make consciousness of the fact a necessary requisite in such punishment, and that all inquiry relates to the probability of such consciousness. The execution of divine justice must proceed in the same manner. The Deity inflicts evil with a settled view to some end; and no end worthy of him can be answered by inflicting it as a pu nishment, unless to prevent other evils. Such end may be answered, if the patient is conscious, or can be made conscious of the fact, but not otherwise. And whence then does this difference in any one's moral capacity arise, but from that plain diversity in his natural one? from his absolute irretrievable want of consciousness in one case, and not in the other? Suppose now that one in the former condition kills a man; that he, or some part of what we call him, was ever so notoriously the instrument, or occasion of that death; yet if he was either then insensible of the fact, or afterwards became so, and so continued: Would he be any more guilty of murder, than if that death had been occasioned by another person? since at that time he was truly such, or at least is so now, notwithstanding that most people might be apt to judge him still the same, from a sameness in outward circumstances (which generally supply the best means men have of judging) from his shape, mien, or appearance; though these often differ widely from the internal constitution, yet are as often mistaken for it; and this accordingly thought and spoke of with little more philosophical propriety, than when we, in the vulgar phrase, describe a man's condition by saying, We would not be in his coat.

Suppose one then in the situation abovementioned; could any pains, think you, inflicted on him suit the idea, or answer the ends of punishment, either with regard to himself, or others, farther than mere show and delusion? Rewards and punishments are evidently instituted for the benefit of society, for the encouragement of virtue, or suppression of vice, in the object thus rewarded or punished, and in the rest of the community; but what tendency to the above purposes can either of these have, if dispensed to one who is not so far himself as to become conscious of having done any thing to

deserve

deserve it? What instruction is conveyed to him? What admonition to such others, as are duly acquainted with the whole of the case, and see every circumstance thús grossly misapplied? And as in these cases, laws only can define the circumstances in which a man shall be treated as accountable, they only can create guilt, i. e. guilt also is a forensic term, or a mode of considering any action, which in its essence implies knowledge of a law, offence against that law, and a sense of having offended against it; i. e. an after consciousness of the fact; without which after consciousness, punishment would be of little avail, as it would neither serve to guard the man himself against a like delinquency, nor tend to the warning of others, who by such inflictions would openly perceive that they might chance to suffer pain, without being able to assign a reason for it. Thus may personality be extended or contracted, and vary in various respects, times, and degrees, and thereby become liable to great confusion, in our applying it to various subjects; yet is the ground and foundation of it fixed; and when once discovered, its consequences are not less so, both before God and man.

Abstract, general ideas (of which this is an eminent one) are alone productive of certain, uniform, and universal knowledge: Thus qualities of a certain kind, when abstracted, or taken apart from nature, and set up for common standards, are so far independent as to become absolute, unmixed, or perfect in themselves, however different they may be found in their respective concretes. Thus goodness, justice, guilt, merit, &c. in general, are ever the same goodness, &c. all the world over, however imperfectly they may appear in any particular subjects, times, and places. In the same manner as a line, or the abstract consideration of length without thickness or breadth; the consideration of surface, i. e. length and breadth without thickness, must be the same, in all intelligent beings of like faculties with us, though the natural substances which suggest them may differ

*Note 19. to King's Origin of Evil. Rem.k.

X 2

with

with an endless variety. Let personality answer to a line or surface; let the substances it is predicated of, like the infinite variety of solids in nature, (with their appendages, heat, cold, colour, &c.) in which length and breadth are found, vary as you please, still the abstract ideas of line and surface, and therefore of person, will remain invariable. And thus propositions formed out of these general ideas contain certain truths, that are in one sense external and immutable, as depending on no precarious existences whatever. Being merely what we ourselves make them, they must continue the same while the same number of such ideas continue joined together, and appear the same to every intelligent being that contemplates them*. They do not stand in need (I say) of an objective reality, or the existence of any external things in full conformity to them, since we here consider things no farther than as coming up to these original standards, settled in the minds of men ; or as capable of being included in such measures as are applied to determine their precise quantity, quality, &c. we are ranking them under a certain species or sort, hence called their essence, which entitles them to the name descriptive of it, as is sufficiently explained by Mr. Locke. They want therefore nothing more to establish their reality, than to be consistently put toge ther, so as may distinguish them from others that are merely chimerical, and qualify them for the admission of any real beings that may occur: Thus, not only the instance of a triangle so frequently used by Mr. Locke, but every theorem in Euclid, may be ranked among the abstract considerations of quantity, apart from all real existence, which seldom comes up to it: As it may be justly questioned whether any triangle or circle, as defined by him, ever existed in nature, i. e. existed so that all the lines of the triangle were right ones, or all the lines drawn from the centre to the circumference equal. These ideas presuppose† no one being in particular, they imply nothing more than a proper subject of in-,

