Page:Observations on Man 1834.djvu/265

 may arrive at a far more precise interpretation of prophecy. It may also be, that much philosophical knowledge is concealed in the Scriptures; and that it will be revealed in its due time. The analogy between the word and works of God, which is a consideration of the religious kind, seems to comprehend the most important truths. To all this it must be added, that the temper of mind prescribed by religion, viz. modesty, impartiality, sobriety, and diligence, are the best qualifications for succeeding in all inquiries. Thus religion comprehends, as it were, all other knowledge, advances, and is advanced by all; at the same time that where there is a morally good disposition, a very small portion of other knowledge is sufficient for the attainment of all that is necessary for virtue and comfort here, and eternal happiness hereafter.

The great differences of opinion, and contentions which happen in religious matters, are plainly owing to the violence of men’s passions, more than to any other cause. Where religion has its due effect in restraining these, and begetting true candour, we may expect an unity of opinion, both in religious and other matters, as far as is necessary for useful practical purposes.

Section III
OF THE AFFECTIONS IN GENERAL.



we may observe,

First, That our passions or affections can be no more than aggregates of simple ideas united by association. For they are excited by objects, and by the incidents of life. But these, if we except the impressed sensations, can have no power of affecting us, but what they derive from association; just as was observed above of words and sentences.

Secondly, Since therefore the passions are states of considerable pleasure or pain, they must be aggregates of the ideas, or traces of the sensible pleasures and pains, which ideas make up by their number, and mutual influence upon one another, for the faintness and transitory nature of each singly taken. This may be called a proof à priori. The proof à posteriori will be given, when I come to analyse the six classes of intellectual affections, viz. imagination, ambition, self-interest, sympathy, theopathy, and the moral sense.