continuation and Conclusion of the illustrative Moral Argument - 229

Part III

Sect. I. — Of a due Estimate of the Happiness, or

Misery, of civilised Man - 285

Sect. II. — Of the Proximate Design of creating Man, as an order contradistinguished from Brutes - - - 304

AN

ESSAY

ON

IMMORTALITY.

Section First. The Preliminary General Argument*

THE speculation now offered to the reader, is entertained owing to an apprehension that the ordinary moral argument in favor of a future state is not near so general or philosophical as the Nature of things seems capable to admit.

If this conception be well founded, it becomes the more important, considering that the usual field of speculation on this sub- ] ject, does not appear to promise any stronger indication than what has been long and popularly recognised ; and considering also 3 '

B that while the growth of moral evidence seems thus unprogressive, it certainly has not hitherto produced either a general unanimity of opinion among men, or even a sufficiently confident reliance in all those who incline to rest upon it.

"Man is born unto trouble as the

flame flies upward." — — This much

worn truth has been registered in the bosoms of a long succession of human millions, and ^as been often and pathetically the theme of the best and wisest men in every age. But though the fact is so generally acknowledged, as to be equally beyond contest and above illustration, it is not to be asserted without a grateful acknowledgment, that there is also much good in human life- There is indeed so much good already diffused among mankind, and so much more appears possibly attainable, that, upon a view of the whole species, (which we are to remark, is the most extensive view usually taken) perhaps we cannot form any reasonable expectation of a future state, but are left in all the darkness of ignorance.

The prospect being thus obscure upon the last mentioned general ground, men have naturally been determined to what appears the next prominent consideration ; and this is found to be the inequality with which the whole sum of existing human good is divided among the individuals of our species. — This last indeed is a very striking truth, which comes home to every bosom ; and perhaps no persuasion arises more naturally, than that an intelligent and good Governor of the world, would not permit the injustice, or the hardships, which fall upon the innocent and the virtuous, without making some provision for the sufferers.

But reasonable as this opinion may seem,, there arises, from the nature of things, a consideration which may somewhat discountenance it. The evil in question, though b 2 very hard, and indeed very extensive, is however but a partial consideration : and such is the utility of general laws in Nature, that it may be supposed fit, that individuals should be liable to suffer accidental ills involved by these causes of general good, even though no after provision were made for the

sufferers. — It is obvious, that to make

good and evil fall presently upon desert, there would need be a continual succession of violations of general laws, or a confusion, the consequences of which are incalculable; and from this consideration, many persons may incline to fear, that we have no very strong ground of hope from the inequality of human happiness, any more than from the state of the species upon the whole.

One thing, at any rate, is here very mani- ' fest, which is, that whatever strength the last mentioned argument really possesses, (and though I consider it very encouraging even by itself) we must confess it rests wholly upon particulars and accidentals, not upon essentials. Therefore, though it should be considered good, so far as it goes, it does not extend to such a base as lies beyond the objection drawn from the utility of general

laws. Now it is in consequence of

marking this narrowness of the ordinary foundation, that I am led to propose here a very different field, which, in the course of some experience, has appeared to me as affording a comparison of much more general extent.

In entering upon the preparatory discussion, it may not be amiss to state, that the subject before us is intended to come home to every class of readers, and will contain nothing but what I trust may be both understood and appreciated by all; unless indeed it may be a very little of what is now immediately to follow in this preliminary ] part. The ordinary reader, or thinker, therefore may consider himself qualified as a juror, in regard of the^eweraZ /ac£ that is herein to be illustrated by a variety of particulars, which he may compare with his own experience: and we will respectfully look to the learned to sanction the principle upon which its application is grounded.— — - This notice, 1 confess, is entered here, to prevent some readers from being alarmed at the very little there is which wears the uninviting aspect of metaphysical speculation. But, to resume.

The general laws of Nature just now mentioned, are not all of one system, but of several, which differ vastly in their nature: therefore, without speculating upon the continual interruption, or confusion, of any ot these, we may compare them, that is to say, one system with another, and draw reasonable inferences, or opinions, therefrom.

