have you heard say of them who were seen yesterday so flourishing One of them was murdered the other was drown'd another died in playing and he who seem'd to have most health expir'd sitting at table One should never have done if one should run over all the manners of Death wherewith dayly and dismall examples strike our eyes and yet what profit do we make thereof He surely is wise and happy who passes on his Life without adhering to it who sees all it's moments slide away as if each of them were to be the last and who prepares himself at the beginning of each day with the same care which he would take upon the day of his Death One acquires this happy foresight by the contempt of the World by the desire of advancing in Virtue by a sincere repentance by a blind obedience to the orders of Providence by an uncloathing and despising of ones self accompanied with a firm resolution to suffer all for Christ Jesus Let us say to him with St. Paul Lord 2 Tim. 4. I am as a Victime which hath already the aspersion to be sacrificed the time of my departure draws near I have finished my course and no more now remains for me but to expect the crown of Justice which is reserved for them who have fought valiantly Behold the state in which a true Christian should be setled Ibid. for he who hath not fought according to the Law shall not be crowned Wherefore make your profit of the strength which God hath given you and whilst you you are in health lay up a treasure of good works for the other Life Perhaps you will not be any longer in the state of performing them when you shall fall into sickness and infirmity You are not surely so great a fool as to fancy you shall always enjoy health Alas how the sentiments of man change in the bed of Death All that he esteemed great in the World appear then to him little and despicable the sin which seem'd to him small and inconsiderable becomes great and monstrous But the change of his reason serves him no more but to plunge him in Despair Learn this sacred doctrine from the mouth of Christ Jesus Lib. 3. c. 49. He who loves his Soul shall lose it Joh. 12.15 Do not imitate those self-lovers of whom the Apostle St. Paul speaks with execration Tim. 3. For nothing is worthy of your love but God alone no not even your own Soul 2 Pet. 3. Jud. 10.8 which is the most perfect image of the Divinity Mat. 16.26 If you love it you shall lose it and if you lose your Soul Mark 8. what will it avail you to have gained the whole World For having once lost your Soul by what exchange can you recover it But we shall never comprehend this truth unless the love of Jesus serves us for our Master O love of my God when wilt thou clear my spirit When wilt thou set my Heart on fire When shall I enjoy thy delights When shall I contemplate the glory of thy Kingdom Comfort me in my Banishment Sweeten my Affliction I sigh after nothing but to be with you my beloved Lord for all the comfort the World offers me doth but augment my impatience and my sorrow When I have a will to raise up my self towards Heaven my Passions draw me towards the Earth Tottering between two so opposit motions I am a burden to my self and I desire ardently to die that so there may be an end of all these combats which put me in perpetual danger to be overcome by the Enemy of my Salvation If I had still any affection for the World I would entreat you to leave me in it but since I have setled all my affections upon you what is there that should stay me upon Earth If God doth you the favour to afford you these feelings do not attribute them to your self Rom. 12. I exhort you not to elevate your selves beyond that which you ought in the sentiments you have of your selves but to contain your selves within the limits of moderation according to the measure of the gift of Faith which God hath imparted to each one of you Jer. 13. 'T is to me alone to whom glory appertains says our Lord. Do not glorify your selves because I have spoken unto you Give to me the glory of all before darkness surprizes you By this means you will profit more and more in Virtue and I will give you a tast of all the sweetnesses of a holy Death Article XXXXI The admirable Prayses which St. Laurence Justinian gives to Death from whence he concludes that 't is no wonder if the most perfect among Christians are they who most desire it WE need not mervail that the Faithful who are penetrated with the Love of Christ Jesus De incendijs Divini amoris desire to die S. Laurence since he hath rendred Death desirable by dying for us In effect 't is no longer a punishment 't is a favour and a favour by so much the greater by how much the sooner obtained For that which was a chastisement of Sin is now a temporal recompense of good Works We ought therefore to look now upon it as the object of our sweetest hopes and not as the subject of our Fears O Death thou art no longer bitter thou art no longer cruel to the Disciples of Christ Jesus as thou wert formerly to the Children of Adam Let us bless our Lord for having made the most terrible of all Evils to be so wholesome and so universal a remedy which frees us from all sorts of infirmities and miseries which exempts us from the misfortunes of poverty from the outrages of our enemies from the attacks of envy from the disquiets of avarice and of ambition in a word from the tyranny of all our passions c which is yet more