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As to the Particular before us; Ic is evident enough that Mankind are laden with many Burdens, many natural Infirmities, many acquir'd Weaknesses, many neceffary Wants, many artificial ones. Our Reason is weak, and our Passions are ftrong; our Bodies infirm, and expos'd to a Multitude of Pains and Diseases; our very Pleasures are fo deceitful, that they are commonly our greatest Plagues. But there is no need to enlarge upon the Miseries of Mankind, which we all feel within our felves, and know to be common to our whole Species.

The great Question now before us is, Whether it be fit for Creatures, thus constituted, and thus expofed, to bear one another's Burdens; for Us who have so many Wants of our own to provide for, fo many Difficulties to encounter, who have fo many Engagements already upon our hands, to enter farther into the Concerns of

Others,

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Others, and load our felves with their Burdens, and make their Labours, their Calamities and Sorrows, our

own.

Now, in order to refolve this Queftion, let us fuppofe, that Mankind liv'd a-part by themselves, absolutely difengaged from each other, and that every one's whole Care and Concern center'd entirely in himself; that all avoided each other, that all fort of Conversation, Commerce and mutual Communication was funk, and that every one took upon himself wholly to provide for himself, without any kind of Regard to any other Perfon or thing whatsoever.

What the State and Condition of Mankind would in this Cafe be, whether their Burdens would be leffened or increased, is not at all difficult to conceive or determine.

Where every one muft build for himself, and cloath himself, and pro

vide for the Sustenance of his Body, for his Health and Pleasure, the Provision would be very coarse, and mean, and fcanty; here could be no Magnificence, no Elegance, no Variety; the Sick, the Weak, and the Aged must languish and pine away by themselves, and starve without any Relief or Comfort, and rot within their Huts without any other Burying-place. All Language would become ufelefs, and of Course cease, nay, and the whole Race of Mankind must cease also, they could be Creatures only of one Age; for in fuch State there could be no Continuation of the Species, the very Suppofition of which implies a little Community, a common Interest, and focial Virtue.

If we should suppose further, that not only all focial Intercourse was fufpended, but that all the vindictive Paffions of human Nature were let loose, discharg’d of all their Restraints,

(a

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(a Suppofition which is inseparable from the foregoing ; for where a common Interest does not make us Friends, separate and opposite Interests will affuredly make us Enemies) did every one pursue his own Pleasure, not only without any Regard to the Happiness of others, but also, without any Regard to the Miseries and Cruelties he inflicted on them; this would open fuch a Scene, as we could not endure so much as the Description of.

The mere Imagination of a State which never was, and never will be, may be thought entirely useless; but let us confider that we see those things very clearly in their Extremes, which we take little or no Notice of in their lower Degreès; Things must be drawn in very strong Colourings to awaken the Attention of the careless and negligent, and to overcome Prejudice and Obftinacy. And if an abfolute Difregard of other Mens Burdens would

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fo evidently and flagrantly increase our own, would destroy not only every kind of Happiness we are capable of, but our very Being itself, we may be affured, that every Approach, every Step of Advance towards this Extreme, will carry with it proportionable Mifchief.

Neither is the State of things before defcrib'd, in all its Parts a mere Imagination or Fiction. There are many Nations in the World, fo favage, fo much Strangers to the Laws and Interests of Society, that they are but very narrowly removed from Brutes: Such is their State, that even their being made Slaves by civiliz'd Nations, is a real Benefit and Advantage to them. And in the best conftituted Governments, when the Publick has been diffolved, and the One Body broken and divided into Factions, and instead of a Commonweal, oppofite Interefts have been fet

VOL. II.

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