For this last mentioned purpose, the first or greatest distinction to be made, seems to be, that of two systems of laws in Nature,

Sect. I J ON IMMORTALITY. ?

which are, the laws of body, and the laws of mind. — These two we know, differ most essentially; and it is to the mental code that we owe all those moral evils, whose amount makes such a vast sum, in addition to the sum of natural evils. Besides this, a great part of natural evil itself is mental, being comprised in the provinces of foresight and retrospect. — And farther, of that part of natural evil ^which originates with body, (inanimate and animate) a part may perhaps be likewise referred to mental laws. —Thus we see how very great is the total amount of human miseries arising, one way or another, from the laws of mind.

But if now we turn, and contemplate mental laws, we shall be presented with the view of a very grand provision in them* to which there is no arrangement in the laws of body that bear any parallel, or analogy.

-The laws of body are the same to all known todies.— But the laws of mind are not t I AN ESSAY ' £3ect. I.

the same to all known minds, The number of minds which sensibly occupy this Earth are of two kinds, or, are governed by

TWO VERY DIFFERENT CODES OF LAWS, which

may, upon inquiry, be found productive of f as different degrees of happiness to their respective subjects,

Now, upon the first blush, this difference must be confessed highly remarkable. — The very existence of two orders of minds, indicates two final causes as widely different as the codes which govern them : and, besides this first conjecture arising from such difference in structure, we seem to be strongly invited to compare the present earthly happiness arising from each, and draw

farther conjectures from the result.

But we seem to be still more strongly solicited to this by observing, that there is no such diversity of systems in the vast fabrick of

INANIMATE CREATION.

Man forms only one order, in a countless variety of sensitive beings which enliven this Earth : and, while he stands thus peculiar in the endowment of moral reason, it is grandly significant, that all the innumerable other sorts of animal life form together but one order : they are all very closely associated links of one chain ; nor is there any intermediate link, betwixt them and us, to confound our distinct reasonings upon each.

Animal man, indeed, is usually treated in the relation which his organic structure bears to those of other animals, and he is therein considered as a proper link in one continued chain of animate beings.— Upon this classification I think Lord Bolingbroke coolly remarks to the following effect ; that it would not obtain, were it not that men differ from brutes more in the structure of their bodies, than their minds. But, though indeed there is a similarity in some features

of mental structure, (which obviously fa re-

c quisite for the common property of animal existence,) we may very safely assert that the above mentioned classification is preposterous, or absurd in regard of the subject now in hand.

' The structure of the human mind, (as known by its various operations) differs immensely from that of the highest brute : and ( this not in degree only, but in kind. And besides this, the two orders of minds differ no less remarkably in another grand point, which is, that instinctive beings are infinitely various, and are formed upon a graduated scale, while, on the contrary, all human minds are of one equal structure.

With regard to the essential difference between the two orders of minds, it may be sufficient here to notice two or three provinces of human mental operation. Let us

take but moral cogitation, and the relations of sensible things. There are no offices in any instinctive mind, which corre-

Sect. 10 0N IMMORTALITY. ' 11

spond to these. — But if we farther take, the conception, and contemplation, of an invisible order of things, a CREATOR, and an hereafter, we must be satisfied that no instinctive mind is formed for any such operations.

Will any man, then, attempt to hook

the rational code upon the instinctive one, and pronounce them two links of one chain, that is, in effect, one code of mental laws ?

From even so instantaneous a glance at the two structures, it must appear highly evident, that when GOD made man, he did not intend him for a head link of mere animal life; for, in that case, we might have been included in the instinctive code, and thus divested of very important mental offices which affect the happiness of mere animal existence. — Contrary to this, man was made not merely a different animal; but a different order of minds ; insomuch, that the grand instinctive code, though it embraces innumerable different gradations of minds, could not c 2

19 ' AN ESSAY, QSect. I.

serve for him, and a far more noble and extensive System of laws exists for his peculiar government. — Of this system it maybe enough to say, here, that embracing man's possible attainments, it comprehends his knowledge, his elections, — and his acts ; and, that it appears to be an institution made in direct cor- \ respondence with the general nature of things, a correspondence which is certainly very different from that which brutes can have with the external world, and therefore, even of itself considered apart from our present subject, highly flattering to our hope of permanent existence.

