(3.) We should be moderate in our expectations. When our state is flourishing, and the course of events proceeds according to our v.ish, we ought not to suffer our minds to be vainly lifted up. We ought not to flatter ourselves with high prospects of the increasing favors of the world and the continuing applause of men. By want of moderation in our hopes we not only in- crease dejection when disappointment comes, but we ac- celerate disappointment: we bring forward with greater speed disagreeable changes in our state. For the natu- ral consequence of presumptuous expectation is rashness in conduct. He who indulges in confident security of course neglects due precautions against the dangers that threaten him ; and his fall will be foreseen and predict- ed. He not only exposes himself unguarded to dangers, but he multiiilies them against himself. By presump- tion and vanity he either provokes enmity or incurs contempt. A temperate spirit and moderate expecta- tions are the best safeguard of the mind in this uncer- tain and changing state. They enable us to pass through the world with most comfort. When we rise in tlie world they contribute to our elevation, and if we fall they render our fall the lighter.
(4.) We should be moderate in our pleasures. It is an invariable law of our present condition that every pleasure which is pursued to excess converts itself into poison. What was intended for the cordial and refresh- ment of human life, through want of moderation, we turn to its bane. No sooner do we pass the line which temperance has drawn than pernicious effects succeed. Could the monuments of death be laid open to our view, they would read a lecture in favor of moderation much more powerfid than anj' that the most eloquent preacher can give. We shoifld behold the graves peopled with the victims of intemperance ; we should behold those chambers of darkness hung round on every side with the trophies of luxury, drunkenness, ■ and sensuality. So numerous should we find, those martyrs of iniquitj"- that it may safely be asserted where war or pestilence has slain its thousands intemperate pleasure has slain its ten thousands.
(5.) We should be moderate in all onr passions. This exercise of moderation is the .more requisite because every passion in human nature has of itself a tendencj- to run into excess. All passion implies a violent emo- tion of mind. Of course it is apt to derange the regular course of our ideas, and to produce confusion within. Of some passions, such as anger and resentment, the ex- cess is so obviously dangerous as loudly to call for mod- eration. He who gives himself up to the impetuosity of such passions without restraint is universally con- demned. Of the insidious growth of passion, therefore, we have great reason to beware. Let us be persuaded that moments of passion are always moments of delu- sion; that nothing truly is what it then seems to be; that all the opinioils which we then form are erroneous ; and that all the judgments which we then pass are ex-
travagant. Let moderation accustom us to wait till the fumes of passion are spent: till the mist which it has raised begins to be dissipated. On no occasion let us imagine that strength of mind is shown bj' violence of passion. It is the strength of one who is in the delir- ium of a fever, or under the disease of madness. True strength of mind is shown in governing and resisting passion, and acting on the most trying occasions accord- ing to the dictates of conscience and right reason. See ' Blair, Sermons, vol. ii, serm. xlii.
Moderator is the name of an ecclesiastical officer in the Presbyterian churches. His duty is to preside over a meeting or an assembly of ministers, to regulate their proceedings in session, and to declare the vote (see Preshyt. Confession, p. 36G sq.). To moderate in a call is to preside over the election of a minister. When the attempt was made to introduce episcopacy into Scotland, one plan was to have jjerpetual moderators for presby- teries— a bishop or his vicar to be chosen to the office.
Moderatus of Gapes (Moderatus Gaditamis), a distinguished exponent of the neo-Pj'thagorean school of philosophy, surnamed after his native place, flourished during the reign of the emperor Nero (A.D. 54-68). He collected all the MSS. extant on the philosophical views of Pythagoras, and embodied them in his works : Lib. xi, De jilacitis sectm PythagoriccB ; Lib. v, Scholaruni Pythagoricarum, which are unfortunately no longer ex- tant. (Simply a fragment of his is preserved by Sto- \)«M?,, Eclog. p. 3.) According to Porphyry {Vita Py- thag. § 32 et 53), Moderatus sought to justify the in- corporation into Pythag'oreanism of Platonic and neo- theological doctrines, through the hypothesis that the ancient Pythagoreans themselves intentionally expressed the highest truths in signs, and for tliat purpose made use of numbers. The number one was the symbol of unity and equality, and of the cause of the harmony and duration of all things, while iico was the symbol of difference and inequality, of division and change, etc. See Neo-Pythagoreanisji. Moderatus is reputed to have been a man of considerable eloquence, and not only to have been popular in his day, but to have found an imitator, to some extent, in lamblichus (q. v.). See Schoell, Hktoire de la litterature Grecque, vi, 54 ; U eber- weg. Hist. PMlos. i, 232 sq. (J. H. W.)