Volume 1

The origin of laws, arts, and sciences, and their progress among the most ancient nations / Translated from the French, vol. III by R. or A. Spearman. Of the President de Gouguet ... Adorned with cuts.

  • Goguet, Antoine-Yves, 1716-1758.
Date:
1761
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The origin of laws, arts, and sciences, and their progress among the most ancient nations / Translated from the French, vol. III by R. or A. Spearman. Of the President de Gouguet ... Adorned with cuts. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    xu pides, &c. are fo well known, that it would be difficult to throw any new light upon them. We cannot fpeak of them without being every moment in danger of repeating what has been already faid in fevera] works, which are in every body’s hands. Thefe are the reafons which determined me not to ex¬ tend my views beyond the period which I have chofen. Let us now fay a few words concerning the order in which I have ranged the feveral fubjedts of this work. 1 fpeak firft of the origin of laws, policy, and government, becaufe arts, fciences, ana, in a word, all difcoveries have had their origin and their improvements in fettled and civilized focL eties. But fuch focieties could never have been formed with¬ out the help of laws, and a government founded on certain principles. The arts, properly fo called, come next. Their difcove- ry, and more efpecially their improvement, are the work of well-regulated focieties, particularly of fuch as have fettled early, and have always inhabited the fame fpot; which nothing but agriculture could enable them to do. For this reafon, I have treated of the origin of agriculture before that of all other arts, as it has been the occafion in a great meafure of their invention, multiplicity, and prog refs. I have thought proper to place the article of the fciences immediately alter that of the arts, becaufe they owe their ori¬ gin to mechanical operations without rules or principles. It was by little and little, by a long courfe of experience, trials, and refiedfions, that mankind were enlightened, that they formed principles and fyftems, and brought their difcoveries and their knowledge to that degree of perfection which de- ierves the name of Jcience, After this, I treat of the origin of commerce and naviga¬ tion. The reafon is extremely obvious, why I did not in¬ troduce thefe two fubjedts, till after I had reprefented the origin and fir ft improvements of the arts and Iciences, for there could be no fuch thing as a regular and fettled commerce, till after the invention of a certain number of arts and fcicn- ces. The fame, may be faid, and with Fill better reafon, of navigation. Without fume (mattering at le aft in arithmetic, aftronomy