Here then is a most extensive, and I suppose a truly philosophical field of compari- j son; and instead of being limited to compare the accidental miseries of one man, with the accidental happiness of another, (both individuals of one order, and liable to the accidents involved by the general laws which regulate this order,) the inquirer is now called

Sect. 1.3 ON IMMORTALITY. IS

to attend to what is more general, or essential. — He will therefore turn from comparing human nature ivith itself, and proceed to contrast one kind of minds with another kind, in regard of the happiness resulting in this life from the constitution of each. And if upon so doing it be found, that the advantage lies with instinctive life, then every one who believes in the existence of a good Governor of the world, must take his goodness as their sure pledge that he would not have laid the greater load of miseries upon the far nobler order of beings, had these beings been intended for no other than } a mere earthly existence.

Perhaps no man could reasonably desire a stronger indication than such. But, we are never to overlook that highly encouraging collateral fact which wants no proof, that the human mind is formed to take continued delight in contemplating the endless works of its great CREATOR ; — that, if it were

U AN ESSAY [Sect, L

' united to a vehicle whose demands were less mean, it might be continually blest by such employments as we must suppose befitting angels ; — and, in short, that reason, if less fit for this life, is far more fit for a higher sphere of action than that we now occupy.

From what has now been advanced, it will appear to be my opinion, that we really possess such very reasonable ground of expectation, as this extended field of comparison can contain. To show that we do so, is indeed the object of the present undertaking ; and the subsequent sections of the Essay are intended to illustrate or prove the general

fact, by a variety of particulars. If this

view of the subject is an unusual one, it will however be naturally accounted for, by stating the circumstances which gave rise to my taking it up, these being perhaps equally unusual. — Accident, which brings us upon so many new truths and opinions, has subjected to my actual observation in various parts of sect. tr\ ON IMMORTALITY/ 15

the world, a pretty extensive view of free animal life, under circumstances certainly very favourable to such a comparison as we are

now considering. Had this experience

been limited to any one district or country, I think it probable, it might not have led me to a serious comparison, any more than such an extent of observation seems to do with people in general : but the local diversity of situations in which the facts have come under my view, has awakened the consideration of generality in this matter ; and the extent of the whole has impressed my imagination much more deeply, than I think is likely to follow upon a man's observing only a small part of animal nature, and reading accounts of all the other parts. — — —If this be not admitted to give any pretension to the subject, 1 freely confess I have none that is higher: and, as it has been openly avowed that accident, (or at least other pursuits than the one in question) led me into the situations which afforded this solitary advantage, it obviously lays claim to no merit, therefore the mention of it must be considered no boast. — The only merit claimed, is in the endeavour to make what I consider to be ; a very important and beneficial application of the facts which accident has thrown in my way.- To this it may be proper to add, that I have not made the application, or embraced the conclusions which will appear in the sequel, without seriously weighing the evidence, and considering its principal bearings, to the best of my judgment : neither should I have rested satisfied in this, so long as I investigated the subject by my own sole reflection ; but, trust I may be so, since it will appear, that my view, however unusual, is far from being singular, or unsupported.

As the simplest outline of the principle upon which the general argumentisgrounded, j

Sect. V] ON IMMORTALITY. 17

I begin by siding with those writers who, in treating the subject by the separate light of Nature, consider man to be in a stale of probation: — To which we must, of course, add that he is also in a condition of frail, organic, animal existence. In this case,

therefore, a portion of natural evil must be thought fit and unavoidable, and moral evil is unavoidably permitted as being involved by the accountable agency of man. But, I have already remarked, that a great proportion of human natural evil is mental, especially as arising in foresight and retrospect; and therefore it (as well as moral evil,) is chargeable to the endoivment called reason.

Now ivhen to the whole of moral evil

(corporeal and mental) is added that moiety

Of NATURAL evil which flows from REASON

excited by natural agents, it makes the sum total of rational ills, beyond all proportion.

greater than our mere animal ills. So

great indeed seems the excess here, that if we strike off all the various evils arising* from reason ; and thus reduce mans mind to an equality of thinking with that of an instinctive animal of the middling degree; we shall find by very far the greater part of the whole burden of human miseries thrown away.. ——If this were clone, the question that would then remain would be, as to the catalogue of human pleasures thereby lost, and those retained. And herein, I imagine, and shall endeavour to show, we should retain those which the mass of mankind, by the undeniable test of their constant practice, prove to be the most solid, stveet, or desireabte.

