ESSAYS, Supposed to be written by Monsieur FOUQVET. BEING REFLECTIONS UPON SUCH MAXIMS of SOLOMON AS ARE Most proper to Guide us to the Felicity of both the Present and the Future Life.  
Translated out of French.  
LONDON: Printed for Thomas Metcalfe, over against the Red Lion in Drury-Lane, and sold by William Freeman at the Bible over against the Middle Temple-gate in Fleetstreet. 1694.   

A LETTER TO My Lady HANMER.  
Dear Madam,  
THIS comes to give you Notice of a Present I have sent you by your Carrier, which will yield an account how I have entertained myself since you made This a Solitary Place by your leaving it: The Present, it shocks my Modesty to term it so, is that little Volume put by me into English, which you liked when I lent it you in its Native Language, at the time of your being in these parts. With the Alteration it receives by my Hand, I am sensible, Madam, I make you a very bad Compliment, to offer to entertain one of your Judgement with the Defects of Mine, and yet I am not able to forbear it. The Character you gave this Piece, when you told me you had attempted to take Notes out of it, but found you could not justly do it without writing out the whole Book, makes me bold to believe there is something in it that may shine quite through the Cloud of my Style, and afford you a pleasing Beam. The Person, Madam, supposed to be the Author, was Monsieur Fouquet, who, besides his own vast Wealth, had the Management of the greatest Revenue that belongs to the Crown of France. Amongst a great many Accusations which happened to be brought against him, and which at last condemned him to a perpetual Imprisonment, one was, That he lived higher than the King himself, though he proved he had done it by the Ruin of his own Fortune. Now certainly this Person must needs be taken for a Witness of good credit, when he sets before our Eyes, as he does after Solomon, the little Value which the things of this World deserve to have with us: He writ this, and a former part of the same Work, in the solitude of his Confinement amongst the Mountains of Savoy, which, the Author says, did not a little contribute to the enlightening his Thoughts; and so it may be esteemed the fit to be received by you, Madam, in your Retirement in Wales, whither you have withdrawn yourself. If you find in places of this Volume, when you converse farther with it, a Spirit of Devotion, I hope you will take notice in what Persuasion it was written, and examine, whether you ever met with any thing truly of that kind, which has been written out of that Persuasion: And I wish, Madam, you may make such an advantageous Observation here as I could desire. If my Wishes do not suit with your Inclinations, at least, Madam, they agree to Perfection with the true Friendship and Respect I have for you, which would contribute, if they could, to your highest Felicity. I have much Pardon to beg of you, but chief for my Boldness in printing this Letter before my Translation, and in taking the liberty to place your Name before so weak a Work as my part of this comes to: But, Madam, allow me to give my Pen this Reputation, in consideration of the Honour I have of a Near Alliance to you, but more especially for that I am, beyond all the rest of the World,  
Madam, Your most Affectionate, Faithful, and Obedient Servant, E. GAGE:   


A Preliminary MAXIM; OR, REFLECTIONS Upon the Last Words of the ECCLESIASTES of Solomon,  Faciendi plures libros nullus est Finis: finem loquendi pariter omnes audiamus. Eccles. xii. 12. 

PARAPHRASE.  
MEN set no Bounds to their Pens in Writing, and less to their Tongues in Speaking: The Misfortune is, That the greatest part of them know not what ought to be a Man's End in Writing and in Speaking, nor will give themselves the trouble to find it out.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It must be confessed, that the number of Books at this day is very great, and yet were they all good, there would not be many. It would conduce sufficiently to the Honour of Church and State, did every Age produce but five or six, by the Favour of Providence, that merited to be turned into all Languages, and had the Privilege of the Books of Antiquity, to be known no less than the Sun, and to last no less than the World. O Immortal Stars, said the Son of Syrach (speaking of the Psalms of David) Immortal Stars, created to illuminate future Ages, and to adorn them with your miraculous Lights, even to the end of the World! Ornavit tempora usque ad consummationem seculi.  
My design is, not in this place to take notice of the ill fate of so many Books, as no sooner see the light, but are straight buried in Oblivion; nor of those that may be termed the Burden of their Country, and the Crime of their Parents; neither of those other, that like the Lion's Whelps of the Prophet Ezekiel, come into the World armed with Teeth and Claws, and which at the instant begin to by't, to tear men's Reputations, and to suck their Blood. Leo factus est & didicit capere praedam, hominemque comedere.  
I mean to speak of such Books as have the Benediction of Heaven, such as are penned by knowing and learned Authors helped by the Light of the Holy Ghost, and I shall only follow St. Chrysostom, my dear Reader, in making an Observation to you, which doubtless will prove useful at the Entrance into this little Work.  
He says, That such Books as these are Man's fittest Companions during this mortal life, Companions that are faithful, familiar, and respectful, taht are always near at hand, without being uneasy or troublesome; that are silenced when we please, without taking exceptions, and entertain us without tediousness, when we would have them speak again, that teach us, without flattery or dissembling, the Truths of God, and the Rigour of his Judgements, and in fine, show us our Faults, and make us observe our Weakness and Imperfections, yet give us no offence or distaste.  
So that we cannot but esteem these wonderful Books in the number of the most admirable productions of the Holy Ghost, and the most proper, to make us see the Defects of our Corrupt Nature.  
True it is, that this should be the principal Care and Office of those that love us, and whom we love; but, Where is that Friend to be found, that will show us the Wounds of our Soul, when only to see them gives so great offence? Where are they to be found, that will venture to put their Hand to this tender place, and endeavour our Remedy by charitable Admonitions, when all the World knows, that but to touch it, is to make it worse? To what end serve any Remonstrances, tho' never so discreet and secret, and though applied with all the Civility and Sweetness imaginable, but to turn small Scratches into bleeding Sores and mortal Wounds? How many Thunders have been raised in a Family; how many Quarrels and scandalous Breaches, only from a word of true Friendship, that hath displeased too nice a Friend?  
I say therefore, that on such occasions these Books are our most incomparable Friends: their Office and Intention is, to set our Faults before our Eyes; and this they do in so obliging a way (which is the Wonder) as that instead of being offended at these free Censurers, who are so well acquainted with our Faults, we rather do admire and esteem them; chief, in that they best know how to discover to us, and set down in Paper pathetically and clearly whatsoever lies the most hidden and black within us, and all that God Almighty sees, through the impenetrable Recesses of our guilty Conscience.  
Another Wonder of these Books is, that tho' they lie open before the Eyes of all the World, yet they discover these Truth's only to the Persons that seek and aught to know them, telling things in that admirable way, that the Guilty alone know it is they that are spoken to, and that the Writer himself knows nothing of this, no more than any other Man.  
Such Sinners as read these Books find their Consciences touched to the quick, and yet perceive no Hand that comes near them, or any Eye that observes them. In a word, they have no reason to complain, but only of Themselves.  
There was heretofore graved upon a Looking-glass this Motto, which equally suits to a good spiritual Book, Nemini parcit, neminem laedit; It spares none, and yet it hurts none. Indeed, it is evident, that the Glass shows to those that look in it, and mind it, all the badness and deformity of their Faces, and the good Book all the spots and foulness of their Consciences: Both the one and the other show this without hiding, without excusing or disguising any thing, and yet neither of them anger's any Person, or gives him any just cause of Complaint; Nemini parcit, neminem laedit. It is the Property of an excellent good Book, not to spare in any sort the Sin, nor yet to offend in any sort the Sinner.  
For it could be counted no less than a ridiculous Extravagance, what a young Lord did not long since, who happening to come into the company of some Persons of Quality, that were reading a Book, in which his depraved Manners were represented to the Life, fell into a violent Passion, and would have snatched away the Book, to have torn it in pieces, but being hindered, he went away full of Threats, and such Designs as his foolish Rage put into his Head. The next day some Persons made a Painter draw a Looking-glass and just before it a Dragon, which seeing there his hideous shape, seemed to fly away, yet turned his Eyes with Indignation towards the innocent Glass, on the top of which were written these few words, as the Motto of the Looking-glass, (Se non me fugit; 'Tis not from me, but from himself he flies). It is the sight of his horrid Head, full of Poison and Deformity, that enrageth him, and puts him into this fright.  
And this I take to be the fittest Answer can be made to those malicious Spirits, who out of their hatred to them are still ready to defame and play the Satirists on good Books.  
For my part, at least, if any one should take offence at the Truths which in this little Work accompany the Maxims of Solomon; all the Apology I should make should be summed up in these three words, Se non me: he accuseth his own Conscience, and not my Pen; his Quarrel is to Himself, and not to Me.  
But it is time, my dear Reader, to make an end of this Preliminary Maxim, and to acknowledge to you, that this Work done by so weak a Hand, hath no Value in it but what it derives from the words of Solomon, dictated by the Holy Ghost, acquainting you with such Maxims as are proper to guide us in relation to our Temporal and Spiritual Good, which together make up the Felicity of this Life; and that these two sorts of Good are set forth in the Texts of Solomon, put down in the Table at the end of this Book.    

MAXIM I.  OPtavi & datus est mihi sensus: Invocavi, & venit in me Spiritus Sapientiae. Venerunt autem mihi Omnia bona cum illa. Sap. 7. 

PARAPHRASE.  
GOD having offered me, when I came to the Throne, whatsoever my Heart should think good to desire, I thought I could not choose better than that, which was most worthy to come from his Almighty Hand. The greatest part of Mankind ask every thing of him in their Prayers, except his Grace, that they may become Wise, tho' it was this alone I durst ask of him. Da mihi, said I to him, O Lord, since you will have me reign happily: Sedium tuarum Assistricem Sapientiam; Call to mind, O Great God that it was your Wisdom, whose Light assisted you to produce this World, and to see that every part of the Work should be good and pleasing in your Eyes: Is it not the same also that aids you still to govern the whole, and that marks out to your Providence the ways of its Conduct, and the rules of its Do? Mitte illam ut mecum sit & mecum laboret; O send her me, that I may be enlightened by her, during my toilsome Journey: and suffer me not to be upon the Throne, unless she be there with me, You that never ruled without her, and that know it, in her absence, to be the most unhappy station for any Man. Invocavi & venit in me Spiritus Sapientiae.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Men aim holily, at the Felicities of the Life to come, yet are not forbid to look after those of this present Life; Necessity often forces us to desire them, God sometimes helps us to acquire them: There are even some of them that he has chosen to be the Lot of his Elect in this low Region, and to be the Mark of their Election and Perseverance in his Grace: amongst these there is not any one so desirable, as the Skill how to order our Actions with that Wisdom, as they may neither harm Others nor ourselves.  
Wisdom is in effect no other thing, but the Felicity of Man, both in this and in the other World. It is a general 
Venerunt mihi omnia Bona cum illa. Sap. 7.  Good which contains all that infinite Variety of different Helps and Remedies, of which we stand in need during this Mortal Life. She sufficeth all alone to him that knows and does possess her; whatsoever else is wanting to Man, when once he becomes Wise, he wants no more to make him Happy.  
It may be said of her at least, that she is the Rendezvous of those Qualities which render a Man sovereignly perfect and truly divine; who has her, has a modesty of Countenance, a serenity of Mind, a force and greatness of Wit, a sublimity of Knowledge, and a reach into all the Secrets of Nature, an elevation up to the high Spring of Light, and a continual Familiarity with God; in fine, an Immensity of Heart, always fixed upon Heaven, and yet always present to this Lower World, in the exercise of its Courage and Bounty towards those who depend on him: Can we then do less than own, that where these are, such a Man in a Country, altho' one of the least rich, and least befriended by Fortune, is in spite of her the most happy and most amiable of Men? All that she can give to Kings comes not into comparison with the value of what he possesses. Pretiosior est cunctis opibus, & omnia quae desiderari possunt non valent sapientiae comparari.  
It is not my design, O Christian Soul, to raise up your hopes to this high Pitch, so much above your Reach; measure your strength, and know yourself. Wisdom has its different degrees, and do you aim at that station to which God and your Conscience calls you. All that I pretend here, is to tell you, That you that are not content with your present condition, nor with that you have been in formerly, if you will be but as wise, as you may be, by the Help and Grace of Almighty God, which he offers you, you shall find, in what Station or Place soever you are, your Quiet in it; and your Happiness thus settled, shall never more be overthrown by any Misfortune.  
I do not say, that Fortune shall then become favourable to you; or that she shall not Attempt to do you Mischief; I only say, it shall not be in her power to Afflict you.  
There is no question, but that those Miseries which overrun whole Kingdoms may enter into your Country, fall upon your Lands, and enter your very House, but never into yourself. That part of the Immortal Soul where God has graved his Image, and Wisdom stamped her Privilege, must be exempt from all those Profanations, to which the rest of Man is so much liable. Grief, Vexation, and Impatience come not at that place, but in the midst of Loss and Ruins: Quiet shall never perish there, no more than Innocence.  
Let them weep and lament who know, their Sins and the Imprudence of their Actions, have brought upon them these ill Accidents. Your Virtue, which has kept you from being one in the number of the Faulty, will keep you also from being one in the number of the Unhappy; whilst such as they make Outcries of Despair, and sink under the Storm, you shall possess a perfect calm of Heart, and will reckon it a better Condition, and more honourable, to have had no share in the Faults which may have brought Misery amongst your Family, than to have a part in a good Fortune, that should befall it merely by Accident.  
In a word, Non contristabit Justum quidquid ei acciderit, says Solomon; No Accident that befalls the wise and the just man, can turn him from his right Bias, and the doing of his Duty, or so much as cause in him disorderly Motions. There may be Tumult and Noise round about him, but Peace shall never forsake him within. And whilst he finds his Soul serene and quiet, it will little concern him, though his Aims be crossed, or if he suffers in his Affairs: Non contristabit quidquid ei acciderit.  
But David says more, and goes yet further, let us not fear to follow 
Non accedet ad te Malum & Flagellum non appropinquabit Tabernaculo tuo.  him in saying, That if there be Wisdom in you, the Goodness of God will not permit the Strokes of his Anger to come at you, or so much as to threaten or approach your Habitation.  
The greatest part of our Misfortunes, and almost all of them, befall us, by the want of foresight. That which happens to the Merchant, who having left the Harbour indiscreetly, and not foreseeing the Tempest, perishes upon the Sea, is common to almost all the afflicted, that lament either the Overthrow of their Lawsuits, or their other Losses. They lay the Fault both upon Heaven and Earth, when the true cause is, that they were blind, and could not see the Disguises put on Truth by false-hearted Men, nor the secret Turns of Fortune, hid in the obscurity of the time to come. Quia non cognovisti tempus, saith the Gospel: Whoever you be that relate your Mischances, complaining bitterly of the cruelty of your Enemies, of the deceit of your Flatterers, or injustice of your Judges, accuse not any thing but your own Ignorance, and the small reach of your Thoughts, which could not see beyond what appeared before your Eyes: the discerning Thoughts of Wisdom go much further.  
Observe, that though it be said of the generality of Men, that they are subject to Afflictions, yet it is rarely said of the Wise Man, who has a holy Modesty and Prudence. There is a kind of Instinct in us, which prompts us to believe, that to be wise and happy are not two distinct Qualities in such a Person: we are persuaded, that he can never miss of Success, because he bears in his Looks the Character of a Mind, not to be deceived in the Events of what he Undertakes.  
In Reality, according to the Motto which Solomon does bestow upon him, one of his Essential Properties 
Omnia improvisa didici.  is, to know to day what will be to morrow, and to prevent the Evil by his Care and Precaution, which are enlightened from above.  
He does not limit his Sight to the Countenances of Men; he has a Light that goes further than the Eyes, and shows him what lies most dark and hidden in their Hearts. St. Peter says, (speaking of true Wisdom) It is a Light created by God to shine in dark places: Lucerna lucens in Caliginoso loco.  
The Apostle means, that as there are two Lights in this World appointed to discover to our mortal Eyes things material and visible, one the Sun, which shows them clearly by day; the other the Moon, which shows them also, but yet obscurely, in the absence of the Sun; so are there two other Lights appointed for our Souls, by which to see things spiritual and immaterial; the first, that Sun of Paradise, termed the Light of Glory, which will manifestly discover to us the infinite Greatness and Beauty of the King of kings, and all whatever that is wonderful and incomprehensible in the Mysteries of the Trinity, and of the Incarnation of the Word: the second, (which is the lesser, luminare minus) the Light of Wisdom, which has its Rise and Spring from the Bosom of God, and is to enlighten us upon the Earth, and to show us obscurely, yet certainly, those Truths which are invisible and impenetrable to the blind Skill of vain Politicians and Philosophers; Lucerna lucens in Caliginoso loco.  
Enlightened by the Rays of this glorious and divine Star, the Sages of all times have penetrated through the Clouds of Ignorance, (with which all Men are involved) into the most profound Mysteries of the Gospel, and into those of Grace and Nature.  
By the help of the same Rays, when you become wise, you will discover, not by Revelation, or any miraculous Illumination, but by Conjectures supernaturally guided, the darkest Thoughts of Men Hearts, the Designs of Human Policy, the Snares laid by Ambition, Hypocrisy, 
Quaecumque sunt absconsa & improvisa didici. Sap. 7.  Envy, and Impiety, with all the Dangers hidden in the secret Paths of Treachery and Hatred. I shall see them, says Job, speaking to God, and shall walk in the midst of an undaunted confidence, when I shall be enlightened by your light: Quando splendebit lucerna tua super caput meum & in tenebris ad lumen tuum Ambulabo.  
To conclude, Be wise, and you shall see all the Accidents of Danger before they come; nor will you study, as others do, to give them a Repulse when present, but go and meet them afar off, to prevent them with little Pains: You will do, in relation to domestic Troubles, what Solomon did miraculously in relation to contagious and stormy blasts of Air; he knew the Art, how to go and find them in their Caves, and there to dispel them: He knew the Art, how to make Health, Happiness, and Abundance reign in his Provinces, when at the same time other Nations pined with Famine, or perished by Diseases.    

