Remarks upon the Fable of the Bees.
by Frances Hutcheson
1750



REMARKS

UPON

The FABLE of the BEES.




To Hibernicus.




Nunquam aliud natura aliud sapientia decit.

Juven.




SIR,




A Great part of your readers must have heard of a book entituled, Private
Vices public Benefits. I do not intend any answer to that book; but rather
hereafter to shew it to be unanswerable, notwithstanding the zealous attempts
of some of the clergy. Yet it is to be hoped that that author's performance
will not supersede the labours of others on the same subject, without design
of answering what he has wrote.




It is not the interest of every writer to free his words from ambiguity.
Private vices public benefits, may signify any one of these five distinct
proposition: viz. "Private vices are themselves public benefits:"
or, "private vices naturally tend, as the direct and necessary means,
to produce public happiness:" or, private vices by dextrous management
of governors may be made to tend to public happiness:" or "private
vices natively and necessarily flow from public happiness:" or lastly,
"private vices will probably flow from public prosperity through the
present corruption of men." Were it proper to croud your margin with
citations, you should have several passages of that book for each of these
five sentences, as if it were the meaning of the title. Far be it therefore
from a candid writer to charge upon him any one of these opinions more than
another; for if we treat him fairly, and compare the several parts of his
work together, we shall find no ground for such a charge.




What his own private happiness is, any one may know by reflecting upon
the several sorts of pleasant perceptions he is capable of. We imagine our
fellows capable of the same,and can in like manner conceive public happiness.
They are happy who have what they desire, and are free from what occasions
pain. He is in a sure state of happiness, who has a sure prospect that in
all parts of his existence he shall have all things which he desires, or
at least those which he most earnestly desires, without any considerable
pains. He is miserable who is under grievous pain, or who wants what he most
violently desires.




There is one old distinction of our desires, according as some of them
are preceded naturally by a sense of pain, previously to any opinion of good
to be found in the object; which is desired chiefly in order to remove the
pain; whereas other desires arise only upon a previous opinion of good in
the object, either to ourselves, or to those we love. These desires, though
they do not presuppose any sense of pain previous to the opinion, yet may
be attended with pain, when the object imagined to be good is uncertain.
The former sort of desires are called appetites; the latter affections or
passions. The pains of the appetites when they are not gratified are unavoidable.
But the pains of many disappointed passions might have been prevented, by
correcting the false opinions, or by breaking foolish associations of ideas,
by which we imagine the most momentous good or evil to be in these objects
or events, which really are of little or no consequence in themselves.




No reason or instruction will prevent sensible pain, or stop a craving
appetite. Men must first be free from violent bodily pain, and have what
will remove hunger and thirst, before they can be made happy. Thus much is
absolutely necessary. If there be but small pleasure attending the enjoyment
of the bare necessaries of life, yet there is violent pain in their absence.
Whatever farther pleasures men enjoy, we may count so much positive happiness
above necessity.




The world is so well provided for the support of mankind, that scarce
any person in good health need be straitened in bare necessaries. But since
men are capable of a great diversity of pleasures, they must be supposed
to have a great variety of desires, even beyond the necessities of life.
The commonest gratifications of the appetites do not satisfy them fully:
they desire those objects, which give some more grateful sensations, as well
as ally their pain; they have perceptions of beauty in external objects,
and desire something more in dress, houses, furniture, than mere warmth or
necessary use. There is no mortal without some love towards others, and desire
of the happiness of some other persons as well as his own. Men naturally
perceive something amiable in observing the characters, affections and tempers
of others, and are struck with a harmony in manners, some species of morality,
as well as with a harmony of notes. They are fond of the approbation of each
other, and desirous of whatever either directly procures approbation and
esteem, or, by a confused association of ideas, is made an evidence of any
valuable ability or kind disposition. Wealth and power are in like manner
desired, as soon as we observe their usefulness to procure any kind of pleasures.




Since then our desires are so various, and all desire of an object, while
it is uncertain, is accompanied with some uneasiness; to make a society happy,
it must be necessary, either to gratify all desires, or to suppress, or at
least to regulate them. The universal gratification is plainly impossible,
and the universal suppressing or rooting them out as vain an attempt. What
then remains, in order to public happiness after the necessity supply of
all appetites, must be to study, as much as possible, to regulate our desires
of every kind, by forming just opinions of the real value of their several
objects, so as to have the strength of our desires proportioned to the real
value of them, and their real moment to our happiness. Now all men of reflection,
from the age of Socrates to that of Addison, have sufficiently proved that
the truest, most constant, and lively pleasure, the happiest enjoyment of
life, consists in kind affections to our fellow-creatures, gratitude and
love to the deity, submission to his will,and trust in his providence, with
a course of suitable actions. This is the true good in our power, which we
can never too strongly desire. The pleasures of this kind are so great and
durable, and so much above the power of fortune, so much strengthened by
the probable hope of every other valuable pleasure of life, especially the
esteem and love of our fellows, or at least of the better part of them, that
other pleasures seem almost to vanish when separated from them; and even
the greatest pains seem supportable if they do not exclude them. By this
means we may be sure, if not of all the pleasures we can desire, yet of those
which we most desire, and which may make our existence agreeable to ourselves
in the absence of others.




