Chap. TIL ANTIENT M ETx\PH YSI CS. yt 



Ij known, compared to what it is at prefent : And, we are now to 

 confider, whether, v/hen it is become the univerfal purfuit, not on- 

 ly of individuals, but of nations, man is at prefent happier, or at leaf!: 

 lefs miferable, than he was in the days of Homer, 



I have elfewhere obferved, that it would be inconfiftent with the- 

 wifdom and goodnefs of God, to fuppofe that he has not afligned, 

 fbr every animal, an oeconomy and manner of life, which mult 

 make him as happy as his nature is capable of Now, that is the con- 

 dition of man, while he is in what I call the natural Itate, and is fuch 

 as Ariftotle has defined him to be, an animal who has the compara- 

 tive faculty, and is capable of intellect .ind fcience, that is, in other 

 words, a better kind of brute *. In this Itate, to fay that he was" 

 miferable, is faying that all the brutes, by far the greater part of 

 the animal creation here below, are miferable. Now, to fay this, I 

 hold to be impious : For it is faying that all the animals here below 

 are created to be miferable; which I hold to be inconfiftent with the 

 wifdom and goodnefs of God; for I maintain, that all animals are as- 

 happy as their nature w^ill admit, and the order of things in the uni- 

 verfe, while they continue in the ftate in which God has placed 

 them. But, in the civilifed ftate, he is no longer the animal pro- 

 duced by God and nature, but an animal of his own making; fo that 

 the queftion is. Whether, in that ftate, man has made himfelf hap-^ 

 pier than he was in the natural ftate when he was no better than a 

 'brute ? And, as- money or wealth is the chief thing that civil fociety 

 has added to his natural ftate, it is alfo to be inquired, whether the 

 acquifition of it has made him happier or more miferable than he 

 was in his natural ftate. 



The acquiring of money by war, or by trade to diftant countries 

 does certainly not make men happy, but, on the contrary, tends to 



make 

 * See what I have faid of this definition of mafi, vol. 4. p. i;. and followinp-. 