MAXIM II.  Stultus illudet peccatum: & inter Justos morabitur gratia. Prov. 14. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Sin is pleasing to all at the time of committing it, but when once committed, the Wise man grieves and afflicts himself bitterly for it; the Weak and Scrupulous despairs; he that is hardened and impudent mocks at it, and wonders at the tenderness of those good Men that pity him, and talk of Repentance.  
Of all the Diseased, those that are most to be pitied, are such as pity not themselves, but are in love with their Distemper: Let us hate ours, Hatred is its Remedy, and a sign that we are not forsaken, but that Heaven has yet Designs of Mercy for us.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It is the ordinary Custom of Men to apply themselves with great assiduity to useless and idle trifles, and to take no manner of care for things of the highest importance.  
You bestow a great expense in the Habits you wear, and take a great deal of pains to dress yourself handsomely, that you may appear pleasing in the Eye of the World, and never so much as think of healing that horrid Canker, that eats into your Face, the loathsomeness of which makes every one flee your company, and renders you hideous and insupportable to all that see or come near you.  
To what end serves all this expensive Bravery? What good do these precious Movables of your Chamber, with this magnificence of your Bed, do you, if in the midst of all these Riches, and so much costly Gaiety, designed for the sweetening of your Sleeps, you feel the Stone within you tearing with its sharp points your Entrails, and forcing you to cry out like to a Criminal on the Rack? I mean, if in the height of the Prosperity and Honours of your Family you feel the Sting of Mortal Sin that disappoints your rest; and if you must hear night and day the dreadful Cries of your wounded Conscience, which puts you in mind of the approach of Death, and of Eternal Misery. Dum ad speciosa tormenta alligatus: sub ingenti titulo Cruciaris.  
No certainly, Sin is not an Evil of small importance, to be neglected or made sport withal.  
There is not a Wise Man upon the Earth, that would not choose to lose his Goods and Life, nor a Saint in Heaven that would not renounce his Paradise, to go and suffer eternally in Hell, rather than to commit a Mortal Sin.  
It is said of the Seraphins, That they were grieved they ever had a Being, when they first saw Sin to grow amongst them; and that they became the Companions of Sinners.  
What St. Paul said in the Transports of his Love, was no less seraphical nor admirable; That it would be more easy for him to perish himself, and be put in the number of the Reprobate, than to see those Sins in the Hearts of Christians, which they see in themselves, and suffer to remain there without remorse. He said this from the bottom of his Heart, because he understood the two essential Properties of Man's Sin, which are no less than to be the death of an immortal Soul, and the true Cause of the death of a God, a Parricide and a Deicide.  
There have been some converted Sinners so divinely illuminated, and so clear sighted in the foulness of Sin, as that after having mingled with their Food Ashes and their Tears, and after having suffered the severest Austerities in their Bodies for several years, not thinking they had yet satisfied for their Sins, have wished to go and suffer the Torments of Hell, there to finish the time of their Penance. It would be a long Work to collect what the Fathers have writ, and to consider all they have observed hereupon; it will be sufficient for you to know his Mind, who is the Master of Saints, and what his Thoughts are of you and your Sins, and how he comes to know them; but than you must interrogate him thereupon, and he will answer.  
To learn this well, your best way is, not to have recourse to the great Doctors, you will gain this Science sooner in Solitude than in the Schools: Whoever you are, that have spent several years in thinking of other things than your Salvation, and matters of Eternity, do not deny your Conscience three or four days time, to hear what it will say to you from God on this mighty Subject, and to learn of it the explication of these few words of St. Denis, Lux in se Notitiam Tenebrarum Habet; That Light contains in itself the knowledge of Obscurity, that in seeing and knowing itself, it knows what is Darkness.  
St. Denis means, That God had the same thoughts of Man's Sins that the Sun would have of Night, could he but see and know himself; undoubtedly, though there be nothing of Darkness in the Sun, yet had he Eyes and Understanding, as he must see beyond any Person, that his Light is the most perfect of all visible Beauties, so he must needs see also beyond any, that there is no Deformity so dreadful, or such an Enemy to the Eyes, as the Night: Although he had never been acquainted with her, nor had ever seen her, his own perfect Brightness would suffice him, to know and measure her truly by.  
Nothing is so certain, as, That in God there is not any Spot or Sin, but that He is all Infinite Light and Brightness; and yet with this pure and impeccable Essence it is that He sees what Sin is beyond what all Men in their sinful and corrupt Nature ever did see.  
I leave you here to yourself, O Christian Soul, lift up your Eyes, and contemplate privately upon this Divine Truth, That God, by his own Holiness, knows your Sinfulness, examines, considers, and comprehends all the degrees of it. By this it is that he measures what you are at the time of your Disorders; and as He sees an infinite Beauty and Greatness in His Divine Perfections, so He beholds with an infinite Horror and Infamy your Guilty Actions: He measures your Station by his own, and finds, that as high as He is exalted in Greatness and Glory, by the sublime elevation of his Wisdom and of his Love to his Eternal Word, so low, by forsaking Him, are you sunk and fallen into the deep Abyss of Darkness and Nothingness. He sees both the one and the other in the same Vision.  
What do you mean, O Great God, cries out David, trembling with Apprehension, Posuisti iniquitates Nostras in Conspectu tuo; Must it be by such a shining Light that you behold and consider the Foulness and Infamy of our Miserable Life, and must the Ages of our Ingratitude be amidst the Splendour of your Paradise, one of the Spectacles of your Eternity? Saeculum Nostrum in illuminatione vultus tui. In this manner God knows what passes within you, and thus He thinks of any of the least of your Sins.  
But then, how many does He see of these! look into yourself whilst He looks into you, and see in your Soul what He sees there, that innumerable company of Inveterate Sins, that heap of Old and New Corruption. All these Black Objects that God contemplates in you, contemplate them I say, in yourself, and let nothing be hidden from you. He knows your Thoughts, do you know his, and consider what He intends; at least, see what hangs over your Head, at the time that I am speaking to you; His Justice, with Pen in Hand, that observes you, and writes; His Mercy, that is leaving you, and ready to deliver you up to Death: they, by their interior Voices, both reproach you with what you are at present, and tell you what you shall be to morrow, or this night, or perhaps within an hour, unexpectedly, in the height of your Honours and your Pleasures, Dead, Judged, Damned; in three minutes space this great Change will be made, and made for ever: Velut Somnium Avolans non invenieris & qui te Viderint dicent, ubi est.  
It is God that speaks to you, weigh his Words, meditate and grant to your Conscience that Solitude and Privacy which it begs of you, to the end it may be heard upon this Subject, and that you may consult with it.  
The Question is, Whether you will continue, by a desperate Choice, in the deplorable state in which you are, or get the soon you can out of it, by the means of doing Penance.  
Perhaps neither the one nor the other will please you, and your Answer will be made only in Tears, like a Sick body that is given over, and lies on his Bed tossing from one side to the other, sending out Groans and Lamentations. Quo Ibo?  
It may chance to come into your Head to do like that Sinner the Prophet speaks of, which is to learn whether there be any Corner of the World where God is not, and where you may neither be seen by him, or persecuted by the reach of his Voice: Quo Ibo à Spiritu tuo, & quo à facie tua fugiam? Alas, Lord, says he, you that know all things, know you not what it is to be seen by a God, with all our Sins about us? what it is to be called to a Holy Life by so many strong and inviting Inspirations, whilst long Habits and Customs have chained us to the World, and whilst a cruel and invincible Passion has engaged us in the love of the Creatures. Great God, continues he, have Pity on me; I desire but this Favour of you, that you will tell me, you that only know it, to what part of the Universe I may fly, to be hid from the Sight of your Eyes, and freed from hearing the Threats of your Justice, with Calls and Pursuits of your Love. Quo Ibo à Spiritu tuo?  
Behold here a strange Design, to ask of God himself what you must do, and whither you must go, to flee away from him: But what outdoes this, is, that God does not refuse to give his Answer to such a Question, with Advice upon it.  
The Answer which he gives, and which I address to you. O Christian Soul, is, That you must go to the place where Mercy dwells, upon Mount Calvary; and provided that you then say what is fit to be said to that Supreme Mercy, and that you will let it work its Pleasure on your Heart, there you will find the Quiet and Security you seek.    

