which only serves to acquire good and that which is the subject and matter of good For vertue which we have declared to be the true Good is of such a nature that she serves her self indifferently with contrary things doth good with Poverty as well as with Riches with Sickness as well as with health We commend him that suffers his wants with patience his sickness with constancy as we do him that liberally distributes his substance and lives virtuously in his health So that if you will call Riches good because they are assistant to vertue call poverty so too for even she attends her more But because we have no pretence for the calling two things so contrary in themselves by one and the same name let all such things rest indifferent as are rendred good or ill by the disposition of man and without which he may arrive at his End which is to be composed according to perfect Reason to make good use of things presented to him and consequently to possess the fruition of his Good If we would rightly know in what consists our good we must discover what in our selves adheres to it for it must be a good of that side since nothing seeks another good then is annext to its own Now without all doubt the Beginners and movers of our actions in us are the Understanding and the Will the Good then that we aim at should be their perfection Peace and Satisfaction But if we there place Health and Wealth and esteem them our Goods and consequently what are their Contraries Ills why do we not presently declare that we can have no Felicity in this world and that our lives are here no other then a perpetual Hell For ye shall alwayes have the Images of Death and affliction before your Eyes which you esteem ills and of which the one is often present and the other ever threatning by his nearer approach If these be ills Fear is just and how happy is that man who is alwayes in fear Let us then either conclude that man hath no good decreed him in this world to which he can possibly arrive or that That Good wholly depends upon Virtue The end that any one proposes to himself of things must be proportioned to his power if otherwise it be impossible for him to obtain instead of his good it becomes his affliction It were the work of Danaids to fill perforated Vessels if among all the Sciences there were none that designs her self an End to which she may arrive by her own Precepts Can we imagine that Nature who is the Mother of all Arts and Sciences hath ordained for Man Her chiefest work an End beyond his Power The Will we say is that which seeks our good and a will well governed will nothing but what it can nor busie it self with things beyond our reach as with Health Riches and Honour If in these consisted our good it were in vain to employ our Reason and Will we should attempt it by wishes and vows as a thing depending upon a thousands accidents not to be foreseen or withstood and of which Fortune is the only Mistress How likely is it I beseech you that Nature having created Man the most perfect of all her works should ordain Him so miserable as that his Good which should be his perfection not only should depend upon another but upon so many things which he must never hope can be all favourable to him and that He should like another Tantalus be there perpetually gaping for his long'd for waters Nature commands you for good to have the understanding disposed for the use of what is presented to you and to pass by things you cannot have Had you rather rely on Fortune and expect from her falacious hand your good than to work it your selves It is a Law divine and inviolable from the beginning of the world that the good we would have we must give to our selves Nature hath bestowed a Magazine in our minds let us there stretch forth the hand of the will and take what Arms we please if that will be reasonable and moderate it turns all things to good as Midas turned all things to gold by his touch We can meet no accident in our Persons or Estates so malicious whence we should not extract Peace and satisfaction of mind if we can satisfie that we have obtained our End For though we were content so much to slacken the severity of this Sect as to confess that Body and Goods which are but the instruments of life make a part in Man and have power by their quality to disturb that of the Soul we ought notwithstanding never to acknowledge that any loss which may happen either to Body or Goods should take away the felicity of Man when his mind enjoyes its Good and its delight Of things composed of many parts the most noble gives the name and law to the rest who then shall doubt the felicity of the whole Man when the soul is happy So we pronounce a Republick happy after a famous victory notwithstanding the loss of some Citizens because her happiness proportions it self in the Person of the Prince or State to whose good and service all the rest ought to apply themselves in so much as that every private Souldier shall glorifie himself in his wounds love them and boast they were received for preservation of King and Commonwealth shall we then allow the Body another sence or desire than what relates to the satisfaction of the Soul shall we so chain the Soul to the Body as that her good shall be slave to the members