propositions, not allowed to be innate, equally partake in with them:
and since the assent that is given them is produced another way, and
comes not from natural inscription, as I doubt not but to make appear in
the following Discourse. And if THESE "first principles" of knowledge and science are found not to be innate, no OTHER speculative maxims can
(I suppose), with better right pretend to be so.
CHAPTER II.
NO INNATE PRACTICAL PRINCIPLES
1. No moral Principles so clear and so generally received as the
forementioned speculative Maxims.
If those speculative Maxims, whereof we discoursed in the foregoing
chapter, have not an actual universal assent from all mankind, as we
there proved, it is much more visible concerning PRACTICAL Principles,
that they come short of an universal reception: and I think it wil be
hard to instance any one moral rule which can pretend to so general and
ready an assent as, "What is, is"; or to be so manifest a truth as this, that "It is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be." Whereby it is evident that they are further removed from a title to be innate;
and the doubt of their being native impressions on the mind is stronger
against those moral principles than the other. Not that it brings their
truth at al in question. They are equally true, though not equally
evident. Those speculative maxims carry their own evidence with them:
but moral principles require reasoning and discourse, and some exercise
of the mind, to discover the certainty of their truth. They lie not open
as natural characters engraved on the mind; which, if any such were,
they must needs be visible by themselves, and by their own light be
certain and known to everybody. But this is no derogation to their truth
and certainty; no more than it is to the truth or certainty of the three
angles of a triangle being equal to two right ones because it is not so
evident as "the whole is bigger than a part," nor so apt to be assented to at first hearing. It may suffice that these moral rules are capable
of demonstration: and therefore it is our own faults if we come not to
a certain knowledge of them. But the ignorance wherein many men are of
them, and the slowness of assent wherewith others receive them, are
manifest proofs that they are not innate, and such as offer themselves
to their view without searching.
2. Faith and Justice not owned as Principles by al Men.
Whether there be any such moral principles, wherein all men do agree, I
appeal to any who have been but moderately conversant in the history of
mankind, and looked abroad beyond the smoke of their own chimneys. Where
is that practical truth that is universally received, without doubt or
question, as it must be if innate? JUSTICE, and keeping of contracts,
is that which most men seem to agree in. This is a principle which is
thought to extend itself to the dens of thieves, and the confederacies
of the greatest villains; and they who have gone furthest towards the
putting off of humanity itself, keep faith and rules of justice one with
another. I grant that outlaws themselves do this one amongst another:
but it is without receiving these as the innate laws of nature. They
practise them as rules of convenience within their own communities: but
it is impossible to conceive that he embraces justice as a practical
principle who acts fairly with his fellow-highwayman, and at the same
time plunders or kil s the next honest man he meets with Justice and
truth are the common ties of society; and therefore even outlaws and
robbers, who break with all the world besides, must keep faith and rules
of equity amongst themselves; or else they cannot hold together. But
will any one say, that those that live by fraud or rapine have innate
principles of truth and justice which they al ow and assent to?
3. Objection: though Men deny them in their Practice, yet they admit
them in their Thoughts answered.
Perhaps it will be urged, that the tacit assent of their minds agrees to
what their practice contradicts. I answer, first, I have always thought
the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts. But,
since it is certain that most men's practices, and some men's open
professions, have either questioned or denied these principles, it is
impossible to establish an universal consent, (though we should look for
it only amongst grown men,) without which it is impossible to conclude
them innate. Secondly, it is very strange and unreasonable to suppose
innate practical principles, that terminate only in contemplation.
Practical principles, derived from nature, are there for operation, and
must produce conformity of action, not barely speculative assent to
their truth, or else they are in vain distinguished from speculative
maxims. Nature, I confess, has put into man a desire of happiness and an
aversion to misery: these indeed are innate practical principles which
(as practical principles ought) DO continue constantly to operate and
influence al our actions without ceasing: these may be observed in all
persons and all ages, steady and universal; but these are INCLINATIONS
OF THE APPETITE to good, not impressions of truth on the understanding.
