Letter 90 — On the Part Played by Philosophy in the Progress of Man (§36)

“Next there came the fortune-favoured period when the bounties of nature lay open to all, for men’s indiscriminate use, before avarice and luxury had broken the bonds which held mortals together, and they, abandoning their communal existence, had separated and turned to plunder. The men of the second age were not wise men, even though they did what wise men should do.”