See the first note to Abp. King's Origin of Evil. + Vide Bp. Butler's Diss. on Personal Indentity.

quiry, (as was said above) or some such creature as is either actually endowed with, or at least susceptible of these specific qualities, or modes, which furnish matter for the whole tribe of abstractions daily made and preserved by such terms as usually serve to denote them; whether appellatives, in order to distinguish men in their several stations and relations, private or public; to describe their character or conduct, office, &c. as parent, patriot, king, &c. or such more general, technical ones, as paternity, patriotism, kingship, &c. the nature, end, and use, of all which abstractions, with their names, are well enough understood, and would not easily be mistaken in affairs of common life, which are happily less liable to such kind of subtile refinements, as have brought metaphysical speculations into that contempt under which they have long laboured. In short, of these same abstractions consist all general terms and theorems of every science; and the truth and certainty contained in thein, when applied to morals or theology, is no less determinate than in other sciences; it is equally capable of strict demonstration, as Mr. Locke observes, and equally applicable to full as useful and important purposes: The great general truths, I say, arising out of these general essences, or entities, (as they are sometimes called) are all clear, constant, and invariable in themselves, though the names in which such a collection of ideas should be preserved, are often through the poverty and imperfection of language rendered extremely vague and uncertain in each writer or speaker, and the ideas formed by them in other men's minds (which are their proper archetypes, and a conformity to which alone makes them right or wrong, truly or untruly applied) thereby become no less frequently confused and indeterminate. Thus, in the case before us, the word person is often used to signify the whole aggregate of a rational being, including both the very imperfect idea, if it be any idea at all, of substance, and its several properties, [as is the common way] or taking all the essential qualities together, [which properly constitute the substance of any thing*] with several of their modes.

* See the first note to King, and the authors there cited.

As when speaking of any one, we include soul, body, station, and other circumstances, and accordingly style him a wise, worthy person; a tall, comely; a rich, great one, &c. where person in a lax, popular sense signifies as much as man. In which popular sense Mr. Locke manifestly takes the word, when he says, it "stands for "a thinking intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking being, in different times and places." B. 2. C. 27. §. 9. But when the term is used more accurately and philosophically, it stands for one especial property of that thing or being, separated from all the rest that do or may attend it in real existence, and set apart for ranging such beings into distinct classes, (as hinted above) and considering them under distinct relations and connexions, which are no less necessary to be determined in life, and which should therefore have their proper and peculiar denomination. And thus sameness of person stands to denote, not what contitutes the same rational agent, though it always is predicated of such; but we consider his rationality so far only, as it makes him capable of knowing what he does and suffers, and on what account, and thereby renders him amenable to justice for his behaviour, as abovementioned.

Whatever ingredients therefore of different kinds go to the composition, what other particulars, whether mental or corporeal, contribute to the formation of this intelligent being, these make no part of our inquiry; which, I beg leave to repeat it again, is not what enters into the natural constitution of a thing, but what renders it so far a moral one, and is the sine quâ non of its being justly chargeable with any of its past actions, here or hereafter: Or, in other words, it does not affect the reality or the permanency of such intelligent beings, but only regulates and retains those beings under such a moral relation, as makes them properly accountable to some superior for their course of action. It is an artificial distinction, yet founded in the nature, but not the whole nature of man, who must have many other essential powers and properties to subsist as man, and even to support this in question; but none other, we say, that

can