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i. e.

For Time the Nature of the World translates,
And gives all Things new from preceding States;
Nought like itself remains, but all do range,
And Nature forces ev'ry Thing to change.

"And yet we foolishly fear one kind of Death, whereas we have already past, and do daily pass fo many other." For not only, as Heraclitus faid, the Death of Fire is the Ge<neration of Air, and the Death of Air the Generation of Water: "But, moreover, we may more clearly discern "it in ourselves: The Prime of Life dies, and paffes a«Ε way when Old-Age comes on; and Youth is terminated "in the Prime of Life; Infancy in Youth, and the first

Age dies in Infancy: Yesterday died in To-day, and To-day will die in To-morrow; and there is nothing "that remains in the fame State, or that is always the "fame Thing. For, that it is fo, let this be the Proof: "If we are always one and the fame, how comes it to pass, "that we are now pleased with one Thing, and by and by "with another? How is it that we love or hate, praise or "condemn contrary Things? How comes it to pass, that << we have different Affections, and no more retain the "fame Sentiment in the fame Thought? For it is not

likely, that, without Mutation, we should affume other "Paffions; and that which fuffers Mutation does not re"main the fame, and if it be not the fame, it is not there, "fore exifting: But the fame that the Being is, does, like "it, change its Being, becoming evermore another from "another Thing; and, confequently, the natural Senfes ❝ abuse and deceive themfelves, taking that which feems, "for that which is, for want of well knowing what that "which is, is. But what is it then that truly is? That "which is Eternal That is to fay, that never had Beginning, nor never fhall have Ending, and to which "Time never brings any Mutation. For Time is a moving Thing, and that appears as in a Sha- Time a moving "dow, with a Matter evermore flowing and Thing, without "running, without ever remaining Stable Permanency. "and Permanent: And to which those Words appertain

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Book II. "before, and after, has been, or fhall be; which, at the "firft Sight, evidently fhew, that it is not a Thing that "is; for it were a great Folly, and an apparent Falfity, "to fay, that that is, which is not yet in Being, or that "has already ceased to be: And as to thefe Words, Prefent, Inftant, and Now, by which it seems, that we "principally fupport and found the Intelligence of Time, "Reason discovering, it does presently destroy it; for it "immediately divides and fplits it into the Future and Paft, being, of Neceffity, to confider it divided in two. "The fame happens to Nature that is measured, as to Time that measures it; for fhe has nothing that is Subfifting and Permanent, but all Things are either Born, Bearing, or Dying. By which Means it were finful "to fay of God, who is He who only is, that He was, or "that He fhall be: For thofe are Terms of Declension,

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Paffage, or Viciffitude, of what cannot continue, or "remain in Being. Wherefore we are to conclude, that "God only is, not according to any Measure of Time, "but according to an immutable and an immoveable E

ternity, not measured by Time, nor subject to any De"clenfion: Before whom nothing was, and after whom "nothing fhall be, either more New, or more Recent ; "but a real Being, that, with one Sole Now, fills the for "ever, and that there is nothing that truly is, but He " alone; without being able to fay, He has been, or shall "be, without Beginning, and without End."

r

To this religious Conclufion of a Pagan I fhall only add this Testimony of one of the fame Condition, for the Clofe of this long and tedious Discourse, which would furnish me with endless Matter. What a vile and abject Thing, fays he, is Man, if he do not raise himself above Humanity? 'Tis a good Word, and a profitable Defire, but equally abfurd; for, to make a Handful bigger than the Hand, and the Cubit longer than the Arm, and to hope to ftride further than our Legs can reach, is both impoffible and monftrous, or that Man fhould rife above himfelf and Humanity; for he cannot fee but with his Eyes, nor feize but with his Power. He fhall be exalted, if God will

T

* Seneca in his Natural Question, lib. i. in the Preface.

will lend him his extraordinary Hand; he fhall exalt himself, by abandoning and renouncing his own proper Means, and by fuffering himself to be raised and elevated by Means purely Celestial: It belongs to our Chriftian Faith, and not to Seneca's Stoical Virtues, to pretend to this divine and miraculous Metamorphofis.

W

CHAP. XIII.

Of judging of the Death of another.

