Chap. V. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. $7 



There is another people, who, hke the Inhabitants of the Pelew 

 iUands, having no four footed animals in their country, are not 



hunters ; 



Our people lived thirteen weeks among them, and in clofe intercourfe with them, 

 and had an opportunity, during that time, to fee their behaviour, not only in peace, 

 but in war, in which they accompanied them and affifted them ; and during that 

 time, it does not appear that they difcovcred any crime, vice, or folly among them } 

 but on the contrary, found them pofieiTed of every virtue and every amiable quality, 

 with a politenefs and delicacy of fentiment which could not have been believed, if it 

 were not fo well attelled. They verify the truth of an obfervation made by Arifto- 

 tle, " ihat the love of knowledge is natural to man," though it be a paffion which^. 

 according to my obfervation, is one of the weakeft among us: For thev fliewed a 

 love of knowledge, and a deGre to be inftrufted in all our arts, which was really 

 furprifing, and was moft eminent (among other eminent qualities), in that young man 

 the king's fon, whom they carried with them, and who, if he had lived, would, 

 I am perfuaded, have done the greateft honour to his nation, and to human kind. 

 They live in the moft natural way, in fo far that they wear no clothes, eat very little 

 flefh, ufe no ftrong liquors at all, but live almoft altogether upon the fruits of 

 the earth, fuch as yams and cocoa nuts. At the fame time they bathe, and anoint 

 with oil } both which are pradlifcd by fo many different nations, both favage and ci» 

 vilized, that I believe they are arts for preferving heahh, which inftintTt dircfts men 

 to praftice. But as they depart fo far from nature, as to hve in houfes and to ufe 

 fire, they are liable to fome difeafes, particularly thofe of the fcrophulous kind. 



As to the ftile of this work, I fhould like it much better if it were more fimple, 

 and with lefs afFeiflation of ornament. But I obferve, that what Mr Keate has put 

 into the mouth of the king of Pelew, or of his officers, is excellent, not only for 

 the matter, but for the ftyle, which is perfeftly plain and natural; fuch as what he 

 makes the king fay upon occafion of the fufpicions of him which the Englifli micht 

 entertain, (p. 249. of the third edition), and what his general fays in defence of the 

 Englifli, (p. 221.). And indeed it would have been moft abfurd, to have made men, 

 doing every thing in fo natural a v/ay, fpeak in the florid ftyle of Mr Gibbons. I 

 can, however, pardon him for the ufe of that ftyle, in his declamations upon the- 

 philanthropy of the Pelew men, which was really wonderful. But the fpeeches I have 

 mentioned, I am perfuaded, he does not write in his own ftile, but ^ves them, both; 

 matter and ftile, as Captain Wilfon had them from the. interpreter., 



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Vol. IV, Hi 



