Cnap. VI. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 177 



I do not know whether Ifhould not add to flefli the ufe of fait. It is 

 reckoned by Salluft, the Roman hiftorian, to be one of the irritamenta 

 gulae ; and the Baron Hontan fays it was one of the three reafons 

 which aHuron gave why Frenchmen did not live folong as they. The 

 other two were, the ufe of wine, and the exceffive ufe of women. 



I have already obferved, that even our vegetable diet is not whole- 

 fome, becaufe the vegetables we eat are not the natural fruits of the 

 earth, but raifed artificially, from the dung of animals. This dung, 

 by which they are nourifhed and grow, muft be a part of their 

 compofition ; fo that, in eating fuch vegetables, we muft eat dung, 

 according to the obfervatLon of the King of Ethiopia to the ambaf- 

 fadors of Cambyfes King of Perfia, v/ho having told him that the 

 Perfians lived upon w^heat raifed in the ordinary way of cul- 

 ture, he faid he did not wonder they lived fo fhort a time, as 

 they fed upon dung *, This makes the garden vegetables, 

 fuch as turnips, in the neighbourhood of a great tov/n, tafte 

 fo much of the dung, as to be offenfive and difgufting. But, 

 even in the corn that is raifed in the fields, there muft be a 

 certain quantity of that fame filthy nouriHiment of the plant, and 

 which, of necefTity, muft, in fome degree, go to our nourilh- 

 ment. Even grafs that has been very much dunged, as the meadows 

 ^bout London are, will make the fleih fed upon it neither whole- 

 fome nor pleafant to the tafte : And the milk of a cow fed upon 

 fuch grafs, or the butter that is made of it, will hardly keep fweet 

 twenty-four hours. 



The next invention of luxury was the ufe of wine ; a thing more 

 unnatural ftill, not being pradifed by any animal in the natural ftate. 

 it islikewife believed by many, that wine, and other fermented li- 

 quors, give ftrength. But Homer knew better ; though he fpeaks 

 Vol. III. 2 fo 



* -Herodot. Lib. iii. Cap, 2r. 