This thorough correction of our opinions will not endeed extinguish our
appetites, or prevent all pain; but it will keep our appetites unmixed with
foreign ideas, so as to be satisfied wit the plainest nourishing food, without
being disturbed by imaginations of worth, dignity and merit, in a manner
of living which is not in our power. We may in like manner break the foolish
conjunction of moral ideas with the finer sort of habitation, dress, equipage,
furniture, so as not to be dejected upon the unavoidable want of such things;
we may learn to look upon them as they really are, without imagining them
necessary to a happy and honourable life, however they may be some additional
advantage to it.




Then we may observe, that though this correcting our opinions and imaginations
will make the absence of the pleasures above necessary very tolerable to
us, and cut off many vain anxieties, yet no person is thereby rendered insensible
of any real pleasure which these objects do give. Though we shall not look
upon them as the chief good in life, or preferable to the public interest,
to our virtue, or our honour; yet, when they can be enjoyed consistently
with superior pleasures, our sense of them may be as acute as that of others.
An affectionate temper never stupified the palate; love of a country, a family,
or friends, never spoiled a taste for architecture, painting, or sculpture;
the knowledge of the true measures and harmony of life never vitiated an
ear, or genius for the harmony of music or poetry. This certainly is the
only way in our power of preserving the full relish for all the pleasures
of life, and yet securing ourselves against its pains.




But if the fullest present enjoyment cannot make the human mind easy and
fully satisfied; if we be disturbed by the uncertainty either of external
objects, or of our own existence in this world; if any are subjected to such
a cute pains, that nothing can make them amends for them in this life; if
no man can be sure but this may be his condition in the future part of his
existence in this life; if the present seeming disorders and calamities,
sometimes befalling the best of men, and the insolent prosperity of the worst,
disturb an honest compassionate heart: the hope of a future state is the
only universal support to all conditions of good men, which can make them
fully satisfied with their existence of all adventures; especially if the
means of obtaining this future happiness are no way opposite to their greatest
present happiness.




It is too improbable, I own, that all men will ever thus correct their
vain opinions and imaginations: but whoever do so in any measure are so much
the happier; and if all did so, all would be as near happiness as our present
state will allow. No trade, no manufacture, or ingenious art would be sunk
by it, which produces any new pleasures to the senses, imagination, or understanding,
without bringing along with it prepollent evil.




It is obvious to all, that in a nation of any tolerable extent of ground,
three fourths employed in agriculture will furnish food to the whole. Were
this land divided to all, except a few artificers to prepare instruments
of husbandry, the whole nation must want all the pleasure arising from other
arts, such as fine convenient habitations, beautiful dress, furniture, and
handy utensils. There would be no knowledge of arts, no agreeable amusements
or diversions; and they must all be idle one half of their time, since much
of the husbandman's time is now spent in providing materials for more curious
arts. Would it be advisable to any impartial mind, who regarded the good
of the whole, to keep them in this state, and to prohibit all arts but husbandry,
with what was absolutely necessary to it, confining them to their huts, and
caves, and beasts skins, to secure them from cold; allowing them no farther
compensation for the conveniences they might procure by industry, than the
pleasure of idleness for half their lives? What other answer do we need to
this question, than what every one will give for himself?




What man, who had only the absolute necessaries of meat and drink, and
a cave or a beast's skin to cover him, would not, when he had leisure, labour
for farther conveniences, or more grateful food? Would not every mortal do
so, except some few pretended gentlemen, inured to sloth from their infancy,
of weak bodies and weaker minds, who imagine the lower employments below
their dignity? Does not the universal choice of mankind, in preferring to
bear labour for the conveniences and elegancies of life, shew that their
pleasures are greater than those of sloth, and that industry, notwithstanding
its toils, does really increase the happiness of mankind? Hence it is that
in every nation great numbers support themselves by mechanic arts not absolutely
necessary; since the husbandman is always ready to purchase their manufactures
by the fruits of his labours, without any constraint; which they would not
do if the pleasures or happiness of idleness were greater. This may shew
us how little justice there is in imagining an Arcadia, or unactive golden
age, would ever suit with the present state of the world, or produce more
happiness to men than a vigorous improvement of arts.




