may have its due exertion, it is neceffary that the understanding be free, and, confequently, unhampered by established authority. Reafon cannot abide the "balm of fuperftition." It is that which perplexes it and renders it unhappy.

Our author afferts, page 392, that "the beft feelings of mankind are the refult of prejudice. And finding enthufiafm, "that fine delirium of the foul," oppofed by reafon, fcruples not to call the latter " a cold, and till of late, ineffectual fceptic, that would rob us of all our blifs."

Now what are the best feelings of mankind? Are they not fuch as coincide with his most just and most enlarged conceptions? Are not genuine devotion and univerfal benevolence, the sources of men's most exalted and pureft delights? Devotion and benevolence confift in loving and refembling that Being who is free from all partiality and prejudice. Prejudice the fource of the beft feelings! Who knows not, on the contrary, that it is the fource of the worft diforders in fociety? Alarmed as our author appears at the innovation of reafon, and the fuccefs it is obtaining over prejudice and enthusiasm; he is, perhaps, not lefs novel, though fufficiently unreasonable in his affertions, that he might oppofe its inroads. It is conviction which is the genuine fpring of the best and fineft feelings. Where this is wanting, the affections are either fluctuating or difordered, or fixed in fome erroneous purfuit. Error rafhly fixed, conftitutes prejudice; which is, therefore, the direct and well known opponent of conviction. The latter can rarely find place where the former is previously harboured. They are, indeed, things diametrically oppofite, and cannot co-exist in the fame mind on the fame fubject. Confequently, the feelings which refult from each of them, must be of natures no lefs oppofite. And whereas thofe which arife from, conviction, cannot but be among the best and fineft feelin

p

ings of mankind; thofe which refult from prejudice muft reasonably be expected to rank among the worst and coarfeft of them.

But enthufiafm, "that fine delirium of the foul," is its offspring. Till now, I had always understood a delirious perfon to be one of the moft wretched and unhappy of mortals. That delirious feelings are among the fineft, is furely a doctrine not less novel and strange, than any of thofe which have been fuggefted even by "chemical moralifts." Enthusiasm is, in fact, no other than a diforderly ftate of the paffions. We ever, in common language, regard an enthusiast as one whofe mind is overheated by fome prejudice. None will deny that the paffions are liable to extreme diforders; but few will affert, either that this diforderly ftate is the moft delightful, or that to let them continue in that ftate, is the beft means of preferving them in their genuine vigour. Moft will allow that here the falutary aid of reafon must be called in; not, indeed, to effect their extermination, but rather, left they fhould exterminate each other.

It is true the term reafon, like most other words, is liable to abufe. Perhaps it ought to be conceded, that this term has been, in fome refpects, confiderably abused by fome late moralifts. Reafon, or the human underftanding, is not defigned to operate against any other laws of our nature, but in perfect conformity with them. Reafon is cool, impartial reflection. The various objects of the paffions are thus carefully contemplated, and their comparative worth eftimated. By This means the paffions are duly regulated; their ardour in purfuit of particular objects is, perhaps, often abated. But this is becaufe thofe objects are not worthy of being fo ardently purfued-because nobler objects may, amidst this eagerness, be forgotten or neglected; and becaufe the too eager purfuit of any object is liable to nd in difappointment. What will be the refult? Will

un

any

any of the fympathies of our nature be thus deftroyed? will even felf-love, the most homely of all the paffions, ceafe? No; its ufurpations will be prevented. It will be kept at home to be purified by the fprings of kindred affections, patriotifin, and benevolence. It is becaufe the inferior paffions are fo apt to ufurp an unrighteous dominion, that the aid of reafon is fo neceffary. Befides, were it not for reflection, man must remain an entire ftranger to the most exalted and lafting enjoyments. If we do not reflect, we must be led by fenfe, and remain ignorant of those objects which reflection brings to our knowledge. Our pleasures, therefore, must be fenfual, grofs, and of fhort conti. nuance. Let reflection be employed, and an endlefs field of improvement in knowledge and virtue will be prefented. But let imagination be indulged without reftraint, and many unreal beings and doctrines may quickly be conjured up; prejudices will be formed, fuperftition will occupy the place of fublime truth, and enthufiafm will be plentifully kindled. Instead of this, let calm and patient inveftigation be exercifed, and many real, though invifible objects, will be prefented; truth will be feparated from fanciful delufions; fuper. ftition itself will be difpelled, and the fublimeft truths being clearly diftinguished, will elevate the human mind, and implant in it the feeds of lafting and increafing felicity.