I deny not that there are natural tendencies imprinted on the minds of
men; and that from the very first instances of sense and perception,
there are some things that are grateful and others unwelcome to them;
some things that they incline to and others that they fly: but this
makes nothing for innate characters on the mind, which are to be
the principles of knowledge regulating our practice. Such natural
impressions on the understanding are so far from being confirmed hereby,
that this is an argument against them; since, if there were certain
characters imprinted by nature on the understanding, as the principles
of knowledge, we could not but perceive them constantly operate in us
and influence our knowledge, as we do those others on the will and
appetite; which never cease to be the constant springs and motives of
al our actions, to which we perpetually feel them strongly impelling
us.
4. Moral Rules need a Proof, ERGO not innate.
Another reason that makes me doubt of any innate practical principles
is, that I think THERE CANNOT ANY ONE MORAL RULE BE PROPOSED WHEREOF A
MAN MAY NOT JUSTLY DEMAND A REASON: which would be perfectly ridiculous
and absurd if they were innate; or so much as self-evident, which every
innate principle must needs be, and not need any proof to ascertain its
truth, nor want any reason to gain it approbation. He would be thought
void of common sense who asked on the one side, or on the other side
went to give a reason WHY "it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be." It carries its own light and evidence with it, and needs no other proof: he that understands the terms assents to it for its own
sake or else nothing will ever be able to prevail with him to do it. But
should that most unshaken rule of morality and foundation of all social
virtue, "That should do as he would be done unto," be proposed to one who never heard of it before, but yet is of capacity to understand its
meaning; might he not without any absurdity ask a reason why? And were
not he that proposed it bound to make out the truth and reasonableness
of it to him? Which plainly shows it not to be innate; for if it were it
could neither want nor receive any proof; but must needs (at least
as soon as heard and understood) be received and assented to as an
unquestionable truth, which a man can by no means doubt of. So that
the truth of al these moral rules plainly depends upon some other
antecedent to them, and from which they must be DEDUCED; which could not
be if either they were innate or so much as self-evident.
5. Instance in keeping Compacts
That men should keep their compacts is certainly a great and undeniable
rule in morality. But yet, if a Christian, who has the view of happiness
and misery in another life, be asked why a man must keep his word, he
will give this as a reason:--Because God, who has the power of eternal
life and death, requires it of us. But if a Hobbist be asked why? he
will answer:--Because the public requires it, and the Leviathan wil
punish you if you do not. And if one of the old philosophers had been
asked, he would have answered:--Because it was dishonest, below the
dignity of a man, and opposite to virtue, the highest perfection of
human nature, to do otherwise.
6. Virtue generally approved not because innate, but because profitable.
Hence naturally flows the great variety of opinions concerning moral
rules which are to be found among men, according to the different sorts
of happiness they have a prospect of, or propose to themselves; which
could not be if practical principles were innate, and imprinted in our
minds immediately by the hand of God. I grant the existence of God is
so many ways manifest, and the obedience we owe him so congruous to the
light of reason, that a great part of mankind give testimony to the law
of nature: but yet I think it must be al owed that several moral rules
may receive from mankind a very general approbation, without either
knowing or admitting the true ground of morality; which can only be the
will and law of a God, who sees men in the dark, has in his hand rewards
and punishments, and power enough to cal to account the proudest
offender. For, God having, by an inseparable connexion, joined virtue
and public happiness together, and made the practice thereof necessary
to the preservation of society, and visibly beneficial to all with whom
the virtuous man has to do; it is no wonder that every one should not
only allow, but recommend and magnify those rules to others, from whose
observance of them he is sure to reap advantage to himself. He may, out
of interest as wel as conviction, cry up that for sacred, which, if
once trampled on and profaned, he himself cannot be safe nor secure.
