conflicts and temptations of Conscience which still rack and torture ill Womens minds when they come to die for tho God casts her on her Bed of sickness and pain yet he will be sure to lift her up with the arms of mercy and bless her with the assurance of a perfect state of Bliss after her painful life is ended for tho Death be the wages of Sin yet a Pious death is but the passage to a Heavenly Life And a Religious vertuous Woman at her death will as certainly enter into a state of eternal Felicity as an impious vain and wicked one will into that of deserved misery Solomon says That the fear of God is not only the beginning of wisdom but the end of it for it teacheth you to regulate your desires and purifie your actions as it will make you live well in order to die so So that indeed our good actions concur in their influence towards the happiness of our souls as the Sun does in motion to the Dial the Dial is not the true cause of the Suns motion to it yet by the Suns shining on the Dial you may truly Judge of the true motion of the Sun. But leaving aside that dispute whether good works can only merit Heaven or not as the Papists teach I am sure living a pious vertuous life in the faith of the holy Jesus will certainly carry you there this all Ladies know but few will practise or so much as think of I mean as you ought for you usually defer all thoughts of the other World till you are just parting out of this when alas the time present is only yours for that past is no more and that to come is not yet so that you do but live between them both the present being the only time you can properly call yours for God well knowing what great Prodigals you are of it is so providently merciful as to trust you only with a Minute at a Time for as he gives you one so he still takes away the other as a Lesson of instruction not to rely on any time but the present and to perform all your Christian duties in it as the only time appointed you by God for it And Ladies if you will but employ this present time as you ought you will certainly find time enough in it to enjoy both the delights of this World and to secure you the felicities of the next By this all our vain Ladies may easily know and joyfully conclude that there needs no great difficulty in obtaining Heaven since it only requires as I have told you a strict pious and vertuous life to compass it which may easily be done if you will but spend half so much time in serving your God as you daily wast in looking on your Glass in praying for your Soul as in setting out your Face which must certainly nay perhaps suddenly stink rot and be eaten up by nasty Worms And really supposing there was no such place of Bliss as Heaven for the Godly nor yet of Torment as Hell for the wicked yet a pious vertuous life cannot but be more healthful for the body and more satisfactory to the mind than excess pride and vanity can be to either Next 't is worth your consideration to think how little true content most of you can find in this World and how little time 't is you can enjoy that little you do desire for such considerations cannot but render you somewhat sensible of your great and extravagant folly in all your ludicrous sports and pastimes unskilfully gaming away your souls so as in a manner to set Eternity against a Moment I mean the Momentary pleasures of this life which cannot last before the joys of Heaven which are everlasting and sure there can be nothing more foolish than to rely on the duration of your abode on Earth as any solid and lasting possession there being nothing more frail and tottering than the Basis your life stands on for tho you are never so healthful yet you cannot but find in your self some marks and symptoms of Mortality which may serve as Advertisements of the instability of this your earthly being which is subject to a thousand Diseases and a torrent of Accidents especially in you fine young Ladies whose bodies are so tenderly built and nicely composed as the leaving off a Hood or wanting of a Skarf the least crum of Bread that sticks in your Throats or the smallest stop in the course of your Blood I had almost said or motion of your Tongues puts the whole Oeconomy of your body in disorder if not utter ruin witness as an instance of this accidental mortality Pope Adrian who as story says was choaked with a Flie nay your very food the support and maintainer of your life ought to be a Memorandum of your Mortality since you cannot live without it and if sleep be the Image of death you are by the very necessities of your nature to die every night during the few days you live But whether you live long or die early you must certainly Die and you are in this as well as in all things else to submit your will to Gods and to bend your greatest endeavors and fix your strongest resolutions in an intire obedince to it which if you truly and heartily do you must learn the great vertue and Christian perfection of self-denial and despise all those worldly flatteries and enjoyments mortifie all your excess of vanity and extravagant pleasures that you may become truly amiable pure and holy in the sight of God when you live in compliance to his holy Laws and submit in all things to his good will and pleasure who is all love and beauty itself in the highest measure and perfection and therefore the least spot or impurity in your lives is a direct violence and contradiction to the most excellent nature and being of an infinitely pure and holy God. And now before I quite finish this Discourse let me beg one of you Ladies to suppose your ' self to be in the actual possession of all the worldly pleasures you can fancy that you enjoy as great honours as your ambition can aspire unto and as much Beauty and Riches as your vain and Covetous humor can thirst after and as many rarities as your appetite can wish for and that your Gallant was as kind handsom and constant as you could wish In a word that you thought him as beautiful as you think your self pray do but now consider what all these will amount to at the hour of death and in order to it reflect a little seriously what a weak Basis your life stands on for according to the common Law of the Land a Life is valued but at seven Years purchase and many times by the course of Nature a Life does not last half so long Next if you will but condescend so far to mortifie your self as to go and visit one of these Lovers of vanity and railliers of Religion
Husbands by it shew more confidence in their Wives than discretion in themselves and as too much liberty spoils some Wives so a strict watchful Jealousie makes many Wives worse than they would be by believing them worse than they truly are for doubtless many Husbands make their Wives dishonest by mistrusting them for that breeds anger and hatred and they often create revenge which some hot Womanish spirits will act upon any account tho they themselves are the greatest sufferers by it I esteem Jealousie to be a most ridiculous folly not only because Jealous Men eagerly seek what they highly dread to find but if a Man had more Eyes than Argos yet as Argos was he may be deceiv'd by a simple Woman for if a Woman will but put on the wickedness of the Devil she will not fail being furnished with the subtilty of the Serpent And therefore it often happens that great and wise Statesmen in the Politicks of Marriage who trust in their Wives vertuous words great modesty and strict outward behaviour may be deceiv'd for unvertuous thoughts and designs are usually disguised and set out in finer expressions than plain honest dealing and those commonly promise most that mean to perform least because they intend to pay in no other Coin than bare words and false assurances and therefore none ought to wonder if great Politicians as well as others are now and then deceiv'd in their Wives vertue We read that Sampson with all his Strength tho he could not be out-witted by all the Philistines was over-reached by the subtilty of a Woman A strict seeming outward modesty is not still an infallible sign of a Wives true inward Vertue since 't is not extraordinary to see a Woman look like a Saint before Company and act like a Miss in private for many handsom Women that are of a good coming and melting nature assoon as you are a little advanced into their acquaintance and favour yet seem very coy and severe at first entrance into it imitating the Sea which tho never so quiet and calm in the main yet still casteth out rough waves near the shore And now whatsoever men may think of me I am sure my meaning is truly friendly in advising them that if they are in the happy state of freedom not to yoak their Liberty in Marriage for meer Beauty or bare Mony but chiefly for vertue and goodness for if you but consider seriously you will find certainly that the misery of an ill Wife is no new affliction but as very an old one as Marriage and almost Nature it self witness Adam who lived in a continued innocency and felicity whilst he remained in the Paradice