It

HEN we judge of another's Courage in Death which, without Doubt, is the most remarkable Action of human Life, we are to take Notice of one Thing, which is, that Men very hardly believe themselves to be arrived to that Period. Few Men die with an Asfurance that it is their laft Hour, and there is nothing wherein the Flattery of Hope does more delude us. never ceases to whisper in our Ears, Others No very refohave been much ficker without dying; my lute Affurance Condition is not fo defperate as 'tis thought, at the Article and, at the worft, God has wrought other of Death. 'Miracles.' This happens, by reason that we fet too much Value upon ourfelves. It seems, to us, as if the Univerfality of Things were, in some Measure, to suffer by our Annihilation, and that it did commiferate our Condition. Forafmuch as our depraved Sight represents Things to itself after the fame manner, and that we are of Opinion, they ftand in as much Need of us, as we do of them; like People at Sea, to whom Mountains, Fields, Cities, Heaven and Earth are toffed at the fame Rate as they are:

Provebimur portu, terræque urbefque recedunt 3.

i. e.

Out of the Port, with a brifk Gale we speed,
Advancing, while the Shores and Towns recede.

Who

Eneid. lib. ii. v. 72.

1

Book II. Who ever faw an old Man, that did not applaud the past, and condemn the prefent Time, laying the Fault of his Mifery and Discontent upon the World, and the Manners of Men?

Famque caput quaffans grandis fufpirat arator,
Et cum tempora, temporibus præfentia confert
Præteritis, laudat fortunas fæpe parentis,
Et crepat antiquum genus ut pietate repletum '.

i. e..

Now the old Ploughman fighs, and shakes his Head,
And, prefent Times comparing with thofe fled,
His Predeceffors Happiness does praise,

And the great Piety of that old Race.

The important
Confequences
Men are apt to
afcribe to their

Death.

We draw all Things along with us; whence it follows, that we confider our Death as a very great Thing, and that does not so easily pass, nor without the folemn Confultation of the Stars: Tot circa unum caput tumultuantes Deos; as if there was a Rout among fo many of the Gods about the Life of one Man, and the more we value ourfelves, the more we think fo. • What! shall so much • Knowledge be loft, with so much Damage to the World, without a particular Concern of the Deftinies? Does fo rare and exemplary a Soul coft no more the killing, than one that is vulgar, and of no Ufe to the Public? This Life that protects fo many others, upon which fo many other Lives depend, that imploys fo vaft a Num"ber of Men in his Service, and that fills fo many Places; ' fhall it drop off like one that hangs but by its own fingle Thread?' None of us lays it enough to Heart, that we are but one. Thence proceeded thefe Words of Cæfar to his Pilot, more tumid than the Sea that threatened him.

f

Italiam fi cælo authore recufas,

Me pete: Sola tibi caufa hæc eft jufta timoris,
Vellorem non noffe tuum, perrumpe procellas
Tutelâ fecure mei

Lucrets kb. ii. v. 1164. u Lucan. lib. v. v. 579.

i. e.

i. e.

If thou to fail to Italy decline

Under the Gods Protection, truft to mine;
The only just Cause that thou haft to fear,
Is that thou doft not know thy Passenger;
But I being now aboard, tho' Neptune raves,
Fear not to cut thro' the tempeftuous Waves.
And these,

credit jam digna pericula Cæfar
Fatis effe fuis: Tantufque evertere (dixit)
Me fuper labor eft, parvá quem puppe fedentem,
Tam magno petiere mari.

i. e.

W

These Dangers, worthy of his Destiny,
Cæfar did now believe, and then did cry,
What, is it for the Gods a Task so great
To overthrow me, that, to do the Feat,
In a poor little Bark they must be fain
Here to surprise me on the fwelling Main?

And that idle Fancy of the Public, that the
Sun mourned for his Death a whole Year;

Ille etiam extinto miferatus Cæfare Romam,
Cùm caput obfcurâ nitidum ferrugine texit *.

i. e.

The Sun's

Mourning for the Death of Cæfar.

The Sun, when Cafar fell, was touch'd for Rome
With tender Pity, and bewail'd its Doom.

and a thousand of the like kind, wherewith the World fuffers itself to be fo eafily impofed upon, believing, that our Interests alter the Heavens, and that they are concerned at our minute Actions. Non tanta Calo focietas nobifcum eft, ut noftro fato mortalis fit illi quoque fiderum fulgor. There is no fuch Partnership betwixt us and Heaven, that the Brightness of the Stars fhould decay by our Death.

w Lucan. lib. v. v. 653, &c. y Plin. Nat. Hift. 1. ii. c. 8.

Now,

* Virg. Georg. lib. i. v. 460, &•

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