Chap. VI. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 6i 



HAVING faid fo much of man in his natural ftate, I proceed to 

 confider him in a ftate of civility and arts, beginning with 

 his progrefs from the natural to that ftate ; for that there muft have 

 been a progrefs, and that he did not become at once an animal of 

 civility and arts, is what no perfon can doubt, vpho knows any thing 

 of the hiftory or philofophy of man ; or if he be fo ignorant of that 

 hiftory and philofophy, as to have any doubt in the matter, I think 

 -what I have faid in the firft volume of the origin of language may 

 fatisfy him. 



The firft ftep in this progrefs muft have been ajfociating^ or living 

 together in herds, as the Ourang Outangs do at prefent, and as many 

 people of the antient world did * ; and the firft thing to be conft- 

 dered is, What prompted man to live in that way ? Was it inftind, 

 foch as prompts cattle and ftieep to herd together ; or was it fome 

 motive of neceflity or convenience ? 



Ariftotle has divided animals, very properly, into gregarious and 

 folitary, and fome that partake of both kinds ; and the gregarious 

 he has fubdivided into political and not political. The political he 

 defines to be thofe who carry on fome common work, that is, a 

 ■work for behoof of the whole herd ; whereas thofe, who are not 

 political, carry on no common work, and therefore have no 

 bond of union, though they herd and live together f . Man, he 

 fays, is that kind of animal, which is neither altogether gregarious 

 nor altogether folitary, but participates of both. So that here we 

 may oblerve another variety in our fpecics, not hitherto mentioned, 



by 



* Origin of Language, vol. I. book 2. chap. 3, 4, 5, 6, & 7. 



I This divifion of animals I have explained in the fecond chapter of the feco'nd 

 book of the firft volume of the Origin of Language, where I have alfo corrected the 

 text of Ariftotle. 



