of nature, which even his magic pen cannot paint as a state in
which a single virtue took root, it would have been clear, though
not to the sensitive unreflecting wanderer, that man was born to
run the circle of life and death, and adorn God's garden for some
purpose which could not easily be reconciled with his attributes.

But if, to crown the whole, there were to be rational creatures
produced, allowed to rise in excellency by the exercise of powers
implanted for that purpose; if benignity itself thought fit to call
into existence a creature above the brutes, who could think and
improve himself, why should that inestimable gift, for a gift it
was, if a man was so created as to have a capacity to rise above
the state in which sensation produced brutal ease, be called, in
direct terms, a curse? A curse it might be reckoned, if all our
existence was bounded by our continuance in this world; for why
should the gracious fountain of life give us passions, and the
power of reflecting, only to embitter our days, and inspire us with
mistaken notions of dignity? Why should he lead us from love of
ourselves to the sublime emotions which the discovery of his wisdom
and goodness excites, if these feelings were not set in motion to
improve our nature, of which they make a part, and render us
capable of enjoying a more godlike portion of happiness? Firmly
persuaded that no evil exists in the world that God did not design
to take place, I build my belief on the perfection of God.

Rousseau exerts himself to prove, that all WAS right originally: a
crowd of authors that all IS now right: and I, that all WILL BE
right.

But, true to his first position, next to a state of nature,