Disquisition on the Ancient Commerce to India.
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I divide this space into three periods, because in each is to be seen a
very distinct feature.

During the first period, previous to the fall of the Roman empire, the
order of things was such as had arisen from the new state of mankind,
who had gradually increased in numbers, and improved in sciences
and arts. The different degrees of wealth were owing, at first, to local
situation, natural advantages, and priority in point of settlement, till
the causes of decline begun to operate on some; when the adventitious
causes of wealth and power, producing conquest, began to establish a
new order of things.

The second period, from the fall of the Roman government till the
discovery of America, and the passage to the East Indies, by the
ocean, has likewise a distinct feature, and is treated of by itself.

The rulers of mankind were not then men, who from the ease and
leisure of pastoral life, under a mild heaven, had studied science, and
cultivated the arts; they were men who had descended from a cold
northern climate, where nature did little to supply their wants, where
hunger and cold could not be avoided but by industry and exertion;
where, in one word, the sterility of nature was counteracted by the
energy of man.

The possessors of milder climates, and of softer manners, falling