MAXIM III.  Donec Aspiret dies, & inclinentur Vmbrae Vadam ad Montem Myrrhae & ad Collemthuris. Cant. iv. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Until such time as the Shades vanish, and that the Daybreakof a Blessed Eternity does appear, I will go solitarily up upon the Mountain of Myrrh, and the Hill of Frankincense, and contemplating on Eternal Truths, will form thence raise myself up to God by Prayer and Penitence, and be like the Incense, which in mounting to the Skies, destroys and consumes itself in its own Flames.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It is not my Voice, O Christian Soul, nor the Voice of Man, but somewhat more powerful, and more worthy to be harkened to, that calls you up to Mount Calvary, and expects you there, it being the only place where you can calm all the Motions of your Soul, and settle yourself in the Happy Condition which you seek.  
When you are there, spare not to utter quickly all that your Grief shall suggest to you to say, and proceed in complaining of that satal Impulse, as you count it, which carries you continually to the love of your Sins, notwithstanding you are continually in the Eye of your God, and persecuted by his Calls and Threats: Quo Ibo à Spiritu tuo, & quo à facie tua fugiam?  
After this lift up your Eyes, and contemplate upon him you see stretched on the Cross before you, you will discover in his opened Heart a Mercy which discerns Sinners, it is true, but beholds them to no other end, than to proportion the Pardon it designs them to the greatness of their Faults: You will find then, this God you fly, pursues you only, that He may make you capable of enjoying one day an Eternal Felicity, in the room of that Punishment you have deserved at his Hands, and which you can never escape, but by having recourse to his Cross.  
Consider with yourself, that the lowest and the vilest Condition a Man can be in is the state of great Sinfulness; and the highest Condition a God can be in, is that of great Mercifulness.  
To these two Extremes were GOD and Man come, the one of height, the other of lowness, on the day of the Passion; Man, by spilling the Blood of his crucified Saviour; and God the Father, by seeing and suffering that precious Blood to flow. Here is matter for you to contemplate and stay upon a while.  
I have not much to say to you on my part, the Prophet David has included whatsoever can be or aught to be said on this Subject, in these few words, That there is in Man great Sin, and in GOD great Mercy.  
Great Sins are such as are committed contrary to the most holy Laws of Nature, and which spring in the Heart in Ingrateful Man after Baptism, during the height of the Favours and Benefits of his Redemption: They are such as are renewed after Pardons received, and Promises made of Repentance; such as are multiplied by continual Relapses, as are fortified by Impunity, are hardened by Chastisements, and such as scandalousloy increase under the weight of Sickness, Misfortune, and Malediction, mocking at the Authority and Threats of Justice. In fine, great Sins are such as put a Man alive into the Beginning Flames of Hell, when sharp Sorrows and a despairing Remorse seize on the Heart of a Sinner, and that to get some Ease, he falls into that desperate Frenzy of imagining he is got out of the Reach of God Almighty's Hand, which makes him stand at defiance with Heaven, and abandon himself to all the wicked Effects of Atheism and Brutality. Opprimamus Justum nec Parcamus viduae: Impleamus nos Vino: Nullum sit praetum quod non pertranseat luxuria nostra.  
Great Mercy is that, which beholds this Spectacle with an Eye of Compassion, and efficaciously undertakes to afford a Remedy. To effect this, it assembles what is most strong and attractive in the Conquering Grace of the Holy Ghost, 
Quast antelucanum illumino.  of which it frames a Light like to the Morning Aurora. By the means of such a Light spread over the Face of the most stupefied Sinners, this Divine Mercy gets into their Eyes without Violence or Trouble, and breaking the Fetters of their Dead Sleep, awakens and illuminates them, makes them in an instant see the Beauties of Virtue, and calls and draws them to it; then this Mercy itself entering into them with its divine Attractives, and becoming Mistress of their Hearts, engages them, by an irrevocable resolution, to the performance of Acts of Penance and Sanctity. Corruscasti, & splenduisti, & Rupisti Surditatem meam. S. Aug.  
O Great and Adorable Mercy, which sets no Limits to the extent of its Benefits! which has not seen in Six thousand Years the Crime committed on the face of the Earth, that it was not ready to pardon, if the Sinner were ready to repent and accuse himself of it! which does not see any such in Hell amongst all the Blasphemies and execrable Impieties of that place, that it would not now be ready to forgive, if the Devils and the Damned would stoop from their Pride to ask that Grace, and draw from their Hearts an Act of Humility and Contrition! How many are the Sins, O Christian Soul, that your Life numbers since you were first a Sinner, and how many have the Favours of God been since that time! Has there a day passed in which this loving Father of his prodigal Children has not been watching foe ryou, and looking about to offer you his Hand, that He might draw you out of the Pit you were fallen into, from the Gates of Death and Hell, and out of the Bonds of the Devil?  
In a word, There is great Sin and foul Ingratitude in Man, and in GOD great and high Mercy.  
Consider then, if you think good, what you have to do in this Case, and which of the two Resolutions you ought to take; whether to flee as you purposed, so far from God that you might be out of the call of his Voice, running where Despair and Blindness will lead you; or, whether you will turn home to that Mercy which stretches out its Arms to you, and calls you to your Salvation. Consider, I say, and choose.  
Choose! Alas, said St. Peter, Ad quem ibimus? verba vitae aeternae habes: Grace and Life, O Divine Saviour, are between your Lips, ready to be poured forth on miserable Man, my Heart longs for both: I am a Sinner, Death and Sin are in me, and stop my Breath: there remains for me but a moment's space of Life, and then follow Pains to Eternity: Whither shall I go to seek for Remedy? Whither can I, unless I go to you? Verba vitae aeternae habes. Examine well these few words, and try to hear what is said to you thereupon from above: for my part, I have nothing more to say, than what you have newly heard; you have great Sins upon you, and you stand in need of great Mercy; go up to Mount Calvary, there is no other place where it may be found, or where you ought to seek it.  
True it is, that you are there accused of having shed the Blood of your Saviour, and of having been the Executioner that has crucified him: There you are shown, on the top of a Tree, the most enormous Crime that ever was committed, and it is laid to your charge; but be not frighted, only be sure, as soon as you appear before the Crucifix, to let the Truth issue from your Heart, and out of your Mouth: confess, that you are the Guilty One against whom both Heaven and Earth call out for Vengeance, Iniquitatem meam Ego Cognosco; you will straight find there will come Mercy out of the Heart of God, to meet and embrace you, and He will join his Grace on your Lips, to the Confession of your Faults, and the Truth of your Sorrow: Misericordia & veritas obviaverunt sibi.  
Speak out then, own your Crime, and say with David, Peccatum meum Contra me est semper. True it is, O Lord, that my great Sin, which contains all the infinite multitude of my Offences, is present with you on the Cross, but then your great Mercy is with you there too: it is by that Standard you will measure the designs of your Heart towards me; and it is with it you will consult, to learn what Answer you shall return to my Tears: Miserer mei secundum magnam Misericordiam tuam. I implore not the Mercy of Angels or Saints, or of a God all Glorious in Heaven, my Need reaches to the want of the Greatest and Supreme Mercy, and that is not to be had but from a God upon the Cross, whom I have put to death, He is the Only One that must renew my Life: Unite those innumerable Pardons and Favours which you have granted to all Sinners since the beginning of the World; O unite them all at present into one, for me alone; Secundum multitudinem Miserationum tuarum: In me you behold all the Sinners that ever were; therefore I must seek in you for all that Goodness, and all that Love, that has converted them all even to this day: O my divine Saviour, glorify your Omnipotence, and show what a God can do for so lost a Creature, and how his Grace can raise a quite dejected Heart.  
Entertain these kind of Thoughts in your Mind as much as you are able, and by the number of your Acts of Contrition, encourage the Divine Mercy, to shower on you its Numerous Benedictions.    

MAXIM IU.  Vadam ad Collem Thuris. Cant. iv. 

PARAPHRASE.  
I will go up to the Hill of Frankincense, and there by Prayer and Penitence will I raise myself so high, as to get into the Wounds of Jesus Christ; and I will grave so deep in my Soul the Characters of his Sufferings, that no other Life shall be left me, but what I breathe out of his Heart.   

REFLECTIONS.  
See here the Method you are to observe whilst your Solitude gives you the leisure to hearken to your Conscience, and to mind what it will say to you: Tell often to yourself the Story of your wretched Days, and let not so much as one of those dreadful occasions slip from you, which has engaged you in Wicked Company: call to mind each Fault, and over each weep and lament: Perform those Acts of Contrition, that may make you worthy the Grace that has drawn you out of Hell, which the death of Christ has merited for you.  
Say to him, That which afflicts me most, (O Lord) touching my enormous Crimes, is, that my Heart is weak, and has not strength enough to hate them. Alas, Lord, mine alone can be but poor in Sorrow, poor, tho' I had the Hearts of my Confessors to help me, who have known and lamented them together with me: by my Goodwill I would have the Hearts of all Men and Angels, and out of this Multiplicity of Hearts would I collect and frame a hatred and detestation of my Ingratitude, that should be great enough to make them equal to my Grief and Misery: Cor mundum Crea in me Deus; Employ, O Lord, your Power and your Mercy; create a new Heart, and bestow it on me, with which I may stisfie you, and love you.  
With this desire our Saviour will be pleased, as he was with that of David, St. Peter, and other Converted Sinners, who after having employed Years in lamenting and weeping, when their Tears were quite exhausted and spent, did seek to know, whether the World could not afford the Means to raise within their Souls a Spring of these bitter Waters, such as should never stop, but last to the very end of their days: Quis dabit Capiti meo Aquam, & Oculis meis fontem lachrymarum?  
Say you the same thing, contemplating on your crucified Lord, and say it with Sincerity, and from the bottom of your Heart; let Sighs of Love express it instead of Words; Quis dabit Capiti mei? How happy should I be, could I shed Torrents of Tears to join with the Torrent of my Saviour's Blood, such as should flow in every place where I have committed Faults, to show, wherever I have Sinned, that I have Sorrowed, and given lasting Marks of my Repentance. O all ye People, who have heard of the 
Audite Populi & Videte dolorem meum.  Scandals of my past Life, come and hear my mournful Cries, come and behold my Sorrows! behold them you, my God, and see how my Conscience suffers: in you I hope, even in the Condition I am fallen into, be you so good as to grant me your Love in the same measure; at least, look on me, thus as I am, and let that Virtue issue from your Eyes, which can give Grace and Life. Vide Domine & Considera.  
This God, who sees and hears you during these holy moments in which your Griefs renew, and that you feel the Convulsions of your afflicted Conscience, will not fail to comfort you, by his repeating to you interiorly, what has been so often told you by his Prophets and Evangelists, that your Sins are blotted out, and forgiven, and that not one spot of them remains in your Soul.  
Thus much I know, O my Divine Saviour, but still the memory of them is remaining in your Mind.  
Alas, Great God, how insufficient it is for my Comfort to be told I am forgiven! To make this perfect, you that can be ignorant of nothing, must find out some means to be ignorant of my Misdeeds, and to forget whatsoever has befallen me in the time of my wretched and scandalous days.  
For how is it possible to live in the presence of a God, who has seen my Treacheries, and bears them still in mind! how is it possible to be comforted, tho' I am daily told the News from him, that my Sins have been washed with his Blood! when at the same time my Reason informs me, that they appear yet before his Eyes, that they will ever appear, and that the Ages of my Ingratitude must, amidst the Glories of his Paradise, be one of the Objects of his Eternity! Posuisti iniquitates Nostras in Conspectu tuo, soeculum Nostrum in illuminatione Vultus tui.  
God, who with a Complacence observes these Fears and Disquiets within you, will give them a Remedy to make your Consolation entire.  
For whilst you are breathing out your Complaints in this familiar way, when he comes once to comfort you, He will do it certainly like a God, and stretch his Power miraculously so far, as even to forget all, and bury the whole Memory of your Sins in the Ocean, whence it shall never rise again: Disponet iniquitates Nostras & projiciet in profunda Maris omnia peccata Nostra, quoniam Volens est misericordiam.    

MAXIM V.  Generositatem illius Glorificat, Contubernium habens Dei. Sap. viij. 

PARAPHRASE.  
The Greatness and the Eminence of Grace are glorified by the Man that lives familiarly with God.   