But the gift of rationality is not therefore the less noble, or desirable, though its earthly effects appear thus unhappy ; it could be so considered only, if supposed the endowment of a mere earthly being. If man's estate is that of probation, then, moral elections — and a knowledge or contemplation of past and future,— seem absolutely necessary to his trial. But these two last are the

grand sources of almost the whole mass of human miseries : and, since without them we could not so much as argue our eligibility for a future state, the evils that flow from them appear desirable, even upon the very lowest estimate. -The highest estimate, on the other hand, affords far more than a bare eligibility in the structure of our minds; for, beyond this, it would appear that the grand aggregate of actual human sufferings (natural and moral, corporeal and intellectual) is vastly greater than is good, or than need have been, for a mere earthly existence : — But the grand consideration of

all, in the present argument is, that we are not here left to doubtful conjecture, or to an unphilosophical speculation upon an unexampled state of existence ; for, if the following induction be established, we have actual evidence in proof, by the very different state

of a different order of beings, existing in D 2

Nature before oar eyes, as examples of animal happiness which GOD might have bestowed upon man, in an equal, or a somewhat greater degree, had he not, for some high purpose, judged fit to bestow upon us the GIFT OF REASON. — This gift has been bestowed, and has produced correspondent effects on our present happiness : therefore this last evidence leaves us no room to doubt of the DESIGN of creating rational beings here ;

— and HUMAN SUFFERINGS, COMPARED

with instinctive life, thus become to us

the SIGN. The moral pledge in the

goodness of GOD, that our earthly state is burdened with great evil, only as preparatory for a far greater good.

Thus we find, the same gift of reason, which brings to us, by two grand sources, a vast tide of various evils, contains also the source of Hope,— that is, of a rational expectation which much more than counterpoises all the miseries we suffer, and leaves the pre-

Sect, lj ON IMMORTALITY. 2f ]

ponderance 011 the side of happiness, even here ; — a satisfactory reliance, which we gain, by a due exercise of this same reason, upon the phenomena of sensitive Nature; not confined to views of oar oiun species, (which at the greatest can be but particular) but more philosophically extended to the full scale of known animal existences.

As I am rrot aware that any one has preceded me in the same extent of view ; and certainly it is a field which has not yet been cultivated, so as to produce a beneficial or popular argument in favor of a future state ; I might justly fear the magnitude of the attempt, especially since the subject has in all ages occupied the attention of mankind, and is one in what the means of a moral argument may have been considered as almost equally efficient at all times. But, fortunately, while there appear various and powerfu 1 reasons why the great comparative fact, herein, has been overlooked, in ordinary ;— and still stronger reasons why it has not been applied by the philosophic few who have noticed it; (two important considerations which I shall have occasion to treat) it will at least be manifested that 1 do not stand alone as to the fact.

Complaints against the actual eviis of rationality are almost innumerable : but these can only make up a side of the question. They can lead to no conclusion. — It is the comparative fact alone that must determine us. But now, in regard of this last, a concurrence, or rather an anticipation of my opinion, is to be found in authors of the highest rank of moral, intellectual, and literary reputation ; an agreement which doubtless will place my ground above many trifling • cavils which otherwise possibly might be started by persons of limited viewsv and which, therefore, I shall place in front of my position. — The extracts from these, which

Sect. ir\ ON IMMORTALITY. IS

will be placed before the reader, will, I trust, be fully sufficient to satisfy him (if he be unwilling to judge for himself) that my views are not singular, nor taken upon slight ground. — At the same time it may be farther satisfactory to him, as it is to me, to know that I could not have been biassed by these authorities^ because I was unacquainted with them when my own opinion was originally formedv 4 — In stating this, however, I would not omit to confess, with due respect to those great names, that such an agreement affords me a confidence, which no man ought to have in his own single judgment, especially on a point of such deep and general interest to his species.

In referring to authority, perhaps, 1 could not begin more unexceptionably, than with the sentiments of Archbishop King, in concurrence with those of his illustrious commentator, Mr. Laiv, afterwards Bishop of Carlisle.— — The main object of the " Essay

0# Origin of Evil," is to account for Evil, consistently with the wisdom and goodness of GOD : Therefore, the greater the proportion of human misery, the more difficult must have been the author's undertaking, — In the progress of the work, w e accordingly find, it was a great object to argue the good of reason, and even a good above reason. And, upon the whole, we can have no doubt, that every thing therein either expressed, or implied, to the disadvantage of human life, was yielded with caution, and with real reluctance, as was equally requisite for the success, and becoming the high

office, of the writer. We are at the same

time to remember, that the general concurrence of his commentator renders this a twoold authority of the most desirable kind.

