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    more than the former . In this he will , perhaps , be thought by many to have gone too far , —and , in fact , some of his expressions are strong , and his doctrine is occasionally somewhat startling and paradoxical . There can be little doubt that the moral character , in the earlier stages of its development , is in a great measure influenced by motives derived from an immediate view to our own happiness as affected by our conduct , and that

    this will always continue to be so , more or less , as long as our characters are imperfect . We may go further , and maintain that an influential sense of the connexion between the practice of virtue and the greatest happiness of the agent , is an important and even indispensable instrument in the cultivation and improvement of the character , in the formation of virtuous habits , and ultimately in promoting and strengthening purely disinterested affections . It is , perhaps , scarcely wise absolutely to discountenance and

    reject any motives by which men , in a certain stage of their progress towards perfection , are incited to the performance of good actions ; what is now done from a less worthy principle may afterwards be continued from a better . Nevertheless , Dr . Hartley will probably appear to be correct when he maintains that the acknowledged prevalence of interested motives in stimulating to the duties of benevolence and piety is a sufficient proof of the imperfect development of these principles in the mind ; and it requires

    only a little attention to the nature of the process by which they are gradually produced to be aware that , though in the first instance derived from pleasures , desires , and pursuits altogether selfish , they have yet a tendency to approach nearer and nearer to a state in which they are perfectly disinterested ; that is , in which they are pursued fo ? their own sake , independently of all regard either express or implied to any other

    considerations . It will also appear , that the further this approximation has been carried , the more completely all selfish feelings are excluded from the motives by which man is incited to the practice of religion and virtue , the greater will be his progress towards the highest perfections of which his nature is capable , and the more completely will he fulfil all the purposes of his being .

    The fact unquestionably is , that a just theory of the human mind , and of the gradual progress and succession of the different principles of action as they are generated by the influence of association , proves , in conformity with universal experience , that there are and must be generated in our constitution purely disinterested affections and feelings . We are born , it is certain , in a state wholly destitute of any such feelings ; beings purely selfish , sensual , corporeal ; knowing nothing beyond ourselves , nothing in ourselves , but mere bodily sensations . It is not , however , for a long time that the infant continues in this state either of intellectual or of moral

    insensibility . The various sensations which it experiences speedily give rise to ideas ; the faculties of the understanding are roused into action ; memory recalls the traces of past sensations ; judgment compares them with those which are actually present ; and they are connected and associated together in various combinations , so as quickly to call the mind into existence and exercise . Again , when the attention has been directed to the

    various impressions made from without , and the mind has learnt to reason concerning the causes of these impressions , and the manner in which its various wants are supplied , an idea presently arises of the connexion between these supplies , accommodations , and pleasures , and the attention and care of others . These ideas continually occurring in close connexion , shortly become united in the mind also in the way of association ; since nearl y all the pleasures which young children receive are conferred upon them oy their

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    596 Hartley ' s Rule of Life .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1828, page 596, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2564/page/12/