REFLECTIONS.  
A principal Duty it should be in devout and holy persons, to add a Lustre and Glory to Sanctity; but there are many of them that do much otherwise, and who, we must confess, give by their Indiscretions too much Ground to Libertines, for their contempt of this Divine Virtue,  
I cannot tell whether this proceeds from an innocent Ambition to imitate the Saints in those Actions wherein they are most inimitable, and miraculous; but this I can tell, that it brings no Honour to Sanctity, to be more Saintlike 
Non plus sapere quam oportet, Sapere ad sobrietatem.  than God approves. It fares with Holiness as it does with Wisdom: whosoever has too much of either, falls very short of having enough.  
This too much is the thing, I may boldly say, that dishonours Christian Piety, and is the cause it meets with so little respect in all Companies in the World. The Misfortune comes not by the Devotion of such as are discreet and holy, but by the true Folly of such as are scrupulous, and the False Sanctity of such as are Hypocrites.  
To be of an Humour not to be satisfied but by taking byways to go to Heaven, and building upon Rules which are Strangers to the Church's Morals, and to all Divinity; to be persuaded, that to break a day of Lent in the time of a dangerous Sickness, is a high and guilty Frailty; that it is not to die like a Christian, or a Chosen One, unless Death comes by the Violence of Mortifications, and unless a Man inflicts on himself as much as ever Tyrants did upon the Martyrs they have made. These sort of Principles, and others like them, preached up by the Montainists and Novatians, were never any Honour to Devotion or Devout Persons, though they might be so often to their Directors, who have judged them fit Cloaks to hid their growing Heresies, and who by showing to us devoties ruined in the Health both of Body and Mind, by their Watch and Fasts, pretend to give us infallible Proofs of the Holy Lives of their Teachers, and Sanctity of their Doctrine.  
Be devout: but in case you cannot be so, without rendering Devotion either falsely commendable or truly ridiculous and contemptible, never pretend to it at all. Bring not into the Sanctuary, under the Title of a Mortified and Spiritual Man, such Defects as will make the Wise to laugh at you, as well as others, and Condemn you against their Wills: it is a matter of Shame, that happens almost every day, even in the most modest Conversations, never to hear the Devout spoken of, but that it is with some Censure of their Carriage.  
Make not one in the number of those that are the cause of this, as you will infallibly do, if you go about to square your Devotions to certain ways of living, such as the Tongues of Libertines have Right to make sport with, and the truly Pious are obliged in Conscience to condemn.  
Of this number you will certainly be, if at your return from your long Contemplations made at the Feet of the Altar you bring home with you the Uneasiness of your Melancholy and Fantastical Humour. One of the chief Rules of eminent Sanctity is, That we must live in our Family after the manner that an Angel would live there; if this be too hard for you, yet live in it like a Reasonable Man, at least, live not there like a Wild Beast, giving your Domestics occasion to complain of you each hour of the day, and attribute to you, what was said of a great Devotee of old, That the more he Fasted and Prayed, the more insupportable he became.  
Call to mind, that there is no other true Saint in the World, but he that understands true Charity and true Civility to be one and the same Virtue.  
Beware, above all things, of what happens frequently in the Carriage of some Spiritual Persons, that you do not rank your Disobedience and Opiniatrety in the number of your Virtues and Duties, and that you do not fix your Aim upon Superstitious Ways and Courses.  
Repel with vigour all Follies seizing on the Imagination, such as are Illusions, Anxieties, and Disquiets, caused by the Dreams of Fancy: Suffer not any empty Fear, or Vapour raised from the Earth, to mingle with your Thoughts, where God would see only what is Divine.  
Fear Mortal Sin, and fly it more than you would do Death, but be not frighted with the Name and Show of Sin. The Devil, to fright poor fearful Woman, makes use of the most innocent and harmless things, and gives them often the Resemblance of Mortal Sins: fear them not, nor make the Wise laugh at your Deceit and Weakness, as you would do at a Child, who should be frighted at the sight of a Marble Serpent on a Fountain; for as there is nothing less venomous or dangerous than these Dragons and Monsters of Brass and Marble, made to adorn the Palaces of Princes, so there is nothing less Sin and Impurity than those Visions and Ghosts of Sin, with which the Devil uses to haunt the Imaginations of the chastest Virgins; they sigh, and grieve, and are ready to despair at them, believing they are damned: the Indevout seeing this, mock at it; let it have your Compassion, but imitate them not: raise your Courage high enough to slight these interior Goblins.  
Freedom, Tranquillity, Courage, and Wisdom are the Companions of true Devotion, and must enter along with it into your Soul: At least it is true what a Holy Father said excellently well; That to become devout, is to receive by the Benefit of Grace all that Vigour and those Good Qualities which Nature had denied us at our Birth. It would be a wonderful Misfortune to have the contrary befall you; and having been a Man of good Sense when you dealt in the Affairs of the World, you should now, after having seriously resolved to give yourself to God, begin the Exercises of a Good Life, by becoming uncivil, shy, dreaming, and fantastical.  
Where Grace is, there should not be wanting any one Beauty or Greatness that befits an Immortal Soul; and yet we see great Sinners, who show, in the Face of the World, to have Honour and Courage, whilst Persons of devotion make it none of their Duty to correct the Defects of their timorous Nature.  
The true Means to unite within us those Perfections I have named, and to accomplish a Spiritual and Christian Life with Honour and Glory, is to observe well what this Text of Solomon teaches, being one of the choicest things he has written, and to make it our principal care and business to converse daily with God, and practise a familiarity in his Presence; Generositatem illius glorificat Contubernium habens Dei.  
True it is, that God is your Lord and Master, and that the Rank you hold before him should put you in the humblest place, under his Feet, and even below a Nothing, if that were possible: but yet notwithstanding, when you come to love him, and that with Mary Magdalen, during the conversation of one Heart with another, you possess the high Privileges near him that belong to a Lover; that Glorious Quality gives you a Right to behold Him as your Equal, and to say boldly to Him, Dilectus meus mihi & ego illi: My Beloved is mine, and I am his.  
In the Church, and at the times of Sacrifice and Adoration, let your Submission and Respects show you to be a poor Shadow in his Sight; but in other places, and at times of liberty, accustom yourself to treat with him as you do with those that love you, and whom you love; He is near you, as they are; tell Him the same things you would say to them; acquaint Him with your Affairs and Designs, your Hopes and your Fears, and all that relates to you; get to have the most intimate familiarity with Him, and the most secret communication that is possible; say to Him whatsoever the Transports of Love shall draw from your Heart, and fear nothing so much as to be daunted in the presence of this Spouse, since nothing more displeases Him in a Holy Soul, than the trembling Fits of Distrust, and the Disquiets of a Scrupulous Conscience.  
True it is, that he is to be sovereignly respected; yet since it is His Will to love you, and that He will have you love him tenderly and divinely, all the Honour He expects from you, is to have you converse with Him, as you would do with one that loves you, and to tell him your Thoughts with all the Freedom of a true Affection and Confidence. Acquaint Him then with all the Passages that relate to you, altho' he knows them before. It is from yourself that He would hear them. As much God as he is, it concerns him to know this from you, because He loves you, and that whatsoever touches you, becomes the Business and the Interest of his Love.  
I maintain then, That it is this Conversation with God that glorifies Devotion in you, that makes the Force, the Beauty and Excellence of it appear, and compels even the proudest Sinners to honour and esteem it.  
The reason of it is, That at the time of this interior Converse God does speak to you, not by Dreams in the Night, as to Joseph, nor by a loud Voice, heard by many, as to St. Paul, but as to a beloved Spouse, by Words immediately issuing from his Heart, such as are form out of the Sighs of him that does pronounce them; that is to say, by Breathe and impressions altogether divine.  
In a word, God observes towards us, in these Conversations, the same Method we use to a Friend, when we have a Secret to impart in the presence of Company that should not hear it.  
Taking him apart, and putting our Mouth close to his Ear, we whisper to him so softly, and so near, that our Breath enters with the Words into his Ear, and that at the same time he hears us, he receives in the warmth and other impressions of our Breath. Ducam eam in Solitudinem & loquar ad Cor ejus: I will lead her into Solitude, and will speak to her Heart.  
Thus God deals when he would inform any Holy Soul how he should act on every occasion: He treats with her of all Matters necessary for her to know, and upon each communicates His Secret Thoughts, but does it so softly, and so truly, by the way of one Heart's entertaining another, that He is not heard but of herself. It is not only, says the Prophet, a Voice that speaks, but withal, Quasi Sibulus aurae tenuis, it is, as it were, a Divine Breath of Air, that enters, and spreads itself deliciously over the Person's Heart, and which, besides the Light and Instructions it affords, brings also the Force and Ardour needful for Execution.  
I say, it brings the Force, and other Celestial Qualities: for, as the Discourses of this Incomparable Lord and Master are properly but the Breathe of his Heart, and the Impressions of his Love, so they are also, properly speaking, but the Emanations of his Wisdom, Intelligence, and Goodness, which entering into us, at the times of this Glorious Union and Communication of Hearts, does pour into us, with his Orders, all the Vigour, Grace, and Sanctity that a God can bestow.  
These Breathe and Inspirations from the Holy Ghost, which, St. Bernard 
Inspiravit in faciem ejus spiraculum Vitae.  says, on the day Adam was form, being conveyed into a Statue of Dirt, made an Immortal Soul rise there, and a lively Image of the Diunity, which being spread over the Face of Moses, on Mount Sinai, transformed him into the brightness of an Angel, Ex Consortio sermonis Dei, which being poured into the Breasts of 
Insufflavit dicens Accipite Spiritum Sanctum.  the Apostles, made the Holy Ghost to enter into their Souls with the Power of forgiving Sins, and curing all Human Maladies. It will be these that during those precious Moment's you employ in the Bosom of your beloved Spouse, will quite drive out of your Heart all Weakness, Cowardice, Illusion, and Ignorance, and make such Perfections and Graces spring up in their room, as will cause you to be beloved of Men and Angels. Come into Company after this, you that have given the Worldlings occasion to contemn a Devout Life, and you will be sure to appear before them in such a Condition, and with those Qualities, as shall compel this blind World to open its Eyes, and confess, That a Devotion adorned with the Grace of Jesus Christ, embelishes our Nature, and that of all the Persons we love and admire, none deserve to be loved and admired like those that are truly devout. Generositatem illius Glorificat Contubernium habens Dei.  
Observe withal, since we are upon the Subject of a happy Devotion, that the Privilege I am speaking of, (whose Method is, to live familiarly with God) is so extraordinary, that it seldom meets with a Refusal of any thing you ask, either for yourself, or such as have a Share in your Prayers.  
I say no more than this of it, That it falls out with God as it doth with Kings. The only way to gain a Power in Courts (Experience teaches us) is to become familiar there, and obtain the Privilege of speaking our Minds with an entire Freedom.  
How often do we see there Persons of High Rank and Merit making the most respectful Addresses, and using the most moving Speeches, to gain their reasonable Requests, who yet come away without obtaining any thing; when at the same time a Sunamite, or a Hester, who has found the way to touch the Heart, and to become familiar, carries the Day, and obtains whatsoever she would have; nay, is courted to speak boldly, and name her Inclinations. Quid habes Ester & quae est petitio tua? What is it, my dear Hester, you desire? Etiamsi dimidiam partem regni mei petieris dabitur tibi.  
I deny not, but that humble and fervent Prayers, accompanied by Fasts, by Tears, and other Devotions, such as People use in Churches, are very good and excellent, questionless they are so, and many times very efficacious; but the Secrets of God's Wisdom, and the Reasons of his Refusals, we are no ways able to dive into.  
I say only, it would be an Excellent Means to make your Prayers become efficacious, if, whilst you enjoy the sweet of this tender and solitary Converse, resting in Spirit between the Arms of your Beloved, you should utter with Confidence your Heart, and sigh out your Wants upon his Breast: I say, that these Sighs would perhaps prevail, before the long Prayers of others, and their Studied Fervors.  
But take notice, that this is the State of a Soul that loves nothing but God alone: Delectate in Domino & dabit tibi petitiones Cordis tui: Let us not, says David, approach to God, as Courtiers to their Princes, in expectation of their Bounties. Look not for any thing when you go to God, besides the Happiness of being near him; let His Presence be your Hope, your Repose, your Life: when God shall look into your Heart, and find nothing loved there but Himself, it will suffice to make your Prayers prevail, if He but sees in the same Heart, or in your Memory, the Impression of those things which have been recommended to you.    

MAXIM VI.  Fons vitae, Eruditio Possidentis. Prov. xuj. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Learning is one of the Fountains of Life to the Man that does possess it.  
Ignorance and Death have a great Resemblance in many things: the Soul of a Man that knows nothing, is in his Body, as if it were lodged in a Tomb; all the Life he has, is but the Life of a Beast, and only a Shadow of Human Life. To be Ignorant, according to the Opinion of the Wise Man, is to be a sort of Creature that spends a great deal of Time in passing on from his Birth to his Death, without making a Step into Life: Perierint quasi non fuerinty & Nati quasi non Nati.   

REFLECTIONS.  
As Knowledge is one part of our Perfection, so it is also one part of our Felicity. Make yourself then a Knowing person, so far at least as you are obliged to be such, by the Laws of Nature, and of Religion, and by those of Decence and Honour. Of what Age soever you are at this present, and let your Rank be what it will in the World, it is necessary, if you will hold the Rank of a Man of Worth, that you be not ignorant either in Philosophy or in Christian Divinity.  
You may know enough of both without putting yourself to any great Trouble or Pains, and without running after those Professors, who make a Trade of teaching these Noble Sciences. I do not advise you to go and study under them, or to haunt teir Schools, but I advise you to learn, what you are to think of Eternity, and by what Means you may avoid a Misery of that duration.  
The Masters that are fittest to teach you these things, have expected you, for this long time, at least there is no need of your going far to seek them, you may find them wheresoever you are yourself, and near enough to you, to speak privately to your Heart; it is but entering within yourself, and you may hear what they will say. Here follow some Reflections that will help you to know these Masters, and to profit by their Discourses.  
Mind then, that you no sooner began to live, but that you were obliged, by the nature of your Birth, to begin to know three Truths; 1. That there is a God that gave you Life. 2. That there is a Nothing, from whence you came, and a Death, to which you are going. 3. That there is a Jesus Christ, who redeemed you, and must give you a Resurrection.  
At your coming into the World you have met with three Masters, or three Voices ordained to teach you these three Lessons: The Voice of Nature, the Voice of Death, and the Voice of the Gospel and Grace. These are not three Discourses, but three Subjects for your Meditation, that I present you with.  
In the first place, I say, That to make yourself perfectly knowing in the Morals, it will behoove you to become the Disciple and Scholar of Death, and to take Lessons from that Master.  
Death does not speak, but it has a Silence in which is summed up all the Doctrine of the Prophets, and Apostles, and that contains all those admirable Instructions they have left, to aid you in leading a Good Life, and to help you to solve well upon every occasion those Difficulties that shall be offered to you by your blinded Conscience. All the Counsels of the Holy Fathers are in the Mouth of Death; what makes the Wonder, is, that Death, without speaking a word, causes all those Counsels and Instructions to enter into your Heart, and does this in such a way, and with that Force and Energy, which those Holy Fathers could never arrive at. Death does this, says Solomon, every time she presents herself 
In ea finis Cunctorum admonetur hominum.  before your Eyes, and as often as she invites you to the House where she is, and shows you in the Face of a Dying Person the Sentence that Heaven has decreed against you, That you must die, and be to morrow in the same Condition as you now behold this sick expiring Creature. Testamentum hujus Mundi morte Morieris.  
Solomon means, that when Men die, certain pale Characters appear to be traced upon their Lips, which every one can read, and where they find these two words, Hodie mihi, Cras tibi. The Prophet calls this their Will or Testament, which Death writes for them, and makes their Heirs with those others that encompass their Bed, to see, and be Witnesses to it. All read it, and all understand it: You, that are the Great Ones of the World, have often read it, and you have learned from thence, says St. Gregory, that the Inheritance which every one of your Ancestors has left you at the Moment of his Death, has been the News, that you must die as he has done; and that you, and all the Riches, Honours and Greatness you now enjoy, must in a few days time return to what they have been heretofore, to Dust, to Ashes, and to Nothing. Pulvis es, & in pulverem Reverteris.  
Of all the Forefathers you have had since the beginning of the World, there has not been one amongst them, that has miss the Signing of this Testament, and the leaving you this Inheritance.  
Such a Testament, cries out Solomon, as a Young Man enriched by the Rapine and unjust deal of his Father, needs but read with attention, to become the holy and happy Heir of a Dives and damned Person.  
Read then, but observe that the great benefit of this Reading, and of this contemplation, does not consist in beholding what Death has shown you, but in remembering that you have seen it.  
When She has shown you, in the low bottom of a Sepulchre, whole Armies of Worms covering the Face you lately adored, and that She has made you confess, that this Rottenness was once your Idol; the few Syllables she would have you imprint in your Mind, which contain all her Instructions, are, Memento homo; Remember, Youngman, what you have seen in this Tomb, and what you have learned there.  
In truth, to the learning of your Morals perfectly, and how to live Wisely and Christianly, it will conduce but little, to look on dying and dead People: There is not that Person does not go to see his Relations and Friends upon their Deathbed, and who, at that time, does not think of the Affairs of another World, and propose to himself Designs of Conversion and Repentance: but then, by the next Morning we find all these Thoughts blotted out of our Minds, like Dreams, and we know nothing of what we saw, and what we designed Yesterday. Indevotion, Libertinism, and Vanity, have the same station in our Hearts as before, and we begin again to live like Sinners, that had not heard or known that any in the World had ever died.  
O ye Mortals, cries out Death, it is not only in the Church, whilst you are shedding Tears at the Funeral of your Brother, who died Yesterday suddenly, without one Word of Confession, after an Impenitence for several Years, that you are to study the Doctrine I teach, but it is by remembering this miserable Exit, Memento. Keep in your Mind the Thought of this Death, and cherish the Memory of it, whatsoever Change of Fortune may befall you, or in what part of the World soever you may be: carry the Remembrance about with you into all Companies, and converse with it interiorly: whilst others are thinking only of laughing and diverting themselves, be you attentive to mind what it will tell you, and to let its Doctrine enter into your Heart.  
Doubt not but it will enter; and be you never so ignorant at the present, within a short time you will have no more need of running after Casuists, to learn what are the obligations of a Christian Life, or to put Questions concerning the Duties of your Conscience; you will know every thing, and be able to answer all its Doubts yourself: nor will you then have the least Thought of going to the Learned Doctor's with such Disguise, as may make them pronounce you safe from your just Fears, or endeavour to use such Means, as they may counsel you to carry your Sins with you into another World. The Fear of Death first introduced Physicians, and the Forgetfulness of Death Casuists.  
In a word, during your Divertisements in the time of your Affairs, and in every occasion of your Life, be sure to keep what I have told you in your Eye: put your Questions to Death, and converse with her, she will make you more knowing in the Morals than all those Rigorous Teachers, who writ in their Books, and speak in their Sermons so many Rare Matters touching dying suddenly in an ill state, but who, being once out of the Pulpit, forget all they have said, and lead a Lawless Life in Disorder and Looseness. That would prove a fine Book of Morality for your Closet, which the Emperor Heradius kept in his, a Death's Head, with these three words on the Forehead, What I am now you will be to morrow. There is no Difficulty you can have in your Conscience, that this admirable Casuist will not answer in every Point.    

