arife in him that disturbs the Peace of his Spirit; he is rack'd with Fears or with Hopes; or difcompofed with Anger and Peevifhnefs; or he is haunted with the Memory of fome paft Folly or Sin; or he is difpirited with too much Labour; or dull for want of Employment; or vexed with fome troublesome Bufinefs; or cloyed with his Recreations and Divertisements; or fomething or other he doth or fuffereth that is not very grateful to him. The Discontents which arife from fuch Causes as these, are indeed infinite and innumerable; and tho' fingly taken, they are very small Matters, yet being taken in the Lump, and likewife coming fo thick upon us every Day, they really make human Life, in the general, and as to most of the Periods of it, to be a troublefome, unquiet, unfatiffactory Thing.

7. But, feventhly, if these little Things I have mentioned be confiderable enough to trouble our Days, what must we fay of the many fad Accidents, and more grievous and weighty Afflictions, that do frequently exercife the Patience of Mankind? If in the best Condition of human Life, Men are not happy, but every thing is able to ruffle and disorder them; O how miserable are they in the worft! It is true, all Men do not fuffer equally, but fome much more than others; but yet he that is afflicted leaft in this World, hath his fufficient Share

of

of Pain and Anguifh, and feels enough to try his Courage and his Patience to the uttermoft; especially if to the Confideration of his own Sufferings he adds the bitter Things that he fees others undergo, fome of which may likewife come to his own Share before he goes out of the World.

It is able, in truth, to draw Tears from ones Eyes, ferioufly to reflect upon the fad, deplorable, calamitous Condition of a great Part of Mankind in this World; to exhibit to our Minds that difmal Scene of Things that are every Day prefented to our Eyes. Here are fome languishing under a long and tedious Diftemper, unfit for all the Functions, and incapable of any of the Enjoyments of Life. Others roaring out for the Extremity of Torture they fuffer from the Stone, or the Gout, or an Ulcer, or a broken Limb, or fome fuch other tormenting Accident. Others mourning for the Lofs of a dear Parent, on whom they depended; or the Death of a Child, who was the Stay and Comfort of their Age. Others fretting and fuming for the dif graceful Circumftances they are fallen into from an high Fortune. Others even heartbroken, for the Poverty and Neceffity to which they are reduced thro' the Profufenefs of their Lives, or the Mifadventures of Trade, or the Ruins of a Fire, or the Calamities of a War. Others groaning and howling under the Whips and Stings of an VOL. VI. C c awake

awaken'd Confcience, being filled with Horror and Amazement, and Defpair, from the Senfe of their Crimes, and the Apprehenfions of the Vengeance of God in the other World. Others (which is indeed the faddeft Sight of all) wallowing in all manner of Senfuality and Wickedness, giving up the Reins to their brutish Appetites, committing all Sorts of Villanies, Murders, Rapines, and Beaftialities, without Senfe of God or Religion; regardless of their own Souls, or the Souls of others; difhonouring their Profeffion, blafpheming his Name that made them, and, in a Word, making all the Hafte they can to everlasting Damnation.

Thefe Things are very fad, and must deeply affect us, tho' we ourselves were not concerned in them. But, alas! we are none of us mere Spectators of the Miferies of others; we must expect to bear a great Part ourselves in this Tragedy. So long as we have mortal Bodies exposed to Sicknefs and Diseases, to fad Accidents and Cafualties; fo long as we have a frail Nature, that betrays us to a thousand Follies and Sins; fo long as we have dear Friends and Relations, or Children, that we may be deprived of; fo long as we may prove unfortunate in our Marriage, or in our Pofterity, or in the Condition of Life we have chofen; fo long as there are Men to flander us, or to rob us, or to undermine us;

fo

fo long as there are Storms at Sea, or Fire upon Land ; fo long as there are Enemies abroad, or Tumults, Seditions, and Turns of State at home: I fay, fo long as we are exposed to thefe Things, we muft, every one of us, expect, in fome Degree or other, to bear a Share in the Miferies of the World.

And now, all these Things confidered, judge ye whether this World doth look like a Place of Reft; whether it is not rather a Stage of Calamities and fad Events. Judge ye,whether the best of human Things be not (as Solomon here tells us) Vanity; but the worst of them, intolerable Vexation of Spirit.

8. Which will still appear the more evident, if, in the eighth and laft Place, we add this, namely, That tho' all we have hitherto faid did go for nothing; tho' we could be fuppofed to be exempted from all thofe Inconveniencies and Mifchiefs I have mentioned ; tho' we could be supposed to be capable of an uninterrupted Enjoyment of the good Things of this Life as long as we live; (which yet, you fee, in the Conftitution of Things, is impoffible) yet even this would not fatisfy much to the making our State in this World eafy and happy; for there is one Thing ftill would fpoil all fuch Hopes and Pretences, and that is, the Fear of Death, which, as St. Paul truly obferves, hath made Mankind all their Life- Heb. 2.1g: CC 2

time

time fubject to Bondage. For a Man to confider, that how happy and profperous foever his Circumftances are, yet he is mortal as well as other Folks; he muft, in a little Time, die, as he fees his Neighbours do, and leave all his Comforts behind him ; what a difmal Reflection muft this needs be to a Man who hath fet up his Reft in this World, and dreams of no other Happiness but what he hath here! To think, that in a few Years at the fartheft, but poffibly in a few Months or Days, (for no Man knows how foon the Time will come that God will call him) he fhall lie down in the Duft, and then all that he hath here poffeffed and enjoyed, is loft and gone, irrecoverably gone! Only there is his Carriage and Behaviour in this World, his Virtues and his Vices, his Thoughts, and Words, and Actions that will go with him into the other World, and these must be feverely fcann'd and accounted for! I fay, for a Man, that hath no other Aims in this World, to confider thefe Things, how ungrateful, how tormenting muft the Thought of them be! What Reft, what Peace can accrue to him from all the Satisfactions of this Life! This Bufinefs of Dying, and what is to come after it, is fuch a bitter Sauce, fuch a Mixture of Gall and Wormwood to all a fenfual Man's Enjoyments, that it is impoffible to avoid the being miferable under the Apprehenfions of it.

O that