and the moral sense, come at last to be honoured and esteemed in an eminent manner, and consequently to incite men from mere vanity and ambition to seek the praise of humility. And the ridicule and shame which attend vanity, pride, and self-conceit, concur to the same purpose; which is a remarkable instance of the inconsistency of one part of our frame with itself, as the case now stands, and of the tendency of vice to check and destroy itself.
From the whole of what has been delivered upon this class of pleasures and pains, one may draw the following corollaries.
Cor. I. All the things in which men pride themselves, and for which they desire to be taken notice of by others, are either means of happiness, or have some near relation to it. And indeed it is not at all uncommon to see persons take pains to make others believe that they are happy, by affirming it in express terms. Now this, considered as a mere matter of fact, occurring to attentive observation, might lead one to conclude, that the pleasures of honour and ambition are not of an original, instinctive, implanted nature, but derived from the other pleasures of human life, by the association of these into various parcels, where the several ingredients are so mixed amongst one another, as hardly to be discernible separately. The young, the gay, and the polite, are ambitious of being thought beautiful, rich, high-born, witty, &c. The grave, the learned, the afflicted, the religious, &c. seek the praise of wisdom and knowledge, or to be esteemed for piety and charity; every one according to his opinions of these things, as the sources, marks, or offsprings of happiness. And when men boast of their poverty, low birth, ignorance, or vice, it is always in such circumstances, with such additions and contrasts, or under such restrictions, as that the balance, upon the whole, may, some way or other, be the more in their favour on that account.
Cor. II. Praise and shame are made use of by parents and governors, as chief motives and springs of action; and it becomes matter of praise, to a child, to be influenced by praise, and deterred by shame; and matter of reproach, to be insensible in these respects. And thus it comes to pass, that praise and shame have a strong reflected influence upon themselves; and that praise begets the love of praise, and shame increases the fear of shame. Now, though the original praise, commendation, blame, censure, &c. of good parents and preceptors, extend only, for the most part, to acquired accomplishments and defects, and particularly to virtue and vice; yet the secondary influence will affect men in respect of all sorts of encomiums and censures, of every thing that comes under the same denomination, that is associated with, or tied up by, the same words. Though the preceptor direct his pupil only to regard the judgment of the wise and good, still there are so many like circumstances attending the judgment of others, that it will be regarded something the