of a single Life but he was no sooner Married to Eve but he was cast out of both And 't is most certain let your Love range over Court Town and Country nay ramble over the whole World you can never choose a Wife that is not her Daughter and common experience tells us that there are few Daughters that do not savour something of their Mothers humor as well as nature and therefore 't will be highly prudential in this sad and weighty affair to consider that Marrying a bad Wife as 't is more than an even Lay one does has something in it of the nature of that sin for which men can have no repentance or pardon no more than they can have any ease or relief for it while they live for one may as well pretend to free Deaths Prisoners from the Grave as unchain the Married during their Lives no Skill of the greatest Artist nor yet Argument of the most subtile Socinian can ever evade or loose a Wedding Knot it being of an extraordinary lasting Union quite differing from all others for Men can unbind all others whilst they live but a Marriage Vow can only be unbound by death it self And now I have given you this part of my Opinion as to meer Mony or beauty Marriages which many Husbands may truly call in the Apostles phrase tho spoke in another and more divine sense That Labor of Love. I hope 't will not appear an extraordinary fault in saying it S. Paul had foreseen the Romantic Gallantry and extravagant folly I think I might have said madness of many Marriages made now adays which some of our vain inconsiderate Ladies are drawn into by the common report that such a Man has a great Estate which suits well with her eager desire to keep a Coach and six Horses which she vainly fancies will not only carry her thorow all the miseries of Marriage but into the Towring pastime of the Park without the least concern of getting a good prudent sober religious Husband many of them not valuing or at least not considering other than the keeping a splendid Retinue and glittering train of Liveries than wearing rich Clothes adorn'd with Gold and costly Pearl when there are a hundred more weighty concerns that are more needful Appendencies to compleat a happy Marriage Really this is one of the chief Causes why such Marriage Love decays and wears out with their Wedding Coaches and is as often out of order as they 't were well if they still could be as easily mended which none ought to wonder at it being but natural for effects to follow their Causes Among all the great and extravagant follies that are used in the inequalities of Marriages in our days there 's none appears to me more irrational and unnatural than an old Mans Marrying a young Woman which in my Opinion seems a Match fitter to make sport for others than to raise joy to themselves for an old Man is to his young Wifes Bed but like juice of Orange to her Stomack it may create in her an Appetite but of it self can never satisfie it such an old Man being not only unsuitable undecent but unwholesom too being to her like a March Sun which all the great Physitians concur in opinion to be very unhealthful as having only strength to exhale Humors but wants force to dissolve them so that such a Match is so great a folly as I shall only here need name one shameful misery that commonly attends it and indeed I need name I think no other either to fortifie my opinion against it or to set out ones misery for doing it which is this That an old Man that Marries a handsom young Woman tho his Wife may be so vertuous as not to Cuckold him yet the world is so wicked in its reports to Censure him so as it will always which minds me of a story of a Gentleman whom both his Wife and Neighbours agreed to proclaim the truth of his being a Cuckold and she dying he Married an old ugly rigid Puritan that was so odiously deformed as he was satisfied she wanted Power and the world Charity enough to Cuckold him for 't was impossible there could be a spark of Love or liking in the Case and he did believe that this Wife would not only be a
bodies And sure since it cannot be denied but a vertue that overcomes the highest difficulties fiercest inclinations and most youthful passions must needs excel all others then it cannot be in the least doubted but that a young handsom Widow that leads a retir'd strict and unmarried life must needs in that kind surpass all other Women because she practises more the vertue of continence than any of them can I mean as to the outward mark of our knowledge since a Widow that lives in a true conformity to such a strict pious life resembles most and approaches closest to the heavenly one which must needs be the best as coming nearest to perfection for she declines the natural commerce of the body to enjoy the better and Spiritual Contemplation of the Soul. And 't is most certain the more Women keep their thoughts and desires from worldly delights and vanities the more their minds will be fortified against them and the more ready they 'll be to embrace true felicity We read in Scripture that the Womans subjection to the Man was laid on her as a penance and punishment for her disobedience to her God. Truly most of the young Married Sparks of our Age are very active in observing Gods pleasure herein yet not at all on the account of the Almighty's design but the worlds practice which is for such Sparks to make Marriage a punishment to the Woman as much as they can that is as much as some Wives will for serve honour and obey are grown but words of course which all Women must repeat after the Minister at Marriage but few will perform after they are Married and their promise of obedience till death them do part is seldom in their thoughts as long as they live Indeed I have known some young handsom Widows who have lov'd their own Reputation and their Husbands Memory so much as to continue some years in a strict deep Mourning as well in their Life as Dress And I have also known other Widows of the wild brisk London brood that have not so much Complemented their Husbands death as to hold out one year a Widows Life tho contrary to the Custom of the Country and the common Rules of decency and civility And as shewing so little a concern for a Husband is very unbecoming and highly immodest not to speak worse so on the other hand overmuch grief and despair are both imprudent and irreligious But I need not speak much of this overabundant Mourning for a Husband since 't is a distemper of mind very few Widows of our age are inclin'd too and therefore not in danger of being infected with for most Widows can tell us that they are so well read in the brave Roman Story who though they had no other bounds to their aspiring hopes than the Conquest of the whole world yet they still placed their glory and praise as much in suffering well as in doing so saying as they ought not to be overmuch exalted by prosperity so they ought not to be too much depressed or cast down by adversity but to observe the Golden Rule of Mediocrity in both Cases and therefore 't is not ill Wife-like but brave Roman like to suffer all losses with Courage and Patience And 't is from these Considerations that many of our fine young gay brisk Widows say They esteem more the Phylosophers Wit than his Wisdom who being in great affliction and weeping most bitterly for the death of his Wife one of his friends told him his crying could do neither him nor her any good Therefore said the Philosopher I Cry. But this is a kind of doleful Logick that suits ill with the sprightly gaiety of our fine young Widows and therefore it must be needless as well as troublesom to mind them of it it being a very unmodish doctrin to preach to such young Widows that because their Husbands are out of the world therefore they ought to live as if they were not in it and bury themselves alive in a strict solitary retirement which they will tell you savours more of great folly than true wisdom since no Woman by her Matrimonial Vow is engaged to Love her Husband longer than till death them do part and indeed as Wives now go I think 't is very extraordinary to meet one that truly loves her Husband half so long In a word she that gives her Husband a more lasting Love than she promised is generously kind but she that pays him as much as she ingaged for is truly just Next 't is most certain that all extreams are bad and therefore Widows ought to avoid them on both sides either by shewing too little a Concern or too violent a Grief for their Husbands death I know I need not travel your thoughts so far as the East-Indies to shew you the barbarous examples of Womens love to their dead Husbands bodies by sacrificing themselves to the Devil by burning themselves alive soon after their Husbands death we have examples enough in the History of our Neighbouring Princes of their Wives barbarous Cruelty committed against their own Lives for their Husbands loss of theirs but then do not mistake me so as to think I believe there are any such kind of fond foolish Wives in our age as Adymond Queen of Sweedland