to his father's patronage; and the result of this recommendation soon appeared on the appointment of the former to the living of Houghton, near Darlington, and of Secker to that of Houghtonle-Spring. This was three years after Butler's nomination as preacher at the Rolls; and henceforth for some time he divided his residence between the Rolls and his parochial benefice. Four years later he received, through the representation, it is said, of Secker, the living of Stanhope, one of the richest and the best in England, and hereupon, soon afterwards, he resigned his preachership at the Rolls, and went to reside in the country. Shortly before this he published his celebrated fifteen sermons. The first three of these sermons especially, contain those ethical views with which his name has been so prominently associated; and there are few facts more remarkable than the powerful influence exerted by these brief and unsystematic compositions on the course of ethical inquiry in this country. They appear, with the others, to have been preached in the regular course of his ministry at the Rolls. They are written obviously on a preconceived and definite plan of thought, but without any great elaboration, or strict consecutiveness of reasoning. They are really sermons, in short, and not treatises, and this is always to be borne in mind in judging them as a whole, and in relation to a connected theory of morals. It is plain, moreover, that they were meant to have a polemical bearing, although, as is Butler's habit, this bearing is very indirectly expressed. It is in the notes, and not in the text that it appears. The allusions in the former to the views of Hobbes, show that Butler had these views before him, and that he aimed to meet them from a higher and more comprehensive study of human nature. Whatever may be the absolute value of the theory of morals implied in Butler's sermons, there are few who will be disposed to deny their success as directed against the selfish system of Hobbes. Taking his stand on the facts of human nature, he clearly proves that these facts are at variance with such a system. It neither exhausts them, nor so far rightly interprets them. Self-love is indeed a true element of human nature; but so also is benevolence. There is a principle in man which just as directly seeks the good of his fellow-creatures, as there is a principle in him which seeks his own good. To endeavour to resolve the former principle into any phase of the latter—the love of power for example—as Hobbes had done, does not in the least embrace or explain the facts of the case. But further, there is a definitely moral principle in man. This he finds and establishes by the same process of induction, and it is in the assertion of this principle of conscience, that his chief distinction as a moralist has been supposed to consist. It is here also, however, in the constructive part of his theory, that he has most exposed himself to criticism and objection. The reality of conscience, as an element of human nature, he has strongly seized, and set on a firm and immovable basis. He claims primarily, and above all, for human nature, a moral character. Law and duty are its highest expressions—and this by no means merely in the spirit of the ancient stoicism which denied any force to the lower and more obviously natural principles. Nature and spirit, duty and self, are not opposed with him. Each element is recognized in his broad survey, and he finds the complete idea of human nature only in the harmonious adjustment and right relation of the several elements. Beyond the breadth and thoroughness of his analysis, however, Butler cannot be said to have given us any adequate view of moral science. Various defects appear as soon as we begin to exalt his hints into a philosophy, and inquire more particularly what is the nature of conscience—what is its exact relation to self-love—distinct, and in some senses opposed to it, and which it yet, in its highest sense, embraces? What is, further, the relation of conscience to reason and education, and what the source of that peculiar attribute of power, that he has so strongly claimed for it? Is it in any sense autonomous, as Kant has maintained, and as everything that Butler has said on the subject might leave it to be inferred? And if not, what is its character in regard to a higher will and eternal law of duty? It cannot be said that Butler has met any of these questions. To him remains the credit, however, of having vindicated on a clear basis of fact, and in a powerfully original and effective manner, an interpretation of human nature which, in its comprehensiveness, destroys every system of mere selfishness. Shaftesbury somewhat before him, and Hutcheson contemporary with him, put forth the claims of the moral sense as opposed to the perversions of Hobbism, and the caricaturists of Locke; but neither of them did so with such a width and penetration of view, or with such a simplicity and depth of ethical insight as Butler.
Butler continued in the quiet retirement of Stanhope for seven years, during which he conceived, and probably composed, the chief part of his great work, "The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature." He was drawn from his retirement in 1733, being nominated by Lord Chancellor Talbot his chaplain in that year, and then, in 1736, a prebendary of Rochester. In the same year he received the distinction of being appointed clerk of the bedcloset to Queen Caroline, in which capacity his duties were to attend her majesty every evening from seven to nine o'clock.
The "Analogy" appeared in 1736. It is conjectured that the substance had formed part of the series of sermons delivered by Butler while preacher at the Rolls—a conjecture supported by Butler's own statement, that the selection of the fifteen sermons was very much determined by accidental circumstances. The conjecture is not improbable; and the idea of the "Analogy"' may therefore have been present to the mind of Butler when he retired to Stanhope. It was undoubtedly worked out in thought, if not actually completed, during his rural retirement. In fairly judging the "Analogy," it is of great importance to keep in view the circumstances in which it appeared, and the state of mind in regard to christianity which it was intended to meet. It has been greatly misjudged from inattention to these facts, not less by men who have greatly admired it, than by those who have severely censured it. Butler evidently never designed his work to be an absolute and adequate proof of the truth of christianity. He designed it expressly to remove difficulties—to show, in his own language, in which we may, as in many other places, discover a deep irony, that it is "not so clear a case as many suppose, that there is nothing in christianity." The deistical spirit had been busy in England for more than half a century. Without descending into the vulgar arena of controversy which was crowded on all sides of him by pamphlets and brochures which have perished, save in the pages of Leland, it was undoubtedly the intention of Butler to take part in the great struggle going on around him. His habits of mind did not fit him for any sharp-shooting. He does not, therefore, enter into direct conflict with any of the deistical productions which had recently appeared; although, as Mr. Fitzgerald has remarked, the influence of Tindal's Christianity as Old as the Creation, which was first published in 1730, may be distinctly traced in many passages of the "Analogy." But, advancing from the deistical position, he aims to find a general train of argument which should carry unprejudiced and discerning minds along with him. Much had been said of nature, and the comparative excellence of its course of action and government. There was no dispute as to its divine authorship, and this, accordingly, Butler makes the starting-point and fruitful principle of his whole argument. Admitting the course and constitution of nature to be divine, he maintains that all the characteristic facts and principles of religion, natural and revealed, are in strict analogy therewith. There is a parallelism throughout—a correspondence of plan and issue, of type and result; and if the lower be divine, the higher must, therefore, be no less so. Being of the same make, they must have the same author. We do not mean to say that this positive aspect of Butler's argument is very strongly turned upon us by himself. He undoubtedly sets forth more obviously and distinctly its polemical and refutatory aspect, showing that whatever is difficult and apparently objectionable in christianity, has its counterpart in nature; and at particular length pointing out (part i. chap, vii., and part ii. chap, iv.) the grounds on which all our conclusions as to the divine government must be held to be necessarily imperfect in the one case as in the other. But while his more direct object is thus negative, and according to the statement with which he starts; the higher positive and constructive meaning is everywhere implied, and plainly gives a higher value and force to the argument, especially in the face of much of the criticism that has been directed against it.
After the death of Queen Caroline in 1737, Butler's merits, which she had strongly commended to her husband on her deathbed, were not forgotten. He was appointed to the see of Bristol in the year following; and in 1740 to the valuable deanery of St. Paul's, on which occasion he resigned his rectory. The means supplied him by his deanery enabled him to carry out at Bristol a favourite fancy which he had for building and
