The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 2 (of 9): Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and PrivateJefferson, Thomas
History
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 2 (of 9): Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private
Jefferson, Thomas
United States -- Politics and government -- 1775-1783; United States -- Politics and government -- 1783-1865
3. Moral Philosophy. I think it lost time to attend lectures on this
branch. He who made us would have been a pitiful bungler, if he had
made the rules of our moral conduct a matter of science. For one man of
science, there are thousands who are not. What would have become of them?
Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be formed
to this object. He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong, merely
relative to this. This sense is as much a part of his nature, as the sense
of hearing, seeing, feeling; it is the true foundation of morality, and
not the το χαλον, truth, &c., as fanciful writers have imagined. The
moral sense, or conscience, is as much a part of man as his leg or arm. It
is given to all human beings in a stronger or weaker degree, as force of
members is given them in a greater or less degree. It may be strengthened
by exercise, as may any particular limb of the body. This sense is
submitted, indeed, in some degree, to the guidance of reason; but it is
a small stock which is required for this: even a less one than what we
call common sense. State a moral case to a ploughman and a professor. The
former will decide it as well, and often better than the latter, because
he has not been led astray by artificial rules. In this branch, therefore,
read good books, because they will encourage, as well as direct your
feelings. The writings of Sterne, particularly, form the best course of
morality that ever was written. Besides these, read the books mentioned in
the enclosed paper; and, above all things, lose no occasion of exercising
your dispositions to be grateful, to be generous, to be charitable, to
be humane, to be true, just, firm, orderly, courageous, &c. Consider
every act of this kind, as an exercise which will strengthen your moral
faculties and increase your worth.
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