who when she heard her Husband was kill'd by the Danes said she would soon follow him and presently stabb'd her self I might name you many more of this bloody Nature but surely such kind of Tragical examples are to be look'd upon but as the vile and wicked effects of madness or a devilish despair and not at all the motions of a pious vertuous love since good Wives may shew their kindness without shedding their blood and may mourn heartily without dying Cruelly for such unnatural deaths utterly destroy that great Christian vertue of well regulating their passions And certainly no Widow stands more engaged to her Husbands memory either by the Laws of outward Civility and good manners or by the inward effects of true love and real esteem than to observe those kinds of measures and degrees of mourning for their Husbands which are usual according to the rules of custom and decency which is to live a strict religious and unmarried life for some considerable time or longer as some Women do and among those many who continue so to the end of their days and so are Widows indeed according to S. Pauls phrase and so deserve his character of honour And among those I cannot omit a just commendation of the three most Excellent vertuous Ladies and kind Sisters who live together near London I need not name them because I am sure there are not three Widow Sisters of their high Quality great Vertue and clear Reputation that live together in all England for which as they have the just admiration and praises of all true Lovers of Vertue so I wish all Widows would strive to imitate their religious example that so like them they might
enjoy comfort of true devotion and felicity upon earth as an earnest of more blessed comforts and happiness they do expect in the other World. And who by leading such a constant religious and unmarried Life the world must plainly see that such Widows have no particular fondness for any Man in the world since their dear Husbands are out of it and that they do still shew a constant affection real esteem and memory of their Husbands vertues and reputation and by a particular kindness continued to all their Husbands Relations and Friends as much as if they had been now actually living and could be made sensible of the effects of their good or ill nature towards them I say such a vertuous and discreet carriage in Widows is a most clear demonstration that Loves do not expire with their Husbands Lives and certainly such an affection must be more real and less byassed as to all appearances than the love of any living Wife can possible be since that may only look counterfeit and be disguised by wearing a Mask of self-interest or design rather than of true affection or value and may be reckoned on the account of living in good esteem or reputation as to the world or be counterfeited for an outward seeming kindness to her Husband tho she has no real inward one in order to live at peace and quiet at home both for her Childrens good and for her own and families ease But a Widow that continues as I have said consonant kindness to her Husbands memory and Relations and lives in the state of a private and religious widowhood such a one can expect no return or hope for any praise or advantage but from the just commendation of her vertue while she lives or indeed the more certain comfort and assurance of her eternal happiness when she comes to die But mortifying Discourses of this nature I am sure must be far from making any agreeable musick to the fine young Widows but it may be sound harsh and unpleasant as well as useless and unliking many of the fine gay young Widows making the day of their Husbands death the joyful Birthday of their own freedom And there are few of these brisk witty sort of Widows that are not so great Philosophers in the Politicks of Marriage and so persectly read in all parts of Scripture tending to that point as to be wisely able to extract out of it the vertue of Patience and to possess it in so high a degree and great measure as to be able to raise to themselves satisfactory Arguments of all sizes degrees and qualities whatsoever to arm themselves against the loss of a Husband of any kind be he good or bad poor or rich so as to render his death at least easie if not pleasing by arguing and reasoning with themselves after this manner If my Husband was good and vertuous and made a holy end suitable to his religious life sure I ought not to mourn for it but rejoyce at it that he is gone to Heaven and that I have in a manner half my self there before hand and therefore it must argue want of Charity kindness and good nature to lament and mourn for his happiness in living and dying so well If my Husband was wicked lewd and prophane I have a double reason to rejoyce for his death first that the world is rid of so bad a Man and I of so ill a Husband and am no more oblig'd to lie every night with so much wickedness in my bosom and that we are now no more one flesh who were so far from being of one mind and humor and I have also this second means of extracting this heavenly advantage by it that having experimented the slavish misery of serving the Creature I am now or at least ought to be the more ready and willing to dedicate all my remnant of Life only to the service of my Creator whose service is still perfect freedom and everlasting felicity If my Husband was poor and needy I have reason to be glad he is intirely delivered from the great misery of want and that his poverty is dead and buried with him for none ever feels want in the Grave But if my Husband died Rich I have great reason to rejoyce that he has left me so and has given me by his death what he denied me all his life the incontroulable Treasure of his Wealth and that I have now the range of the whole Kingdom to ramble over and spend it after what kind of manner and with what sort of Company as I fancy most and love best and by being a Widow I am become the perfect Empress of my own Will instead of being confin'd at home a Subject to my Husbands and sure none can relish with more gusto the ease and liberty and the many pleasures of freedom than she that 's newly deliver'd from the bondage of a Marriage confinement and therefore what Seneca said of Vertue that there 's no Passion or Affliction in the World that Vertue has not a Remedy for The same may be said in reference to most young Widows love to their Husbands let their passionate kindness for them be seemingly never so great whilst they live yet they will be sure to find Remedies for their overmuch mourning for their death And therefore I shall advise Husbands never to Antidate their trouble by fearing that their death will produce a long sadness in their Wives at the common rate Marriage-Love now goes there 's no great fear of it since in most Wives their good Jointure-Rents outweigh their Love-sighs or at least Counterpoise all their formal Mourning for there is really so little pure Love in many of our Marriages now adays as Husband and Wifes Love is but of the same nature of that of great Sovereign Princes whose Love is but meer Interest and a Husbands death to many of our Wives is become as Repentance for Sin which cannot come so soon or late but it still brings Comfort with it And now lest you may take my speaking against Widows Marrying to be but a kind of raillying Discourse fit only to entertain but not to convince and that my reasons against Widows Marrying are but meer Romantick pleasant to be read but needless to be believ'd I will wave my own weak reasonings and quote you some Scripture ones that seem not to favour Widows Marrying but rather the contrary to continue as they are and for their encouragement to it propounds to them great advantages by it which are these The first is out of the Old Testament Lev. 22.13 If a Priests Daughter be Married she must not eat of the Offerings of holy Things but if the Priests Daughter be a Widow she may eat as in her Touth that is as if she had been never Married and was a Maid which was a priviledge Women had by living Widows under the Mosaick Law and which would not have it seems been granted had she been made unclean
