146 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



this life, or in any other life he fliall afterwards be in, he ftiould 

 not be enabled to make fome progrefs, more or lefs, towards a re- 

 covery from his fallen ftate. For that purpofe, as I have faid, 

 neither the folitary (late nor the herding is fufBcient. Now, the 

 only other ftate, in which man lives in this life, is the civilifed: And 

 that ftate, I fay, is abfolutely neceflary for giving him the ufe of 

 intelledt, and enabling him to make fome progrefs towards a re- 

 covery from his fallen ftate ; for it is in that ftate only, that he can 

 recover the ufe of intellecl, wliich he has loft, and improve it by 

 the cultivation of arts and fciences. The faculty of intellect, which 

 only remained with him after his fall, is a latent quality in him, 

 which can only be produced by degrees; and it is only civil fociety, 

 and the clofe intcrcourfe of men with one another in that fociety, 

 that bring forth this latent quality by giving him occafion to ex- 

 ercife it, in the fame manner as other latent faculties in our natures 

 are produced, fuch as the ufe of fpeech, of mufic, and, I may add, 

 of every other art and fcience, which all belong to our nature, but 

 are only exerted by ufe and pradice in civil fociety. 



It may be objedled to what I have faid of the fall of man, and of 

 liis reftoration from his fallen ftate by the means of civil fociety. That, 

 as God is perfe£lly good and at the fame time omnipotent, he 

 mieht have exercifed his power to prevent the fall of man, or, after 

 he had fallen, to reftore him immediately and diredly to his primi- 

 tive ftate, without the flow procefs of that reftoration by the means 

 of civ: i fociety. 



To this I anfwer, that as the univerfe is a fyftem, it muft be go- 

 verned by general laws, otherwife it would be no fyftem*. Now, 

 thofe laws are what we call the laws of nature^ which arife from the 

 nature of things ; and as God is the author of nature, fo that the 

 nature of things is part of his nature, he could not have altered the 



nature 



* Page 76. ©f this volume. 



