evil may be a legitimate object of desire. It is right, therefore, to desire that thieves and murderers may be detected and punished, as a means of promoting the happiness of other moral beings. The same is true of all sins which are appropriate objects of the Divine displeasure. The conviction and punishment of sinners, is doubtless desirable, considered with relation to the universe of moral beings, on the same ground that the punishment of thieves and robbers is desirable, considered with relation to civil communities.

As long as men do right, their interests are in perfect harmony with those of other moral beings. When, by doing wrong, they diminish the possible happiness of other beings, it is just that they should suffer, to repair their voluntary injury of others; and that having brought their interests. into collision with those of others, theirs should be sacrificed, and the interests of others secured. All morally good actions are legitimate objects of desire. We ought to desire to perform them ourselves, and to have others perform them. Acts of benevolence, justice, and veracity are of this description. These acts all agree in being conducive to the happiness of the agents and of other moral beings, who act on the same principles. They may involve the unhappiness of moral agents, but they cannot involve the ultimate unhappiness of any that are morally good.

Morally good actions do not cease to be desirable in cases where they involve the misery of the morally evil, because in these cases, as in all others, their effects are, on the whole, favorable to the happiness, both of the subjects and other holy beings.

CHAPTER V.

IS MISERY IN ANY CASE AN OBJECT OF DELIGHT?

§ 462. In the foregoing exposition of the emotions and affections, the capacity of taking delight in the happiness of others, and of experiencing pain from their distress, has been distinctly exhibited. In one condition and under one limitation, men have been described as capable of desiring the unhappiness of others; that is, in the punishment of moral wrongs. This seems to imply that under such conditions, men are capable of taking delight in the misery of others. What is the fact? Is misery inflicted in the punishment of moral wrongs, an object of delight? Is it possible for the human mind to find pleasure in it? And if possible, is it right? The object of pleasure is good. Things are good as ultimate ends, or as means to other ends. Happiness is an object of delight as an ultimate effect, in cases where it has no subserviency to other ends. As there must be an ultimate cause on which all causes depend, so there must be an ultimate effect, in which all effects terminate, and to which they all contribute. The ultimate effect of all good actions, is happiness; that of all evil actions, is misery. All the objects of our delight, therefore, are summarily comprehended in happiness, and the means of happiness; and the objects of our distress in misery and the means of misery. Is this a general law, or is the case above referred to an exception? The question is a question of facts, to be determined by observation and experience.

§ 463. Happiness is an object of delight on its own account; and many other things as means of happiness. How is it with suffering, inflicted on the wicked? Is it delighted in on its own account? Or as a means to some more remote good? Take, for example, the punishment of a child by a parent. The child has done wrong, and is subjected to punishment. That punishment involves pain or suffering of some kind. Does the parent delight in the pain of his suffering child, because those sufferings are of a penal character? Does it give him pleasure to see his child suffer as the just reward of his evil doing? The entire human race answers, no. The loving parent can find nothing in

trinsically delightful in the sufferings of a sinful child. The idea that they are deserved, does not make them delightful. I speak of the thing as it is, and as all parents know it to be. As a matter of fact, kind and good parents take no pleasure in the infliction of punishments upon their children, nor in the penal sufferings of their children, however much they may have been deserved. The ends of punishment, as administered by wise and good parents, are all prospective, never, in the least degree, retrospective; nor intrinsic to the suffering inflicted.

In the infliction of punishments, parents consult for the future good both of their children and families; and they do this on the principle that there is an essential harmony of interests, so that the same things which are for the greatest good of the child, are in no case prejudicial to the essential interests of the family; and the same things which are necessary to the greatest good of the family, are in no case prejudicial to the essential interests of the child. As a necessary means of future good, the penal sufferings of a child may be objects of pleasure to a loving parent, but on no other conceivable condition.