honour to so that he wanteth nothing of all that he desires but God giveth him not the power to eat thereof which is an evil Disease because such a Man wanteth even what he hath what can such a miserable be call'd better than a sad wretch that makes himself a voluntary Slave to labour in the Mines of his own wealth and Vassal-like only to enjoy the drudgery part for his own share making his wealth a burden without reaping any true pleasure or advantage by it so that such a Man tho he be never so rich must die in debt to himself for he strips himself of necessaries during his own life to make his Children a Wardrobe after his death I am sure the prodigality of our London Gallants is after a quite different Manner for so they can but make a Wardrobe for themselves and Misses during their own lives many of them care not tho they leave their Children in a condition to want necessaries after their death which too many of them can justifie by woful experience several of their Fathers Estates that did belong to them as their Birth-right by their Parents luxury pride and folly have been made a sacrifice to the extravagant expences and vain profuseness of their Mistrisses pride and their own sottishness as that they have left nothing to their Heirs of Inheritance but the wind as Solomon expresses it Prov. 11.29 The certain loss of their fathers Estate and the uncertain getting another for themselves if they can I have read of a Philosopher that was perswaded by his friends to leave his retirement for a little time to see a fine Shop plentifully stor'd with all manner of rich things and fine knacks and being asked what he thought of all those rare things I am thinking said he what a World of things are here I do not want for what 's more than we use is more than we need I am confident if one of our fine London Ladies had been shewn that sight and asked that question her answer had been what a World of things I want that are not here which much justifies a Writers saying that the ancient Latins called Womens Wardrobe Mundus a World yet I find in the Map of Womens ornamental Dresses reckoned by the Prophet Isaiah the sum total of them there named to be but twenty one which clearly shews the vast difference between the twenty one years of Men and the twenty one Dresses of Women for by the Law of our Kingdoms all Mens years under one and twenty are not allow'd to reach discretion but our Prophet seems here to say that by the Law of God all Womens Dresses that amount to much more that pass beyond twenty one must exceed all discretion for certainly they must be too many for Women to wear whom God declares too many for him to like And tho without any dispute 't is a sin to doubt that those ornamental Dresses which the Creator thinks too many no Woman Creature but ought to esteem more than enough yet so extravagant and phantastical are many of our fine Ladies and Gallants as they are so far from esteeming that Number sufficient as they send almost every week to Paris for such supplies of new fashion Dresses as one might as soon Climb up to the Top of all Numbers as to â—â—pe to reckon the numberless variety of Womens Dresses there belonging much more Rigging to set out a young Lady than a Man of War so hard 't is to cast up the variety of parts as now adays belong to compleat a great Modish Ladies Dress and Equipage And therefore I fancy an old Philosopher gave both a good Reason and true Character of the fashion of rich Dresses That 't was the deadly catching Disease of Women and the foolish passion of men Indeed I find no reason to believe any of these kind of Ladies are knowing in Philosophy because they cannot be lovers of Wisdom that are haters of Discretion which makes a main part of it But I have a great deal of reason to believe that they are knowing in Satans Arithmatick and too well understand sinful Subtraction and vain Multiplication since we find so many of them can Subtract the Ten Commandments to the scarce keeping of one and multiply the twenty one ornamental Dresses to the using of hundreds And the worst of it is that not one of these twenty one Dresses are a kin to those S. Peter advised the Women of his time to wear which was not putting on Gold or curling Hair or what is Corruptible but the Ornaments of a meek and quiet Spirit 1 Pet. 3.3 4. which exactly suits the true beauty of Religion which the Apostle says is of great price in the sight of God for that will render Women of so pious a Temper as tho the youthful gaiety of their human Nature may make them think of the vain dresses of the times yet their sanctified minds will never let them forget to be true followers of the state of Eternity Indeed 't is a hard measuring Cast whether their variety of vain extravagant Dresses deserves more Mens sober pity or contempt most I am sure are fitter for either than my description yet I must be Charitable to them tho they are far from being so to themselves as to wish that these our fine young modish Ladies and their Gallants would keep more Commandments and use fewer Dresses that they might thereby lessen their own particular vanities and moderate the general English out-cry against French fashions which many think have not only over run but near destroyed all our noble ancient great way of Living and grave kinds of sober Dresses Sure if our fine young Ladies and great Modists would but a little seriously reflect of what most of their fine Clothes are made they would not be so proud to glory in what they really ought to be asham'd off for the fine Silks we wear are but the workings of poor little Worms and our finest Cloth is made of the Wooll of Sheep so that our covering was but that of Beasts till our pride and vanity robb'd them of it And indeed our great adored Mistris Mony which all of all sorts receive with so great joy and entertain with so high delight as the only true happy and undecaying Mistris in this World for all Love her passionatly at once and what 's yet stranger than all both Sexes are still constant in their eager love and great fondness of her nay Solomon had so great an esteem and value for Money as he said it answered all things yet if we truly look into its Extraction we shall find it as very mean as that of our Clothes for as Seneca well observes That Gold and Silver were still mixt and never kept better Company than Earth and Dust till avarice and ambition raised and parted them and so they became our Masters as well as Mistrisses O how strangely is Apparel Metamorphosed We read in Genesis that it was
first used to hide our Shame but now 't is worn to shew our Pride and God knows if we truly consider we are very far from having any reason to boast of our Apparel since 't is but the cover of Shame and Sin and therefore we ought to wear it but as deep mourning for the great loss of our dear friend innocency Nor can any deny but that Mourning is a Garment fitter according to the strictest niceties of our very present Modes to denote true sadness than set out vain glory to manifest grief than express joy yet so evil is our present Age as many of the wicked brood of elder Brothers who as one said pray for their Fathers lives but not their living plainly shew at their Fathers death in what a manner they are concern'd for his loss not theirs by their chearful Countenance and Gay Lives which clearly Proclaim that they Mourned rather because their Fathers lived so long than died so soon and so make their long funeral Cloaks which usually weigh heavier on their Backs than the cause of them on their Hearts rather a Habit of great Joy than true Mourning But real Mourning hath nothing to do with our French Dresses therefore this discourse shall have no more to do with it and I will now return to my Subject and mind you that the French have brought into England so many strange Fashions as 't is to be scared our young fry of Nobility and Gentry will esteem piety and vertue as things quite out of fashion and use and indeed their Lives cannot be more extravagant and vain than their Apparel if I can properly say they have any left Certainly if Sir John Suckling had lived to these times he might well have added to that pithy saying of his This trifle Woman will unman us all and uncloath us too for Doublets are quite left off by all the Modists And for the Breeches most of our young Sparks and some of the old Fops have lost them also being generally given by our Gallants to their Mistrisses and by the meer Country Gentlemen to their Wives which by the by is a new Mode that contradicts the old Law to confound the Habits of several Sexes so that if our Women increase thus in Power and our Men continue so in folly 't is very probable that those of the next Age may see our English Modists pictur'd as they do Truth that 's naked These sort of Men if I may properly call them Men that have lost their Manhood having left off their Doublets and yielded up their Breeches have nothing on to wear but their Coats which may indeed serve to cover their Nakedness but can never hide their Shame for so degenerating is their temper as to make themselves servants to Women whom by their birth-right they ought to rule over as Lords and Masters and what is worse and stranger than all this to be pleased and glory in their servitude I read of a great Politician that Counselled his Prince to reflect on the dangerous consequence that might happen by admitting his Subjects to receive Pensions from forrein Kings and his reason was that forrein food was apt to breed forrein blood in them And indeed 't is a saying as very true as old that use is a second nature we being apt to like best what we are accustom'd to most both history and our own experience afford us many strange examples of the nature of Custom and among those many one of an English Gentleman who was in my time in the Gallies