MAXIM VII.  Dedit illi Sapientiam Sanctorum, honestavit illum in laboribus. Sap. x. 

PARAPHRASE.  
God has conferred on the Wise Man the Science of the Saints, and has employed him gloriously in such occasions as have placed him by the help of that Divine Science in the Rank of Extraordinary Men.   

REFLECTIONS.  
I have said, That one part of your Happiness during this Mortal Life, is to be knowing; and that one part of the Knowledge proper for your Calling, is Divinity.  
Perhaps this may cause your wonder, but nevertheless it is a matter you have heard of long since, and have begun to practice and undertake many years ago: Have not the first Lessons you have been taught after your coming into the World, and the first Pains you have been put to in your Cradle, been to learn the Articles of the chief Mysteries of the Christian Faith?  
In so much, as that to help you to arrive at that Happy Condition I have been speaking of, all that I shall add to the Instructions which were given you in those days, is but thus much: O Christian, whosoever you are, that which came out of your Mouth at your Prayers, when you were two years old, say now the same from your Heart, and believe perfectly that which you say: for, as all the Lessons of Death are included in the word Memento, in the like manner are all those of the Gospel included in the word Crede, Believe.  
Do not imagine, that to become a great and true Divine in the School of Jesus Christ, it will be necessary for you to know the Truths of his Doctrine by the Experience of your Eyes, or the Speculation of your Wit, or by the Reasonings of those Masters who consecrate their Days to the penetrating into these impenetrable Mysteries.  
The most Able Masters know nothing certainly of this Supernatural Divinity, more than what they know by their Faith. And to the end that you may know as much of it as they do, the whole consists in acknowledging sincerely from the bottom of your Heart, and weighing in your Mind with devout Reflections, that which you learned hereof in the time of your most tender years, and that which the first Women came about you did believe for you, when they taught it you.  
At the times of your daily Devotions, do you venerate with an humble submission of your Thoughts, the Propositions which the Holy Scripture sets forth to you, of the Trinity of Persons, the Incarnation of the Word, the Resurrection of Mankind, etc. And from that instant, when at the prospect of these unspeakable Mysteries prostrating yourself before the Altar, (your Soul transported with Admiration and Love) you shall pronounce these words, Credo Domine adjuva incredulitatem meam: I believe, O Lord; but yet, O Sovereign Disposer of my Life, support you my Weakness and Ignorance with the assistance of your Grace. I say, from that Instant you shall become a greater Doctor in Divinity than all those learned and proud Professors, who speak like Angels touching the Trinity, but believe what they say of it less than you do.  
A firm Faith, with the Symbol of the Apostles imprinted in your Heart by the Finger of the Holy Ghost, raiseth you in a moment to that degree of Capacity, that the Angels would aim at, were they to live with us in this World below, and would they strive to please God, and be ranked in the number of his Elect. Their Principal Employment, in my opinion, would be the same that I invite you to, which is, to meditate on, and sign by continual Acts of an obedient and blind Love the first words of the Testament of Jesus Christ; In Principio erat Verbum, & Verbum Caro factum est.  
I say not this to blame the laudable and just Curiosity you may have to mind, when you are at Church, what is preached upon these Theological Mysteries, or what the Learned say of them in teir Assemblies, or during their private Discourses.  
On the contrary, I hold, be you of what Condition you will, That it must prove much to your Honour to understand them so well, as to be able to speak knowingly of them upon occasion: and I say further, that the more advantage you have over the Common Sort, by your Birth and Parts, the greater aptitude you have to comprehend these high Verities, and the more Prevailing way of communicating them to others, and of setting them forth in Company.  
It cannot be other than a very advantageous Sign in a Person of Quality, to find his Inclinations lead him to the contemplating the high Mysteries of our Religion, and the endeavouring to find out what lies hidden in the Parables of the Gospel, and the dark Enigmas of the Prophets: Certainly there must be something great and noble in that Soul, which is pleased with a Contemplation that makes the Delight of the Angels.  
The famous Saying of Tertullian, That the Soul of Man is naturally a Christian, relates particularly to great Souls: if there be any such, they are those that come into the World with a secret impression of Veneration towards the Person of our Saviour, and with a holy Ambition to raise themselves yet to a higher Perfection, by the knowledge of the greatness of his Theology, and of the greatness of his Benefits to Mankind.  
In Reality, we know that it is He alone that has ennobled our Nature, and that from the lowest station of the World, into which the Malice of the Serpent had cast us, even below the basest of Brutes, has infinitely raised us, not only above Beasts, and above the Devils, but above the Angels themselves, and has given us the Rank of Honour before all Creatures both of this and the other World.  
I say, infinitely above Beasts, in that, on the first day of our Fall, he did restore us to the use of Wisdom, Conscience, and Moral Goodness, with the other Privileges our Condition has above them, Privileges granted by Nature, and lost by Sin, which He has restored us by Grace, and purchased back for us with the price of the Blood of a God, the Mark of our Value ever since: O homo, Erige te, tanti Vales.  
I say, infinitely above the Devils, in that He has compelled them to adore our Nature in his Person, and to become for all Eternity the Worshippers of a Man-God, to become the Captives of other Men, and even of little Children; since we have known so many Infant-Martyrs to have conquyered them, by the Victorious Grace of that Invincible Redeemer: Apparuerunt Humiles mei, Filii Puellarum Compunxerunt eos.  
In fine, infinitely above the Angels, inasmuch as he has carried Human Nature up, where it sits in Triumph upon teir Throne, and has not given them in Heaven a Seraphim, or any other Spirit of the Prime Orders, but a Man to command them, and be eternally their Sovereign Lord; it being his Will besides, that other Men should enter into their Fellowship, and share with them in their Felicity.  
We know also His Will to be such, that Men composed of Flesh and Blood, born amongst Beasts upon the Earth, and subject, as they are, to Death and Rottenness: Men that have been dead and buried for many years, and become the Horror and Infection of the World, shall rise out of their Graves, and Mount up to Heaven in Triumph, crowned with the Splendour of Glory and Immortality, that they shall enter there with their Bodies, and that the Beauty of their Faces adorned with all Majesty, by his Redemption, will prove one of the great Ornaments of Paradise; and that, in fine, they will make so admirable an appearance there, as the Angels shall think themselves honoured to pass their happy Eternity with them.  
To know all this, and keep an Indifference, without a desire of knowing any further, how is it possible for any Man that has a sense and feeling in him?  
It would be a very hard Law, to tie you up so, as that you should have only Acts of Faith in reference to the Person of Christ, and not have the liberty of enquiring of his Interpreters, touching the Wonders of his Incarnation, and the secret ways of his Conduct, which he will have communicated to the Humble, and hid from the Reprobate.  
What is blamed in some Persons of Quality of both Sexes, and in others indiscreetly curious, is, to take upon them to be able to dispute in the favour of Heresies, and become Judges and Censures of the Church's Doctrine.  
What is most justly blamed besides, is the Rashness of some, who failing both in Wit and in their Endeavours to know and weigh any thing exactly, will nevertheless be so bold, as to talk confidently of all matters, to the scandal of the Angels, and those good People which happen to be in their company: These are a sort of Persons, who upon the first occasion offered them of venting their Opinions upon any point of the Gospel, mingle the Errors and Blasphemies of their Ignoranee and Vanity with the most Sacred Truths, and cause all this to enter together into the Minds of those simple People, that harken to them and believe them.  
Know all you can of the Mysteries of our Faith, let them be the Subject of your Reading, of your Meditation, and of your Study, if you think good: but as to matter of Speaking of them, there is one thing necessarily required, that you be wise and humble, and have a high Respect for your Religion. If it be thus with you, you have your Freedom for the rest; for whilst you are in this Condition, you will be sure never to speak or hold your Peace, but very fitly.  
Observe, that here are three different Lessons; that of Death, Memento, Remember; that of the Gospel, Believe, Qui Crediderit salvus erit; and lastly, that of Nature, Behold and look about you; Peto, Nate, ut in Coelum & ad terram Aspicias.  
This third Proposition will appear more clear from the words of Solomon, which follow, and yield more Light to it.    

MAXIM VIII.  Mundum tradidit disputationi eorum, ut non inveniat homo, opus quod operatus est Deus ab initio usque ad finem. 

PARAPHRASE.  
God has delivered up the World to the Disputes of the Learned, but never a one of them is able, by his Conjectures, to reach at that which he would not have known.   

REFLECTIONS.  
I have said, That the Voice of Nature is to be harkened to as a Teacher; and you will find by Experience, that you will learn the rest of your Philosophy sooner from her, than you can from the Schools, with all their old and new Methods. She does but show you the Heavens and the Earth, with the other Creatures, and by these means instructs you, that both you and they, with herself, are the Workmanship of an Infinite Power, teaching you to read in the Sun and the Stars the first words of God the Creator's Testament, In Principio Deus Creavit Coelum & teiram; In the Beginning God who was, created that which was not.  
Whatever your Quality may be, and the Excuses you may draw from your Pride, Idleness, or Multiplicity of Affairs, do not neglect the study of this Philosophy; there is not any thing more honourable than to understand it, and discourse handsomely of it; or any thing more easy than the learning of it: All that She calls upon you to do, is but to open your Eyes at your Idle Hours, and look upon the World; Peto, Nate, says she to you, ut in Coelum & ad terram aspicias & ad Omnia quoe in eyes sunt, & intelligas, quia ex Nihilo fecit illa Deus.  
O my Son, I ask but this one thing of you, that you will contemplate the Heavens and the Earth, and that you will let that Light enter into your Mind, which they will produce, and it will not fail to bring along with it Science, Devotion, and Humility.  
Open your Eyes then, O Christian, and contemplate; and whilst do you contemplate, be careful in three matters:  
The First, To see yourself with your own Eyes, or to learn by the Report of Credible Persons the Variety of Things which God has form in every Element, and in every part of the Universe.  
The Second, To consider with Wise Reflections what is Rare in the Quality and Property of each thing; what the Lands, Rivers, Fountains, Metals, Beasts, Plants, and the Productions of every Country yield, that is most singular and curious: in a word, whatever the Eye of Man sees here below, that is remarkable, to be careful to get a Knowledge of it, if you can possibly, and to lay it up as a Treasure in your Mind, making out of it an inexhaustible Spring of Natural Curiosities, such as may cause the Company that hears you talk, to say of you what was said of a great King of old, Impletus est quasi flumen Sapientia; That at times of Conversation there flowed out of his Lips Rivers of Science, and an Infinity of Admirable Things, which ravished the Hearers without ceasing.  
The Third, To observe in this Variety of Wonders the differing Marks that are shown of the Greatness and Beauty of God; and whilst you are observing, to let your Heart go after the sweet Attractives of his Grace, which are able to raise you up to him, and make you say with David, in Transports of Love and Admiration, O Lord, O God of gods, how admirable you are, how sublime and incomprehensible in your ways, how profound in your designs, and mighty in your actions; how magnificent you are, how amiable and adorable! Potentiam tuam, & Justitiam tuam usque in altissima: quoe foecisti magnalia: Deus quis similis tui?  
This is the Character of a true Philosophy, to terminate its Speculations by acts of Divine Love, and an increase of Sanctity.  
The Character of a false and corrupt Philosophy, is, to terminate its Inquiries by an increase of Presumption and Ignorance, and by making the Philosopher become prouder and blinder than he was before his Studies.  
Another Difference between these two so opposite Philosophies, is this; That which I invite you to learn, employs itself in contemplating and admiring what God shows us of his Works; the other busies itself in striving to see that which God will not have us see, but will have hidden from our Eyes.  
Is it not a strange thing? The Divine Wisdom has sealed up in darkness certain Secrets touching its Productions, not at all material to be known by us, and yet the Philosophers of this other School will undertake to come to the knowledge of them: God therefore permits them, for their punishment, to pursue the Undertaking, and they painfully consume their Lives in hunting through a dark Labyrinth, after that which they shall never find.  
They hunt and search indeed; all their Wits are employed in studying night and day to penetrate to the very Centre of Being's, to dive into the bottom of Substances, and to divine what those mysterious Secrets are, which the Creator has so carefully buried in an everlasting Night; then to speak their Thoughts of them, and after to maintain with Arguments all they have said; and placing the World, as it were, in the middle of them, to strive in their Academical Combats to carry away the Honour one from another, of having best guessed and known, in spite of God's Will, the Reasons of his Works, and the Mysteries of his Providence.  
It was in contemplation of these men, that Solomon pronounced the remarkable words of my Text, Mundum tradidit disputationi eorum; God, who ha● left it to the pleasure of Kings, to beset with their Armies of an Hundred thousand Men some Town, or Spot of fortified Ground, let's also these Assemblies of Doctors fall to work about a little Atom▪ and suffers them for these Three or Four thousand years, to be obstinately set upon, comprehending the devisibility which he has hidden in the Point of a Needle, or upon discovering what are the Springs from which the Sun receives his Motion, from whence the Sea derives its regular Agitation, or the Beasts their Quickness when they course and run; whether it be one vast Soul spread over the whole World, or whether it be a multitude of little indivisible Souls, which fly up and down blindly every where, and by their continual motions produce all Action, Noise, Light, Colours and Smells, and all manner of Figures that appear within the Universe, not having so much as the assistance of any Reason, Intelligence, Imagination, or Life, to further them in it. All this, cries out Solomon, like the Labours of the Ambitious, and the Cares and Disquiets of the Covetous, is but Vanity of Vanities: It is the Sickness and Distemper of their Minds, who wilfully bind themselves over to the sway of their Passions, and the dreams of their Pride, spending their days to no end, but to convince other men that they have dreamt aright.  
It was a fine Saying of St. Augustin, That the Pythagoras' and the Democritus' shut themselves up alone in their Closets, and there each sets himself on work to shape and frame his particular Opinion and Folly; after which is done, they meet at public Assemblies, and by their Disputes do as much as call one another Fools, in a learned way.  
Dispute with these, if you will, upon their Positions, or rather exercise your Wit with them to divert yourself, and ease your Mind of any weight.  
It is not to be denied, but that a Wise Man, without diminishing any thing of his Wisdom, may encounter a Friend in this way, so that he pretend to no more than to divert himself, by putting his Friend to his shifts to defend his Opinion, or by forcing him to quit an ill Game; yet should you prove good at this Sport, you must not therefore take yourself to be a great Philosopher; we shall never be that truly and perfectly, till such time as the Philosophy of the Angels above in Heaven be our Study here below, and the Philosophy of Men only our Entertainment and Pastime.    