The comparative wealth of any country is plainly proportioned to the "quantity
of the whole produce of husbandry, and other mechanic arts" which it
can export. Upon the wealth of any country,when other circumstances are equal,
does its strength depend, or its power in comparison with others. Now if
any allege that the improvement of arts, by foreign trade, is at least pernicious
to the public, by its occasioning many calamities to famines, and deaths
in shipwreaks; that therefore the whole would have been happier without it;
let us only consider, that in computing the good or evil consequences of
any actions, we are not only to consider the bare quantities of good or evil,
but the probabilities on both sides. Now had a country once as many inhabitants
as would consume its natural wild product in their caves or thickets, it
is plain that according to the usual increase of mankind in peace,the next
generation could not subsist without labour, and vigorous agriculture. It
is certain also that many diseases and deaths are occasioned by the labours
of husbandry: is it therefore for the public good that a thousand should
barely subsist as Hottentots without labour, rather than the double number
by agriculture, though a final number should die by that means? When our
minds are dejected with old age, or sudden apprehensions of death or its
consequences, we may prefer a few days or hours to all things else; but what
man of good understanding, in sound health, would not prefer a life of sixty
or seventy years with good accommodation, and a numerous offspring, to eighty
or ninety years as a Hottentot or worse? What man of common sense would refute
to cross the channel for a considerable advantage to his channel for a considerable
advantage to this family, though they had the bare necessaries? And yet even
this voyage hazards life more than staying at home. If the agriculture of
three fourths can support the whole, the other fourth, by applying themselves
wholly to mechanic arts, will produce more conveniences or pleasures than
could be hoped from a fourth of the labours of each man; since by confining
their thoughts to a particular subject, the artificers acquire greater knowledge
and dexterity in their work. Again, if navigation and foreign trade will
support more men than domestic industry and barter, it may really tend to
the good of the whole, though it endangers many lives. Five millions, subsisting
any country by help of foreign trade, are a greater advantage in the whole
than four millions without trade, though in each age twenty thousand should
perish by shipwreaks. The rates of insurance will teach us that the losses
at sea are not even in this proportion to the number supported by trade,
many of whom go not abroad at all, and others escape when the goods are lost.
Either then the propagation of mankind must be diminished, or men must endure
even the hazardous labours of the sea. But how few are there in the world
who would not, even without any constraint, hazard a voyage rather than die
childless: nay, rather than want any conveniences and pleasures of life above
necessity for themselves or families? The increase therefore of trade does
plainly tend to the good of the whole, notwithstanding all its hazards, which
we see men voluntarily submit to every day.




Now if any own that the increase of trade promotes the present happiness
of human life in the whole, and yet maintain that it is vitious; the debate
will turn upon the idea of vice. It is certain that almost all the heathen
moralists agreed with him. "who spake as never man spake," that
virtue consists in love, gratitude, and submission to the deity, and in kind
affections towards our fellows, and study of their greatest good. All sects,
except the Epicurcans, owned that kind affections were natural to men; and
that consulting the greatest public good of the whole, as it was the surest
way for each individual to be happy, so it was vita secundum naturam, or
secundum rectam rationim. The Epicurcans of the better sort however, they
denied any affection distinct from self-love, yet taught the same way to
private happiness, by reasons like to those by Puffendorf, only without consideration
of the providence of the deity, or a future state. If vice be the opposite
to virtue, viz. those affections or actions which tend to the public detriment,
or evidence ingratitude or contumacy towards the deity, we may easily conclude
that the utmost improvement of arts, manufactures, or trade, is so far from
being necessarily vicious, that it must rather argue good and virtuous dispositions;
since it is certain that men of the best and most generous tempers would
desire it for the public good.

But this subject will require farther consideration.




 I am, Sir, yours, etc.




 P.M.




To Hibernicus.




Cui non conveniet fua res, ut calceus alim,

Si pede major eris, subvertet; si minor, uret.

Hor.




Sir,




The only arguments brought to prove that vice tends to the public happiness
of society in this world, are these; "That the power and grandeur of
any nation depends much upon the numbers of people and their industry, which
cannot be procured unless there be consumption of manufactures; now the intemperance,
luxury, and pride, of men consume manufactures, and promote industry."
In like manner it is asserted, "That in fact all wealthy and powerful
states abound with these vices, and that their industry is owing to them."




But if it can be made appear that there may be an equal consumption of
manufactures without these vices, and the evils which flow from them; that
wealth and power do not naturally tend to vice, or necessarily produce it;
then, though we allow that these vices do consume manufactures and encourage
industry in the present corruption of manners, and that these vices often
attend wealth and power, yet it will be unjust to conclude, either that "vices
naturally tend to public prosperity, or are necessary to it; or that public
happiness does necessarily occasion them."




