hers, and are thus disposed to approve the same
conduct in ourselves: what we praise as judges of our fellow-men, we
deem praise-worthy, and aspire to realize in our own conduct. Some men
may differ from us, and may withhold that praise; we may be pained at
the circumstance, but we adhere to our love of the praise-worthy, even
when it does not bring the praise. When we obtain the praise we are
pleased, and strengthened in our estimate; the approbation that we
receive confirms our self-approbation, but does not give birth to it.
In short, there are two principles at work within us. We are pleased
with approbation, and pained by reproach: we are farther pleased if the
approbation coincides with what we approve when we are ourselves acting
as judges of other men. The two dispositions vary in their strength in
individuals, confirming each other when in concert, thwarting each
other when opposed. The author has painted a number of striking
situations arising out of their conflict. He enquires why we are more
pained by unmerited reproach, than lifted up by unmerited approbation;
and assigns as the reason that the painful state is more pungent than
the corresponding pleasurable state. He shows how those men whose
productions are of uncertain merit, as poets, are more the slaves of
approbation, than the authors of unmistakeable discoveries in science.
In the extreme cases of unmerited reproach, he points out the appeal to
the all-seeing Judge of the world, and to a future state rightly
conceived; protesting, however, against the view that would reserve the
celestial regions for monks and friars, and condemn to the infernal,
all the heroes, statesmen, poets, and philosophers of former ages; all
the inventors of the useful arts; the protectors, instructors, and
benefactors of mankind; and all those to whom our natural sense of
praise-worthiness forces us to ascribe the highest merit and most
exalted virtue.

Chapter III. is 'On the influence and authority of Conscience;' another
long chapter, occupied more with moral reflections of a practical kind
than with the following out of the analysis of our moral sentiment.
Conceding that the testimony of the supposed impartial spectator does
not of itself always support a man, he yet asserts its influence to be
great, and that by it alone we can see what relates to ourselves in the
proper shape and dimensions. It is only in this way that we can prefer
the interest of many to the interest