Chap. VIII.] MORALS OF THE DIFFERENT PROFESSIONS. 367

some arsenic, the salesman begins to be anxious. He considerswhether it is probable the buyer wants it for a proper purpose.If he sells it, he cautions the buyer to keep it where others can-not have access to it; and, before he delivers the packet, legiblyinscribes upon it, — poison. One of these men sells poison tothe body, and the other poison to the mind. If the anxiety andcaution of the druggist is right, the indifference of the booksellermust be wrong. Add to this, that the druggist would not sellarsenic at all, if it were not sometimes useful ; but an immoral orlicentious book cannot be useful to any person, or on any occa-sion whatever.

But this point may be usefully pursued still further. Supposethat no printer would commit such a book to his press, and thatno bookseller would offer it for sale, the consequence would be,that nine-tenths of these manuscripts would be thrown into thefire, or rather that they would never have been written. Theinference is obvious ; and, surely, the consideration does notneed enforcing, that, although one man’s refusal may not preventimmoral books from being published, he is not therefore exemptedfrom the obligation to refuse. A man must do his duty, whetherthe effects of his conduct be such as he would desire, or other-wise. Such purity of conduct might, no doubt, circumscribe aman’s business, and so does purity of conduct in some other em-ployments ; but, if this be a sufficient excuse for contributing todemoralize the world, if profit be a good justification for departingfrom rectitude, it will be easy to defend the most atrociouscrimes. He who is more studious to justify his conduct than toact aright, may say, that, if a person may sell no book that caninjure another, he can scarcely sell any book. ' The answer is,that, although there must be some difficulty in discrimination,though a bookseller cannot always inform himself what the precisetendency of a book is, — yet there can be no difficulty in judging,respecting many books, that their tendency is evil, and only evil.If we cannot define the precise line of distinction between thegood and the evil, we can still perceive the evil when it has at-tained to a certain magnitude. He who cannnot distinguish dayfrom twilight, can distinguish it from night. And not only book-sellers, but all who are knowingly concerned in the circulation of