jS ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book TI, 



cularly that mod dreadful dlfeafe confumptioji^ of which more die 

 than of any other two dif^afes,; and, as it is children, or perfons 

 under age, who commonly die of it, it muft be produced by the dif- 

 cafes or weakneffes of the parents Now, I Tiould be glad to know, 

 whether crimes and vices, difeafes and indigence, be not one or other " 

 of them, and much more altogether, the fource of the mifery of every 

 nation ? 



There is one obfervation more that I will make upon the love 

 of money. It is a pilfion which may be faid to comprehend 

 every other, as it furnifhes the materials for gratifying not only our 

 fenfual appetites, but our vanity, and our talle for every thing we 

 think beautiful or fine ; alfo our ambition, particularly in Britain 

 where money makes a man very eminent in the ftate and govern- 

 ment of the country. It is, therefore, a moft comprehenfive pafTion; 

 But it excludes what I think our greatefl: happinefs in this life ; and, 

 that is the pleafure of loving and being loved ; for a man, who is 

 r oireffed by this paffion, has neither love nor frienJihip for any man. 

 Now a man, who loves no man, can be beloved by no man, not 

 even by his neareft relations j for, as Horace fays, addreffing him- 

 felf to the man of money, 



Non uxor falvum te vult non fillu? ; omnes 

 Vicini oJerunt, noti, pueri atque puellae. 

 Miraris, cum tu argento port: oai;iia poaas, 

 Si nemo praeftet, queoi non morearis, amorem, 



Lih. I. 5fl/. I. 



This paiTion, in Britain, is as univerfal as it is comprehenfive, 

 money being the purfuit, not only of almofl every private man but 

 of the public; for our legiflature, when it is ailembled, is chieHy em- 

 ployed about money ; and the principal bufmefs of our miiiifLer is 

 to contrive means how to get it, and how to lay it out. And this 



may 



