82 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book II. 



any more baggage-men were taken from his neighbourhood ? He 

 laid, Several ; and they were all affeded in the fame way, more or 

 lefs, after they came home ; and one or two of them died. 



There is an inftance much later than any I have mentioned. A 

 woman appeared in the neighbourhood of Briftol, come from what 

 part of the world nobody knows. She went about begging, and always 

 lodged under a hay-ftack ; nor could flie ever be perfuaded to fleep 

 in a houfe. She was reputed to be mad ; but I could never hear any 

 other proof of it, except that fhe would give no account of herfelf, 

 and faid, there was no happinefs but in the open air, and that in the 

 houfe there was nothing but trouble and mifery. Some charitable 

 people, but (to ufe an expreflion of Shakespeare) fools of Nature , 

 liave lately houfed and confined her ; the confequence of which is, 

 as I am informed, that her health, which was perfeiSlly good before, 

 is much impaired, and her mind begins to be really difordered. 



What, then, can be the reafon that the one change is fo danger- 

 ous, while the other is not at all fo ? It can be no other, I think, 

 than this, that the one is from an unnatural to a natural life, the o- 

 ther from a natural to an unnatural. 



1 believe it is the fame in the article of Diet, as of Houfing. If a 

 man, that haS been always accuftomed to a fober and fimple diet, 

 ihould at once be tranfported to a rich luxurious table, his health 

 would undoubtedly be affeded ; and I have heard of men falling, by 

 ihat means, into very bad difeafes ; whereas, if our rich men, who, 

 like Di'ves in the Parable, fare fumptuoufly every day, were to be 

 forced (for I believe they would not do it voluntarily) to live like 

 poor men, they would be very much the better for it, even thougli 

 the change was ever fo fudden. 



Thus, I think, I have proved, that the Life of Man in his natu- 

 ral ftate, when he was guided by inftind and not by opinion, was 



in 



