Popular Sports and Exercises. 165 



to that fondness for public diversions and 

 sportive contests, so conspic^ous!y displayed in 

 the history of rpankipcl.-TThe influence of 

 physical causes, ip regulating the nature of 

 these diversions, may be readily conceived. 



The hardv, strenuous and active amusements 

 pf the inhabitants of the temperate and frigid 

 zones, would depress and exhaust, rather than 

 enliven and invigorate, the residents of la torri^ 

 clime. Hence the supreme delight of the 

 Asiatic consists in the enjoyment of those 

 pleasures which are purchased with little 

 fatigue of body, or agitation .of mind. To' 

 inhale the grateful fumes of his pipe, and to 

 foil his adversary in the stratagems of chess, or 

 other sedentary games, constitute the principal 

 part of his amusements. 



Although physical causes necessarily circum- 

 scribe the sphere of man's active pursuits, yet 

 they have much less controul than those of a 

 moral and political kind. Man is endued above 

 all other animals with a frame and constitu- 

 tion w^hich can adapt itself to every diversity 

 of clime and change of temperature. He can, 

 in a measure, subdue physical obstacles, when 

 powerfully stimulated by moral and political 

 causes. — The savage, compelled to hunt his 

 prey for food, has little leisure to cultivate his 

 intellectual taste and powers. — If not expose4 



