her than as they are
necessary; yet they rejoice in them, and with due gratitude acknowledge
the tenderness of the great Author of Nature, who has planted in us
appetites, by which those things that are necessary for our preservation
are likewise made pleasant to us. For how miserable a thing would life
be if those daily diseases of hunger and thirst were to be carried off by
such bitter drugs as we must use for those diseases that return seldomer
upon us! And thus these pleasant, as well as proper, gifts of Nature
maintain the strength and the sprightliness of our bodies.

"They also entertain themselves with the other delights let in at their
eyes, their ears, and their nostrils as the pleasant relishes and
seasoning of life, which Nature seems to have marked out peculiarly for
man, since no other sort of animals contemplates the figure and beauty of
the universe, nor is delighted with smells any further than as they
distinguish meats by them; nor do they apprehend the concords or discords
of sound. Yet, in all pleasures whatsoever, they take care that a lesser
joy does not hinder a greater, and that pleasure may never breed pain,
which they think always follows dishonest pleasures. But they think it
madness for a man to wear out the beauty of his face or the force of his
natural strength, to corrupt the sprightliness of his body by sloth and
laziness, or to waste it by fasting; that it is madness to weaken the
strength of his constitution and reject the other delights of life,
unless by renouncing his own satisfaction he can either serve the public
or promote the happiness of others, for which he expects a greater
recompense from God. So that they look on such a course of life as the
mark of a mind that is both cruel to itself and ungrateful to the Author
of Nature, as if we would not be beholden to Him for His favours, and
therefore rejects all His blessings; as one who should afflict himself
for the empty shadow of virtue, or for no better end than to render
himself capable of bearing those misfortunes which possibly will never
happen.

"This is their notion of virtue and of pleasure: they think that no man's
reason can carry him to a truer idea of them unless some discovery from
heaven should inspire him with sublimer notions. I have not now the
leisure to examine whether they think right or wrong in this matter; nor
do I judge it necessary, for I have only undertaken to give you an
account of their constit