2o6 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



not live a a few minutes without it, but alfo by the pores of our 

 fkln, which are called abforbing vejfels *, 



The firfl cover from the air, that men ufed, appears to have beea 

 what nature furnifhed them, fuch as caves ; and it was in that way 

 that the Cyclops, as Homer has defcribed them, lived. When 

 nature did not furnifh fuch caves to them, they dug them out of 

 rocks, of which a remarkable monument is at this day to be feen in 

 an ifland of India, near to Bombay f; and as the progrefs of arts 

 advanced, they came at laft to make that covering from the wea- 

 ther, above ground, which we call a Houfe. 



But men, not fatisfied with this cover from the weather, invented 

 another, and a much clofer one, which we call clothes. Before^ 

 however, I come to fpeak of them, I think it is proper to obferve, 

 that the care of our fkin, which covers our bodies, is of the greateft 

 importance in our whole animal economy ; for our fkln both takes 

 in and throws out a great deal. By its abforbing veflels, it takes in 

 the air, in and by which, as I have faid, we live: And it alfo throws 

 out a great deal by its perfpiring veJfelsX^ of which I ihall fay more 

 very foon. 



Clothes were not ufed by man before his fall, as our Scripture tells 

 us§. The firft clothes, he ufed, were of (kins ||, which is the only 

 clothing that fuch of the barbarous nations, as do not go naked, ufe 

 at this day; and, indeed, without the arts of fpinnlng and weaving, 

 by which clothes are made of vegetables, men could only be cloth- 

 ed by what clothes the brute, that is by (kins. But the vegetable 

 clothing, which we ufe, is much clofer and warmer than ikins throv/n 

 about the body are. So that, if any covering by clothes be hurtful, 



the 



• Vol. V. p. 19. t Vol. III. p. 83. 



\ Ibidem. S Gencfis chap. iii. v. 7. fl Ibid. v. 25. 