and depend upon them that the mind shall suffer as they are well or ill disposed If Nature would that the perfection of Man should depend in Body and Goods she had given to all the same Body and the same Goods for they making a part in their Nature ought to be alike in all and to pass from the Genus into the Individual but having on the contrary conferred them both in a very different condition both for body and goods she hath given to all an indifferent power to make good use of such Bodyes and goods as they have that so the Action of the Soul may render it self as conspicuous and honourable by one means as another And indeed her Excellence shines more bright and merits more praise by how much when destitute of such instruments she of her self arrives at her proper End as in my opinion we ought better to esteem the Pilot who through the rage of waves and tempest can bring a leaky Vessel unfurnished of Sail and Tackle safe to the Port than he who with a new tight Ship well rigg'd for service with a savourable Sea and right gale a-poop Let us then make this determination that since the felicity of man depends upon his Good that his good is to live according to his Nature and that to live according to his Nature is not to be disturbed with
Riches ill when by them we serve our selves to the execution of wicked Passions we render Poverty good when we accompany it with Frugality and Patience we render ease and rest miserable when we become slothful and unmanly and we make pains and labour sweet when thereby we acquire the reputation of serving our Country Then let us take all things as we ought and we may make our advantage of every thing for there is not an accident can happen for which Nature hath not prepared in us an Habitude to receive and turn it to our content In all things then that usually afflict us we must consider two things first the Nature of the thing happened secondly the Nature of what we have within us and by this means using things according to Nature we can never be capable of any offence For Vexation being a malady of the Soul and contrary to Nature we ought not to permit it a possession in us That which most offends us is the novelty of the accident which we evidently perceive in that the most adverse things are rendred sweet by custome Slaves blubber when they first enter the Gally but in three months sing at the Oar and raw Sea-men are pale when they weigh Anchor though in a calm when Saylors laugh in a storm Custom is all But the effects that Custom works in the Vulgar that meditation supplies in the Philosopher for by mature consideration we render things familiar and indifferent to us Let us then exactly weigh the Nature of whatever can offend us and represent to our selves the ugliest face of malicious and insupportable mishaps as Diseases Poverty Banishment and Injuries and examine in all these what is according or contrary to Nature The Body is diseased 't is not we that are offended but the body for the offence lessens by the excellency of the things perfection and Sickness may administer an occasion of Patience and Fortitude much more commendable than Health it self Where there is a greater occasion of praise is there less of good by how much the mind is more considerable than the body by so much the goods of the one are greater than those of the other If the body be but the instrument of the mind who shall complain when the instrument submits it self to the service of him it is destined to The body is sick that 's no news since from its composition it is subject to change I but the pains of diseases make themselves felt and force us to roar out in spite of the best Philosophy we have They make themselves felt I confess but only felt as to the body and only make us cry out if we will for pain is only intolerable to them that think it so and there are who support it in its most bitter pangs Possidonius discoursing in Pompey's presence was surprized with a violent fit of the Gout which in spite of its importunity he concealed pursuing his discourse without any look or action to consess it Pray tell me what new remedies had this Philosopher found out against this pain what Sear-cloths what Unguents against this Gout only the knowledge of things and the resolution of his mind To what purpose were the Body ordained to serve the Soul when if the Soul were afflicted with the bodies accidents she would become slave to it and if we ought not to be afflicted with what befalls the body by how much less at what concerns our goods For the loss of them is nothing so sensible as the loss of health They are both without us but the body is the nearer of the two Man comes naked into the world and naked returns can he then call any thing his he neither brings nor can carry away Earthly goods are like movables in an Inn which we ought to regard no longer than there we stay I but some may object and say losing them I shall perish for want of food If this care afflict your mind you were better desire to starve with a calmness in the Soul than live rich in perturbation trouble You must make account that the losses you sustain are the price of your peace and satisfaction if you esteem them so you can never lose them if not you lose both goods and mind