desirable which exempts us from Sin Death having thus changed its nature Christians have no longer any aversion against it but on the contrary they desire it as much as other men dread it and they invite to their assistance that which the World avoyds as the cause of its destruction Now altho' all true Christians have these thoughts we must nevertheless acknowledge that the Saints are infinitly more pierced therewith As they have more love for Christ Jesus they have also a greater desire for Death The ardour of this Love gives them such an absolute contempt of Life and such an impatience to get out of it that there is not a moment in which they wish not the separation of their Soul from their Body Nothing more nearly touches than these Words of David when having his Heart transfixed with the darts of Divine Love and as it were transported out of himself by a happy and holy fury he exclams Psal 83. â— My Soul languishes and is consumed with a desire to enter into the house of our Lord. My Heart burns with
a Child of God not to tie himself to things present and perishable that he may sooner go towards his Father who stretches forth his arms to receive him This tender affection and this holy impatience spring from the purity of a good Conscience He who is enflam'd with the love of eternal Goods is not puff'd up in Prosperity nor cast down in Adversity He is as it were above the Earth and dwells already in Heaven he conserves a Spirit evermore equall in the inequality of his lives events Finally he is like him of whom it is said in Scripture You stick not either at the Benedictions or at the Maledictions of the World but you are as an Angel of our Lord. 2. Reg. c. 24. v. 17. 2. Instruction of St. Chrysostom That we should be miserable if our Life were never to end and that if we had a faithful and true belief of the Resurrection we should not only not dread Death but we should ardently desire it WHen God gives us Life In cap. 12. Gen. Hom. 32. 't is by an action of his Omnipotency but when he gives us Death In Cap. 5. Gen. Hom. 21. 't is by a wholesome effect of his Bounty What would Life be without Death A long sequell of miseries an eternal Banishment an infinite Punishment In Cap. 5. Gen. Hâ—m 67. and almost as cruel as that of Hell For what more painfull torment could be inflicted upon them who love Serm. in Verba Pauli De dormientibus nolo vos Ser. 29. than to separate them for ever from their beloved object If this Maxim is true in sensual love is it not infinitly more in the Divine love A Heart deeply engaged in this love to which one should say you shall remain always upon Earth and you shall never see God would it not have cause to esteem it self almost as miserable as the Damned It is therefore truly said That if Death is the chastisement of Adams Sin 't is also the greatest favour that God could grant to the Children of Adam after his Disobedience Before the coming of Christ Jesus Death was frightfull because men were its slaves and that they could not obtain of God any more then temporal rewards for their good actions But since he hath ransom'd us by his precious Blood since he hath loved Death and made an alliance with it it is not only no longer an Evil but 't is the greatest of all Goods 't is the source of all imaginable happinesses Thus the fear of dying ought to be consider'd as a weakness of Nature and not as an effect of Reason 'T is true that all Creatures have an extreme desire to conserve their Being but this desire is not pardonable except only in such people who know nothing of any other Life than this The true Christian who hopes after this Death a more noble and a more happy Being than this first Being which he receiv'd by being born into the World not only desires not to conserve it but burns with impatience to loose it that he may acquire the possession of a soverain Felicity There is no truth which Christ Jesus preached and assured more authentically than the Mystery of the Resurrection Ib. Serm. de tridua Domini Resurrec and there is nothing also which the Enemies of Christianism have more thwarted All the World agrees that Christ Jesus died 1 Cor. 18.23 The Jews looked upon his Cross as a Scandall and the Gentiles as a Folly But as for the Resurrection they all absolutely deny it only the Christians believe that and God gives to them all sorts of proofs thereof He permits that Souldiers should be placed around his Sepulchre he rises forth of the Tomb in their presence the Stone is overturned the Earth trembles the Guards are affrighted the Women find him not where they had layd him and the Angells assure them that he was risen He appeared to his Disciples in particular in publick in divers places in many encounters He stays with them Forty days he there drinks he there eats and when one of them protests that he would believe nothing of it unless he could see him with his Eyes and touch him with his Hands our Saviour presents himself unto him shews him the Wound of his side will have him to put his Finger into it and finally forces him by this last proof to cry out I doubt no longer John 20. v. 28.29 you are my Lord and my God Thou hast believed answered Jesus because thou hast seen Blessed are they who believe without having seen Can one desire testimonies more evident and more authentical of his Resurrection If we are Christians we must believe it