Intemperance is that use of meat and drink which is pernicious to the
health and vigour of any person in the discharge of the offices of life.
Luxury is the using more curious and expensive habitation, dress, table,
equipage, than the person's wealth will bear, so as to discharge his duty
to his family, his friends, his country, or the indigent. Pride is having
an opinion of our own virtues, abilities, or perfection of any kind, in comparison
of others, as greater than what they really are; arrogating to ourselves
either obedience, service,or external marks of honour, to which we have no
right; and with this view desiring to equal those of higher stations in our
whole manner of living. There is no sort of food, architecture, dress, or
furniture, the use of which can be called evil or itself. Intemperance and
luxury are plainly terms relative to the bodily constitution, and wealth
of the person. Pride, as it affects our expences, is also relative to the
station and fortune of the person; so that it is impossible to fix one invariable
quantity of food, one fixed sum in expenses, the surpassing of which should
be called intemperance, luxury, or pride. Every one's knowledge, and experience
of his constitution and fortune, will suggest to him what is suitable to
his own circumstances. It is ridiculous to say, "that using any thing
above the bare necessaries of life is intemperance, pride, or luxury; and
that no other universal boundaries can be fixed; because what in one station
or fortune is bare study of decency, or conveniency, would be extravagance
in another." As if temperance, frugality, or moderation, denoted fixed
weights or measures or sums, which all were to observe, and not a proportion
to mens circumstances. Great and little are relative to a species or kind.
Those dimensions are great in a deer which are small in a horse; what is
great in a house would be small in a mountain. Will any one thence argue,that
there can be no adapting one form to another, so that it shall neither be
too big nor little? Cannot a coat suit a middle stature, because the same
dimensions would be too great for a dwarf, and too little for a giant? If
then in each constitution, station, or degree of wealth, a man of good sense
may know how far he may go in eating and drinking, or any other expences,
without impairing his health or fortune, or hindering any offices of religion
or humanity, he has found the bounds of temperance, frugality, and moderation
for himself; and any other, who keeps the same proportion, is equally temperate,
though he eats and drinks, or spends more than the other.




That these are the ideas of temperance, frugality, and moderation, given
by all moralists, antient and modern, except a few Cynics of old, and some
popish Hermits, is plain to all who read them. All sects, as well as the
Stoics, recommended the correction of our opinions and imaginations about
the pleasures above necessity; and yet the use of them they all allow, when
it is not inconsistent with the offices of life; in such circumstances they
were always looked upon as preferable to their contraries. The Christian
law suggests nothing contrary to this; it has set before us, beside the present
pleasures of virtue, which it represents as superior to all others, the hopes
of eternal happiness; yet it frequently recommends diligence and industry
in providing for ourselves and families, and for a fund of good offices toward
others: it no where condemns the rich or powerful for being so, or for desiring
high stations, unless when these desires are so violent as to counteract
our duty. The requiring some to part with their possessions, was only a candid
forewarning of the first disciples, what their profession of Christianity
would probably cost them in those days of perfection. A community of goods
is no where commanded; though men who knew the approaching perfection did
wisely sell their possessions, to turn them to the only valuable purpose
then in their power, and conveyed them to persons who could possess them.




Since then intemperance, or pride, were scarce ever understood to denote
all use of any thing above bare necessaries, all conveniency of life above
Hottentots; why any one should affect to change their meaning, is not easily
guessed, unless it be with this view. Luxury, intemperance, and pride, in
their common meaning, are vices; but in this new meaning are often innocent,
nay virtuous; and without them, in this new sense, there can be no consumption
of manufactures. Common readers however will still imagine that these sounds
denote vices; and finding that what they confusedly imagine as vicious is
necessary to public good, they will lose their aversion to moral evil in
general, and imagine it well compensated by some of its advantages.




But let us retain the common meaning of these words. It is certain, luxury,
intemperance, and pride, tend to consume manufactures; but the luxurious,
intemperate, or proud, are not a whit the less odious, or free from humanity
and barbarity, in the neglect of families, friends, the indigent, or their
country, since their whole intention is a poor selfish pleasure. The good
arising to the public is no way owing to them, but to the industrious, who
must supply all customers, and cannot examine whether their expences are
proportioned to their fortunes or not. To illustrate this by an instance
in the manner of that notable writer: "Suppose his Decio, or Aleander,
or Jack, surfeited with beef, falls into some light distempter, and in hopes
of attendance at low rates, sends for a neighbouring quack: the quack imagines
no danger, but makes the patient believe it; he talks much in the usual cant
of bilious temperaments and sanguine complexions, of the sinking of spirits,
and the heart's feeling cold and condensed, and heavy as lead, of mists and
confusion about his eyes; he promises, after some previous preparations,
which the quack finds necessary to prolong the disorder, by some powerful
medicines, to swell his spirits, restore them to their strength, elasticity,
and due contexture, that they may fan the arterial blood again, and make
him so light that he may tread on air. The patient grows worse, fears death,
thinks on his past life,and sends for an honest parson, who instructs him
in true principles of virtue, and shews him wherein he has been deficient:
the strength of his constitution overcomes both the drugs and the disease,
the patient recovers, becomes a man of integrity and religion, and ever after
honours the honest clergy as the most useful men in any state." Now
are these effects to be ascribed to the quacks? Are such pretenders the less
odious? Is quackery the cause of religion or virtue, necessary to it? Does
the honour of the clergy depend upon the practice of quacks? It is best in
such affairs to go no farther than confused apothegms: "private quackery,
public virtue: medicinal nonsense, patients repentance: quacks prescriptions,
honours to the clergy."




But let us in the next place examine if an equal consumption of manufactures,
and encouragement of trade, may be without these vices. Any given number,
in a small time, will certainly consume more wine by being drunkards, than
by being sober men; will consume more manufactures by being luxurious or
proud, if their pride turn upon expences, than by being frugal and moderate.
But it may be justly questioned, whether that same number would not have
consumed more in their whole lives, by being temperate and frugal: since
all allow that they would probably live longer,and with better health and
digestion; and temperance makes a country populous, were it only by prolonging
life.




