3x6 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS, Book VII. 



FROM what has been faid, I think, it is evident, that the hu- 

 man fpecies has been decreafing from the earliefl: times, of 

 which the hiflory is preferved to us, and is ftill continuing to de- 

 creafe ; and if fo, that fooner or later it muft, in the courfe of na- 

 ture, come to an end : For it is impoffible to conceive that what has 

 been fo long decreafmg, and ftill continues to decreafe, fhould not 

 come to an end at laft. 



I know it will appear furprlfrng, and, I believe, incredible to 

 many of my readers, that a whole fpecies of animals, and tlie fpe- 

 cies of the governing animal on this earth, fhould die out. But our 

 fpecies confifts of nations, and nations of families. Now we fee, 

 every day, families dying out : And if families die out, why fhould 

 net, in procefs of time, the nations they form die out ? And^ ac- 

 corcUngly, we are fure from hiftory, that nations have been extin- 

 guilhed in that way. I have mentioned nations in Ii:aly that have 

 dilappeared ^ -, and we are fure that a very great nation, and the mofl 

 populous, I believe, that ever was for the extent of territory which it 

 poffefTed, (I mean Egypt) is now no more. And if there has. been an 

 end of fome nations, it cannot appear incredible, that, in procefs of 

 time, there fhould be an end of all. This, indeed, woul^d appear 

 incredible if men lived in the natural way, as other animals do ; for 

 there is no example of thofe fpecieses of animals being extinguifhed, 

 except by the arts of men in particular countries, or by convulfions 

 of nature, fuch as eruptions of burning mountains or inundations. 

 But the life of man in civilized fociety, as I have fliown, is alto- 

 gether unnatural ; fo much fo that it would be contrary to nature 

 if the fpecies J^-fan flio'.ld laft like other fpecieses, w^iich live in the 

 natural way. Pefides difeafes, the civilized life produces vices and 

 crimes without number j and, particularly, avarice and ambition,. 



by 



* Page 26;; of this vol. 



