3GG liENRY KIEKE WHITE's REMAINS. j 



comets along their eccentric orbits, ceases to exercise his 

 providence over the aifairs of mankind, and leaves them 

 to be governed and directed by the impulses of a corrupt 

 heart, or the blind workings of chance alone. Yet this 

 is inconsistent both with the wisdom and goodness of the 

 Deity. If God permit evil, he causes it : the difference 

 is casuistical. We are led, therefore, to conclude, that 

 it was not always thus : that man was created in a far 

 different and far happier condition ; but that by some 

 means or other, he has forfeited the protection of his 

 Maker. Here then is a mystery. The ancients, led by 

 reasonings alone, perceived it with amazement, but did 

 not solve the problem. They attempted some explana- 

 tion of it by the lame fiction of a golden age and its 

 cession, where, by a circular mode of reasoning, they 

 attribute the introduction of vice to their gods having 

 deserted the earth, and the desertion of the gods to the 

 introduction of vice.* This, however, was the logic of 

 the poets ; the philosophers disregarded the fable, but 

 did not dispute the fact it was intended to account for. 

 They often hint at human degeneracy, and some un- 

 known curse hanging over our being, and even coming 

 into the world along with us. Pliny, in the preface 

 to his seventh book, has this remarkable passage : '* The 

 animal about to rule over the rest of created animals, 

 lies weeping, bound hand and foot, making his first en- 

 trance upon life with sharp pangs, and this forno other 

 crime than that he is horn man." Cicero, in a pas- 

 sage for the preservation of which we are indebted to 

 St Augustine, gives a yet stronger idea of an existing 



* Km von drt jt^sj oXv/jc^ov ci^o ^6i>vo; tv^vonTi;^ 

 XivKoic-iv (pcf.oiiff(Ti KuXij\J/ufiiveu ;^^«« xocXov, 



A^aVKTUV (JLiTtt. (pvXov ITOV, T^cXfTTOVT Ut^ Q^WTT OVi 



AiSui X.OCI 'Sifx.itri;' <r« ^£ Kii^iTUi uXyiot. Xvy^a 

 ^vviTois avfipu^otffi, xaxov o* oly^ icrciTci uXk-/}. 



Eesiod. Opera et Dis lib. i. 206: 



" Victa jacet Pietas : et Virgo csede madentes, 

 Ultima coelestum terras Astrsea reliquit. 



Ovid, l.i., fab. 4. 



" Panlatim deinde ad Snperos Astrse recessit, 

 Hac comite atque duae pariter fugere sorores." 



Juvenal, Sat. vi., 1. 19. 



