LECTURE XXI.

"He has no Statues they cry, of his Family. He "can trace no venerable Line of Ancestors.-What then! Is it "Matter of more Praife to difgrace one's illuftrious Ancestors, "than to become illuftrious by his own good Behaviour?"

C. MARIUS's ORATION TO THE ROMANS,

PRIDE was not made for Man; yet weak and imperfect as he is, he arrogates to himself honours and diftinctions. When he looks towards the heavens, he vainly fuppofes that for him alone the Sky is decorated with innumerable orbs of light; when he looks down upon the earth, he expects to receive homage and adoration. The rank which he holds in the fcale of created Beings, and that in which he is placed amongst his own Species, neither intitle him to prefume on the Goodness of God, nor to treat his Fellow creatures with infolence and contempt.

The Proud are arrogant. Having impressed

their minds with an inflated idea of their own confequence, they fupport this felf-created dignity with pomp and oftentation. In their behaviour there is an affected statelinefs mixed with difdain.

Though

Though totally inattentive to that refpect, which others have a right to receive, they are scrupulously tenacious of their own pretenfions.

Pride is of a felfish nature; because it demands from the World that reverence which it will not repay. But the contemptuous manners of proud Perfons will be reflected on themselves; becaufe every Man, in whatever rank of life, has fenfibility enough to feel a perfonal indignity. If the lower claffes of Society pay to the higher that refpect to which they are intitled, they have no right to receive, in return, infult and oppreffion.

If things are to be eftimated by their intrinfic value, how infignificant muft those objects appear, on which the proud build their importance! Rank and Fortune have no worth in themselves abstracted from perfonal merit; because they are often poffeffed by right of inheritance, not as the rewards of integrity, industry, or virtue. They are frequently the lot of the undeferving ; who, without thefe adventitious circumftances, would live and die in obfcurity. Their Follies

would pafs unobferved, and their vices unnoticed. Had they been born to a more humble condition, they would have been unknown: Whereas we now hold in veneration the names of many who have lived before us, and in paft ages, not because they were of honourable extraction, or endowed with Riches, but because

they

they had distinguished themselves by eminent Talents, employed for the benefit and inftruction. of mankind. Without the boaft of heraldry; without the comforts, and perhaps the neceffaries. of life, they have emerged from obfcurity; and will be recorded in the annals of Fame to the lateft period of time, which, in the natural course of things, will deftroy the fuperb monuments of human Pride. Of what confequence, then, are Rank and Fortune, if unaccompanied with those gifts which ennoble the mind or thofe Virtues which dignify the foul? These may add a splendour to Birth, and difpofe the Opulent to make a right application of their wealth.

But let us more particularly examine the intrinfic value of Birth and Riches, the usual supporters of Pride.

Though the rank of life, in which we are born, is, as I have before obferved, an accidental circumstance; and of itself can neither confer honour, nor ftigmatize with difgrace; yet how many are there, who boaft of a long line of Anceftry, and, on that account, claim pre-eminence and diftinction! How many are there on the other hand, who, having raised themselves from indigence, are ashamed of their Birth, and therefore endeavour to conceal it!

It might be thought envious, perhaps, in fuch as are of an inferior rank, to despise the Pride of Genealogy; or to depreciate the honour of those, who

can boaft of a long fucceffion of illuftrious Anceftors. But it has been the opinion of the wife, and of the Great themselves, if distinguished by Wifdom, as well as by Birth, that true Nobility refideth in the Soul, and that there is no dignity but in Virtue.

Though honour by defcent is confidered by fome as the most noble, yet diftinction must be more meritorious in thofe, who have acquired it by the celebrity of their actions, and by the Services they have rendered their Country. They, who receive it, in the first instance, are indebted to their Ancestors : But on the laft it is conferred as a Reward. In this cafe it should be regarded as an incentive to laudable undertakings; and the Pride of distincti on may be useful to the Community. But if their Defcendants pollute the honour that is thus derived, by a bafe and degenerate conduct, it will only dif grace them; and the Virtues of their Progenitors will not hide the depravity of their manners; but if these Virtues defcend as well as the Titles, the laft will derive a luftre from the former; otherwise they are degraded by vice, and the profligacy of their Poffeffors will be more obvious; and their examples will be more pernicious.

It appears, then, from what has been faid, that the diftinction of rank is no longer honourable, than as it is fupported by Virtues, fuitable to, and correfponding with, it. There is but one

fort of Pride that is juftifiable in Perfons, who are nobly born, and that is, the Pride of not difgracing their Birth by the meanness of their actions. If they claim respect on no other account, but because of their illuftrious defcent, they will claim that to which they are not entitled; and which the wifer part of mankind will not pay them: who confider this fort of honour, independent of perfonal merit, as a Bauble fit only to amufe little minds.

Titles were undoubtedly firft conferred as the diftinguishing badges of great and heroic deeds. But when once they are bestowed indifcriminately, are profufely distributed, and are granted as the wages of venality and corruption, which is often the cafe in Governments debilitated by luxury; they are then so far from being honourable, that they are, on the contrary, the difgraceful insignia of political fervitude.

In republican States, thefe diftinctions lofe much of their confequence. Every private citizen feels his own importance, as derived from the equality* of the Government to which he belongs.

He

* The word equality is not here used in the sense affixed to it, by fome modern political writers, because in that acceptation it is a chimera, and can neither be supported by history, or the experience of mankind. We fee the effects of an attempt to make all men equal, in the prefent democracy of France, where though one of its abstract propositions of Government is equality,

yet