If we will be Happy we must believe it without seeing it any otherwise than by the Eyes of Faith What Happiness ought we to expect from the Rusurrection and from the Promises of Jesus Christ Is it not to be resuscitated as he is that we may reign with him But to have a share in his Resurrection and in his Kingdom we must necessarily die Death therefore is an inestimable advantage and happiness and thus we ought not to dread it but with all our hearts to desire it What advantage can we find by living longer Old age and the Infirmities which accompany it do they not render us imsupportable to others and to our selves Consider an old man overwhelm'd with years his spirits dejected his Body extenuated his face full of wrinkles his eyes half shut up his voyce trembling his head hanging down towards the Earth as it were seeking for a Sepulchre wherein to be buried Is not this a kind of Monster in nature But that which is here more monstrous in him is the desire to live in despight of so many incommodities and to trail along his Soul captivated and burthened with such heavy chains Strange blindness of man This passion is more violent in the very caducity and feebleness it self than in the most tender youthfulness Whatever tye a man advanced in age hath for his dignities and for his treasures he would willingly destrip himself of all to prolong his Life for some years and he would employ these years in acquiring other honours and other riches of which he should destrip himself Madd man Weak Worm of the Earth Reffuse of the Universe Learn that in so deplorable an estate thou hast nothing more to desire but Death nor any thing to hope for but the Resurrection Serm. 20. in verba De tormientibus An Engraver hath made a fair Statue he finds it afterwards to be eaten with Rust and spoiled by the injury of time The love he hath for his own work moves him to take compassion on it he breaks it in pieces casts the mettal into the fire and frames a Figure fairer then the former This is that which God did having seen that Man who was his Image and his Head-work was disfigured by Sin By what right and upon what
have nothing to fear upon Earth and as they possess nothing but their Soul and their Body so they look upon Death as an advantage which puts them in possession of Christ Jesus When they understand that some one among them is dead there 's a universal Joy amongst them all No one daring to say Such a one is Dead but they all say Such a one hath finished his Course At this happy tidings they chaunt forth Canticles of Joy to the praise of God humbly demanding of him for themselves the grace of a speedy and holy Death In effect as the Gladiatours have an extreme desire to get forth of the Theatre where they are perpetually expos'd to new Wounds so they who lead an austere Life and see themselves perpetually expos'd to the Temptations of Sin burn with a desire to put an end to their combats and to be delivered from the labours of this miserable Life in order to enjoy a repose which shall never be interrupted Article XVII 6. Instruction of St. John Chrysostom That the Death of Christ Jesus ought to have cured us of the dread of Death and that the Ceremonies of the Church in the Funerals of the Faithfull should afford us Comfort and Joy both for them and for our selves ST Paul says That before the birth of Christ Jesus Hom. 4. in Ep. ad Heb c. 2. Death reigned in the whole Univers and that its Empire was extended over all the Nations of the Earth Then Man began not to live but to Die without passing to a better Life But the Saviour of the World hath triumphed over Death by dying he hath destroyed its Tyranny even to the gates of Hell and those ghastly places to which it fled have acknowledged the power of our Deliverer In so much as after his Passion and his Resurrection one cannot be his Disciple without loving Death as he loved it Thus my Brethren strengthned by his Example we have no longer any cause to trouble our selves when we think of that last hour and we should do amiss to make now such complaints as our forefathers did before the coming of our Redeemer What do we see upon Earth Job 14. sayd Iob more wretched than Man He is born of a Woman amidst pains he lives a short time and suffers much his best days pass away as a shadow and he never remains constant in the same estate Were it not better for him never to have been At least there remains some hope in the Wood when 't is cut down the Stem thereof buds forth afresh and its Branches becom more thick and green than before But as for Man when the Woof of his life is once broken off 't is for evermore He comes naked forth of his Mothers womb and he shall return naked into the womb of the Earth What remaines there of man when he hath served for food to the Worms Could he not behold the Light but upon this hard condition that he must in a moment after be plunged in the darkness of the Tomb Behold what was the langage of men before the coming of the Messias But Christ Jesus hath visited us in these darknesses he hath drawn us forth of this shadow of Death wherewith we were encompassed he hath caus'd our Life to spring from our Death he hath open'd us a passage to Eternity by passing himself first by a Death ignominious in appearance but in effect glorious Thus he fought Death with its own weapons he hath pull'd out its sting 〈◊〉 23. he hath