MAXIM IX.  Curam habe De bono Nomine: hoc enim permunebit magis tibi, quam Mille thesauri pretiosi, & magni. Eccles. xli. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Amongst all those things which you possess, have a particular care of that which may last beyond Life, and be enjoyed by you after Death.  
This Death will transport your Riches into other Hands; Time will destroy your Buildings and consume your Works; nothing but the Merit of your good Actions will follow you to Heaven, and nothing will remain to you upon Earth but the Reputation you shall have acquired by the Wisdom of your Carriage, and the good Examples you have left behind you: Labour still with all your force to make yourself as rich this way as you can possibly, that when you come to die, you may end with the Consolation of having left that Honour in your Family, which you found in it when you came first into the World.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Curam habe de bono nomine, when you are well spoken of in Company, or amongst the generality of the People, and that you have got a Reputation in your Country, do not make much account of it, if it be owing to Fortune, and less still if you are beholden to the Contrivance and Partiality of your Friends for it, who go about, by their interested Praises and officious Lies, to make you pass for an Extraordinary Person: but if this befalls you through the Blessing of God, who disposes Men to observe the Merit of your Actions, and set a Value on you in their Hearts, cherish it with a particular Care, and be sensible, that it ought to be ranked amongst the most precious things that belong to you.  
Preserve it tenderly, for it is a Duty in you to do so, but make it not on any terms the Aim and End of your Designs and Hopes.  
You must consider, that this Reputation is as it were your Shadow, and that it is impossible for you to turn your Eyes and Thoughts that way, and fix them there for one moment, without turning yourself away from the true Sun, and losing his Sight. Nothing sure renders a Man more glorious, whilst he walks in the Paths of Innocence and Justice, than to be waited on by the People's Praises, and the Voice of Fame: but it would be a shameful thing for you, should you run after these Shadows, and make them the Motives of your doing your Duty, and the Causes of setting your Heart on any Employment.  
To speak clearly in one word, To have a care of your Reputation, is not to be bend upon seeking the Esteem and Praises of Men, but it is, to be bend on doing no other thing but what is pleasing to God, and truly deserves the Approbation and Esteem of All. An indifferent thing it should be to you, whether Men or Angels value your Actions, but you ought to take all the care in the World to order them so, that they may be worthy to be valued both in Heaven and Earth.  
And certainly you may observe, that amongst all the great Princes and Prelates in the World, the most illustrious still have been those, that in their Undertake never sought the Favour of People's Tongues, or the Applause of Nations, but those who have acted so well and gloriously in all they have done, as that this World, which they had no design to please, could not but covet to know all they did, and give it their admiration: The difference between them and the others is, that the Ambitious, by their heroic actions, seek the pleasure and satisfaction of being applauded and praised by Men; whereas these have the same Enjoyment, but look not out for it, their Aim is at something incomparably more attractive, and honourable, and more worthy to be rested in.  
Do like them, you who are a considerable Person, and bear some high Office in your Country, Curam habe de bono Nomine. You would be unworthy to carry the Name of a Gentleman, should you fail in having a great Care of your Honour; this Care consists not in getting Men to praise you, nor in quarrelling with those that will not honour you, or that do show a contempt of you; it consists in being offended at yourself, for having done contemptible things. The Subject of your Choler and your Trouble should not be to have the Disorders of your Life taken notice of and known, but that you have suffered them to fix upon you for so long a time, and that you still show no dislike to them: call not those faulty, who observe and talk of them, their Liberty in this does not depend on your Complaints or Threats: Heaven, your Conscience, and the People are three Witnesses against you, which you will never have the power to blind or silence: it is you that are the faulty Person; it is your own Heart, which by its scandalous Crimes blackens you, both in the Face and in your Reputation: when you appear in this condition before the Eyes of these three dreadful Spectators, and that you blush to be thus seen, accuse not those that see you, blame your own blind Ambition, if it has put you upon getting a prime Dignity in the Church, only to make you appear (spotted as you are) with the more Shame and Infamy. Since you stand upon the point of Greatness and Honour, be effectually honourable, and imitate those that are so.  
Imitate them, you that bear Offices, and sit upon your Tribunals, and consider, that to appear in those stations without Honour, nothing can be more infamous, nor nothing more ridiculous in such an one, than to go seek for Honour there: Never hunt after Reputation in these occasions, but do so well, as that you may find it in them: make these two Duties to agree.  
To effect this, looks like a Task for an Angel, and yet however it is the most important of your Affairs, and not the most difficult: all the Difficulties, as I have said, lies in this point, That whilst you exercise your Charge, you so well govern your Mind and Intentions, as to do nothing purposely to make you honoured and esteemed of Men, nor nothing but what will oblige them to honour you sincerely.  
Whensoever you shall refuse to commit an Injustice; when you shall choose rather to perish than to betray the Innocent, and give up their Right either to Favour or Power; do not say to yourself as Cato did, What will Rome think of my Baseness, if I do thus? say with Judas Macchabeus, Should I stoop to Fear, what will God say, who forbids me to scandalise my Country, and slain the Glory of our miraculous Victories by such an Infamy: Absit ut fugiamus abiis Moriamur in Virtute Nostra.  
Cato dying to get an everlasting Name in Rome, became the Martyr of the Commonwealth; become you in the like occasion the Martyr of the Living God, maintain your Honour with an invincible Force and Courage even to Death, but do it not for the sake of your Honour; do it because this is inseparably joined to the Glory of God, the Good of the Public, the Edification of Man, and the Interest of Religion.  
In a word the Point lies here, To do all that deserves to be liked by Man, but yet in pleasing Man, to do nothing but to the end of pleasing GOD.  
Whosoever you be then, that live in the face of the World, looked upon by Heaven and Earth, you that are addressed to by Crowds of Suitors, who come begging to your Feet with Tears to do them Justice, be sure you keep yourself free from endeavouring by counterfeit Looks and vain or False-appearances to win their Approbation and Esteem, so to be noted for a Man of Honour and Integrity. Think never further, than how to act in your Employment according to the Laws of Conscience, and to acquit yourself before God in all your Christian and Civil Duties; but do this with that winning Grace, as that the Benefit you may hope for in undertaking an Affair, comes short still of the Reputation, and that the Persons you deal with be fully satisfied with all your ways, by the handsome Marks you give of your Integrity.  
Make a Prosit to yourself, and with it a Gain of Love: God approves it. But whilst things prosper with you, fix your Mind still on Heaven. In every Action, at every good Success attending such a prudent and virtuous Carriage, aspire to God alone, and grace within your Heart this Motto, which Otho the Great had always before is Eyes; The Shadow of my Happiness is, to be pleasing to Man; but by True Happiness is, to be pleasing to GOD.  
It is this sort of Reputation, which truly makes a Man's Fortune, and that roots Honour in all those Families where we see it fixed.  
Be you but a simple Tradesman, or a poor Country Labourer, with that little Stock of Goods you have, let your Credit at least equalise it, without minding what Men say of you, either good or bad, live after such a way as may oblige your Neighbours to speak well of you, and be edified by your Examples; you will find that your proudest Gentlemen and Masters will themselves be edified by you, and that soon or late they will be forced to confess you are a Man of Honour, and much above them, if they want your Conscience, and the Command you have over your Passions. Gentility is often bought, but an Honourable Heart never, nor the Title of An Honest Man; this springs only from a Modesty of Countenance, a Sincerity of Words, and a Wise Judicious Carriage, accompanied with an Inviolable Truth: Curam habe de bono Nomine, hoc enim tibi permanebit, quam mille thesauri pretiosi & Magni.    

MAXIM X.  Coacervavi mihi argentum & aurum substantias Regum ac Provinciarum: omnia quae disideraverunt oculi mei, non Negavi iis: & Vidi in Omnibus Vanitatem & Afflictionem animi. Eccl. two. 

PARAPHRASE.  
From my younger years I have known what Nature teaches Man, That he comes not into the World, but to seek in it Felicity: I have sought for it, and done all in my power to find out where it lies.  
I have enquired after it amongst those Princes who have been counted the most happy; I have known their Minds, and considered all their Ways; I have seen their Examples, and they mine; we have followed one another's Steps; and in conclusion, I have observed, that they and I have run through the World, flying from Pain and Trouble, to seek a Good, which only Heaven can yield. After having banished out of my House and Territories Poverty, Sickness, and War, I have caused to be brought to me all that the Indies and Arabia would afford, and all that the Kings of Europe and Asia had, that was most precious: I have gathered together all the Riches and Delights of every Nation, hoping amongst them I should meet with Felicity, but it would never appear; and all I have done has served only to send it further off, and give me Affliction. Vidi in omnibus vanitatem & afflictionem animi.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It is but an ill Project, in seeking the Means to become happy, to endeavour to bring matters to such a pass, as that you should not suffer any Inconveniency, but be wholly left to the enjoyment of the Good Things you possess.  
Solomon undertook this, and brought it easily to pass, but he soon repent him; Omnia quae desideraverunt oculi mei non Negavi eyes: I have not denied myself, says he, what Contentments my Heart desired, without the Exception of any one. Is it not a strange thing? from the very moment that he wanted nothing, he began to be unhappy; those Delicacies he had so much desired became themselves his Bitterness and dislike.  
Imagine not, O Christian, that when you are arrived at what you have aspired to, for these many years, and that you have nothing left to wish, you will be without cause of Complaint, even than you will complain, and find it a great Evil to have no more to aim at or desire. Amongst the Wretched, none deserve Compassion so much as those whom Fortune has put into such a Condition, as they have nothing more to do, than to enjoy her past Favours, but are condemned to rest in one and the same flourishing way, without any opposition.  
It seems really, in all appearance, that the Quiet of our Mind, during this mortal Life, does not consist in the possessing of the good things expected and hoped for by us, but in the acquiring of them, and seeing them come into our Hands. They are no sooner ours, but that we begin to disrelish them, in case they do not beget a new Desire. After having toiled for a long time, and thirsted, to arrive at some degree of Honour, our whole Joy is in getting to it, and not in resting there. In two days after the Success of a Design, our Passions thrust us upon new Attempts, and we must obey them, otherwise that which is most insupportable to Man's Nature, falls upon us, to find ourselves tied up Night and Day to dull Rest, and wearied to death by the quiet and continual enjoyment of one and the same Happiness. This proves, that it is better to labour in giving a Repulse to some Evil which assaults us, than to possess a Good we have acquired in Idleness.  
So true it is what Seneca has said, That there is a certain something within us, which is an Enemy to our Repose, and will have us continually give ourselves new Troubles.  
The Question is, from whence this proceeds: To accuse Destiny of it, or the capriciousness of our light and sickle Imagination, is an Error; the true Reason of it, according to the Holy Fathers, is, That these seeming Lightnesses, and these mysteriour Disgusts of every Felicity belonging to this Life, spring from a secret instinct stamped on our Souls, together with the Image of the Creator. Tam bonam fecit Deus hominis Naturam, ut male sit ei, non esse cum Deo. Our Soul, says St. Augustin, is so excellent and divine, and framed in such a manner to possess God, that as soon as he is absent, and separated from it by Sin, this Soul cannot but suffer by a dismal Solitude, and at the same time be quite exhausted, languishing with an insatiate Thirst: But, what would she have? she knows not herself; all that she knows is, that she is cruelly disgusted and nauseated with all the Presents the World makes her, and that this Disgust comes from the violent and extreme desire she has to some one Good that is not offered her.  
To content and satisfy her, you go and hunt after change of Remedies, and find out new Employments for her, and all manner of Divertisements proper to ease the restless Disquiets of this melancholy and wearied Soul: She tastes, and seems at first to find some Relish and Solace in these Novelties; but the Fits of her Distemper soon return; she gins on the sudden to complain anew, and you are put to begin again to look out fresh ways to ease her: you look them out, you take pains, you heap up a World of Riches, and load your House with them, then show this great Abundance to your Soul, and you say to her what our Lord said, Behold and be at rest. Anima Mea, habes multa bona congregata in plurimos annos requiesce. See, my Soul, we have got into our Hands all that can be desired in the World; be content, and comfort yourself. This Soul, not be comforted, instead of opening a Heart to let in Joy and Hope, answers you only with Complaints; after having tasted and tried these new Remedies, these new Employments, and all your other precious Novelties, she thrusts them back with Scorn, and cries out to you, Cumeta Vanitas & afflictio spiritus: The Goods of the Earth, ye Riches and Honours, what are ye, but Vanity of Vanities, Affliction and Despair?  
Wonder not at this: an immortal Soul, that feels the Violence of its Desires, and finds, that besides the good things you show her, she cannot be without an infinity of others, infinitely more desirable: When she comes to know, that she must rest quiet, and content herself with what she sees in your Hands, and that there is nothing for her to pursue or hope for in Heaven, what must her Sufferings be? Can she take any other Resolution, than to abandon herself to Vexation and Sorrow, and to all the Miseries of a despairing Conscience?  
No certainly, this does not arise from a capricious Melancholy bred within you, but from a hidden Insight born with you, which takes its time, at your hours of leisure, to put your Soul continually in mind, that when she is separated from God, all her spiritual and Divine Substance is not other thing than an extreme Misery, and from that instant an infinite one, tho' not to be felt infinitely but in Hell.  
Behold the interior Peace that great Riches afford, but Wisdom tells us by the Pen of Solomon, we are to reckon otherwise of a Mediocrity.    