Again, would there not be the same consumption of the same products, if
inferior people contracted their drinking and dress within the bounds of
temperance and frugality, and allowed poor wives and children what might
be necessary to exhilarate and strengthen them for labour, and to defend
them from the cold, or make their live easier? Would there be a less consumption,
if those of greater wealth kept themselves within the bounds of temperance;
and reserved the money thus saved to supply the interest of money lent gratis
to a friend, who may be thereby enabled, consistently with temperance, to
drink as much wine, as, had it been added to the quantity drunk by the lender,
would have taken away his senses? Or, if all men drink too much, and families
too; what if they retrenched? The money saved might improve their dress,
habitation, or studies; or might enable a poorer friend to consume the same,
or other manufactures, with equal advantage to the public; or might preserve
the same persons longer in life, and health and good circumstances, so as
in their whole lives to consume more.




In general, if the single luxury of the master of a family consumes manufactures,
might not an equal quantity be consumed by retrenching his own expenses,
and allowing conveniences to his family? If a whole family be luxurious in
dress, furniture, equipage; suppose this retrenched, the increase of wealth
to the family may soon enable younger children in their families to consume
among them frugally, as much as would have been consumed luxuriously by the
ancestor; or the frugal consumption of fifty years, in the condition of a
wise gentleman, may be as great, as the luxurious consumption of twenty years,
succeeded by thirty years of pinching, remorse or beggary. If a man of wealth
has no children, his own moderate enjoyment, with what he may enable worthy
friends to consume in their own houses, or what he may spend temperately
at a hospitable table, and genteel equipage, may amount to as much as the
squandering of a luxurious epicure, or vain fool, upon his own person, in
the short time his life or fortune will last.




Unless therefore all mankind are fully provided not only with all necessaries,
but all innocent conveniences and pleasures of life, it is still possible
without any vice, by an honest care of families, relations, or some worthy
care of families, relations, or some worthy persons in distress, to make
the greatest consumption. Two or three plain suits becoming gentlemen, worn
by younger brothers or friends, will employ as many hands as a foppish one
worn by a vain heir. The same be said of furniture of houses, equipage, or
table. If there be sufficient wealth to furnish the most sumptuous dress,
habitation, equipage, and table, to the proprietor, and discharge all offices
of humanity, after a proportionable rate, why should this be called vice?
It plainly tends to public good, and injures no man. It is indeed the business
of a wise man to look before him, and to be armed against those hazards or
accidents which may reduce the highest fortunes: all men should correct their
imaginations, and avoid any habit of body or mind, which might be pernicious
upon a change of fortune, or unfit them for any duty of life: but this may
be done without reducing men to a Cynical tub, or frize coats. Wherein then
the virtue of this retrenchment should consist, or the vice of a more pleasant
chearful way of life, is not easy to tell; unless it lies in the confused
use of ambiguous words, temperance, and frugality, and humility.




Who needs be surprized that luxury or pride are made necessary to public
good, when even theft and robbery are supposed by the same author to be subservient
to it, by employing locksmiths? Not to repeat again, that all the good effect
is plainly owing to the industrious, and not to the robber; were there no
occasion for locks, had all children and servants discretion enough never
to go into chambers unseasonably, this would make no diminution of manufactures;
the money saved to the house-keeper would afford either better dress, or
other conveniences to a family, which would equally support artificers: even
smiths themselves might have equal employment. Unless all men be already
so well provided with all sorts of convenient utensils, or furniture, that
nothing can be added, a necessity or constant usefulness of robbers can never
be pretended, any more than the public advantages of shipwrecks and fires,
which are not a little admired by the author of the fable.




It is probable indeed we shall never see a wealthy state without vice.
But what then? it is not impossible; and the less any nation has of it, so
much the happier it is. Wise governors will force some public good out of
vices, if they cannot prevent them: and yet much greater public good would
have flowed from opposite virtues. The excise is now increased by the drunkenness
of some poor masters of families: but sharing their drink with their poor
families might make equal consumption of the same kind; or if they retrenched
this article, they might consume other kinds of goods, paying equal duty
to the public. The persons themselves would avoid many diseases, be more
capable of labour, live longer, in all probability, in contentment and good
temper, without foolish contention, quarrels, and dissatisfaction both in
their families and among their neighbours. The like would be the effect of
a sober and temperate deportment in better stations.