at Marseillies where by long Custom of being so he not only grew a Contended Slave but if I may so say a Voluntier for he was a good Gentleman of the Family of the Courtnies and as he said had some prospect of an Estate in England yet he chose to continue that kind of Life rather than enjoy his Liberty which they say was offered to be procured for him which mad refusal of his has totally defeated half the French Proverb That there can be no such thing in Nature as an ugly Mistris or a handsom Prison 'T is an old Curse among the Turks I wish you as little rest as a Christians Hat and I wish it may not grow a new Curse among the Christians I wish you as little rest as an English Fashion for they are now so much Frenchefied as they change oftner than the Moon and rest as little as the Sea which is in a continual motion And I think I may properly enough say of Fashions what a Writer said of Serving-Men such as are extraordinary Tall are entertained for Porters to Lords and such as are very Low are taken to be Dwarfs to Ladies whilst Men of a good middle-size Stature often want Masters So all extremities of Fashions are worn by many of the Lords and Ladies but a sober moderate Dress few will entertain So much have these extremities of French Fashions infatuated our minds and debauch'd our fancies that those that do not exactly follow their Measures tho they are above all needful use and very much beside all decent sobriety are esteem'd as great Phanaticks and Dissenters to the gentile Rules of modish Dressing as any Nonconformist can be to the Government of Church Discipline Thus we have fool'd our selves into such ridiculous extreams as to make the French superfluities to become not only the Standard of our Fashions but the very necessity of our Apparel Paris being for Fashions like the Camelion for its Colours who gives them to all beholders whereas in all others we receive them from the Ideas of things we meet with And indeed the French Fashions change so often and cost so dear that many of our young Fops that are newly got into their Estates but not at all into their years of discretion do follow their vain fashions and so to be esteemed modishly well bred in a little time are forced to sell their real Estates for ever and if 't were not for fear of grating your Ears with the unsavory sound of a Clinch I was just going to say that they are the very worst sort of Fools that will sell English Lordships to buy Frech Manners As our Conditions are not alike so our Dresses ought not to be the same for our Clothes must match our Revenue as well as fit our Body for great Expences become a poor Man as a large Switzers Breeches does a Dwarf The Cost of keeping a great Table a rich Equipage and a large Retinue being only for a Person of great Quality and good Estate and he that sells his Lands only to live at such a ranting extravagant rate in a few Months shews his great folly as well as merits the misery of sad want Apparel like a River is only good and useful whilst kept within the Banks and Limits of Moderation but when it begins to swell and break out into excess it is so far from being useful as it still proves pernicious if not destructive We
do you no real good therefore to apply to your self the right use of both instead of being angry at others for accusing you of some vices you do not act be angry with your self for acting the many you do which is the true way of having Praises and deserving them too Praise is not only the dearly beloved Mistris of Christendom but also of Turky for 't was Praise that was the occasion of making the grand Vizier Mustapha lose so many Men before Vienna for his Story tells us that he did not attempt that Siege so much to serve his Master as to Court his Mistris more out of design to gain her than out of hopes to take it but Mustapha was as much mistaken in his measures of Conquering his Mistrisses heart as in those of taking Vienna for by destroying her Husbands life he totally destroyed her Love and so made his Mistris to revenge her Husbands death to beg the Grand Seignior to take away Mustapha's Life which he did and by it she shew'd her kindness to her Husband and the Grand Seignior his Justice to her 'T is desire of praise and ambition that makes the French King imploy such vast Sums of Mony and Armies of Soldiers to work about his Palace of Versaillies which is rather a Prodigy of Riches than a Miracle of Nature fitter to be wondred at for the vast expences laid out on it than to be praised for any agreableness about it except the Gardens and Water-works which indeed excel all either of Rome or Florence and consequently the whole World but for the House it self I could observe nothing in it extraordinary except the rich Gildings both within and without and therefore as to my own opinion of the Place I think there 's nothing so wonderful in all that glory as that any one should so much admire it having neither River Wood good Land or pleasant Prospect about it being all round about close besieg'd by great coarse and ragged Hills which cannot add much lustre and glory to the Situation of any place of such vast Expence and Magnificence so as to be Celebrated by some as one of the Wonders of the World. We read in History that Alexander the Great expressed much trouble that he had no more Kingdoms left him to Conquer I am sure the French King needs no cause of trouble for want of more Hills to Conquer and site about his Palace of Versaillies as long as he lives tho he had more Men and Mony to employ about levelling them than now he has Indeed such a Royal Building of Magnificence well deserved a most pleasant and Stately Situation but it seems that King thought it more noble better becoming his greatness to make one by the expence of Art than to be beholden to one of Natures free bounty that the World might know he scorn'd so mean an offer whilst he has Armies that can level Mountains as plain as he pleases and Mony to mount Rivers as high as he desires And indeed if we range over not only France and Turky but all the whole World we shall find that Praise is the Butt all Shoot at tho few hit the Mark for if we but look narrowly into Praises and consider the Actions as well as the Persons they are commonly great Flatterers and the breath of such Praises is but like a Rain-bow which is no other than a meer seeming Collection of many bright Colours without any true substance or long duration one day discovering the folly of the other and a few days will shew you your own end and with it the vanity of them all Therefore if the young Ladies could but perswade themselves to think seriously of the little reality there is in the Praises Men present them and the vain pastimes the World deludes them with both Women and Men will find that most of their delights are vain and despicable for the possession of much beauty breeds great pride and high concern and the decay of it creates in such as much discontent and envy at what they then lose and afterwards see others enjoy And so 't is the same with many of Mens Worldly delights which soon become uneasie to the Mind and often destructive to the Body for a debauch of drinking makes most sick and out of order after it and the enjoyment of handsom ill Women causes usually foul Pocky Diseases such French punishment suiting well with such an English transgression for the fondness of an unvertuous Love placed on an unchast Womans beauty is like the Fire of a Candle which lasts no longer than it flames and Candle like assoon as its flame is consum'd it presently expires in a stinking snuff So such a debauch'd Love I should have said Lust commonly ends with the odious detesting thoughts of such a foul and lustful passion which makes him then loath the sinner as he ought still the sin and himself for having committed the folly And if any one of these Venus Courtiers falls in Love with a truly vertuous Beauty hopes to gain his base unchast desires of her by fierce Courtship great adoration large offers of Presents all these thick larded with the common false Oaths of the praises of her great beauty and his great and constant Love the Lingua franca of all Gallants which all still swear to observe but few ever design to perform and therefore handsom Ladies never ought to Credit for surely he that speaks what he does not believe none ought to believe what he speaks but is bound in Conscience and Honour to slight his Courtship and scorn his Offers or else she must do much worse slight her self and reputation too 'T is a Proverbial saying that Love is blind I am sure such a sort of Love is for he will not see the unjust desires he makes to her but only minds the unkind returns she makes to him without ever considering that they spring from her Love to Vertue and a good Reputation but vainly fancies 't is her Love to some happy Lover that 's in her favour and keeps him out which disquiets and torments his Amorous mind with a fierce Jealousie which Solomon calls the Rage of Love and tho young Men are more naturally enflam'd with eager desires in the pursuit of beauty than old Men are for Age to Love is like Water to Wine the more quantity of Water the less strength in the Wine but t is most certain old Men are as able Courtiers and Lovers of Wealth as any young Men can possibly be Riches being like the Sun agreeable and comfortable to all and indeed nothing is more common than to see Covetousness to grow in most with their Age and the reason of it in my Opinion is that all other youthful sprightly delights but that of gaining Wealth decreases as Age increases but the pleasure of Mony all Men can keep as the Heathen do their Gods they adore under Lock and Key But yet this so adored