at once Will you know how easie these wounds are to cure See then the honoured scars of such wounds received and closed up by the greatest and most generous Persons who have laught and given God thanks for such petty losses Hear Zeno who said the winds were favourable that day he suffered shipwrack for they cast him upon the shore of Philosophy where he past the rest of his life in peace and tranquillity free from civil tempests and the importunate troubles that attend such as are busied in publick affairs Will you know how losses may be supported habituate your selves to love things for what they are if you have an Earthen Platter esteem it as an Earthen platter that may be broken and you will not be angry when it is broken So pass from the least things to the greatest from the vilest to them of highest price and do the same If you love your Children love them as men subject to Death and when they come to dye you will neither be surprized nor troubled Opinion oft afflicts us more than the thing it self and Opinion receives its bulk and stature from the terms we use in accidents that befall us for we call one thing by the name of another and fancy such a thing like such a thing so much do Images and Ideas possess us Let us then sweeten our terms the best we can If one of our Children dye let us not say we have lost but restored a Child to God that lent him and so of any other loss If peradventure we meet an outrage by a wicked person that spoils us of our goods let us immediately deliberate thus in our selves How doth that man in himself do me harm by whom God takes back what he had only lent In the rest observe what judgement you make of such losses as those you suffer when they happen to another and consider how much you in the same condition were moved when notwithstanding you should blame and reproach their complaints think that the sentence you have passed upon them is a prejudice against your self which you cannot renounce The judgement we make in anothers cause is alwaies more just than that we make in our own If our Neighbours boy break him a glass you only say there is a glass broken if his Son dye why he was mortal why do you not so by your own without crying and raging and accusing gods and men for a thing of course The thing you foresaw is come to pass what should amaze you For my part I think we foresee as much as we ought and may so far as not to be astonished at any thing principally the things we call injuries For let us lay before us what have been
Passions and to behave himself upon all occasions with moderate Reason We must as necessary to our happiness purge the Mind from Passions and learn how to animate our selves against whatever may happen to us Now that which can best instruct us in this way and teach us the inclinations of a right spirit and a will governed by reason is Prudence which is the beginning and end of all Vertue For that making us exactly and truly to know the condition and quality of things objected to us renders us sit to distinguish what is according to Nature what is not what we ought to pursue and what we ought to fly She removes the erroneous opinions that afflict us restores our natural affections and in her Train follow all other Vertues of which she is at once the Mother Nurse and Guardian Oh! the life of Man were happy if alwaies conducted by this excellent guide But alas by how much this Vertue is excellent by so much is it rare and is in our minds like the veins of Gold in the earth found in few places It is in my judgement that great magnificent and impenetrable Buckler sorged by Vulcan for Achilles in which he carried the Heavens the Earth the Ocean Clouds Stars Thunder Cities Armies Assemblies and Battels and to be short what in this world is to be seen thereby intimating to us that knowledge renders the Soul of Man more invulnerable than a large seven-sold sheild can do the body But as Achilles went to the School of Chiron to make himself sit to bear this massy sheild so must you come to that of Philosophy to learn the use of Prudence which will teach you that Prudence is to be exercised two waies one to advance us to good the other to repell evil But as we bring not our minds pure to Philosophy our Physitian but rather prepossessed and contaminated with froward popular humours we must like a skilful Chirurgion who before he make any application to the wounded part draws forth malignant humours begin by purging our mind of all such rebellious Passions as by their smoak obnubilate the eye of Reason otherwise the Precept of good manners and sound affections is of no more advantage to the Soul than abundance of of food to a corrupt body which the more you endeavour to nourish you offend We call that Passion which is a violent motion of the Soul in her sensitive part and makes her either apply her self to what she thinks is good or recede from what she takes to be ill For though we have but one Soul cause of life and action which is all in all and all in every part yet hath that one Soul very different agitations even contrary to one another according to the diversity of Vessels where she is retained and the variety of objects presented to her In one she hath her Encrease in another her Motion in a third