The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Introduction
• Christian Philosophy
• Preface
• Introduction
• An Explication of the Text. Gal. VI. 7.
• Section I
• Proposition I
• Proposition Ii
• Proposition Iii
• Proposition Iv
• Proposition V
• Proposition Vi
• Proposition Vii
• Corolary I
• Corolary Ii
• Section Ii
• Introduction
• Proposition I
• Proposition Ii
• Proposition Iii
• Proposition Iv
• Corolary I
• Corolary Ii
• Section Iii
• Introduction
• Proposition I
• Proposition Ii
• Corolary I
• Corolary Ii
• Corolary Iii
• Proposition Iii
• Corolary I
• Corolary Ii
• Corolary Iii
• Corolary Iv
• Section Iv
• A Preliminary Proposition
• Corolary I
• Corolary Ii
• Proposition I
• Proposition Ii
• Proposition Iii
• Query I
• Query Ii
• Query Iii
• Query Iv
• Query V
• Query Vi
• Query Vii
• Query Viii
• Query Ix
• Proposition Iv
• Proposition V
• Proposition Vi
• I.: Virtue Or Holiness Is the Condition of Eternal Happiness; Without It We Cannot Have a Right to It, Or Be Made Sharers of It.
• II.: Holiness Or Virtue Is Absolutely Necessary to Qualify For Future Happiness.
• III.: Further, the Scripture Specifies to Us the Exercises From Which the Future Happiness of the Virtuous Flow.
• IV.: That According to the Scripture Account of the State of the Virtuous In the Life to Come, It Is a State of Unchangeable, Immortal Glory and Happiness.
• Corolary I
• Corolary Ii
• Corolary Iii
• Corolary Iv
• Corolary V
• Conclusion

Corolary I

We are not merely commanded by christianity to do good, but to love goodness: not merely to do justice, and to act humanely and generously, but to love justice, mercy and bounty. We have implanted in our nature not only all the affections necessary to the private system, or to self-preservation; but all the affections necessary to lead us to right conduct with regard to our kind, or to make us social in our behaviour: and besides, the particular affections of this sort, as compassion, natural affection, resentment against injury, love of reputation, and others, we have likewise, as hath been often observed, a disposition to love and approve goodness. And as the christian precepts to love and approve whatever is praise-worthy and truly commendable, suppose this natural determination in our minds; so they are chiefly to be understood as calls upon us to cultivate and improve this excellent disposition to its highest perfection: as calls to cultivate and improve to its highest perfection, that moral judgment, sense or conscience originally placed in us to be our guide, by which we are necessarily determined to approve virtue, and to disapprove and abominate vice. ’Tis this faculty that makes a being capable of virtue: other beings who want this sense may be good, because their affections may stand right; or they may operate naturally in their just tones and proportions towards the welfare of their species. But in order to have virtue or merit, a being must have a reflecting capacity, by which it can discern good and evil; and such a being is only virtuous in proportion as this discernment is quick, lively, uncorrupted, uniform, and steady in its influences over him. The foundation of virtue, therefore, lies in preserving this sense intire and unvitiated; that is, in daily quickening, invigorating and enlarging it by proper exercises; for if it does not improve, it must<372> degenerate. Such is its nature; nay, such indeed is the nature of all moral qualities, affections or powers. And so indeed is it universally throughout all nature; or with regard to natural, as well as moral qualities. But this hath been often taken notice of.