they had been long neglefted. Front Chaldea and from Egypt
■ two remarkable fyftems branched out, the one over India, China,
and the extremities o f the Eaft, and the fecond over the Weft and
North. Here and there we are ftill able to difcover fome remains;
but in the interior Southern parts of Africa, and over the whole
continent o f America, few, i f any, traces o f thofe ancient fyftems,
have been difcovered. T h e more a tribe or nation preferved of
the ancient fyftems, and modified and adapted them to their particular
fituation,'climate and other circumftances, or raifed new
ideas and principles upon the firft bale or foundation, the more improved,
civilized and happy muft that tribe or nation be. The
more a nation or tribe has forgotten or loft of the ancient fyftems ;
their fituation, climate, and other circumftances, having obliged
them to negleft or to depart from them without making up the de-
fedt by new principles ■ and ideas, founded on the fame plan, the
more that nation or tribe is found to be degenerated, debafed, and
'wretched. Various "circumftances ■ may - have caufed the lofs and
negleft o f the ideas ■ and improvements' o f the fyftem, which their
'progenitors or mother-tribe ftill prefervdd'-; a number o f men are
obliged'for inftance/bn aCcount-'of inteftine feuds • in a nation, to
abandon' their native-country, an'd the climate wherein they were
-born and educated, in order to place themfelves beyond the reach
either o f fhe'power-or 6utrage;6f their enemies';1 they wander over
t ' u* •' i a great
a g r e a t f p a c e o f u n o c c u p i e d g r o u n d , • w h i c h i s f i t u a t e d i n a c o l d e r p r o g r e s s
5 1 _ . j 1 o f s a -
c l im a t e , t h a n t h a t w h i c h t h e y f o r m e r l y i n h a b i t e d ; t h e t r o p i c a l , v a g e s .
fruits which grew in their native country fpontaneoufly, are no
longer to be met w i th ; the roots, which there, by flight cultivation,
gave them abundance o f food, require here a very laborious
and toilfome hulbandry, before they yield the bare necefiaries of
life ; becaufe vegetation is not fo luxuriant, fo rapid, and powerful
in climates, remote from the fun. Let us now fuppofe this
clan, grown by len gth .o f time: into a nation; new divifions fu-
pervening, force another portion, ftill further- from the benevolent
influence o f the fun, where they find none of-the fpontaneous tropical
fruits, w h e r e even the roots; their former- fopport, will not
thrive, on account of the rigours o f their winters.;, they loft therefore,
at once, their fubfiftence; and though they were obliged, in
their former country, to toil during a bated time, they had, however,
the fatisfaction of-colle&ing a certain food; but now, unacquainted
as they are, With the fpontaneous prodiuftions o f this new
climate, which might, perhaps, fupply them-with eatables, they
muft .roam over their new country in queft of precarious food;
they'try to kill by force or addrefs, fome animals or birds or to
catch fome fifh in the rivers or ftas, to procure a fubfiftence; this
entirely alters their mode o f Usin g; their habits, their language,
and I might almoft fay their, nature; their ideas are quite changed,
C U t!:e