her Sence in a fourth her Memory in a sift her Discourse as the Sun who from one essence distributing his raies in diverse places warms one and illuminates another melts wax and dries the earth dissipates clouds and exhausts lakes and marshes When the Parts where she is inclosed only keep and imploy her to the proportion of their capacity and the necessity of their right use her effects are sweet benigne and well governed but on the contrary when they usurp more motion and heat than they should they change and become more dangerous like the raies of the Sun that wandering at their natural liberty warm gently and faintly but contracted and united in the Concave of a glass burn and consume what they were wont to give life to and nourish Now Nature hath given this force and power borrowed from the Soul to the Senses to apply themselves to things to extract their forms and as they are fit or unfit harmonious or dissonant to Nature to embrace or reject them and that for these two Reasons One that they should be as Centinels to the Body for its preservation the other and the chiefest to the end they should be as Messengers and Carriers of the understanding and soveraign part of the Soul and to serve as Ministers and Instruments of discourse and Reason But in giving them this power she hath also prescribed her Law and Command which is to be satisfied with a careful observation and intelligence of what shall pass without attempting to usurp the more high and eminent power and so to put all things into alarm and confusion For as in an Army the Centinels oftentimes not knowing the design of their Commander may be deceived and take an enemy disguised for a friend or for enemies such as come to their relief so the Sences not comprehending the whole sum of Reason are oft abused by apparence and take for advantageous what is wholly against us When upon this judgement and without expecting the command of Reason they come to disturb the Irascible and Concupiscible powers they raise a sedition and tumult in the Soul during which Reason is no more heard nor the understanding obeyed than is the Law or Magistrate in a troubled estate of civil discord Now in this Commotion the Passions which disturb the peace of the mind and mutiny against the Soul make their first insurrection in the Concupiscible part that is to say in the place where the Soul exerciseth this faculty of desiring or rejecting things offered to her as they are proper or contrary to her delight or conservation They move then according to the apparence of a Good or Ill. If it be a present good and of which they enter into a present fruition we call that Motion Pleasure or Delight If it be of a good to come from which we are far distant we call it desire if of a present Ill of which we already resent the incommodity and distast and which we lament in other men we call it Hate or Horrour if of any Ill we bewail in our selves vexation if this vexation be occasioned by what concerns us nearly we call it Grief if by mischance in another Pitty if occasioned by an apparent Good in which we pretend to share Jealousie if by good we have no part in Envy if occasioned by an Ill to come we call it Fear This is the first body of Mutineers that disturb the peace of the Soul whose effects though very dangerous are nevertheless much inferiour in violence to them that sollow For those first motions formed in that part by the presented object immediately shift thence into the irascible part that is to say into that part where the Soul seeks the means she hath to obtain or shun what appears good or evil to her and there as a wheel already moving by a new access of force falls into a prompter speed so the Soul already stirred with the first apprehension and adding a second effort to the first is hurried with more violence than before and raises up Passions more powerful and more
Body a proper and fit instrument to the mind of which on the Contrary the Riot and Excess produce great and malignat maladies natural corrections of intemperance If once we give reins to the Appetite to follow plenty and delicacy we shall be in perpetual trouble the minde will become slave to the Body and we shall finde that we only live to eat We must then allay this pleasure by a moderate use and learn to know that sobriety preserves the Body sound and the Intellect entire Let us then prescribe our selves this Rule to use our meat for the necessity of nourishment and not to accustome our selves to delicates least being deprived of them our bodies become indisposed and our spirits afflicted but on the contrary to make use of plain and grosser meats as well because they make us more strong and healthful as because they are easie to be found and t is a favour we are obliged to thank Nature for that she hath made the things necessary for life easie to finde and that those which are hard to get are not necessary to us Truly I admire the saying of Epicurus though I could wish it had come from anothers mouth that so generous a saying might not have been soyled by the Esseminacy of his other opinions My heart sayes he is extasied with delight and my Body springs with joy that content with bread and water I despise all other dainties If Epicurus be so exalted what