Our author feems to speak of morality as a thing dif tinct from reafon; and as the proper corrective of fenfe. It appears fomewhat difficult to determine, precifely, the meaning which he affixes to the terms fenfe and morality. It is not improbable that he was become fomewhat aware of the truly alarming confequences of his fcheme of banishing reafon from human nature, and was defirous of concealing a certain portion, or modification of it, under the term morality. For whatever has nothing of reafon in its compofition, can be only the mere fuggeftions of fenfe, or of a wanVOL. II,

F f

dering

dering difordered imagination. Morality implies a law, ́or standard of right, by which human beings are to act. But how can that standard of right be discerned, and aptly applied, without reafon? Nay, what is the perception, or application of that standard, but that very exercise of the mind which we call reasoning?

In the following paragraph our author proceeds to argue against fyftems of morality as human inventions. Human nature, he afferts, "trufts for its fupport to the independant illuminations of mind." But why fhould mankind truft to illuminations independant of proper means? The Divine Being has, indeed, been pleased to reveal many fublime truths, which reflect great light on their prefent nature and circumstances. For what purpofe is this revelation given them, except to call forth the right exercife of their powers? Not, furely, to operate in any way to the exclusion of them; not independant of them, but by means of the influence of thofe truths upon them. With refpect to fyftems of morality, they certainly ought to be guided by revelation. But if true, they are not fuperfeded by it; but, on the contrary, derive from it additional force. To furnish us with reafons and motives fufficient to prompt us earnestly to fearch for a rule of right with refpect to every action, word, and thought, is the great object of revelation. To deduce a number of rules of moral life, from the joint light of nature and of revelation, cannot but be productive of good.

crs.

The fyftem of morality to which our author feems chiefly to allude, is that propofed by modern unbelievSome of their principles are fufficiently abfurd, and particularly this, which he quotes from Mr. Godwin's Political Juftice. "We are fick and subject to death, merely because, in a certain fenfe, we confent to fuffer thefe accidents." But furely this is not the cafe, because mortality is, we know by fad experience, the prefent law of our nature. And though mortality will, finally,

finally, be fwallowed up of life, yet this will not be through the energy of our own wills, but through the good pleasure of that Being, who alone has the laws of nature under his controul. There was, however, no need of abandoning reafon in order to encounter fuch an abfurd chimera. Mr. Godwin may afcribe his new difcovery to the powers of reafon, unfhackled by reli-` gious creeds; but those who perceive its abfurdity, will efteem the term, reafon, abuted by fuch an application of it. And Chriftians may regard this as an appropriate instance, that reafon cannot, even in fpite of its moft vigourous efforts, maintain the helm, unaffifted by revelation.

Sept. 9, 1797.

DESCRIPTION

OF THE

IMPERIAL BOTANIC GARDEN.

T. P.

BY ROBERT TOWNSON, L. L. D. F. R. S.

TH

HIS is only an hour's walk from Vienna; and in the fevere winter of 1793, I often went there to enjoy the beauties of a tropical climate. What a pleafing contraft, when, from being battered with driving fleet, or covered with fnow in my way thither, whilst the vegetable world was dead, and the very earth was hid by fnow from my fight, I stepped into thefe hothouses, rich with odours, and adorned with the rarest palms.

These hot houfes, I believe, are the fineft in Europe. One range is ninety yards long and thirty feet high within another range nearly as high, and above a hundred yards long-part of this is a green-house: and three more ranges of hot-houses, each about eighty yards long, but much lower than the former; and, laftly, two or three small green-houses, in one of which