ON THE JEWISH MEATS. 885 and an appropriateand spiritualapplicationof the divine law, may be restored. But to begin from the beginningof things,whence itbehoves me to begin; the only food forthe firstmen was fruitand the produce of the trees. For after wards,man's sintransferredhisneed from the fruit-treesto the produce of the earth,when the very attitudeof hisbody attestedthe conditionof his conscience. For although innocency raisedmen up towardsthe heavens to pluck their food from the treesso long as they had a good conscience, yet sin,when committed,bent men down to the earthand to the ground to gather itsgrain. Moreover, afterwardsthe use of fleshwas added, the divine favour supplying for human necessitiesthe kinds of meats generallyfittingfor suitableoccasions.For whilea more tendermeat was needed to nourish men who were both tender and unskilled,itwas stilla food not prepared without toil,doubtlessfor their advantage,lestthey should again finda pleasurein sinning, if the labour imposed upon sin did not exhort innocence. And sincenow itwas no more a paradiseto be tended,but a whole world to be cultivated,the more robustfood of fleshis offeredto men, thatforthe advantage of culturesomething more might be added to thevigourof the human body. All these things (asI have said)were by grace and by divine arrangement : so that eitherthe most vigorousfood should not be given in too small quantityfor men's support,and they should be enfeebledforlabour;or thatthe more tender meat should not be too abundant,so that,oppressedbeyond the measure of theirstrength,they should not be able to bear it.1 But the law which followedsubsequentlyordained the fleshfoods with distinction:for some animals it gave and granted for use,*as being clean; some itinterdictedas not clean,and conveying pollutionto thosethat eat them. Moreover, it gave thischaracterto those thatwere clean, thatthosewhich chew the cud and dividethe hoofsareclean; those are unclean which do neitherone nor other of these 1 Thissentenceisveryunintelligible,but itisthenearestapproach toa meaningthatcanbegatheredfromtheoriginal. 2 Or,assomeread," foreating,"substituting" esum" for" usum." OTP.— VOL. n. 2 B