1:^6 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



fea; and all the fruits of the earth were given him for food*. Now, 

 if fuch an animal, fo much fuperior to all the other animals on this 

 earth, were miferable, or did not enjoy all the happinefs which both 

 his fenfitive and intelledlual natures afford, we might fay that there 

 is a great imperfection or defedl in the fyftem of the univerfe, 

 more efpecially when we confider that all the inferior animals on 

 this earth enjoy, as I (hall afterwards fliow, every pleafurc that 

 their nature, which is only fenfitive', is capable of. In the civilifed 

 life, I think, I have fhown in the preceding part of this work, that 

 by far the greater part of men are more miferable than the brutes; 

 and even in the natural life they have not that enjoyment of intel- 

 ligence which muft make the happinefs of every intelligent creature. 

 Now, if I could fuppofe that man had always been in the flate in 

 which we now fee him, and was to continue in tliat ftate to all 

 eternity, I fhould think the objedion to the goodnefs of God, and to 

 the perfection of the fyftem of the univerfe, was unanfwerable. But 

 man was not always in the ftate in which we now fee him, nor came 

 out of the hands of his Creator fuch an animal as he now is; but 

 has changed his condition, and is fallen from a more perfect ftate. 

 And this leads me to fpeak of the Fall of Man, which is the fource 

 of all the mifery that he fuffers at prefent; and which, if rightly 

 explained, will folve that grand queftion, not only in the hiftory and 

 philofophy of man, but in theology, concerning the Origin of Evil. 

 I therefore think it proper to make it the fubjedt of another chapter: 

 And I will only add to this chapter, that thofe who judge of the 

 goodnefs of God from the happinefs of man in his prefent ftate, judge 

 very falfely, as they judge by the happinefs of a creature who is not 

 fuch as God made him, but fuch as he has made himfeif by his fall 

 &om the better ftate in which he was created. And the only quef- 

 tions are, imo, Whether or not the Supreme Being could have, in 



confiftence 

 * Gcnefis, Chap. I. 