§ 464. We will take for our next example the punishment of a malefactor by the state. For a gross violation of the rights of a fellow-man, and the infliction of a great personal injury, a malefactor is tried, condemned, and punished by the authority of the state. The entire people contemplate the transaction with pleasure, and pronounce it right. The punishment involves the infliction of severe suffering, and in being pleased with it, the people are pleased with the misery of a fellow-man. But in what point of view are they pleased with it? Is it because the man has got his pay for an evil deed? Is the suffering of the malefactor in itself considered, as an ultimate end, the object of the people's delight? Why, then, does not the parent delight in the penal sufferings of an offending child, because in those sufferings he gets his pay for his evil deeds? But whatever is the nature of the delight of individuals in the punishment of a malefactor, the wise and good, and all who sincerely love that malefactor, will take no pleasure in his sufferings only as a means of future good. Punishments inflicted by the state are expedients for promoting the good of the state, and are adapted also in the highest degree, to promote the good of the criminal, by bringing him to consideration and

repentance. Viewed as means of good, good men, and the friends of the criminal, can be reconciled to them, and find pleasure in them; but they cannot be intelligently reconciled to them on any other supposition.

God declares that he has no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, and we are fully authorized to believe, that in the infliction of eternal punishments, he is governed by the same principles of regard to the beneficial and necessary ends, which are requisite to justify the administration either of parental or civil punishments, in this world. We find, therefore, that in these great departments of government, the government of the family, the government of the state, and the government of God, there is no necessity for delight in misery, on its own account, or considered as an end; and that in the family, this affection cannot prevail, that in the state it cannot prevail among the wise and good, and the friends of the criminal, and that God expressly disclaims it, and declares, in the most explicit manner, that it has no place in his mind of infinite love.

§ 466. But one case still remains to be considered, that of revenge, retaliation, and malicious injuries. Does the human mind in these cases find any delight in the misery which it produces ? Take the ancient law of retaliation. If a man destroyed the eye of his neighbor, that neighbor was allowed to destroy his eye in return. Could the most revengeful man find any delight in the infliction of this injury? Undoubtedly he could. For this is but a type of all injuries, more severe than some, and less severe than others. But what is the source and nature of this delight? And is it rational or irrational? Holy or unholy? We will put another case by the side of it. A boy stubs his toe violently against a stone, which occasions him intense pain; he takes another stone and breaks the stone which did him the injury, to atoms, and feels a little relief from his pain. This boy is a rational being, and his conduct is to be accounted for on rational principles. The pleasure which he feels in demolishing a stone that did him injury, is perfectly analogous to that which a revengeful and enraged man feels in destroying the eye of his enemy.

What is the nature of the boy's pleasure in demolishing a stone? He views it as the intelligent and designing cause of his pain, and he demolishes it to get relief. Having demolished it, by an influence of the imagination, he feels re

lieved. Having experienced this relief once, he is induced to try it again; and perhaps will practice it habitually. The revengeful man is in distress, from a real or supposed injury. His agony is in many cases intense, and demands relief. He inflicts on his adversary an injury similar to that which his adversary had inflicted on him, as a means of relieving his own distress. He imagines that he shall get some relief from it. He makes the experiment, and through the influence of his imagination is a little relieved; his attention is diverted from himself, and is occupied with other objects. Having commenced this course, he perseveres in it, and his revengeful disposition grows upon him by ex

ercise.

§ 467. Revenge is not natural, in the degree to which it is ordinarily developed. It is a plant of cultivation; and may be entirely eradicated. It is denounced in the Scriptures, and reprobated by wise and good men, as a sin. Many seem to suppose that some degree of it is not sinful, and have enrolled it among the virtues, and attributed it to the infinite Jehovah, under the title of vindictive justice. But God acknowledges no such attribute; and properly interpreted, the Scriptures teach that his character is the perfect reverse of this. The holy men who indulge this affection, and justify it, are liable to that noble rebuke of the Saviour to his apostles, when they wished to call down fire from heaven, to revenge an insult offered to him; "Ye know not what spirit ye are of. For the Son of Man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." This is not a solitary passage, in which revenge is made the object of unqualified condemnation. The Scriptures do not condemn excessive revenge merely; they condemn all revenge; and spare neither root nor branch of this disposition. The declaration that vengeance is God's, and that he will repay fury to his adversaries, and recompense to the enemies of all his creatures, does not imply that God is revengeful, or that his punishments are vindictive. It only implies that his punishments are certain, and adaquate to accomplish all the legitimate purposes of punishment, so that every private wrong may be safely left to him to be completely rectified.

§ 468. We infer, therefore, that even in revenge the human mind finds no good in the misery of a fellow-being, but adopts an erroneous expedient for self-relief; and we