2i8 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IIL 



than from Cicero and Seneca.— The Romans excelled only in Arms and 

 Government; — inferior to the Greeks in Language and the Writing 

 Art, — T^heir Hijlory better learned from the Halicarnajfan and Po^ 

 lybius than from Livy. — Their moji valuable literary work the Cor- 

 pus Juris. — The pro/pe& of a much happier Life in the next World^ 

 and a defire^ when we become oldy to bi delivered from the burden 

 of this Body, added to the Plea/ures already enumerated^ com- 

 pleat the enjoyment of the Suminum Bonum, and render us as hap- 

 py as we can be in this flate of Trial and Pilgrimage, — Conclufion 

 of the Comparifon of the Natural with the Civ'iifed State of Man,— ^ 

 With refpeSl to the Body^ the Natural State preferable: — With re- 

 fpe£l to the Mindy the Civilifed. — The Civil fed^ therefore^ the hap- 

 pier State when Governed by Philofophy and Religion. 



I Have faid fo much of the happiuefs or mifery of men, that I 

 think it will not be improper to fay fomething of what the an- 

 tients called the Summum Bonum, or fupremc happinefs of men in 

 this lifcy about which the Stoics and Epicureans differed fo much.. 

 The Epicureans made it confift wholly in bodily pleafures, whereas 

 the Stoics placed it in the enjoyments of the mind : And the Stoics 

 were certainly in the right ; for as the mind (they meant the intel- 

 lectual) is the governing principle in man, and makes him truly 

 man, by diftinguifliing him from the other animals on this earth, 

 the perfeQion of it muft be the perfedion of his nature, and confe- 

 quently his greatefl happinefs. What the intelled perceives in the 

 fubjed: which gives it delight, is the ro ttoc'kov^ or the Beautiful; in the 

 contemplation of which they made the happinefs of man to confift, 

 and therefore they faid it was his only good. That it is the Beau- 

 tiful, and the Beautiful only, which gives dehght to the intellect, I 

 think I have proved in the chapter upon Beauty*. I will, therefore, 



proceed' 

 '^ Chap. 7. of this Book. 



