It is proper to advert to one specific influence in moral enactments,

serving to disguise the Ethical end, and to widen the distinction
between morality as it has been, and morality as it ought to be
It is proper to advert to one specific influence in moral enactments,
serving to disguise the Ethical end, and to widen the distinction
between morality as it has been, and morality as it ought to be. The
enforcing of legal and moral enactments demands a _power of coercion_,
to be lodged in the hands of certain persons; the possession of which
is a temptation to exceed the strict exigencies of public safety, or
the common welfare. Probably many of the whims, fancies, ceremonies,
likings and antipathies, that have found their way into the moral
codes of nations, have arisen from the arbitrary disposition of
certain individuals happening to be in authority at particular
junctures. Even the general community, acting in a spontaneous manner,
imposes needless restraints upon itself, delighting more in the
exercise of power, than in the freedom of individual action.