8 INTRODUCTION. 



other Intelledual being on this earth, it is only by the fludy of him 

 that we can afcend to the knowledge of fupreme intelligence. It is 

 therefore, as I have faid *, not to be wondered at that the feven wife 

 men of Greece, when they joined all their wits together, could pro- 

 duce no greater or better fruit of their wifdom, than what they pre- 

 fented to their God, and infcribed on his temple at Delphi; I mean, 

 the precept, Kriow thyjelf'\^ a precept not only of the greatefl; utili- 

 ty in the pradice of life, but which leads up to the higheft know- 

 ledge of which man is capable, and may be truly faid to be the foun- 

 tain of all knowledge, divine and human. 



But though, in this third volume, 1 have examined the different 

 parts of the human compofuion, and diftinguifhed them, I think, 

 accurately from one another, it is chiefly the animal part of our na- 

 ture that I have confidered. And I have been at pains to (how how 

 much he is changed from what he was in antient times, in health, 

 ftrength, and fize of body, and as the mind is fo intimately 

 conneded wich the body, that the mind aifo is degenerated in thefe 

 later times. 1 have alfo fpoken, in the third volume, of the natu- 

 ral ftate of man \ and I will venture to fay, that there are colled- 

 ed in that volume moie fads concerning man in that ftate, 

 or near to that ftate, than are to be found in any one book ; and as 

 what is called philofophy in this age, is chiefly converfant about 

 fads of natural hiftory, one (hould ihink that we fhould at leaft be 

 as curious about the natural hiftory of our own fpecies as about the 

 natural hiftory of other animals, even fome of the loweft rank, 

 I'licIi as v\'orms and flies, upon which volumes have been written. 

 In this fourth volume I propofe to fay a great deal more upon the na- 

 tural hidory of man, and to trace his progrefs from the natural ftate 



to 



* Ste Vol. II. p. 90, 



■f- vva^i 5-s«i'To)'. Plato's Pi-otagor.iSj p. 243. edit. Serrani. 



