Whose flinty teeth the golden harvests grind,
Feast without blood! and nourish human-kind.


[_Feast without blood!_ l. 278. The benevolence of the great Author of
all things is greatly manifest in the sum of his works, as Dr. Balguy
has well evinced in his pamphlet on Divine Benevolence asserted, printed
for Davis, 1781. Yet if we may compare the parts of nature with each
other, there are some circumstances of her economy which seem to
contribute more to the general scale of happiness than others. Thus the
nourishment of animal bodies is derived from three sources: 1. the milk
given from the mother to the offspring; in this excellent contrivance
the mother has pleasure in affording the sustenance to the child, and
the child has pleasure in receiving it. 2. Another source of the food of
animals includes seeds or eggs; in these the embryon is in a torpid or
insensible state, and there is along with it laid up for its early
nourishment a store of provision, as the fruit belonging to some seeds,
and the oil and starch belonging to others; when these are consumed by
animals the unfeeling seed or egg receives no pain, but the animal
receives pleasure which consumes it. Under this article may be included
the bodies of animals which die naturally. 3. But the last method of
supporting animal bodies by the destruction of other living animals, as
lions preying upon lambs, these upon living vegetables, and mankind upon
them all, would appear to be a less perfect part of the economy of
nature than those before mentioned, as contributing less to the sum of
general happiness.]


"Now his hard hands on Mona's rifted crest,
280 Bosom'd in rock, her azure ores arrest;