BOOKOFOLD-WORLDGARDENS 



The beenthecommon favourite of public and pnv- 



g Faradise ate men > a P leasure of the greatest, and the 

 care of the meanest; and indeed an employ- 

 ment and a possession, for which no man is 

 too high nor too low. 



If we believe the Scripture, we must allow 

 that God Almighty esteemed the life of a man 

 in a garden the happiest He could give him, or 

 else He would not have placed Adam in that 

 of Eden; that it was a state of innocence and 

 pleasure; and that the life of husbandry and 

 cities came in after the Fall, with guilt and with 

 labour. 



Where Paradise was, has been much de- 

 bated, and little agreed; but what sort of place 

 is meant by it, may perhaps easier be conjec- 

 tured. It seems to have been a Persian word, 

 sinceXenophon and other Greekauthors men- 

 tion it, as what was much in use and delight 

 among the kings of those Eastern countries. 

 Strabo describing Jericho, says, Ibi est palme- 

 tum, cut immixte sunt, ctiam alia stirpes hor- 

 tenses, locus ferax^palmis abundant \ spatio stadi- 

 orum centum, totus irriguus, ibi est Regia & 

 Balsami Paradisus. He mentions another 

 place to \>zprope Libanum 6 Paradisum. And 



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