Ossian Collection > Thoughts on the origin and descent of the Gael

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parent justice, to he framed in a superior mould
to other terrestrial animals. He is capahJt- of
enjoyments which refine and purify his sensual
appetites and passions. These, by due cultiva-
tion, are made subservient to the exalted, the
dignified, and heavenly qualities of his nature.
He is then most perfect, when the great end and
object of his actions are the welfare and happi-
ness of his kind ; then it may be said, that his
soul lives in the beams of that pure, glowing,
benignant fire of the divine energy, which per-
vades the \vorlds, and sustains the harmony of
the universe.
The capabilities of our nature prove, then,
that our species stands at the top of the scale of
earthly beings. We alone seem to be brought
within the system of moral agency, from which
arise those various duties we owe to one another
in society ; and by the observance or violation of
which, we are rendered objects of the pleasant
or painful affections of the mind, which dispose
mankind to bestow rewards, or inflict punish-
ments.
The earliest state of human existence being
prior to the knowledge of even the simple ele-
ments of those arts and sciences by which man
is supereminently distinguished from other ani-
mals, we cannot expect to have transmitted to
us, by any race of people, any satisfactory ac-
counts of their original state of existence or
modes of life. It might naturally be expected,