Page:A discourse upon the origin and foundation of the inequality among mankind (IA discourseuponori00rous).pdf/76

 them, we mut deny that, even before the Deluge, uch a State ever exited among Men, unles they fell into it by ome extraordinary Event: a Paradox very difficult to maintain, and altogether impoible to prove.

Let us begin therefore, by laying aide Facts, for they do not affect the Quetion. The Reearches, in which we may engage on this Occaion, are not to be taken for Hitorical Truths, but merely as hypothetical and conditional Reaonings, fitter to illutrate the Nature of Things, than to how their true Origin, like thoe Sytems, which our Naturalits daily make of the Formation of the World. Religion commands us to believe, that Men, having been drawn by God himelf out of a State of Nature, are unequal, becaue it is his Pleaure they hould be o; but Religion does not forbid us to draw Conjectures olely from the