]Now Archbishop King had so little to say, positively, in favor of the gift of reason, that he assumed and laboured at large to prove, that man has a poiuer which would seem to me as if independent on reason ; that is, a power of " being pleased with objects only " because he chooses them." — Among the various illustrations of the nature of this wonderful gift, he says, (Oct. Edit. 3 : Page 338) " Since this power is supposed of such a na- " ture as can please itself, in its act, wherever V it can exert that act it can also please itself " even in opposition to the natural appetites, "the senses and reason." — Again, in Page " 346 he goes on thus, " I think it is evident " thatGod hasgivenus aprinciple of this kind, " and that our Will is only determined by it- " self. They are mistaken therefore who " affirm that either the appetites, passions, " or understanding, determine elections."

Farther on, Page 388, the author sums up thus, " For in the sixth place, it is most ma- " nifest that the greatest good, and that where-* " by man excels other animals, is owing to li- " berty. By the assistance of this we rise " above fate ? and when attacked from with-

E

" out by adverse fortune, we find our happi- " ness within ourselves. Other animals have "nothing to oppose to a distemper, death, or s< pain ; nothing to delight themselves in ex- " cept sleep, food, and the appetite of pro- 4< pagating their species. But a free agent " in the midst of pains and torments, of hun- "ger and thirst, nay death itself, has where- " withal to please itself, and to blunt the edge " of all these evils."

Now for my own part, I have deeply to lament that I possess no such power of making myself happy as that here described, except 1 it be in the hope of futurity ; which, be it observed, I did not first elect without reason, and afterivard cherish because I chose it; but only hope it, because my reason makes me expect it is some sweet or happy state.- The

object, however, of quoting this passage, is to make it highly evident to all those who, like me, have not this power of making themselves happy in spite of "the senses and reason *'\ that the learned and dignified author would not have resorted to such an extraordinary source of human happiness, had it been within the powers of sense and reason, taken together, to render our state sufficiently overbalanced by good in this life.

Besides this unwilling virtual admission of our author, and the general concurrence of his translator, we find the latter express to the point in question. For in Page 210, where the author says, " God produced all things " out of nothing, and gave us being without " our advice ; he seems therefore obliged in " justice not to suffer us to be reduced to a " state that is worse than nonentity," the

translator adds,

" It would be so indeed if this were our only state : but " as it is at present, I fear many have nothing but the hopes " and expectations of another to support them under almost " complete misery ; to comfort and encourage them to un- " dergo evils infinitely greater than all the benefits of life : "Evils which make life itself an evil, and (as our author " says) put them into a state worse than nonentity."

"We have already seen that, in Page 388, e 2 the good Archbishop draws a sort of brief comparison between the estates of man and beasts, wherein he limits the happiness of the latter to " sleep, food," and such " appetites"

- Now I apprehend it will abundantly

appear, from men's practice, that the great mass of mankind do, and ever will, "elect" these gratifications among their most solid pleasures. — But farther, I must observe, the comparison was in this instance sorely strained, to help mankind to a vantage ground. — The fact really is, that though brutes enjoy the sensual pleasures in an extent vastly beyond us, these are not their only, nor perhaps their greatest pleasures. Besides the very remarkable contrast which may be noticed, that most of the innumerable tribes of brutes have a particular kind of food choicely suited to their taste, while the mass of men, in most countries, fare upon things which they find coarse, and often disgusting ; Besides this, I say, we find a great proportion of brutes continually wantoning on earth, in air, and in water, in various delightful ways which man would fain imitate, but never can accomplish. — The pleasures which brutes thus take, are partly sensual, and partly mental; for there is no doubt they enjoy the society and converse of their own kind : But far beyond this, their courtships, their sympathies, their fidelities, often through a long course of years, and their exemplary discharge of domestic duties, evince their high gratification in those acts.- To whatever structure of mind we choose to refer these observances, we must confess they display examples of liappiness therein, which the greater number of human beings cannot reach.