destroy'd it by it self Heb. 11. he hath subdued the Prince of Death and finally he hath cast it headlong into an eternal Abysmus ◠Cor. 25. and by this Victory he hath wiped off the Tears and rased the disgrace of his people from the face of the Earth Isay 25. Let us not my Brethren lose the advantage which he hath given us over Death Let us have no horrour of a thing which God hath rendred to usefull and so glorious unto us Rom. 8. We who possess the first fruits of the Spirit with hope to be delivered from this subjection to corruption and to be made partakers of the glory and of the liberty of the Children of God Let us remain firm in Faith let us generously brave Death If we look on it with Eyes of Faith we shall finde nothing in it that is terrible but on the contrary it will appear to us sweet and agreable and in the end we shall grow familiar with it But we must look upon it at all times and be acquainted with it if we will find it pleasing unto us We must love it and desire it by the example of our dear Master who loved it for our sakes When I behold on one side to what degree of honour Christ Jesus hath raysed us and on the other side when I consider to what lownesse we debase our selves I am altogether confounded at our remisness and negligence I see many among Christians who fear Death not only for themselves but for their Freinds This weakness is so visible among us and even among persons who seem to have much piety that the Pagans publickly mock at it For say they if the Christians believe in God whom they adore why fear they to see him and if they love him what induces them to shun the only thing which according to their own doctrine must unite them eternally unto him 'T is certainly to give occasion to the wicked to esteem all that we say of the eternall Goods and of the Resurrection of the Dead to be meer Fables They less regard what we preach than what we do You destroy by your actions what we endeavour to establish by our discourses for they judge rather of the Religion of Christ Jesus by your Life than by our Instructions In effect all the frights which you make appear shew plainly that you have little confidence in the Word of God When the Apostle S. Paul says I desire to die Philip. 1.23 and to be united to Christ Jesus he teaches us what should be the continuall desire of all true Christians Thus when you testify so great an apprehension of Death you make known to the whole world that your Faith is feeble and languishing we see that you fear to obtain that which you cannot demand with too much ardour and that instead of practising the precepts which you have heard Heb. 1. your Heart resembles those balf-open Vessels which let out all one pours into them For the rest I bless God for that he will have his Church make use in the Funerals of the Dead of such holy and august Ceremonies as condemn your remisness and which convince you of your little Faith For why think you do we there sing Hymns and Psalms and set up lighted Cierges and Torches but to teach you to look upon your Brethren whilst we are burying them as upon victorious Champions whom we ought to accompany with
have yet but very little Virtue and Piety Epist ad Prin. ad Euriam ad Paulinum alibi As Death is the end at which all men must arrive so the thought of Death is a faithfull guide to conduct us with safety unto it For the Scripture hath sayd That if we remember the last days of our Life Eccles. 7.40 we shall never Sin Surely then we run an hazard to sin often if we do not think that we must die We fall into the same misfortune as do those Travellers whom the night hath surprized in a Forrest and who have strayed out of their way Every one of them takes a several track and the farther they go the more they swerve from the right path Christ Jesus hath shew'd us the way He hath said I am the Way and the Truth His Light conducts us amidst the darkness his Voyce calls us He serves us for a guide but 't is by the pathway of sufferings and by the track of Calvary that he leads us and all they who will follow him must as he did carry their Cross and prepare themselves to die This different disposition which men have in regard of Death is the most visible Character of their predestination or of their reprobation And 't is that which Christ Jesus hath shew'd us in the Parable of the Virgins For he says that those five foolish Virgins did not enter to the Marriage of the Bridegroom because they had not put themselves in a readiness to receive him How can one explicate these marriages and this preparation but of the Joy of a Christian Death and of the holy disposition which one ought to have for it He teaches us at the same time that the five Wise Virgins being totally replenished with these holy thoughts deserv'd to have room in the house of the Bridegroom and there to celebrate the Marriage-feast the joy whereof shall last for all Eternity He who would not do good when he could have done it shall be justly punished with an impotency of doing it when he would do it He who would not think of Death during his Life time shall not be able to think of the true Life at the hour of Death And what doth it avail a man to avoid the remembrance of an Evil which he cannot shun and to love that which he is not sure to possess one moment What doth it avail him to adhere to a life which flies from him and to fly from