d if we go no
further, does there appear any absurdity in this? Will any one take upon
him to say that a man cannot find his account in this general course of
life as much as in the most unbounded ambition, and the excesses of
pleasure? Or that such a person has not consulted so well for himself,
for the satisfaction and peace of his own mind, as the ambitious or
dissolute man? And though the consideration that God himself will in the
end justify their taste, and support their cause, is not formally to be
insisted upon here, yet thus much comes in, that all enjoyments whatever
are much more clear and unmixed from the assurance that they will end
well. Is it certain, then, that there is nothing in these pretensions to
happiness? especially when there are not wanting persons who have
supported themselves with satisfactions of this kind in sickness,
poverty, disgrace, and in the very pangs of death; whereas it is manifest
all other enjoyments fail in these circumstances. This surely looks
suspicions of having somewhat in it. Self-love, methinks, should be
alarmed. May she not possibly pass over greater pleasures than those she
is so wholly taken up with?

The short of the matter is no more than this. Happiness consists in the
gratification of certain affections, appetites, passions, with objects
which are by nature adapted to them. Self-love may indeed set us on work
to gratify these, but happiness or enjoyment has no immediate connection
with self-love, but arises from such gratification alone. Love of our
neighbour is one of those affections. This, considered as a _virtuous
principle_, is gratified by a consciousness of _endeavouring_ to promote
the good of others, but considered as a natural affection, its
gratification consists in the actual accomplishment of this endeavour.
Now indulgence or gratification of this affection, whether in that
consciousness or this accomplishment, has the same respect to interest as
indulgence of any other affection; they equally proceed from or do not
proceed from self-love, they equally include or equally exclude this
principle. Thus it appears, that _benevolence and the pursuit of public
good hath at least as great respect to self-love and the pursuit of
private good as any other particular passions_, _and their respective
pursuits_.

Neither is covetousness, whether as a temper or pursuit, any exception to
this. For if by covetousness is meant the desire and pursuit of r