342 TIIE UNLAWFULNESS OF tlELF-MURDER. heathens to justify that which the scripture forbids ? They had very little knowledge of the true God, very dark and doubtful notices of their duty to their Creator, to themselves, and to their fellow -creatures : And though the light of nature would have taught them better had they duly and carefully consulted it, yet it is evident that they actually mistook their duty in many in- stances that were obvious enough to common reason. They imagined that the destruction of a tyrant, the preservation of their country, or the mere honour of their own nation, or the guard of their real or fancied virtues, was sufficient to license and sanctify almost any practices whatsoever. They had many false and foolish notions of courage, great- ness and honour which betrayed them into real iniquities. They sent forth their armies to rob and plunder nations to satisfy their own ambition and thirst of honour : they could murder thousands of mankind in order to enlarge their bounds of empire, and for the glory of their king or of their native city: It was no wonder that men of such principles should imbrue their hands in their own blood under the influence of such sort of motives and pre- tences. Besides this, they were animated with the expectation of fame after death : Immortal memory and renown were the rewards of what they called heroic actions. And thus the hea- thens might glory in their own shame, but they are not set up for out guides or patterns. A christian must regulate his whole conduct by the law of his God, by the rules of the gospel, by the views and hopes and fears of eternal rewards or punishments, which are revealed to him in a diviner light. Let it be considered yet further, that the motives, by which some of these heathen heroes were drawn to self-destruction, are such as scarce ever come into the question now-a-days, and do by no means respect men in the ordinary situation of human life. Which of us has any view or hope or pretence to benefit thou- sands by our death ? To save anation from civil war ? To de- liver our country from the anger of God and a pestilence by offering ourselves as a sacrifice ? To sink in one ruin with the liberties of a state, which we ourselves have long supported ? These are the excuses that are made for those ancient heathens, and covered their names from infamy in such a bloody action. The history of these men, and the honour done them by pagan writers, can give nomanner of sanction to those mean and ridi- culous motives which are the occasions of self-murder in our weeklynews- papers, in the present age. The Romans them- selves would have made a jest of those, who pretended to imitate these their heroes, without being placed in the same cir- cumstances, or having equal motives ; and, as a modern writer well expresses it, " Should any tnan now have it in his power to acquaint the ghost of Cato or Brutus that there was a country
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