Death which seeks after him Man says the Psalmist Psal 38. spins his days as the Spider spins her Web. Isai 59. After many turns and returns wherein he consumes himself with his own labour Death comes which ruins all his work and then it appears not so much as that he ever was Article XX. St. Jerome teaches us the temper we ought to keep in the disgust of Life and in the desire of Death We have added this passage for the Comfort of good people who naturally fear Death NOthing is more ordinary to man In Amos c. 5. etalibi than to be cast down in afflictions to be weary of living and to wish to die But all they who find themselves in this disposition do they believe that they are for this more perfect than others On the contrary they ought to be asham'd of it as of a defect of Faith and a want of Courage Not but that Life is despicable and that it is even meritorious to contemn it but that we should be so far from conceiving a disgust of it when it is full of afflictions as that we ought then chiefly to cherish it as a means given us by God to do penance If Death is to be desired 't is in a delicious Life where sometimes our condition exposes us to sin as it were against our will 't is in a long prosperity where we may have just cause to sigh for passing our life unprofitably and perhaps criminally upon Earth and for vainly spending the precious time which is only lent us to merit Heaven by our sufferings For my part says the Apostle St. Paul If it is permitted to boast 1. Cor. 12. I averr that I glory of my pains and of my afflictions to the end that the power of Christ Jesus may dwell in me I feel a satisfaction and a joy in my Infirmities in Injuries in Poverty in Persecutions in the pressing Adversities which I suffer for my Saviour and when I am weak 't is then that I find my self most strong The contempt therefore of Life is not always a certain mark of our Faith and of our Piety 't is sometimes a weariness of suffering for God sometimes a sadness which the austerity of devotion casts into the Heart we are asham'd to leave it and we want courage to persevere in it If the Soul is not supported by an extraordinary Grace the disgust of all things and even of Piety it self which is insinuated by little and little and the Imagination which black 's it self by dismal thoughts and by desires of dying brings her to the brinks of Despair Those persons who have lately sequestred themselves from the World are more exposed to this misery than others untill the Divine love hath fill'd up all that emptiness which the separation left in their Spirit For whatever endeavour these persons use Nature never endures the yoak of Grace without violence 't is in vain to tame this Nature by the continuall exercises of piety by mortifications by rigorous penances for that inward Law of the Body evermore resists the law of the Spirit and in the combat which is fought between them although the Spirit gets the victory yet it is sometimes weakned and foyled in its own conquests Then we would die because we find no more pleasure in living and in these sad desires 't is Nature which acts and not Grace Nature is willing to discharge herself of Life as of a Burthen which is to her insupportable Always to fight says she always to languish always to suffer Ah is it not something worse than to be dead I know it by my own experience Brethren and if it may be permitted me to glory in my infirmities and to make use of the terms of the Apostle I would tell you what I have done to quell these revolts and these impatiencies of Nature Eusebius of the Death of S Jerome relating his own Words Finding that the memory of the divertisements of my youth followed me every where as my shadow and troubled my most innocent occupations I shut up my self in a dismal Grot amidst the vast Deserts of Siria where the Rocks scorched with the ardours of the Sun furnish'd our Solitary Hermits with places of retrait which are common to them with the Savage Beasts I confess that I could not enter there without horrour but the occasions of offending God appeared to me more horrible than that Solitude Nevertheless in a dwelling so dreadfull where I nourished my self
from the Cell to Heaven The weight of earthly of affections hinders not her flight thither The Love of God wherewith she is enflamed lifts her above the Earth by a secret force like that of the Adamant They who are in so sublime an estate have not only acquired Sanctity but moreover the perfection of Sanctity and the very height of perfection it self But let them give thanks to the Authour of these Favours with a profound Humility For as Pride caus'd the most perfect Angells to fall from the height of Heaven so the same Pride hath caus'd many Solitary persons to perish If God inspires us with a contempt of this Life and an ardent desire of Death let us attribute to his sole Bounty such Sentiments which are so contrary to our Nature and let us humbly expect that he will hear our Prayers Article XXXIX Reflections of St. Bernard concerning the contempt which perfect Christians ought to have of Health and of Life From whence he takes occasion to speak of the Patience they are to practise in their Infirmities and of the Joy which the continual thought of Death affords them if they are true Disciples of Christ Jesus Hypocrates pretends to teach us the method of preserving and prolonging