LECTURE XVI.

ON THE LOVE OF LIFE.

Job II. 4.

All that a man hath will he give for his life.

Of all the feelings and passions, which occur so continually as deservedly to be styled natural, the love of life is the most general, the most deeply rooted, and the most ardent. As soon as existence is felt, in the earliest dawn of infancy, nature shrinks with instinctive horror from any thing which may threaten its destruction. As we advance in age, reason and reflection serve but to strengthen this native impulse. The acuteness of pain and the feebleness of disease are regarded with aversion, not merely from the present uneasiness which they occasion, but, still more, from the termination, to which we apprehend they may lead. Bodily diseases, indeed, appear to be classed, in ge neral estimation, and probably from this cause,

according to the degree of hazard which they bring to life, and not according to the degree of suffering by which they are characterized. Some disorders, painful and wearisome in the extreme, if they are not borne with patience by the sufferer, are at any rate regarded with much indifference by the observer, if not attended with immediate danger. Whilst others, gradually and almost insensibly wearing away the strength, deservedly excite the most earnest commiseration, not so much from the actual suffering, as from the anticipated result. The advance of years, and the necessary approach of death, add but little to the fortitude with which it naturally is contemplated. Grievous as are many of the infirmities to which old age is exposed, they do not necessarily abate the love of life. The young may imagine that existence would be insupportable, if burdened with the pains of age: yet the old themselves still continue to cling with pertinacity to the remains of life, even after all, that appears in the eyes of others to render existence desirable, has long ceased.

Proportioned to our love of life, is the earnestness with which we invariably endeavour to preserve it. There is no labour, however burdensome, no privation, however irksome, but for this end it is cheerfully endured. The

close of life is, by the natural man, removed as long as possible from sight. The heart may sicken at the long delay of hope: but some faint remains still mingle with the bitter cup, which suffering humanity is often compelled to drain. Sooner than give way to absolute despair, every practicable effort will be made: "all that a man hath will he give for his life.”

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Now, there is something in this universal love of life, which appears to distinguish it essentially from all the other feelings which we experience. All our instincts, and passions, and desires, although when abused they may, and do, lead to great irregularity and great misery, yet may be so regulated as to produce much real good. They are implanted in us in order to be employed, not to be inconsiderately indulged: and they are of such a nature, that they can be legitimately gratified. Hunger and thirst may lead to gluttony and drunkenness; but the natural appetite is then perverted from its original intention. The affection of a parent towards the child may degenerate into culpable weakness: but it is only by the fondness of parental love that the helplessness of infancy could be preserved.

The same thing is true of these moral propensities, as of the mechanical contrivances of our frame. Every thing was at first prepared

for a peculiar purpose: and if any inconvenience is experienced, if any thing goes wrong, we may be sure that it arises, either from improper use, or from natural decay, and not from any inherent defect in the design. Nothing is made on purpose to cause biconve nience or pain; no desire implanted which must necessarily and continually be frustrated.

But the strongest of all passions, the love of life, appears in some degree to form an exception to this general rule of beneficent design. Much good, no doubt, arises from it during life: for by its operation individuals are preserved from danger, and from destruction. But still, as long as the sentence, "it is appointed unto all men once to die," is suspended over the human race, so long is the love of life an instinctive feeling which, at the very time we experience it, we know must sooner or later be violated.—There is also something very peculiar in the dread of death in man. In the animal creation, it is true, instinct is especially active in the preservation of life, and in guarding from any thing which may endanger it. But this instinct performs its natural office, and no more. It does not become, what it very frequently is in man, a source of fearful apprehension of future evil. Death comes upon the beasts of the field unexpectedly,

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and therefore deprived of half its terrors. It overtakes man, if he has hope only in this life, long feared, and long anticipated; overpowering all his efforts, opposing all his desires.

Now, compare this necessity of submitting to so dreaded an enemy, with the usual course of God's merciful providence.

Pain is allowed to be a great corporeal evil: and, with the exception of some peculiar cases, in which the final cause is explained by reason, and by revelation, it may usually be traced to the derangement, or decay, of some part of our bodily frame. But suppose, that, upon the inspection of some animated frame, we detected an elaborate contrivance for the production of excruciating pain, should we not conclude that this arose from some evil source; that this exception to all the other works of creation was not the original production of that all-good and all-wise Being, by whom we have been so fearfully and wonderfully made?

Or, again, if in the very midst of a machine, which we knew had been once successfully contrived for long continued motion, we observed, upon a closer inspection, a series of preconcerted devices, by the action of which that motion must, after a certain short period, inevitably cease, should we not be certain that these had been introduced by some foreign