204 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book 11. 



of the fame fpecies with us, but in the natural ftate, without 

 any opinions at all of any kind, is a matter of profound inquiry, 

 for which I am not qualified, as I am no divine, nor (killed in the 

 original language of the Sacred Oracles. 



Leaving, therefore, fuch fpeculations to others more learned, I 

 fhall only add upon this fubjed, that the happinefs of the natural ftate, 

 or of the firft ages of fociety, appears to me to have been very much 

 magnified by the poets ; for, in fiich a ftate, there could be no 

 more, or very little more, than the happinefs of the mere animal, 

 there being wanting the chief happinefs of Man, which confifts in 

 the perfedion of his intelledual nature. If, fays Plato, the men of 

 the golden age, who were fupplied with every thing they wanted 

 without toil or labour, and lived in a moft perfed: natural way, not 

 being clothed or houfed, had employed their leifure in philofophy, 

 they w^ould no doubt have been infinitely happier than the men of 

 this age ; but, if they did nothing but eat and drink, and enjoy o- 

 ther bodily pleafures, it is evident that their happinefs muft have 

 Deen of a very low kind *. 



The only men we read of in hiftory, w4io enjoyed the happinefs 

 defcribed by Plato, were the Gymnofophifts of India. Thefe alone, of 

 all the men we ever heard of, joined the philofophical with the fa- 

 vagc life ; for they lived naked in the woods, upon the natural 

 fruits of the earth, and there philofophifed f. 



* Platonis Politicus, p. 537. 538. cdit> Ficini. 



t Arrian Indica, cap. xi. This author, whom I quoted before, upon the fubject 

 of the Geftation of Elephants, p. 169. appears to nie to have been better informed 

 concerning India and its inhabitants than any other antient author j for he had his 

 information from Megafthenes, who travelled through India, and from Nearchus, 

 who was with Alexander in India, and was the admiral of his fleet, which he con- 

 ducted from the mouth of Indus to Babilonia. 



CHAP. 