our Life Scr. 30. in Cant. Epicurus seeks the means to make us pass it over pleasantly But Christ Jesus instructs us to despise it and to lose it or to render it more short and more painfull Which side will you take To which of these Masters will you become Disciples In my Judgement the choyce contains no difficulty I am not in pain to determine my self either concerning the Sentiments which I ought to follow or concerning the Doctrine which I am to propose unto you I am no Disciple either of Hypocrates or of Epicurus I am the Disciple of Christ Jesus and I speak to the Disciples of Christ Jesus I should be a Prevaricator if I should teach you other Maxims than his Hypocrates undertakes to preserve the health of the Body Epicurus would banish from it all sorrow and cause Pleasure to reign in the Soul On the eontrary Christ Jesus my Master ordains us to endure Sicknesses to love Sorrows and to shun Pleasures Thus the Physitian ayms only to entertain for a long time the union of the Soul and of the Body the Phylosopher thinks on nothing but how to render this Union delightfull and both of them finally confine their spirit to this mortal and perishable Life which they cannot with all their Science either prolong one day or exempt one hour from miseries But Christ Jesus who levells his Doctrine only at an immortal Life and who knows that the Labours and Pains of the transitory Life are absolutly necessary to deserve the repose and the pleasures of Eternity speaks of nothing but of hating our selves and of loving sufferings and Death Doth he not tell us in the sacred Scripture He who hath a desire to save himself John 12.26 let him lose himself and he who shall lose himself for the love of me and of the Gospel shall save himself And what is it to lose ones self if it is not to abandon ones self to the misfortunes and to the pains of Life as a Martyr or to afflict ones self by voluntary Mortifications as a Penitent For 't is a kind of Martyrdom to suffer constantly Sicknesses or the injuries of Fortune and to Mortify the Flesh by a severe Penance and by a continual meditation of Death We have hereupon the example of the Holy Fathers I pist 384. and of our blessed Predecessours Why think you did they make choyce of shady low and moyst Valleys for the building of their Monasteries It was surely to the end that the bad Ayr causing frequent Infirmities to befall the Religious there residing those sicknesses might exercise their Patience and render Death to them more familiar and more desirable In a word my Brethren the Science of the saints consists in suffering for some time Pains and Afflictions Serm. 21. de dversis in order to acquire a happyness full of Joy and of Rest in Eternity Article XXXX Altho' the Book of the Imitation of Christ is in every ones hands yet it will not be unprofitable to extract out of it some pithy passages concerning the contempt of Life There is if we may say it a Moysture and an Vnction of Sanctity in all the Words of that Authour Imitation of Ch. which penetrate even to the bottom of the heart and which give an admirable Idea of the Death of the Saints There is surely Just cause of admiration that so many persons of Piety who continually read this Work and approve of it should still nevertheless passionatly love Life and tremble with fear when one speaks to them of Death FAir day of Eternity which art not darkned by the return of Night Calm and cleer day in which sparkle all the lights of soverain truth Lib. 3. c. 48. and cl 20. Celestial City Happy habitation of the Saints Residence full of joy Place of rest and of delights Lib. 1. c. 23. the possession whereof is not troubled by any of those changes which overthrow the felicities of the Earth Lib. 3. c. 49. c. When will this happy day shine for us When O Lord shall we see this dear Countrey And why do we not uncloath our selves even at this hour of every thing that hinders us from arriving there Alas the brightness of that day shines not yet to us but only afar off We make our interview of it only through the thick darkness of our ignorance Whilst the Citizens of that holy Jerusalem abandon themselves to the transports of their joy and incessantly chant forth Canticles to the glory of the Most high to the glory of his thrice holy Name the Children of Eve unfortunate Heyrs of her Chastisement creep upon the Earth and sigh at the length of their banishment Is that call'd a Living which we live here below All our days are full of darkness of bitterness and of sorrow Our Soul is there upon the rack through a continual fear of Sin Our Heart is there disquieted by a thousand solicitudes dissipated by curiosity transported by ambition blinded by errour beaten down by labour beseiged by temptations effeminated by delights languishing in poverty in Sicknesses and in all sorts of Calamities O Man acknowledge that if it is grievous unto thee to die it ought to be yet more grievous unto thee to live O the Strange stupidity of the human Heart amidst so many miseries Man is to day and to morrow he appears no more Nevertheless he scarcely ever thinks of the uncertainty of his condition Senseless that he is he makes projects for many years as if he were assured to live a long time he who hath not one sole day certain How many men have we seen whom Death hath surpriz'd in the height of their great enterprises How often