![]() ![]() Hence it is, that the making of laws supposes all men naturally wicked and the surest mark of virtue is, the observation of laws that are virtuous: If therefore we would look for virtue in a nation, we must look for it in the nature of government the name and model of their religion being no certain symptom nor cause of their virtue. The truth is, and it is a melancholy truth, that where human laws do not tie men’s hands from wickedness, religion too seldom does and the most certain security which we have against violence, is the security of the laws. Nay, the peaceable, the beneficent, the forgiving Christian religion, is made the cause of perpetual hatred, animosity, quarrels, violence, devastation, and oppression and the apostles, in spite of all their poverty, disinterestedness, and love of mankind, are made to justify their pretended successors of the Church of Rome, in engrossing to themselves the wealth and power of the earth and in bringing mankind under a yoke of servitude, more terrible, more expensive, and more severe, than all the arts and delusions of paganism could ever bring them under: Of so much more force with the corrupt world are the destructive villainies and falsifications of men, than the benevolent and heavenly precepts of Jesus Christ. The general practice of the world is an open contradiction and contempt of this excellent, this divine rule which alone, were it observed, would restore honesty and happiness to mankind, who, in their present state of corruption, are for ever dealing treacherously or outrageously with one another, out of an ill-judging fondness for themselves. It shews the violent bent of human nature to evil, that even the Christian religion has not been able to tame the restless appetites of men, always pushing them into enormities and violences, in direct opposition to the spirit and declarations of the gospel, which commands us to do unto all men what we would have all men do unto us. It cannot but be irksome to a good-natured man, to find that there is nothing so terrible or mischievous, but human nature is capable of it and yet he who knows little of human nature, will never know much of the affairs of the world, which every where derive their motion and situation from the humours and passions of men. ![]() SIR, The study of human nature has, ever since I could study any thing, been a principal pleasure and employment of mine a study as useful, as the discoveries made by it are for the most part melancholy. Considerations on the Weakness and Inconsistencies of Human Nature ![]()
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