from the most careless and precipitate examination. Superficial
reasoners, indeed, observing many false pretences among mankind,
and feeling, perhaps, no very strong restraint in their own
disposition, might draw a general and a hasty conclusion that all
is equally corrupted, and that men, different from all other
animals, and indeed from all other species of existence, admit of
no degrees of good or bad, but are, in every instance, the same
creatures under different disguises and appearances.

There is another principle, somewhat resembling the former; which
has been much insisted on by philosophers, and has been the
foundation of many a system; that, whatever affection one may
feel, or imagine he feels for others, no passion is, or can be
disinterested; that the most generous friendship, however
sincere, is a modification of self-love; and that, even unknown
to ourselves, we seek only our own gratification, while we appear
the most deeply engaged in schemes for the liberty and happiness
of mankind. By a turn of imagination, by a refinement of
reflection, by an enthusiasm of passion, we seem to take part in
the interests of others, and imagine ourselves divested of all
selfish considerations: but, at bottom, the most generous patriot
and most niggardly miser, the bravest hero and most abject
coward, have, in every action, an equal regard to their own
happiness and welfare.

Whoever concludes from the seeming tendency of this opinion, that
those, who make profession of it, cannot possibly feel the true
sentiments of benevolence, or have any regard for genuine virtue,
will often find himself, in practice, very much mistaken. Probity
and honour were no strangers to Epicurus and his sect. Atticus