ARGUMENT OF EPISTLE IV

ARGUMENT OF EPISTLE IV.

OF THE NATURE AND STATE OF MAN WITH RESPECT TO HAPPINESS.

I. False Notions of Happiness, Philosophical and Popular, answered from
v.19 to 77.

II. It is the End of all Men, and attainable by all, v.30. God intends
Happiness to be equal; and to be so, it must be social, since all
particular Happiness depends on general, and since He governs by general,
not particular Laws, v.37. As it is necessary for Order, and the peace and
welfare of Society, that external goods should be unequal, Happiness is not
made to consist in these, v.51. But, notwithstanding that inequality, the
balance of Happiness among Mankind is kept even by Providence, by the two
Passions of Hope and Fear, v.70.

III. What the Happiness of Individuals is, as far as is consistent with
the constitution of this world; and that the good Man has here the
advantage, V.77. The error of imputing to Virtue what are only the
calamities of Nature or of Fortune, v.94.

IV. The folly of expecting that God should alter His general Laws in
favour of particulars, v.121.

V. That we are not judges who are good; but that, whoever they are, they
must be happiest, v.133, etc.

VI. That external goods are not the proper rewards, but often inconsistent
with, or destructive of Virtue, v.165. That even these can make no Man
happy without Virtue: Instanced in Riches, v.183. Honours, v.191.
Nobility, v.203. Greatness, v.215. Fame, v.235. Superior Talents, v.257,
etc. With pictures of human Infelicity in Men possessed of them all,
v.267, etc.

VII. That Virtue only constitutes a Happiness, whose object is universal,
and whose prospect eternal, v.307, etc. That the perfection of Virtue and
Happiness consists in a conformity to the Order of Providence here, and a
Resignation to it here and hereafter, v.326, etc.

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