This, though it takes nothing from the moral and eternal obligation
which these rules evidently have, yet it shows that the outward
acknowledgment men pay to them in their words proves not that they are
innate principles: nay, it proves not so much as that men assent to
them inwardly in their own minds, as the inviolable rules of their own
practice; since we find that self-interest, and the conveniences of this
life, make many men own an outward profession and approbation of them,
whose actions sufficiently prove that they very little consider the
Lawgiver that prescribed these rules; nor the hel that he has ordained
for the punishment of those that transgress them.
7. Men's actions convince us, that the Rule of Virtue is not their
internal Principle.
For, if we will not in civility alow too much sincerity to the
professions of most men, but think their actions to be the interpreters
of their thoughts, we shall find that they have no such internal
veneration for these rules, nor so full a persuasion of their certainty
and obligation. The great principle of morality, 'To do as one would be
done to,' is more commended than practised. But the breach of this rule
cannot be a greater vice, than to teach others, that it is no moral
rule, nor obligatory, would be thought madness, and contrary to that
interest men sacrifice to, when they break it themselves. Perhaps
CONSCIENCE wil be urged as checking us for such breaches, and so the
internal obligation and establishment of the rule be preserved.
8. Conscience no Proof of any innate Moral Rule.
To which I answer, that I doubt not but, without being written on their
hearts, many men may, by the same way that they come to the knowledge of
other things, come to assent to several moral rules, and be convinced
of their obligation. Others also may come to be of the same mind,
from their education, company, and customs of their country; which
persuasion, however got, wil serve to set conscience on work; which is
nothing else but our own opinion or judgment of the moral rectitude
or gravity of our own actions; and if conscience be a proof of innate
principles, contraries may be innate principles; since some men with the
same bent of conscience prosecute what others avoid.
9. Instances of Enormities practised without Remorse.
But I cannot see how any men should ever transgress those moral rules,
with confidence and serenity, were they innate, and stamped upon
their minds. View but an army at the sacking of a town, and see what
observation or sense of moral principles, or what touch of conscience
for al the outrages they do. Robberies, murders, rapes, are the sports
of men set at liberty from punishment and censure. Have there not been
whole nations, and those of the most civilized people, amongst whom the
exposing their children, and leaving them in the fields to perish by
want or wild beasts has been the practice; as little condemned or
scrupled as the begetting them? Do they not still, in some countries,
put them into the same graves with their mothers, if they die in
childbirth; or despatch them, if a pretended astrologer declares them to
have unhappy stars? And are there not places where, at a certain age,
they kil or expose their parents, without any remorse at all? In a part
of Asia, the sick, when their case comes to be thought desperate, are
carried out and laid on the earth before they are dead; and left there,
exposed to wind and weather, to perish without assistance or pity. It
is familiar among the Mingrelians, a people professing Christianity, to
bury their children alive without scruple. There are places where they
eat their own children. The Caribbees were wont to geld their children,
on purpose to fat and eat them. And Garcilasso de la Vega tel s us of a
people in Peru which were wont to fat and eat the children they got on
their female captives, whom they kept as concubines for that purpose,
and when they were past breeding, the mothers themselves were kil ed too
and eaten. The virtues whereby the Tououpinambos believed they merited
paradise, were revenge, and eating abundance of their enemies. They have
not so much as a name for God, and have no religion, no worship. The
saints who are canonized amongst the Turks, lead lives which one cannot
with modesty relate. A remarkable passage to this purpose, out of the
voyage of Baumgarten, which is a book not every day to be met with, I
shall set down at large, in the language it is published in.
