50 VOYAGE TO MADAGASCAR. 



chcs are the moft perverre, the mofi: deceit* 

 fal, and the moft fawning of mankind. 

 He does not hefitatc to affert, that among 

 thefe iflanders treachery and revenge are 

 accounted virtues compailion and grati- 

 tude weakndTes. Such abfurd declamation, 

 however, can impofe only on thofe who 

 have not ftudied, with Roufleau, man in his 

 primitive ftate. Can he indeed, who fol- 

 lows without reftraint the didates of n^ 

 ture, be corrupt and wicked ? When man, 

 in a dualized ftate, is hurried on by the im- 

 pctuofity of paOion, his defirea, rather in- 

 flamed than fatisfied, plunge him into an 

 abyfs, from which ali the power ofreafon 

 cannon de%er him. But the favage, when 

 in his pleafures he follows the impulfe of 

 his fenfes^ experiences nothing of the like 



fitted m it ten yeaTS. It was prmtcd at Parisj in one 

 volume qustto, with figures dclignedand engraven by 

 tlie authofj and was dedicated to the fubintcndant Fou- 

 quet, wKo had the principal fliarc in the company then 

 formed for carrying on a trade to tlxe EaSl Indies* T, 



kind. 