should the Stoicks do Ought they not to honour and reverence sobriety as the foundation of all other Vertues and that which strangles Vices in their Cradle and suffocates them in their seed The Curii and Fabricii have obtained famous victories but none so celebrated as their Frugality well did their acts in arms for a time secure the Roman State from the forraign Enemy but their sobriety hath been a Law in which they have moulded the minds and courages of them who since have subdued all the world the Figs and Carrots which they preferred above the Samnites treasure have proved of a better taste to posterity than the delicates of Apicius in his time The same reasons may serve to excess in Clothes and Buildings and such things as only respect the Bodies use for if we moderate not the Content we there seek by natural necessity opinion will precipitate us where we shall neither find bottom nor shore For example we shall make our shoes of Velvet next of Tissue and at the last of Embroidery with Pearl and Diamonds we shall build our houses of Marble then of Jasper and Porphyry Let us in this observe this Rule that our Clothes be sufficient to defend us from heat and cold our Houses from winde and rain without expecting any more from them but if we find any thing we expect not indifferently behave our selves It should seem the Reason hath more ado to defend it self from the pleasure we take in the sight and fruition of beautiful things than of these we lately mentioned and that what bears in the face the bounty of Nature printed in a rare and excellent Beauty hath some legitimate power over us so that turning our eyes towards it it there in spite of us turns and subjects our affections But we should also remember t is a thing without us a Grace Nature hath bestowed on them that have it not on us a thing whose use as soon turns to Ill as Good and above all that it is but a flower that daily withers and but the Colour of a fading body If you suffer your selves to be transported with this Passion what will you then be no more your selves the body shall suffer a thousand pains in seeking your pleasure and the minde a thousand hells in serving your delight when this desire encreasing shall become love this love encreasing shall become fury Let us then fortifie our selves against this Passion and take heed we fall not entangled with these baits By how much this Passion wantons with us by so much we ought to suspect her and be in good time advised that she would not embrace but to strangle us propose licence and liberty but to subject us feeds us not with honey but to glut us with gall and present us a minutes pleasure with everlasting repentance Let us therefore so compose our minds as that acknowledging in beauty the delicate hand of Nature we should so prize it as we do the Sun and Moon for its Excellence But if the Law allow us a more particular fruition let it be to the end Nature desires without losing the use of Reason which should alwaies command in all things and remember that the immoderate use of this pleasure consumes the Body softens the Soul and debilitates the Spirits Let us not use it if we can abstain before Marriage for besides the defacing of youthful modesty it takes way those sweets of Marriage they find who never used it before which is the Cement of conjugal friendship and nourishes in us a licence to empty and unbridled lust but above all let us never do any base thing to obtain this Pleasure but summon before us the inconveniences many have proved who have surrendered themselves unto it of which some have embezled their estates others lost their lives others their understandings and on the contrary call to mind how much greater a conquest it is to overcome sensuality than possess it and that the continency of Alexander hath proved of a better reputation to Posterity than the beautiful and excellent faces of the wife and daughters of Darius Cleopatra's eyes triumphed over Caesar and Anthony and those of Augustus over Cleopatra and though this kind of pleasure may be accompanied with a certain itch that takes the Body and in that appears something natural Yet the thirst of Riches and Honour and the delight we took in their possession hath no other root than Opinion I know not who hath thus abused us by the imposition of names by calling that Good which depends not upon us but he hath fastened our happiness to a rotten Cable and Anchored our felicity in a quicksand For what is there in this world so uncertain and inconstant as the Possession of such Goods as go and come pass and slide away like a torrent like a torrent they come with a rushing noise are full of violence and trouble their entrance is offensive they asswage in a minute and when they are fallen away nothing but mud in the bottom remains O Riches could we as well see the rust of afflictions that you breed in the hearts of men as the beauty and splendour of your Gold and Silver you would then be as much hated as you are now beloved and those that love you have only this vertue to conceal their affliction that they may not discover their shame but if their Saciety had leave to complain how could fortune answer all the Objections made by so many to whom she hath given so many mischiefs