368 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



ample in the people of the Ladrone Iflands *. And, in general, 

 wherever we find any nation little advanced in the arts of civility 

 and Government, but who have got the idea of a God, we may 

 conclude, that from fome other nation more divilized, with whom 

 they have had a connedion, they have got that idea. This I have 

 Ihown wae the cafe of the inhabitants of North America f : And, I am 

 perfuaded, the fame was the cafe of the inhabitants of Guiana; who, 

 according to Dr Bancroft's account of them :]:, have got the idea of a 

 Supreme God, (fuch a God as the Indians of North America call the 

 Great Spirit^) but which they muft have got from European nations^ 

 particularly the Dutch, with whom they have had an intercourfe for 

 more than a century part. 



Thus it appears, that, while man was converfiint only with exter- 

 nal things, he could not form the idea of a God. It was, therefore, 

 neceflary, before he could do this, that he Ihould prad;ife the piecept 

 of the Delphic God, and befides the knowkdge of external things, 

 fhould ftudy and know himfelf ; for, as I have obferved in more than 

 one place, it is only by knowing ourfelves, that we can have any know- 

 ledge of fuperior intelligencies. By this ftudy, he would difcover that 

 there was fomething within him, which we call mind^ whereby he 

 moved his body, and, by the intervention of it, other bod es, and by 

 which he conduded his life, and provided what was neceflary for his 

 fubfiftence and defence. But this is not all; for it was further necef- 

 fary that he fhould look round him, and confider the works of nature, 

 both in the heavens and earth; where he would perceive that there 

 were motions going on, fuch as he could not perform, and with 

 very much greater order and regularity than his motions. And here 

 there would be an exercife, not only of the intelledual, but of the 



reafoning 



* See, upon the fubjeft of thofe Iflands, Churchill's Coll. of Voy. vol. 4. p. 450. 



\ Page 153 of this vol. 



4 See his Eflay on the Natural Hiflory of Guiana, p. 308. 



