178 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IL 



fo much in praife of the pleafure of drinking, that he was fufpeded 

 himfelf to be a lover of wine, as Horace tells us : 



Laudihus argmtur viiii, vino/us Homerus. 



For he makes Hedtor fay to his mother, when flie offered him wine, 

 upon his coming from the battle, to which he was to return, that 

 wine weakened men, and made them unfit for war *. And, there- 

 fore, I hold that the Carthaginians were in the right, who, as Plato 

 tells us t, never drank wine when they went to war, or were to be- 

 get children. But wine, or vinous liquors, are, by habit, become 

 fo neceffary to us, that, I am afraid, our men would not fight at all 

 without vinous, or, what is worfe, fpiritous liquors : And, I am 

 afraid, many of our children are begotten when we are drunk, or, 

 at leaft, intoxicated with wine. But, if we are to drink wine at 

 all, we ought certainly to drink it, as all the polite nations of old 

 did, diluted with water, and not pure, as the Barbarians drank it ; 

 for, that way drunk, it does not inflame fo much, and goes off much 

 cafier. 



What I fhall next mention, Is the excefs of a thing that is both 

 natural and neceflfary for the continuation of the fpecies ; I mean 

 the ufe of women. In the natural fi;ate, men propagated, as 

 other animals do. The females had their feafons % ; and, at that 

 time, no doubt, the flrongeft, and mofi: courageous of the males, 

 would have the ufe of the mofi females, which is wifely contrived by 

 Nature, for the purpofe of the better prefervation of the race : But 

 thofe flrongeft males could not have very many, as the feafon, I ima- 

 gine, did not laft long, not fo many as to do them any hurt. Whereas, 



after 



• Iliad. ?. Verf. 254. 



Mil [^ ci%»yviu<rr/, y.iiioi ^' xXKY,i re huiufixi, 



t Lib. ii. De Legibus, injine, 



X See Origin and Progrefs of Language, Vol. i- page 452. Second Edition. 



