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"Foolish child," would Madam Luneville reply, "like the silly
bird who hiding its head in its bosom, thinks because it does not see,
it has escaped its pursuers, you hope for security from the vices
of society, by remaining ignorant of their existence. Continue
to believe the world to be such as it seems to be, all smily
courtesey & friendship -- rush into its outstretched arms & while
strained in its embrace, recieve a [??] into your bosom,
equally
certain & equally fatal will be the lot of those who trust to the love &
friendship of the world. -- Words -- mere words -- Love of self, is the only love
on which you can count with certainty -- That never fails -- never decieves
Try every ones actions by this test, & you will never be duped.
"To seek your own happiness, by destroying the happiness of another,
appears to you shocking & criminal -- yet the whole system of society,
nay of the universe depends on this very principle, & no being enjoys everything, not
even existence itself, but at the expence of some other being. According
to your moral code, what right have you to luxury, while
so many of your fellow creatures are starving with hunger & nakedness?
Go, give all you have to the poor, & seek not your own happiness, by withholding
that which would constitute the happiness of thousands. No, no, -- your
sublime morality makes no such sacrifices in reality, whatever it may do in theory -- your conscience is quite
easy on this score, while it recoils from the idea of robbing a
coxcomb of a little sleep, or more truly, of mortifying his vanity, for it is
nothing more, even tho' by so doing you may secure the blessing you
most covet. It is there miserable contradictions, & inconsistencies between the the
practice that shew a theory of religion the [??] of Philosophy, a philosophy, which unveiling
the secrets of nature, discovers self-love, or self-preservation, call it which you
will, as the vital principlle of Being. Self-Love -- remember that is my text, & a
long sermon I could preach from it, but to conclude I make an application of
what has been said, I do not say "Go, & give all you have & c & c. but I say
"Go, & be happy, for this, as your own great moral Sect declares, this
"is our being's end & aim," --