Ibi (sc. prope Belbes in Aegypto) vidimus sanctum unum Saracenicum inter
arenarum cumulos, ita ut ex utero matris prodiit nudum sedentem. Mos
est, ut didicimus, Mahometistis, ut eos, qui amentes et sine ratione
sunt, pro sanctis colant et venerentur. Insuper et eos, qui cum diu
vitam egerint inquinatissimam, voluntariam demum poenitentiam et
paupertatem, sanctitate venerandos deputant. Ejusmodi vero genus hominum
libertatem quandam effrenem habent, domos quos volunt intrandi, edendi,
bibendi, et quod majus est, concumbendi; ex quo concubitu, si proles
secuta fuerit, sancta similiter habetur. His ergo hominibus dum vivunt,
magnos exhibent honores; mortuis vero vel templa vel monumenta extruunt
amplissima, eosque contingere ac sepelire maximae fortunae ducunt loco.
Audivimus haec dicta et dicenda per interpretem a Mucrelo nostro.
Insuper sanctum ilium, quern eo loco vidimus, publicitus apprime
commendari, eum esse hominem sanctum, divinum ac integritate praecipuum;
eo quod, nec faminarum unquam esset, nec puerorum, sed tantummodo
asellarum concubitor atque mularum. (Peregr. Baumgarten, 1. i . c. i. p.
73.)
Where then are those innate principles of justice, piety, gratitude,
equity, chastity? Or where is that universal consent that assures us
there are such inbred rules? Murders in duels, when fashion has made
them honourable, are committed without remorse of conscience: nay, in
many places innocence in this case is the greatest ignominy. And if we
look abroad to take a view of men as they are, we shall find that they
have remorse, in one place, for doing or omitting that which others, in
another place, think they merit by.
10. Men have contrary practical Principles.
He that wil carefully peruse the history of mankind, and look abroad
into the several tribes of men, and with indifferency survey their
actions, wil be able to satisfy himself, that there is scarce that
principle of morality to be named, or, rule of virtue to be thought
on, (those only excepted that are absolutely necessary to hold society
together, which commonly too are neglected betwixt distinct societies,)
which is not, somewhere or other, slighted and condemned by the general
fashion of whole societies of men, governed by practical opinions and
rules of living quite opposite to others.
11. Whole Nations reject several Moral Rules.
Here perhaps it wil be objected, that it is no argument that the rule
is not known, because it is broken. I grant the objection good where
men, though they transgress, yet disown not the law; where fear of
shame, censure, or punishment, carries the mark of some awe it has upon
them. But it is impossible to conceive that a whole nation of men should
al publicly reject and renounce what every one of them certainly and
infallibly knew to be a law; for so they must who have it naturally
imprinted on their minds. It is possible men may sometimes own rules of
morality which in their private thoughts they do not believe to be true,
only to keep themselves in reputation and esteem amongst those who are
persuaded of their obligation. But it is not to be imagined that a whole
society of men should publicly and professedly disown and cast off a
rule which they could not in their own minds but be infallibly certain
was a law; nor be ignorant that all men they should have to do with
knew it to be such: and therefore must every one of them apprehend from
others all the contempt and abhorrence due to one who professes himself
void of humanity: and one who, confounding the known and natural
measures of right and wrong, cannot but be looked on as the professed
enemy of their peace and happiness. Whatever practical principle is
innate, cannot but be known to every one to be just and good. It is
therefore little less than a contradiction to suppose, that whole
nations of men should, both in their professions and practice,
unanimously and universally give the lie to what, by the most invincible
evidence, every one of them knew to be true, right, and good. This
is enough to satisfy us that no practical rule which is anywhere
universally, and with public approbation or allowance, transgressed,
can be supposed innate.--But I have something further to add in answer
to this objection.