beauty Riches carries its troubles as well as delights for there 's great labour in procuring Wealth trouble in defending and preserving it and also great Cares in the well spending it whilst one lives and well disposing of it when we die and so if we look over and search into most Worldly pleasures and vanities we shall find them as contrary to the true repose of this life as they are to the felicities of the next Certainly there is some great Charm in this thing called Praise that tickles the ear inflames the heart raises the spirits enlivens the resolution deludes the reason flatters the hopes and deceives the sight by giving a false gloss and making a counterfeit representation of things for the Bait of Praises for which both Men and Women so strive and eagerly pursue is still painted and set out in the brightest and most oriental charming Colours that are imaginable to allure our eyes inflame our hearts and enliven our ambition But the Hook that is hid in this Bait that is the great dangers hardships and thousands of vexatious disappointments that one must necessarily meet and run thorow in the pursuit of this Idol folly is so obscure artificially drawn as 't is not commonly seen but very ordinarily felt by many in some to their loss of Life and to others of their greatest satisfactions in it And now to put my last finishing Touch to this Picture of Praise the Mistris and Darling of the whole World methinks we ought not to wonder that this adored beauty is so Coy in her Carriage and so difficult to be gain'd if we do but reflect tho in a wholesail manner the sad oversights great mistakes and blind pursuits of its followers of whom I shall only say in general that some are so eager in gazing at it others so over earnest in their seeking it as really most oversee the right way to it which is by true Piety constant Charity and a daily practice of Vertue and Godliness in all their actions And no wonder that such as will not take these blessed Guides should miserably miss their way to it and be sadly defeated in their hopes of it And now having done with my Discourse of Praise give me leave to change the Scene and to pass by the uncertainty of your meeting it tho to reflect on the certainty of deaths meeting you and the terrors that then appear at the end of a vain wicked life and to beg the vain young Ladies Company for a little time that I might lead their thoughts into the sad and dismal Regions of Mortality that they may now consider it to prevent it hereafter from surprizing them and that they may carry their thoughts to the Grave before their friends carry their Bodies The Seasons of our Lives resemble exactly those of the Year the Summer of our Life swallows up the Spring of our Youth and the Autumn of our Age makes us to decline as the Sun does daily of its vigorous heat and influence till all the fair days and various productions of natures beauty at last yeild to old Age Winter as their Grave for as the Apostle says 'T is appointed for every Man once to die and one day is still the death of the other and tho many things may keep back the thoughts of deaths coming yet nothing can retard the time of his approach And now I must humbly beg our vain modish Ladies pardon if I here a little mind them of the sad concluding Scene of their Life and in how miserable a condition some of them must necessarily be in when they come to die and have wasted all their Life in Vanity and Sin little considering Reputation and less fearing Scandal little valuing Conscience and less esteeming Eternity It has often come into my mind that the sad end of such vain Womens Lives is like the last Scene of their Loves to their Gallants which is just as an Ague turned upside down the cold fit after the hot for when the fiery passions of youthful Love are changed through their Inconstancy or worn out by Age or wasted by Sickness for you know that Loves-vanity is but of a short date it either vanishes in the act and is nipped in its gay and vigorous blossom like the tender-leav'd Plants by a cold Northern-wind or else grows wrinkled and impotent like crooked and deform'd shrubs for want of sap and moisture and so grows loathsom and deformed as the grim Jaws of Death that will too at last come with a dreadful stroak to level all our fair Cedars to the ground and make your beauty Ladies to consume away like a Moth fretting a Garment every Woman is therefore but vanity and when you are thus brought to your Death-beds of pain and languishing O then Consider what a sad condition you must needs be in when you will find all your fond beauty and vanity going off the Stage when your life is just expiring when the scorching thoughts of your past vain life come to inflame your mind more fiercely than the burning Feaver can your body and that the remembrance of your past extravagant pride and vanity will torment your troubled Conscience more than ever before they pleased your sensual appetite and that the shivering fit of guilt not only seizes your heart but pierceth your very soul with sad and sober thoughts of your past sins and the strict account that you must soon give of them and of the terrible punishments that you must justly suffer for them when perhaps you cannot comfort your afflicted Conscience with the assurance of having so much as performed in your whole life one pious act or charitable deed when you had both time and means to have performed thousands and so as too many of you do lose the blessings of the other World meerly for slighting Gods mercies in this And farther 't will be well worth the consideration of our vain Ladies that when they lie a dying the sins of their life will flie about their troubled minds as naturally as sparks do about fire and will lighten them to a clear sight of their pride and vanity and their greatest trouble when they are leaving this World is what will become of them when they are out of it and truly it will not be without great cause since their Consciences will then assure them that their Bodily pain in this Life will be but the Prologue or first step to their Souls eternal misery in the next Whereas a pious young Lady who with holy David makes a covenant with her Eyes that they should not behold vanity but observe Gods commandments as her chief study and delight by truly living in his fear she will certainly die in his favour and will find at her death that her good Conscience will be her real friend and true comforter and furnish her with a chearful readiness to submit her will to Gods which will never fail to protect her against all those spiritual
one of these coynesses of folly and despisers of vertue lying sick on her Death-bed past all hopes of recovery and do but observe how her Words and Looks are changed and indeed the whole Scene of her Life her Countenance being all shadow'd over with the pale and dismal Colours of Mortality instead of her gay Vermillion paint for all beauty and worldly delights vanish and leave you with your health being like a Sun-Dial only useful whilst the Sun shines on it then you shall find the but naming her rich Diamond Pendants and fine Pearl Necklace her Embroidered Gowns and Costly Points will prove troublesom to her and the sight or smell of her late beloved Dainties will then loath her Stomach nay a visit of her dear Gallant whom she was so fond of and delighted in will be odious to her sight as well as the thoughts of having too much lov'd him will be grievous to her mind Then her Bottles of White-washes or Cosmeticks will be thrown out and filled with showers of penitent Tears for having used them Then her Boxes of Peeter and Patches and all her Ornamental knacks and dresses she was wont every day to wast so much time about and to take so great pastime in to adorn and set out her beauty will only serve to disquiet her thoughts and the Praises of her beauty will only serve to disquiet her thoughts and the Praises of her beauty will be but so many disturbances in her Sickness and she will be then as much troubled to hear them as she was formerly delighted to receive them and proud in the vain thoughts of deserving them In short on her Death bed all her late dearly beloved Vanities will at that time appear her most afflicting Enemies and she will then loudly declare that nothing