As to the question of fact in this matter: perhaps, whosoever looks into
all the ranks of men, will find it is but a small part of our consumptions
which is owing to our vices. If we find too splendid dress at court, or at
Lucas's [The gayest coffee house in Dublin], or at public meetings for diversion;
we shall find plain dresses at the exchange, at the custom-house, at churches.
The expensive gaiety continues but a few years of most peoples lives, during
their amours, or expectation of preferment: nor would a good-natured man
call this gaiety always vitious. Our gentlemen in the country seldom suffer
in their fortunes by their dress. The consumption in tables would not be
much diminished, though men would never run into surfeiting and drunkenness;
it is not one in a hundred who is frequently guilty of these vices, and yet
all are very day consuming. The extraordinary consumption of revels occasions
generally abstinence for some time following; so that in a sober week as
much may be consumed as in the week one has a debauch. Did we examine our
own manufactures, either linen or woolen, we should find that coarse cloths
and stuff, the wearing of which none count extravagant, employ ten times
as many hands as the fine. And of the fine cloths which are bought, not one
of the buyers in ten can be called extravagant. Were even this extravagance
removed, the consumption of the same persons during their lives might be
as great, as by the vanity of a few years with the poverty of the remainder.




Thus we may see with how little reason vices are either counted necessary,
or actually subservient to the public happiness, even in our present corruption.




 I am Sir, Yours, etc.




 P.M.




To Hibernicus




  ---- Cujus, velut aegri somnia, vanae

 Fingenture species, ut nec pes, neccaput uni

 Reddatur formae

Hor.




SIR,




Mr Addison in his fourth Whig Examiner has given an excellent description
of a certain way of writing which is absolutely unanswerable, and he has
pointed out the secret strength by which it is made so. That the Fable of
the Bees is a performance of this kind, may be easily shewn, not by general
encomiums, but by pointing out its particular excellencies.




There is one outwork of this sort of authors, which though it be not their
main strength, yet is often of great consequence to terrify the timorous
reader, or adversary; I mean open vanity, and pretences to the deepest knowledge.
-- Hic murus abencus esso.




How formidable must that writer be, who lets us know "he has observed
so much above the short-sighted vulgar, and has given himself leisure to
gaze upon the prospect of concatenated events, and seen good spring and pullulate
from evil as naturally," (p. 89) so condescending is he to the meanest
of his readers, "as chickens do from eggs!" How does he raise admiration
in the first paragraph of his preface, letting us know that he has seen the
"chief organs and nicest springs of our machine," which are yet
but "trifling films, and little pipes, not such gross strong things
as nerves, bone, or skin!" Nay, he has no doubt seen "the very
strength, elasticity, and due contexture of spirits which constitute the
fear of shame, and anger, or courage;" (p. 234) and also all the other
qualities of spirits which constitute the other passions: these passions
"along with skin, flesh, and bone, make the compound man." But
this is not all his knowledge; he has "anatomised the invisible part,
has seen the gentle strokes,and slight touches of the passions." (p.
155 and p. 77) This author can "swagger about fortitude and poverty
as well as Seneca, and shew the way to summum bonum as easily as his way
home." (p. 164) He has searched through "every degree of life;
and foresees opposition only from those who have lost public spirit, and
are narrow-souled, incapable of thinking of things of uncommon extent, which
are noble and sublime. He cries apage vulgus to very opposer," (p. 163
and p. 366, 367) and writes only "for the few who think abstractly,
and are elevated above the vulgar." (See the journal subjoined to the
Fable.)




He tells us, "he has pleased men of unquestionable sense; will always
live, and be esteemed while such read him."




Who will not stand in awe of that author, "who describes the nature
and symptoms of human passions; detects their force and disguises; and traces
self-love in its darkest recess beyond any other system of ethics?"(p.
467)




Who, after all this and much more, and egotisms, and affectations in every
page, needs be told by the author that "his vanity he could never conquer?"
(p. 472)




Another useful secret of invincible authors is to interperse a contempt
of pedantry and of the clergy. These damned pendants have got a trick of
reading many authors, observing the sentiments of the greatest men in all
ages; and acquire an impertinent facility of discerning nonsense in the writings
of your easy genteel authors, who are above perplexing themselves with the
sourness and intricacies of thought. Without some defiances and contempt
of pendants and clergy, readers would never have so much as dreamed that
some of our authors were witty and easy writers. When this point is obtained,
then we may fall upon our readers like thunder, with all the little learning
we are masters of in season and out of season: "about Greek and Roman
religions, Egyptian worship of onions (though long ago laughed at by a pedantic
clergyman in a brother-easy-writer on freethinking) trophies, monuments,
arches, military crowns, Alexander, Lorenzo Gratian, Hydaspes, Ostracisms;
the Laconic spirit of our nation appearing in the word gin: that fiery lake,
the Lethe, the Stygian and Circean cup, from whence pullutate Leucophlegmacies:
"we may talk of Stoics, Epicureans, Seneca's estate; nay, even cite
Ovid, and transpose a passage in Juvenal: Si licit exemplis: make double
entendres upon the word envervate; trabat sua quemque voluptas: a Latin joke
from Erasmus: nay, may make most philosophico-philosophical digressions about
"the essences of hope, inkerns, ice, and oak;" we may launch out
into those profound depths in optics, that "air is not the object of
sight; that bulk diminishes by distance, is owing to our imperfection; that
the sky might appear through a hole in a wall as near as the stones; talk
of Pythagoras's abstaining from flesh, Aesop's making beasts to speak; ira
furor brevis est: Lucretia killed herself for fear of shame." We may
improve our language by that easy phrase, "meliorating our condition."
We may use that most grammatical epithet "superlative;" talk of
Vannini, Bruno and Essendi as martyrs, though some of the facts have been
disapproved long ago; "that Homer's heroes talk as porters; Lycurgus's
Laws; Epaminondas, Leotychidas, Agis, the Polemarchi; saturnine tempers,
adoration of the manes of the British Aesculapius; Cicero's vanity, he wrote
O fortunatam, etc. My friend Horace:" with may other most pert evidences
of immense critical erudition; which having spend several years at a Latin
school, and reading Plutarch's lives Englished by several hands.