MAXIM XI.  Mendicitatem & Divitias ne dederis mihi. Prov. xxx. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Let me have neither Poverty or great Riches, says Solomon, this I apprehend, and that gives me Horror. The one leads Man to Atheism, and transforms him into a Devil; the other turns him into a Beast, and makes him the Mockery of Human kind: These are two Pits digged upon the Earth, to be the two great Descents into Hell: Fools run blindly to the one, and cast themselves into it by their Profusions; the Proud and Covetous haste to the other, and damn themselves by labouring Night and Day to get to it.  
Our true Quiet and Repose is found where Wisdom keeps, in the middle. Of all the Conditions of Human Life, the most secure, most honourable, and most easy, is, to live between Superfluity and Indigence, and the furthest off that it is possible from either Extreme.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It has been the Opinion of the World, from the beginning, and still continues so, That the Felicity of Man, during this Mortal Life, consists in his possessing of a great Abundance. Many seem, though at the hour of Death, to be of another mind, and speak of Riches like Persons that were become perfectly undeceived; but whatsoever they say, we see very few return from thence by the help of Remedies, who do not bring back with them their old Mistake.  
The Rule, That the Richer a Man is, the more he is Happy, sticks as fast in our Hearts as our Life does there. We must be dead, St. Augustine says, before we can learn to despise what we worship here below. The Contempt of Riches is a Change of Mind, which does not befall us, but at our going out of the World, and entrance into Eternity.  
Do you anticipate that Day, and learn to know those Truths at present, which ought to be no less known by Christians in the Church of Jesus Christ, than they are in Hell by the Damned and Devils.  
It is his Judgement, inspired by God, who was the Wisest amongst Men, That to become Happy in this World, we must ever keep ourselves in a certain middle way, wherein being not Rich or Poor, we may neither be in want of any thing, or have any thing superfluous: and wherein being freed from the Disquiets inseparably accompanying Want and Abundance, we may live peaceably here, by the Wisdom of our Carriage, and bring it so to pass, that after many years of a calm and devout life, we may go to enjoy an Eternity in another Life, infinitely more desirable.  
Order your Affairs to this end; Take the Pains to settle yourself in this happy way, of having neither more nor less than is sufficient for one of your Condition: strive to have enough to make you pass your days with Honour, and in Peace, and to aid you in performing the indispensible Duties of Justice and Christian Prudence towards yourself, and those that belong to you: have enough to satisfy this, but at the same time keep yourself from having enough to satisfy Ambition and your other Passions.  
The Passions are so many Furies within us, which are chained up and laid fast asleep by Virtue, but are soon awaked by the sound and rattling of Silver and Gold: They begin to cry out excessively, and to struggle with their Chains, at the first perceiving that we have in our Coffers the Means to humour them: the Money we tell over, and they see lodged in our Hands, sets them into a rage, and they are not to be quieted till we put ourselves out of the capacity of contenting them. Reduce yourself then low by your Alms, and let that glorious Incapacity be one of the Examples and Inheritances you leave to your Children. In a word, take this for one of your Maxims, Nec Mendicitatem, nec Devitias; Neither too much, nor not enough. These are two Evils that equally lead to the last of Miseries, and that coming upon us, do mark us with as fatal a Character as Man can bear in his Forehead.  
Do not stay to know the Miseries of a Prison by your own Experience; inform yourself well about it, whilst you have your Liberty. It is sufficient, one would think, to have Eyes to look into the Lives of the Poor and Rich, to teach us to avoid the ever being like to either of them.  
Consider with yourself, that should you come to be suddenly enriched, and be one of those that wears the Title of a great Lord, all the advantage you would get above those of a middle Fortune, would be, to have night and morning a great Hurry and Trouble round you, to have more Flatterers at your Table, more Vanity and Foolery in your Train, more Unnecessaries in your Furniture, more Noise in your House, and Disquiet in your Mind, more Sins in your Conscience, and more to repent of at your Death.  
Have never so many Thousands, you are not able to purchase a second Body; and whilst you have but one, what need have you of two Houses, of three Tables, and much less of threescore Hands to serve you?  
The greatness of this Trouble and Expense, wherein is it useful, but to others, to those that you feed? So that you will find it very well said of the Wise Man, That they who labour most for Riches, labour least for Themselves.  
To comprehend this the better, be you Judge of a Trial that happened heretofore between a wretched Beggar and a mighty Rich man; Pauper & dives obviaverunt sibi: These met one day, as it fell out, before a great Audience of People, and disputed about the Advantage of their two Conditions, which had never been argued.  
The Poor man maintained, that his deserved to be first preferred, and took upon him to bring the Rich man to confess and own so much himself: He asked him, which was the most easy Condition, the less shameful, and the freest from giving Pain and Trouble, whether to have the Care of getting Bread every day for one Person, or of getting it for threescore or an hundred Mouths.  
Whether to receive nothing, but by the way of Alms, or to possess nothing, but by the way of Rapine and Cozenage.  
Whether to be bitten by Vermin, or eaten up by a Swarm of Servants, who have no other Business about 
Qui me Comedunt non dormiunt. Job.  you, but to devour you at your Table, and are ready, when there is nothing left, to cast your Bones out to the Crows, and give up your Interest to the Rage and 
Servis obsideor, etc. Terent.  Covetousness of those Enemies that overpower you.  
Whether to be treated with the Name of Rogue, and accused of Laziness by a Citizen's gripple Wife, or to be treated with the Name of Oppresser and Robber, by a whole miserable Country, and be put to hear the Cries of the Blood and Tears of the People, which call to Heaven for Vengeance against you.  
In conclusion, Which is most to be feared, to be damned for the Sins of Beasts, or for the Sins of Devils? And of the two Atheists, which would be the less severely punished in Hell, he that did not know God in the time of his Afflictions, or he that knew him not in the height of his Riches and Prosperity?  
I cannot say how this Dispute was decided, but Solomon tells us, that both these Conditions are the most dangerous ones that belong to Human Life: And of two ways which lead to an Eternal Unhappiness, the fairer is to be no more valued than the other. One of his Interpreters says, That there is scarce any to be found in Hell, but such as have been either too poor or too rich.  
That voluntary Poverty which is embraced out of Devotion, and supported by Grace, is to be valued above all Treasures, and is certainly the most direct way to Heaven. In this Celestial Path we see a number of our Religious Walk, and many other holy and exemplary Persons, who follow nearest the Steps of Jesus Christ.  
Riches well and wisely governed, and employed with Justice and Christian Charity, is another way, that leads far into Sanctity, but a way very hard to hit.  
Those that can keep in it without wandering, are such of the Elect as are raised to do great Actions through so victorious and extraordinary a Grace from Jesus Christ.  
Out of what you have, tho' it should prove not to be overmuch, after having distributed as befits to your Children and Family, remember you have Friends that have served you at your need; remember the Poor, who come to you from God, and those Guardian Angels that ask a small Proportion of you for the Church; make them out little Shares, if it be not in your power to do more; it matters not, you may become thus as great a Saint as any of those Lords or Ladies, that bestow their Charities never so magnificently; these little Parcels, small as they are, will appear before God of equal Value to the most Considerable Alms; and these differing Liberalities will be rewarded alike in Heaven.    

MAXIM XII.  Magnificavi opera mea Aedificavi mihi domos: Supergressus sum Opibus Omnes qui ante me fuerunt. Eccl. two. 

PARAPHRASE.  
I have built Palaces, I have hoarded up Riches, and great have been the Goods in my possession, I have flourished in Honours and Dignities, have lived magnificently, and my Fortune has given Envy to the most Ambitious; but I have found at last that all this was only Affliction and Vanity, and that a solid Mind, enlightened with true Wisdom, can never find its Peace of Heart this way.   

REFLECTIONS.  
If it be your Destiny to be born of Rich Parents, and a high Family, and if Providence has disposed of you to live in Splendour and Greatness, live after that sort, but do not damn yourself by it.  
Many are the Lessons that Books afford to teach how to understand this Condition, and to govern yourself wisely in it; what I advise is, only to keep still in your Mind these words of Solomon, Vanitas Vanitatum; there are a great many ways of expounding them, the matter rests in hitting the right sense; if there be a Difficulty to find it out, there may be however some advantage made by the searching into it. Employ your Thoughts a while to this Intent, and withdraw from Company sometimes, to hearken to what your Heart will say to you on this Subject; it may inspire you perhaps with Considerations of more worth than all that you can find written: what I can say of it to you, is but a word or two, which I desire you will mind.  
Vanitas Vanitatum: I believe Solomon's Meaning is, That you are the Mistake and Vanity of the World, and the World your Mistake and Vanity: you deceive the World, and it cheats you: you are proud of its Submissions, its Respects, and the Pains it takes to do you Honour; the World glories in your favourable Looks, and in the hopes of the Protection you promise it.  
Both you and it have learned the fatal Secret, how to hinder each from knowing the others Treachery, till it be too late to remedy, and that you are just come to perishing: when you behold the World lying at your Feet, and that you observe its Adorations, with all the ceremonious Protestations it makes you to be constantly and ever yours: you imagine to meet with a Fidelity and Friendship outlasting Time: but within three or four days, if Fortune grows to be weary of you and your Courtships, and that she comes to send you the Decree of her Disgrace, you will see these Adorers fly over to your Enemies to adore them, and court the new Favourites of this Fickle Fortune to your Destruction.  
In the like manner the World, when it beholds you at the present, seated in your Palace, amidst a throng of Persons, who strive to have the honour to speak to you, and say something that is pleasing, and when it observes the glance only of a favourable Eye from you, makes the Joy of all those that are about you, it imagines to behold a Power able to support a Man's Family, and make his Posterity happy for ever, and nothing is thought too dear with which to merit and purchase your Favour, not even Goods or Life. How blind is this Man? in three months' time he finds you laid in a Tomb, and full of Shame, questions himself, if it were on that heap of Rottenness and Dust, that he had built his Hopes and Happiness, and if this were the Idol he adored, at the cost of so much Sacrifice.  
In short, since according to the Testimony of your own Conscience, you are made up of no other things but a company of false Promises, of false Oaths, false Civilities, false Friendships, and false Devotions; and that the World, on the other side, according to your daily Complaints of it, is nothing else but a Cheat, that deceives you. Is it not true, that according to the Dictates of the Holy Ghost, the right Title of this World is the Cheat of Cheats, the Traitor of Traitors, the Seducer above all Hypocrites, the Lie, the Error, and the Vanity of Vanities, to those that are the wrong way wise: Vanitas Vanitatum & afflictio Spiritus.  
Whosoever you are that have Riches by you, and have, like the Palaces and Houses of Great Persons, your glorious Apartments adorned with precious Movables, which you have not a handsome Liberty to part with; consider them with such Thoughts as become a clear discerning and noble Soul: act after such a way, as that God, who sees your Furniture and Riches, may not see any thing in you, when you have your Eyes and Mind upon them, that fastens you to the love of Creatures, but that which ties you faster still to him, and engages you to own, that he ought to be eternally and infinitely loved; Tibi dixit Cor meum exquisivit te facies mea: You know, O Divine Lord of my Life, that these Curiosities and costly Adornments are here only out of an Obedience to your Will; the World gives them the Name of Necessaries and Decencies; the Saints call them Vanities and Hindrances; I call them at this present Shadows of your Greatness, and Presents from your Bounty.  
In fine, at the sight of these Ornaments which appear in your Chamber, be careful to make these two following Reflections: the First, That you behold the Gate which is to let you into your Tomb.  
That it is in this very Bed that is so richly embroidered Death will come to take you, and carry you into another Bed, where the crawling of Worms upon your Body will make a very different sort of Works about you.  
The other, That out of your Tomb you will pass into a Paradise, of which all that you possess here the most precious is but a poor and dark Resemblance.  
It is a very sweet thing to aspire to Heaven from the lowness of Poverty, because we are sure that is the nearest way thither; but it is no less sweet to aspire to it from the height of Prosperity and Riches, if the Goodness of God makes you find, that amongst so many Dangers in which most of the Reprobate have perished, he preserves you in Holiness by his unmeasurable Grace; such as is a certain Token of the Perseverance of his Protection, and of the Eternity of his Love.  
Think, that you see what a holy Spouse saw heretofore, that upon all the Presents God makes you, and all the Goods which come into your House, is written, He that sends you all this, expects you in Heaven: Surge, propera amica mea. Yea are thought of in Paradise, make haste, and come away to him that loves you: Quicken the time by your Long and your Tears.  
This multitude of good things must needs forward you besides, in the acknowledging your Obligations to the Divine Providence; when you see a poor wretch lying in the Straw, full of Ulcers and Stench, dying with Cold and Hunger, what do you see but a Glass representing to you that, which you would or might have been yourself, had not God had a particular Favour for you.    

MAXIM XIII.  Vidi Servos in equis, & Principes ambulantes Super terram, quasi servos. Eccles. x. 