but a religious Life can produce a Comfortable death and will then tell you that if she were the sole Mistris of all the Riches of both the Indies she would give it all for the blessing of a good Conscience for that never leaves one in Sickness or in Adversity but is still the best of Friends in the worst of Times THE TWELFTH DISCOURSE Useful Advices in order to the vain modish Ladies well Regulating their Beauty and Lives I Humbly beg the vain Ladies pardon for beginning this Discourse so uncivilly as to tell them 't is the Opinion of most sober and observing Men that many of you make but a self-deceiving Calculation in the account of your Christian duties and holy performances by fancying your selves well secured and diligently active in the exercise of Gods Commands and in your obedience to him if you do but rise early enough on Sunday to go to Church in the Morning and can Dine so temperately as not to sleep at the Sermon in the Afternoon and do say a kind of siz'd Prayer like a short Grace of a few customary words rising and going to bed all the week after which perhaps may be said more out of long habit than true devotion How many Ladies are there and those of a good and sober sort as Women go now adays that fancy because they live Chast read the Bible now and then and miss going to Church but seldom who are Charitable to the Poor Loving to their Neighbours true to their Friends good will to all and in love with none unless may be a little with themselves think they perform all Christian duties perfectly and therefore deserve all Mens Praises truly and indeed they would not think amiss if they would be but near as just and exact to God in their daily account of their time to him as they are in creating daily fresh pastimes and pleasures to themselves and that they would measure out their time according to Gospel Precepts instead of imploying it in vain London follies and pastimes which among the modish Ladies are partly these So many hours for Dressing so many hours for receiving and returning Visits so many for the Play and the Park so many hours for Dining at this friends house Supping with that and playing late at Cards at t' others or being at a publick Ball or Dancing at anothers so many hours to sleep a Bed to satisfie Nature so many more to lie a Bed to continue their full Face and good Looks besides hours for going to Court to see new fashions and ransacking Shops to buy new-fashioned Silks and fineries besides other times of vain idleness and prodigality of excess and folly as such a great part of the Year for a pretended Disease or rather diversion at the Bath such a season for an infirmity or recreation at the Wells of Tunbridge or Epsom to raffle away it may be our time and money to be profuse and game at publick Lotteries or to charm or decoy some rich Heir or Gallant for next Winters service and now Ladies when all these mis-spent hours are abstracted out of the twenty four besides other parts of your lives accounted I am afraid you will find so great a consumption and ill management of your time as you do often too sensibly of your Estates and Money and so miserably condole those lost Minutes which you might have employed to better purposes in being soberly modest and pious to have performed the duties of Religion which is the only true pleasure and pastime of the soul And tho some of these divertisements I know are not barely in themselves sinful crimes yet sure they are no better than venial sins by their totally taking up and so intirely devouring of young Womens whole time 1. My first Advice therefore to the vain Ladies is to alter the mispending of their time as now they do to employ it as really as they ought to do which is in preparing to die well rather than striving to live high or look fair and not to fancy they spend their time well among such as they but lose it with for as Seneca says They are idle who might be better employed so such Ladies live in some kind ill that may live in many degrees better Therefore as prudent Men manage and regulate their Estates by dividing it into several proportions so much for House-keeping Servants wages Apparel private expences and the like and so suiting their Income to answer their several Charges according to their ability to perform as their occasions require which necessary Measures because many of the young Estated Men will not observe they steer without a Compass run they know not where spend they know not what and live they know not how extravagantly without ease or order Now Ladies to prevent such an extravagant manner of spending or rather wasting of your time I shall advise you in order to the well managing of it not only to divide it into several hours for that is already done to your hand by many good Clocks and Watches but you must subdivide the hours of the day into so many portions set out for devotion business and pastime according to
your ability and conveniency always giving place to the duties of Religion the first and principal part in all your designs and actions still beginning the day with Prayer and praises to your Creator who made both it and you in order to your worshiping and serving him and by so dividing the day into so many several parts and Stages of hourly employments the changeable variety that 's in them will afford you variety of pleasure as well as business to entertain and direct you and prevent you Ladies from complaining as I have heard many of you O what shall we do to pass away this afternoon since you will see all the days business and divertisments marked out before you and really nothing more distracts and vitiates vain young Womens minds than emptiness of business and employment the want of which fills you up with the ill vapours of idleness that old Mother of wickedness whereas certain hourly employments fill and replenish your fancy with such diversity of change and business as is able to suppress and allay all fumes of vain idle thoughts from arising in your minds and save you the expensive trouble of imitating many of the fine gay modish Ladies who by chargeable means and studied Arts purchase ways vainly to pass away their time which by the course of nature without their help and beyond their power runs away but too fast of it self 2. My next Advice to the vain Ladies tho I am sure 't is very good yet I doubt 't will be little lik'd and less follow'd which is to shun the infectious temptations of a vain London life which often gets many young Ladies bad Reputations but seldom good Husbands London being become the very Center-point and Rendezvous where all the vices and vanites of the Kingdom meet yet these vices and vanities are among many of the fine Ladies so richly gilt finely painted and splendedly set out as they are so far from appearing deformed as they seem beautiful and taking to most I mean the inconsidering young Men of the Town Really the Air of London is so infected with Pride Vanity and Idleness that 't is hard for one of you young Ladies to appear in young Mens Company but you must have your Ears furr'd with Oaths and Profaneness or else your person Complemented with vain Romantick Courtship which is not exactly applied and fitted for any one Woman but for all handsom Women in general like false flattering Looking Glasses which Complements not only one but every one that looks on them not staying for a great beauty but still flattering the first comer But Piety and Vertue is still like a pure wholesom Air a comfort to all and an Infection to none and is so far from dislodging or overcasting the lightsomness of any lawful pleasures as it clears and dissipates any dark Clouds of fears that may hang over them for 't is most certain Piety and Beauty Recreation and Devotion may live peaceably together and yield a mutual aid and comfort to one another Indeed if you Ladies would but use to mix Piety with your pastimes you would soon come to make a pastime of Piety and then instead of dividing the hours for vain London pleasures you would make them so many Memorandums of the eflux of time to put you in mind of the duties of Mortality and of the hourly advances you make towards it which requires hourly preparations for it for the same hours serve as well to tell you of your approaches to Death as to divide your pleasures in Life as the same Figures in your Watch serve to tell the hours of the night as well as those of the day Then Ladies you will find that time laid out in Prayer and Devotion is not spending but gaining time and if you will but seriously reflect and heartily practise this great Truth you will soon find that Piety is as to advancing of worldly delights and pastimes but as Ballast to a Ship which does not hinder but only regulate its motion not slackning but steddying its Sayling A fine Lady whose mind is only fraighted with the Airy Cargo of pride and vanity can never steer steddy in her heavenly Course but is still tossed from one side of folly to another extremity of vanity for the want