| For the same reason, a thief, who steals In by a ladder at a window, and takes all imaginable care to cause no disturbance, is in no respect criminal. |
| For either he will not be perceived, or if he be, it is impossible he can produce any error, nor will any one, from these circumstances, take him to be other than what he really is. |
| It is well known, that those who are squint-sighted, do very readily cause mistakes in others, and that we Imagine they salute or are talking to one person, while they address themselves to anther. |
| Are they therefore, upon that account, immoral? |
| Besides, we may easily observe, that in all those arguments there is an evident reasoning in a circle. |
| A person who takes possession of another's goods, and uses them as his own, in a manner declares them to be his own; and this falshood is the source of the immorality of injustice. |
| But is property, or right, or obligation, intelligible, without an antecedent morality? |
| A man that is ungrateful to his benefactor, in a manner affirms, that he never received any favours from him. |
| But in what manner? Is it because it is his duty to be grateful? But this supposes, that there is some antecedent rule of duty and morals. |
| Is it because human nature is generally grateful, and makes us conclude, that a man who does any harm never received any favour from the person he harmed? But human nature is not so generally grateful, as to justify such a conclusion. |
| Or if it were, is an exception to a general rule in every case criminal, for no other reason than because it is an exception? |
| But what may suffice entirely to destroy this whimsical system is, that it leaves us under the same difficulty to give a reason why truth is virtuous and falshood vicious, as to account for the merit or turpitude of any other action. |
| I shall allow, if you please, that all immorality is derived from this supposed falshood in action, provided you can give me any plausible reason, why such a falshood is immoral. |
| If you consider rightly of the matter, you will find yourself in the same difficulty as at the beginning. |
| This last argument is very conclusive; because, if there be not an evident merit or turpitude annexed to this species of truth or falahood, It can never have any influence upon our actions. |
| For, who ever thought of forbearing any action, because others might possibly draw false conclusions from it? Or, who ever performed any, that he might give rise to true conclusions?] |
| Thus upon the whole, it is impossible, that the distinction betwixt moral good and evil, can be made to reason; since that distinction has an influence upon our actions, of which reason alone is incapable. |
| Reason and judgment may, indeed, be the mediate cause of an action, by prompting, or by directing a passion: But it is not pretended, that a judgment of this kind, either in its truth or falshood, is attended with virtue or vice. |
| And as to the judgments, which are caused by our judgments, they can still less bestow those moral qualities on the actions, which are their causes. |
| But to be more particular, and to shew, that those eternal immutable fitnesses and unfitnesses of things cannot be defended by sound philosophy, we may weigh the following considerations. |
| If the thought and understanding were alone capable of fixing the boundaries of right and wrong, the character of virtuous and vicious either must lie in some relations of objects, or must be a matter of fact, which is discovered by our reasoning. |