When thus the character of erudition is secured, next comes knowledge
of the world, another essential quality of an easy writer. This may be displayed
by a word or two of French, though we have English words exactly of the same
meaning; by talking in the strain of porters and hands, about their affairs.
Then the polite gentleman of fine genius will soon appear by a great deal
of poetical language, mixed with prose. What pity it had not at all been
in rhime, like the fable itself! the author's slaughter-house and gin-shop
would have been as renowned as the cave of the Cyclops, or the dwelling of
Circes ingeniuni par materiae!




These are but additional helps. The main strength of the impregnable writer
consists in intricate contradictions and inconsistencies; with some manifest
absurdities boldly asserted, against which no man can produce an argument,
any more than to prove that twice three are not ten. Thus his first sentences
is, that "all untaught animals desire only to please themselves, and
follow the bent of their inclination, without regard to the good or harm
of others:" but a few pages after we shall find that gratitude is natural,
or that men "must wish well to benefactors: that pity or avertion to
the misery of others is a natural passion; that affection to offspring, and
desire of their happiness, is natural: that men may wish well to any other
in what they themselves cannot obtain." (p. 34 and p. 68 and 140)




His very definition of vice is "gratifying appetite without regard
to the public:"(p. 34) by "without regard", we may charitably
understand him to have intended "pernicious to the public", unless
he can shew that all men have agreed to call eating when one is hungry, or
going to sleep when one is weary, vitious, whenever he does not think of
a community. Vice then here is "doing detriment to the public by gratifying
appetite". But go on, and you will find the whole strain of the book
to be, that "vices are useful to the public, and necessary to its happiness:
the solid comforts and happiness of life are the gratifications of appetite."




His definition of virtue is "endeavouring the benefit of others contrary
to the impulse of nature."(p. 34) Yet through the whole book "Universal
virtue would be detrimental to society;" that is, all mens endeavouring
to benefit others would be detrimental to all. "The moral virtues are
the offspring of flattery begot upon pride;"(p. 37) yet in the very
same page, and many other places, "No passion more natural or universal
than pride." Virtue then, which was before contrary to the impulse of
nature, now is become following the strongest impulse of nature.




Again, "Virtue is the conquest of passion out of the rational ambition
of being good;" (p. 36) but a few pages after this, "doing worthy
actions from love of goodness has certain signs of pride, which is the strongest
passion:" and yet, says the author, "This is a sublimer notion
of virtue than his own".




"Heathen religion could not influence men to virtue,"(p. 36)
says he: the direct contrary is asserted by all the heathen philosophers,
historians, orators, tragedians and comedians. The wiser men saw the folly
of their theological fables, but never denied a governing mind, the vulgar
might believe the fables of Jupiter and his brothers; but imagining in the
gods a right superior to that of men, they might fear the judgment of the
gods for like facts to those done by Jupiter, and expect rewards for obedience
to laws given by men, which yet did not bind superior natures. This notion
may make it probable that even very corrupt religions may have in the whole
much more good effects than evil. But who will regard the testimonies of
poor heathens, against this "Observer of concatenated events?"




Presently we find "the seeds of all virtue in the two passions of
pride and shame, which are most natural."(p. 56) In another place, "Virtue
was contrary to the impulse of nature, and the conquest of the passions;"
and soon after it will become what it was again, "No virtue in what
is designed to gratify pride; the only recompence of virtue is the pleasure
of doing good;"(p. 68 and p. 246) but even this pleasure of "doing
good, or acting from love of goodness, was pride."(p. 43)




Pag. 59. He begins his anatomizing of passions; "The passions, concealed
from modesty or good manners, are pride, lust, and selfishness." Either
then pride and lust is not selfish, but disinterested; or this division amounts
to these three members, to wit, "one sort of selfishness, another sort
of selfishness, and selfishness in general."




He asserts, that "Ambassadors debates about precedency flow from
pride concealed under shew of virtue," (p. 73) that is, of "conquering
the passions from the ambition of being good." It seems they all naturally
desire to be hindmost, but affect precedency, that they may seem to conquer
this passion.




"Gratitude is a natural motive of inclination, and not virtue: returns
of good offices are not from gratitude but from virtue; or manners, that
is, concealment of pride, lust, and selfishness, in order to gratify them."(p.
76)




"Luxury is the use of any thing above necessity; nor can any other
bounds be fixed:" (p. 108 and 132) and yet a few pages after, "All
men ought to dress suitably to condition."