of the true blessed Ballast of godliness which will Calm and dispossess your mind of all modish vanities and irregularities and will allay all kinds of immoderate heats raised by the Feaverish distempers of Womanish Passions and will fix your affection on what is immovable and perpetual and will soon cause you to abandon the vain empty undurable pastimes of London for the true endless felicity of Heaven and this is a Heaven upon Earth To love God and keep his Commandments for then you will truly love Vertue and constantly practise Piety and only delight in the beauty of holiness which as it transcends much so it differs far from all Earthly love for that 's seldom or never enjoyed with true quietness long satisfaction or just and equal returns for the most passionate Love we can fancy as a Mistris to her Gallant or a Gallant to his Mistris is commonly of so fickle volatile and inconstant a nature as if a Woman thinks her Gallant loves any other Woman she grows Jealous and if he fancies his Mistris loves another Man as 't is ten to one she does he becomes inrag'd for as Solomon says Prov. 6.34 Jealousie is the rage of a Man here on Earth tho most are Lovers yet many are false ones but in Heaven all are Lovers and are true ones since in your Heavenly Love your act of loving is the certain fruition of your Love a Woman by loving Vertue it becomes hers but by loving a Gallant you become his for she that is under a Gallants command cannot truly say she is under her own In a word all the Riches and Pleasures imaginable that you abandon for the love of God you enjoy them all in loving God above them all And you may be certain Ladies if you can but thus love God as you ought you must despise the World as you should and then you will take more true delight in the title of a good Christian than you did ever before in the vain praise of a great beauty and slight this in comparison of that for a handsom Woman like the Sun is to be esteemed more for her Vertue than Splendor Beauty is but a fine outside Skin but true Godliness is all glorious within and will bestow on you more Celestial beauty in the other World than all your false Glasses and Gallants falser Tongues can flatter you with in this 3. My next advice to you vain Ladies is when you are putting on your fine rich Gowns which so many of you adorn your selves with every day with so great care high excess and vast expence as well of time as mony which makes many of you by being so over careful in setting out your
of a Tulip only pleasant to the Eye for a little time and there 's all or the maker of it which is no other than the various opinion of every gazers inclination beauty having almost as many Fathers as there are Men Judges of it Surely these vain proud Creatures have read the Story of Theodosius a Spanish Prince who was raised to be Emperor for his good Face and therefore think they may well hope to be raised not only to an Empire over Men for their great beauty but that they do well deserve a great transcendency over the ordinary rate of Women-kind but indeed such high beauties are at very best but like Meteors which are exhaled but a little above the Earth and are yet a great deal below the Heavens But suppose I should be so highly Complemental as to allow these great beauties the full Swing and extravagant range of their own vain proud and lofty fancies that they are as far above the ordinary sort of Women as the Skie is above the Earth and that their motions were very generous and sublime imitating the Sea which impatient to be confined by the bounds which God has given is still swelling and striving to mount and raise it self above the surface of the Earth yet I would gladly learn because I can no way fancy how they will pretend to be begot there except it be by the Man in the Moon and indeed that may possibly be some reason why our great beauties are generally so fickle and inconstant in their Love as receiving their great mutability from the influence of the Moon as their immediate Parent 5. Therefore my next Advice to the vain Ladies is still to remember that though your beauties may be extraordinary yet your lives can never be Immortal on Earth and that your great beauty and proud thoughts must both perish with you for it may be truly said of great beauties what the Psalmist said of great Princes Though you are stiled Gods yet you must die like Men so though you may be called Goddesses yet you must die like Women and though your beauty could make as great a Conquest of hearts as ever Alexander did of Kingdoms who had no more to subdue yet as death has certainly put a period to his success and life so he will certainly do the like to your beauty and days For indeed the greatest beauty is but like the finest Glass the more clear the more frail and easily broken for alas take beauty in its very highest Altitude and greatest vigour 't is a fabrick composed and made up of so many tender pieces of such brittle ware and delicate Contexture as the least spot or flaw in any one part spoils or at least blemishes the lustre of the whole and as the Poet says One that is all over Heart Every place proves a Mortal part Now Ladies if you resolve to be all over vertuous and discreet in Reputation so as to live Shot-free from all the wounding Darts of censure you must arm your selves with a clear and innocent complexion of vertue to procure which you must not only abstain from evil but the very appearance of it not only from doing bad Actions and keeping ill Company but even the hearing much less receiving vain praises and as you ought to shew a general civility to all so you ought not to give a particular freedom to any In a word you must manage all your actions with a strict prudence a perfect modesty a real humility a vertuous behaviour and a constant fear of God in all you say and do and these will gain you praises and make you well deserve to be admired for Solomon says Prov. 31.30 'T is the Woman that feareth God shall be praised and by such a blessed and holy kind of life you will secure your self against all the Censorious talk of envious bablers against the venom of those lying malicious Tongues who are not fit to be believed nor worthy to be feared Indeed Ladies the best way to make your earthly beauty continue good and lasting is to be humble in your own thoughts and not to pride or value your selves more than you ought since 't is so vain and uncertain in its most lovely colours and complexion for this will give Men a just admiration of your prudence and modesty and preserve the vertue of it Immortal beyond the duration of this fair and naked substance which some sudden accident or disease can soon blast and rob of all its blooming and youthful vigour strip it of all its gay attirement and you of that vain delight in your own self-admiration so then beauty is only less commendable in her who makes it her only pride and concern to set it off and such a Lady thus trigg'd up and furnished out by great art and invention by glittering apparel and proud ostentation is but like a fire of Straw it may blaze much but it cannot last long and whilst it lights others it consumes it self But a handsom Lady that 's free from affectation and pride and is blessed with great Piety and true Humility is like the Heavenly fire in Moses Bush which burnt and lighted others and yet never consum'd it self A handsom woman that is very proud does but enjoy her beauty as the Miser does his Wealth who does not so much possess it as it possesses him and therefore your truly pious Ladies do but use their worldly beauty as the Apostle says we are to use this World that is as if we used it not by a godly habit of mind consuming all the usual vanity affected by others in the pious reflection that there 's no true vertue or durable satisfaction in it We read in Genesis that good old Abraham made no other use of all his wealth than to purchase him a Grave O why should not all proud Women imitate him and though they be never so rich in beauty employ it all in Purchasing a Grave of Humility to bury the dust of their Pride in and by so doing they will certainly find a Resurrection of true Glory out of it which will raise to them Garlands of perpetual Praises of so Heavenly a nature and vast an extent as they will as much excel all the false vain glittering splendor of this World as the noon day brightness of a Summers Sun does the small glimmering light of a little Glow-worm which cannot be seen but by the help of darkness 6. I shall next advise the vain Ladies to resolve to new mould their Lives in this Spiritual frame of Reformation and to square out all their actions by the Golden Rules of Piety and Vertue I heard of a Gentleman that being dangerously ill of a Dropsie went to a famous Physician for his Advice who bid him abstain from all Drink for a Twelve Month and it would Cure him I am confident the like kind of Remedy would cure the fine Ladies let them but abstain from all vain thoughts on themselves and