200 ■ ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



fciences be joined religion, or even if there be, without arts and 

 fciences, religion alone, if it be a good religion, there is nothing 

 that hinders them to be happy in this life to a certain degree. 



But man being governed, as I have faid, in the civilifed ftatc by 

 his free will, his happinefs or mitery muft depend upon the ufe he 

 makes of that will; for in this life, as well as in his preceding 

 ftate, he has it in his power to alter his nature, and to make liimfelf 

 as it were another man. If he take to religion and virtue, he 

 will enjoy all the happinefs that he is capable of enjoying in this 

 life : If, on the other hand, he take to vice and folly, he will be 

 a miferable man upon the whole; though he will no doubt have 

 fome pleafure in the gratification of his vices and follies, but much 

 overbalanced by the pains attending them ; and for this reafon I 

 have faid* what may appear to many of my readers an extraordinary 

 paradOfX, That man even in this life enjoys all the happinefs that 

 his nature is capable of. 



CHAP. 



Page 131. 