12. The generally alowed breach of a rule proof that it is not innate.
The breaking of a rule, say you, is no argument that it is unknown. I
grant it: but the GENERALLY ALLOWED breach of it anywhere, I say, is
a proof that it is not innate. For example: let us take any of these
rules, which, being the most obvious deductions of human reason, and
conformable to the natural inclination of the greatest part of men,
fewest people have had the impudence to deny or inconsideration to doubt
of. If any can be thought to be natural y imprinted, none, I think, can
have a fairer pretence to be innate than this: "Parents, preserve and
cherish your children." When, therefore, you say that this is an innate rule, what do you mean? Either that it is an innate principle which upon
al occasions excites and directs the actions of al men; or else, that
it is a truth which al men have imprinted on their minds, and which
therefore they know and assent to. But in neither of these senses is it
innate. FIRST, that it is not a principle which influences all men's
actions, is what I have proved by the examples before cited: nor need
we seek so far as the Mingrelia or Peru to find instances of such as
neglect, abuse, nay, and destroy their children; or look on it only as
the more than brutality of some savage and barbarous nations, when we
remember that it was a familiar and uncondemned practice amongst the
Greeks and Romans to expose, without pity or remorse, their innocent
infants. SECONDLY, that it is an innate truth, known to all men, is also
false. For, "Parents preserve your children," is so far from an innate truth, that it is no truth at all: it being a command, and not a
proposition, and so not capable of truth or falsehood. To make it
capable of being assented to as true, it must be reduced to some such
proposition as this: "It is the duty of parents to preserve their
children." But what duty is, cannot be understood without a law; nor
a law be known or supposed without a lawmaker, or without reward and
punishment; so that it is impossible that this, or any other, practical
principle should be innate, i.e. be imprinted on the mind as a
duty, without supposing the ideas of God, of law, of obligation, of
punishment, of a life after this, innate: for that punishment follows
not in this life the breach of this rule, and consequently that it has
not the force of a law in countries where the generally al owed practice
runs counter to it, is in itself evident. But these ideas (which must be
al of them innate, if anything as a duty be so) are so far from being
innate, that it is not every studious or thinking man, much less every
one that is born, in whom they are to be found clear and distinct; and
that one of them, which of al others seems most likely to be innate,
is not so, (I mean the idea of God,) I think, in the next chapter, wil
appear very evident to any considering man.
13. If men can be ignorant of what is innate, certainty is not described
by innate principles.
From what has been said, I think we may safely conclude that whatever
practical rule is in any place generally and with allowance broken,
cannot be supposed innate; it being impossible that men should, without
shame or fear, confidently and serenely, break a rule which they could
not but evidently know that God had set up, and would certainly punish
the breach of, (which they must, if it were innate,) to a degree to make
it a very ill bargain to the transgressor. Without such a knowledge as
this, a man can never be certain that anything is his duty. Ignorance
or doubt of the law, hopes to escape the knowledge or power of the
law-maker, or the like, may make men give way to a present appetite;
but let any one see the fault, and the rod by it, and with the
transgression, a fire ready to punish it; a pleasure tempting, and the
hand of the Almighty visibly held up and prepared to take vengeance,
(for this must be the case where any duty is imprinted on the mind,) and
then tell me whether it be possible for people with such a prospect,
such a certain knowledge as this, wantonly, and without scruple,
to offend against a law which they carry about them in indelible
characters, and that stares them in the face whilst they are breaking
it? Whether men, at the same time that they feel in themselves the
imprinted edicts of an Omnipotent Law-maker, can, with assurance and
gaiety, slight and trample underfoot his most sacred injunctions? And
lastly, whether it be possible that whilst a man thus openly bids
defiance to this innate law and supreme Lawgiver, all the bystanders,
yea, even the governors and rulers of the people, full of the same
sense both of the law and Law-maker, should silently connive, without
testifying their dislike or laying the least blame on it? Principles of
actions indeed there are lodged in men's appetites; but these are so far
from being innate moral principles, that if they were left to their full
swing they would carry men to the overturning of al morality. Moral
laws are set as a curb and restraint to these exorbitant desires, which
they cannot be but by rewards and punishments that wil overbalance the
satisfaction any one shall propose to himself in the breach of the law.
If, therefore, anything be imprinted on the minds of all men as a law,
al men must have a certain and unavoidable knowledge that certain and
unavoidable punishment will attend the breach of it. For if me