"Envy is a mixture of sorrow and anger. Sorrow arises from our want
of what we desire, and anger is raised by us for our ease." (p. 140
and 221) A pleasing passion surely! "Anger is the passion arising when
our desire is crossed." Thus envy amounts to sorrow for want of what
we desire, compounded with the "passion arising when desire is crossed."
This composition is as artful as that of a merry fellow's punch, who liked
to have it made of two quarts of brandy, and one quart of brandy; si licet
exemplis.




"Self-Love bids us look on every satisfied being as a rival:"
and "yet nothing can excite any being to oppose another but his being
unsatisfied."(p. 143)




"Laughing at another's fall, is either from envy or malice."(p.
146)




"Love signifies affection, that is, liking or wishing well."
The object's interest becomes our own in this wonderful manner. "Self-love
makes us believe that the sufferings we feel must lessen those of our friend;
and then a secret pleasure arises from our grieving, because we imagine we
are relieving him."(p. 149) How strangely does our self-love govern
us! It first forms an opinion so prodigiously secret, that never any mortal
believed it; and then makes us feel pleasure, not in relieving ourselves,
but another. Nay, what is it that self-love cannot perform? "When a
man stands in the "street, and shrieks at another's fall from a high
window or scaffold, he believes that he himself is flying through the air:
when a man blushes, upon seeing another do a base action, he believes he
is doing it himself." (p. 55)




I have got yet no further than the 150th page, but with many omissions;
you may have, when you please,twice as many, rather greater beauties of the
same nature; but these may suffice at present. Only I cannot pass over two
passages more; the one is a wonderful composition, so dearly does he love
making a very dispensatory of passions, that rather than want composition,
he will take two pieces of the same thing for want of different materials:
"Laziness is an aversion to business, generally attended with a desire
of being unactive." (p. 267) The other passage is a most important maxim;
"That man never exerts himself but when he is roused by desire;"
or, never exerts himself but when he desires something or other. And he subjoins
this sublime simile, of "a huge windmill without a breath of air."




Before any one pretends to answer this book, he must know what the author
means by "good opinion, high value, worth, unworthiness, merit, noble
actions, overvaluing, thinking well, or having a right to do any thing."
But upon these terms, all mortals may despair of it.




We may make one general observation on the dexterity of this author in
confuting opposite schemes. Suppose the scheme of almost all moralists, except
Epicureans, to be true; "That we have in our nature kind affections
in different degrees, that we have a moral sense determining us to approve
them whenever they are observed, and al actions which flow from them; that
we are naturally bound together by desire of esteem from each other, and
by compassion; and that withal we have self-love or desire of private goods."
What would be the consequence of this constitution, or the appearances in
human nature? All men would call those actions virtuous, which they imagine
to tend to the public good: where men differ in "opinions of the natural
tendencies of actions." they must differ in approbation or condemnation:
they will find pleasure in contemplating or reflecting on their own kind
affections and actions: they will delight in the society of the kind, good-natured,
and beneficent: they will be uneasy upon seeing or even hearing of the misery
of others, and be delighted with the happiness of any persons believed: men
will have regard to private goods as well as public: and when other circumstances
are equal, will prefer what tends most to private advantage. Now these are
the direct and necessary consequences of this supposition: and yet this penetrating
swaggerer, who surpasses all writers of ethics, makes those very appearances
proofs against the hypothesis. No proofs will please him but the contrary
appearances: if he saw "men approving what is pernicious to the public;
or men agreeing to approve the same action, though one thought it useful
to the public, and another thought it pernicious; or if men had no manner
of pleasure in good actions, orin reflecting upon them, nor would value themselves
more for heroism than villany; then indeed he would acknowledge a moral sense
independent of interest and true virtue." So also "Men must delight
in the company of the proud, morose, revengeful and quarrelsome; they must
be indifferent in beholding the most cruel tortures, or the greatest joy
and happiness of our fellows, or even of our offspring. Men must do mischief
to themselves, or neglect their most innocent pleasures, and interest, by
a thorough self-denial, without any inclination to the good of others; and
must have no more pleasure in gratitude, generosity, or humanity, than in
malice and revenge; otherwise this author will never believe any other affection
than self-love: at present he sees all to be but disguises of it, from his
deep reflection about fresh herrings, and the company he would choose."




He has probably been struck with some old fanatic sermon upon self-denial
in his youth, and can never get it out of his head since. It is absolutely
impossible upon his scheme, that God himself can make a being naturally disposed
to virtue: for virtue is "self-denial, and acting against the impulse
of nature." What else then can we imagine concerning al the works of
God in their best state, but




  --- That they were intended,

 For nothing else but to be mended? 

Hud.




Might we poor vulgar make conjectures concerning the spirits of nations,
we would be apt to conclude, that through incapacity for abstract thinking,
the Bocotic spirit of the British is much better discovered by a fourth edition
of his book, than the Laconic by the word Gin.




Thus may thine enemies triumph, O Virtue and Christianity!




 I am, Sir,

Your very humble Servant,

P.M.




 THE END