0

DISCOURSES

ON

HUMAN NATURE,

HUMAN LIFE,

AND THE

NATURE OF RELIGION.

BY

ORVILLE DEWEY, D.D.

PASTOR OF THE CHURCH OF THE MESSIAH, IN NEW YORK.

DIVINITY SCHOOL

LIBRARY.

HARVARD

UNIVERSITY

NEW YORK:

C. S. FRANCIS & CO., 252 BROADWAY.

BOSTON:

J. H. FRANCIS, 128 WASHINGTON-STREET.

BX

9843 •04 D5

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1846.

BY C. S. FRANCIS & CO.

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New Yor

PRINTED BY MUNROE AND FRANCIS,

BOSTON.

63

PREFACE.

I HAVE collected into these Volumes, most of the Sermons and Essays that have been published with my name; and have added some Sermons not before printed, together with Articles from Reviews, and Occasional Discourses. A new arrangement is made, in order to bring the Discourses under certain heads. The title of the Volume first published," Discourses on Various Subjects," is dropped. The first Series in this Edition, "On Human Nature," embraces several of those Discourses; others are omitted; and others, placed under another Head. Discourses on "Human Life," follow; and then, a number of Discourses, for which I could find no more definite title than "The Nature of Religion." In the first Sermon of the succeeding series, on "Commerce and Business," I have attempted by a revision of the Argument, to reply to an objection sometimes urged against its main doctrine, with regard to the use of superior knowledge, power or opportunity. I have met with those who argued thus: "We have a right to take every advantage of each other; it is perfectly honest to do so, because we have agreed to do so. It is a matter of compact, whose chances and risks we mutually agree to take." Now I maintain that the general moral policy of