and patron may
flatter himself that all his grief arises from generous sentiments,
without any mixture of narrow or interested considerations: but a
man that grieves for a valuable friend, who needed his patronage and
protection; how can we suppose, that his passionate tenderness arises
from some metaphysical regards to a self-interest, which has no
foundation or reality? We may as well imagine that minute wheels and
springs, like those of a watch, give motion to a loaded waggon, as
account for the origin of passion from such abstruse reflections.

Animals are found susceptible of kindness, both to their own species and
to ours; nor is there, in this case, the least suspicion of disguise or
artifice. Shall we account for all THEIR sentiments, too, from refined
deductions of self-interest? Or if we admit a disinterested benevolence
in the inferior species, by what rule of analogy can we refuse it in the
superior?

Love between the sexes begets a complacency and good-will, very distinct
from the gratification of an appetite. Tenderness to their offspring,
in all sensible beings, is commonly able alone to counter-balance the
strongest motives of self-love, and has no manner of dependance on that
affection. What interest can a fond mother have in view, who loses
her health by assiduous attendance on her sick child, and afterwards
languishes and dies of grief, when freed, by its death, from the slavery
of that attendance?

Is gratitude no affection of the human breast, or is that a word merely,
without any meaning or reality? Have we no satisfaction in one man's
company above another's, and no desire of the welfare of our friend,
even though absence or death should prevent us from all participation in
it? Or what is it commonly, that gives us any participation in it, even
while alive and present, but our affection and regard to him?

These and a thousand other instances are marks of a general benevolence
in human nature, where no REAL interest binds us to the object. And how
an IMAGINARY interest known and avowed for such, can be the origin of
any passion or emotion, seems difficult to explain. No satisfactory
hypothesis of this kind has yet been discovered; nor is there the
smallest probability that the future industry of men will ever be
attended with more favourable success.

But farther, if we consider rightly of the matter, we shall find that
the hypothesis which allows of a disinterested benevolence, distinct
fro