every habit or sentiment or faculty, which, if ascribed to any
person, implies either praise or blame, and may enter into any
panegyric or satire of his character and manners. The quick
sensibility, which, on this head, is so universal among mankind,
gives a philosopher sufficient assurance, that he can never be
considerably mistaken in framing the catalogue, or incur any
danger of misplacing the objects of his contemplation: he needs
only enter into his own breast for a moment, and consider whether
or not he should desire to have this or that quality ascribed to
him, and whether such or such an imputation would proceed from a
friend or an enemy. The very nature of language guides us almost
infallibly in forming a judgement of this nature; and as every
tongue possesses one set of words which are taken in a good
sense, and another in the opposite, the least acquaintance with
the idiom suffices, without any reasoning, to direct us in
collecting and arranging the estimable or blameable qualities of
men. The only object of reasoning is to discover the
circumstances on both sides, which are common to these qualities;
to observe that particular in which the estimable qualities agree
on the one hand, and the blameable on the other; and thence to
reach the foundation of ethics, and find those universal
principles, from which all censure or approbation is ultimately
derived. As this is a question of fact, not of abstract science,
we can only expect success, by following the experimental method,
and deducing general maxims from a comparison of particular
instances. The other scientific method, where a general abstract
principle is first established, and is afterwards branched out
into a variety of inferences and conclusions, may be more perfect
in itself, but suits less the imperfection of human nature, and
is a common source of illusion and mistake in this as well as in