PARAPHRASE.  
I have seen in the Streets of Jerusalem Servants richly clad, and mounted upon Horses of a high value, after whom Princes have followed on foot, like their Slaves, whilst the People, who lately worshipped them, looked upon them now only with Scorn.   

REFLECTIONS.  
When you see Persons of mean birth, without Wit or Merit, raised to a degree, to which it was your Right to pretend, be not angry with Heaven, nor do you accuse Providence: bear in your Mind, that nothing can befit the greatness of your Heart so much, as to have the Power and the Honour to suppress those Motions in you, which Anger and Envy usually beget on such occasions.  
I own, that these are smarting Strokes, and so much the worse, in that they commonly happen contrary to expectation: but what appears the most bitter in them, is your being forced to pay an Obedience to these People, who by Right aught to lie at your Feet, and to whom the very Beasts, had they Reason, would be ashamed to subject themselves.  
All this I know very well, and yet I maintain you are in the wrong, if you make this your Complaint. These Disorders have lasted for this Six thousand years; Why do you wonder at them? These are the false Steps of blind Chance, let us endure them quietly, and without murmuring: Greater Persons than we are, have endured them in other Ages, and do still at the present; and if the Fellowship of the Miserable be a Consolation to those that are so, there is not a Misfortune in the World, that can afford more Comforters than this.  
How often in a day do we see in the Streets of Paris, what Solomon saw in those of Jerusalem, Servos in equis, & principes super terrum? How often do we see on the Backs of stately Horses, or seated in splendid Coaches, certain Creatures, whose Due it would be rather to carry or draw those Persons of Honour, they meet in their way walking on foot? How many are there amongst the Supplicants, who come before the Courts of Justice to beg Redress, that would deserve to sit in the place of those Robes they worship? In the Temples of our Religion, how many learned and holy Priests do give the Incense to some ignorant and faulty Churchman, seated under a State? How many great men in every station are left to shift in the dark, without Employment, Credit, or Reputation?  
You may perhaps be one of these, whom cross Fate will not suffer to be minded, or so much as to be taken notice of to live: What does it concern you, though if you be known in Heaven, where more honourable matters are designed you, than all that your Desires have ever aimed at without Success?  
In such Occasions as these, never go to make Complaints amongst your Friends, but go and apply yourself to God, and communicate every thing to this Adorable Comforter; He will teach you to understand, that you are not lessened by the exaltation of those Men, but would be most shamefully debased by yourself, in suffering the Disquiets and Vexations of Envy to enter into your Heart; for these interior Pains would be your Confession, that their Prosperity outweighed your Virtue, and that they were happier in the Esteem of Fools that sought to them, than you are in your Approach to God, who comforts you, and knows your Merit. Have a care, at the time of this sweet and glorious Commerce, you show not any Belief, that what is bestowed on unworthy Persons and Sinners can deserve to be ambitioned by a Man of True Honour.  
Learn to understand, that this is a matter fit for your derision, than to become your Affliction and Trouble: Think what passes in China, when their Pagan Priests go to a Carver's Shop to choose an Idol.  
If they meet with a Majestic Statue, and so curious a Figure as may deserve to be put in the Rank of one of their gods, they contemn it, and leave it there; but if they find one that is ill cut, and is ridiculous, deformed, and monstrous, they give any Money for such a one, and set it up in their Temples for a Divinity. See if this be not the same that the World does, and then consider whether the Contempt of such blind Worshippers be worth your trouble.  
In short, when you perceive the first assault of Sadness on such occasions, go and apply yourself to Wisdom itself, and strive to do it in such a manner, as that you may deserve to be both informed and comforted by it.  
It will tell you, that whilst Sinners grow in Power and Wealth, you lose not any jot of that degree, which your noble Mind and just Actions give you above them, in spite of all their Advantages; it will tell you, that the Stars, which seem to be under men's Feet in the Daytime are in that station infinitely higher placed than Men, being they are nearer Heaven, and that they are far superior to all that is great and beautiful in the World, since at the time of their lowness they remain still fixed to their Firmament.  
You will be told further, That it hurts not Gold to lie hidden in the Mine, whilst Vanes of Brass are on the tops of Palaces: That Gold remaining in the lowest Caverns of the Earth fails not to be the King of Metals: That a Holy and Knowing Man, hid in a Cave, and left within a Desert, ceases not to be Lord over these poor, proud, and contemptible Spirits, that are worshipped in a Country, through Faction and Hypocrisy.    

MAXIM XIV.  Vnus quisque in arte sua, Sapiens est. Eccles. xxxviii. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Every Man is wise when he undertakes that Calling which Providence and Nature have pleased to assign him.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Have you a mind to be a Happy and a Great Man? Be then, when you deliberate about the Condition you are to settle in, clear sighted enough, if it be possible to find out that, which is most proper for you, and suits best with your Genius.  
Be sure you choose well: mind and look deep into yourself; penetrate into that which is most singular in your Person; examine your inward Motions, your Inclinations, the most secret Intimations of your Heart: strive to know which way your Instinct would guide you, and to what Heaven and Nature calls you. In a word, understand well what you are, and let not your Talon of a Man born for great Actions, be buried under the quality of a Tradesman or Merchant, a thing which happens too often amongst People of all Nations. There is not a Country in which Men of great value have not been suffered to live and die, without any notice being taken of their Worth, and without so much as their own knowing any thing of it, because they have been put to those Professions, where their Merit and Genius could not be shown.  
The loss of great Men happens in all parts; and that which appears the worst in it, is, that no Person is concerned at it, because they do not know that they have lost, or ever had such.  
Observe, that God is not only the Instituter and Inventor, but also the Distributer of our Employments and Professions; at least, it is his Providence takes care to choose out, in every Country, Persons that are capable to perform them: His Choice is effected, by conferring from their Birth, such parts upon them, as are proper to make them succeed, and become excellent in their ways. Observe further, that there is not a Man amongst us, who can do Service and Honour to the Commonwealth in any great measure, but such a one as Chance, or the Judicious Choice of Parents has fixed in those Employments, for which the Divine Wisdom had marked him out.  
It is not to be doubted, but that there is in every City, and in all other parts of the World, numberless Talents and eminent Gifts bestowed by Nature on many young Men, which destiny them to become one day great Captains, Prelates, Magistrates, Doctors, Architects, or Painters, every one fit to become admirable in his way, and to purchase Honour to his Country.  
But as it falls out unluckily, either for want of opportunity or by the folly of young People, or the blindness of those that should be the Guides of Youth, every one pitches upon a Condition that does not belong to him. He takes a Sword into his Hand, who was born to be a Painter; the other, who was made to be an Architect, following his Father's Steps, turns Merchant; a third becomes a Prelate, who would have made a great General in the Field. It falls out also in Countries where Providence had moulded in its Hands, and fitted many Men with such excellent Qualities, as would promise high things, that there appears nothing so rare to be seen as a Man of Parts, or a Masterpiece of Knowledge amongst them. The greatest part of our Palaces and curious Closets are made rich only by the Works of Antiquity; the little that remains to be admired in these times, are but the Leave of our Ancestors, and they seem to be fallen into our Hands only to reproach us with the Sterility and Poverty of our Age.  
There are Great Men at this present, but the Greatness of many of them does not appear: There are such Presents from Heaven, and such precious Plants, but as Misfortune would have it, they have sprung up in the Woods, and have been left to grow wild under Oaks, and amongst the Shrubs, so that they can bear only harsh and bitter Fruit. Our Age is not to be accused of Barrenness for this, nor the Ages of the Augustus' and the Alexander's to be preferred before it: what Shame there is in this Point, is to be attributed top the Negligence or Blindness of such as ought to have discovered them.  
But some will ask me, where there is an Achilles, a Virgil, a Cicero, a Cato, an Aristotle, a Raphael, a Michael Angelo in our days; my Answer is, That these Architects, these Orators, these Poets, Philosophers, Heroes, and all these new Wonders of the World that you ask for, are at the present where were heretofore the great Princes and Popes, Martianus, Justin, Agathocles, Benedict XI, Sixtus V, before they were raised to the Throne; they are in our Shops, or else in our Villages, poor Shepherds, keeping of Sheep, but we know them not, nor do they know themselves.  
It looks as if only Chance could discover and find out these Rareties; yet Man's Industry, heightened with a Zeal for the Public Good, would certainly go a great way in it: Would Statesmen apply themselves to find out the means, that none of these Men of great Parts, provided by Nature for us, should be lost there, would, without question, be made no little discovery, of them: and, What could prove a greater Service to the Commonwealth?  
The way was known heretofore to find out the most valiant and famed Soldier of the old times, when he was clothed like a Girl, and that he knew not himself to be other than such, but thought to live ever as a Woman. The ways were found to discover, under the Habits of poor Shepherds, the famous Paris, the Grand Cyrus, and the most admirable King of Judea; had they lived still in that way, what would they have been? We admire them now, after Two or Three thousands years are passed, because they were empolyed in their Calling, and that they reigned; if every one should be put to do what is truly his Vocation, how happy would the World be, and how many Excellent Men, and what Master pieces of Art would there appear in it!  
In conclusion, Vnusquisque in arte sua, sapiens est: No Man will become sufficient and able, but in the Profession that belongs to him. When Agathocles in his young days followed his Father's Trade of making Earthen Pots, he was a mere Rogue, good for nothing, an insupportable Brute, able to ruin his Father by his want of Skill in that Calling, and want of Inclination to it. Agathocles was born to reign; a strange Change! no sooner had Fortune raised him to the Throne, but that he proved one of the greatest and the wisest Kings that ever ruled in Sicily.  
Another King, ill versed in the Art of Reigning, whose Grandfather had been a Shoemaker, passing by the Shop of one of that Trade, where a young Man of Birth and Wit was forced to work for a Livelihood, and perceiving that he did not handle his Tools well, did laugh at him, and said he would undo his Master with the spoil of Leather; It is very true, said the young Gentleman Shoemaker, if every one were at his right Trade, I shoult not be the loss of Leather, nor you the loss of Cities, and the ruin of your Country.  
I own, That Nature does commonly produce great and noble Souls, endowed with Excelling Qualities, in Persons of High birth, but she does not always tie herself to this. On the other side there rarely appears in Persons of Quality any great Talon for the making them eminent in the Arts: all that I can assure, is, That the Man who follows his true Calling never fails to be wise; and that one of the choice Say of Solomon is, Vnusquisque in arte sua, Sapiens est.    

MAXIM XV.  Multi Amici sint tibi, & Consiliarius sit tibi unus de Mille. Eccles. vi. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Few Children, fewer Servants, and an abundance of Friends, make the Golden Number, containing what renders a Family chief happy.  
There are Diseases in the Body, which shorten its Mortal Life; there are such in the Soul, as make its Immortality unhappy: the Cure for both is, a true and constant Friend, but to get him you must fear God.   

REFLECTIONS.  
The enjoyment of a number of Friends is one of our Felicities, and aught to be placed in the first Rank of them: the Wise fix their Hearts on this Blessing, and cherish it equally with their Lives. Without Friendship even our Immortal Life would be but a Shadow of Living, or but a beginning of a Death, that would never come to an end: Amicus fidelis medicamentum vitae, & immortalitatis; A faithful Friend is a Medicine of Life and Immortality, says Solomon.  
Have Friends, find them out, but do not purchase them; a bought Friend is commonly one only in outward show.  
The way to get Friends, is, not to make them continual visits, and seek to them with importunity; do not you run after them; stay for them. The same may be said of Friendship, which I have said before of Honour and Reputation; These are Shadows, not to be stopped by a Man's pursuit and endeavours to seize on them.  
The Skill lies in attracting them; carry yourself in such sort at your times of Conversation, that your Soul may discover many Excellencies in it, fit to please Almighty God, but not the least Vanity, or Care to be pleasing to Man.  
The sole Counsel that Wisdom gives you in this occasion, is to live in your own House and every where else, like a Man of Honour and Conscience, and to edify Company by your way of conversing with them; a Way that may show you all commendable, and fill the Hearts of those that know you, with Desire to merit your Friendship. Look up to Heaven, seek after God, and aim in your Desires to please him: True Friends will soon come and seek after you; and they will teach you to know, that Virtue, which links together the Hearts of worthy Men, is a Chain Destiny cannot break, nor Time, nor Death, no, nor Eternity.  
Do a I tell you; love, and make yourself fit to be beloved: have the fewest Flatterers, and the most Friends that you can possibly; I say, the most: your Glory and Advantage in this Point lies not in engaging by your Civilities and Presents two or three Persons to love you: there is not a Thief, or any Wicked Man, that has not two or three Friends of this nature. It is by the great numbers of those that love and esteem us, that we are to be distinguished from the Base sort.  
True it is, to have a great many Confidents is dangerous: Consiliarius it tibi unus, de mille; Have but one, says Solomon, to have two goes far. But as for true Friends, their number cannot be too great, nor scarce sufficient. There is not a Man of Worth, that does not merit and desire to have more than he has. Aim to arrive at that degree to which Joseph's Virtue carried him; this lovely Person was in the centre of the Court, amongst Princes, Statesmen, Philosophers, and the Prime Men of the World, the same he was in Prison, amongst Thiefs and Murderers; he was every where the Beloved of all that saw him. Act so well by the Perfection of your Wit and Nature, and show a Heart so obliging and magnanimous, as that of all those that know you, although many be not trusted with your Secrets, yet none may want an Inclination to serve you, but count themselves happy to meet with the occasion.  
You must not think such Persons unnecessary to you, because you abound in Wealth, or that they therefore may be spared: deceive not yourselves, ye great ones of the World; the higher and more powerful you are, the more need have you of such Seconds to support your Power, and support your Spirit, which must droop and sink when it is left alone. It is true, according to Plato's Opinion, that our Soul is immortal independently of other Souls, but not impassable nor invulnerable.  
Man's Soul, though divine, and come from Heaven, finds itself entangled in strange occasions, during the days of its mortal life; a Traveller lost in the Night in a Desert, without a Guide; a Prisoner in the Dungeon, without Comforter, Credit, or Counsel; a Sick-man in the Straw, without Physician; a Dying one on the Ground, without Priest or Sacrament; a dead Corpse on the Dunghill, abandoned, unburied, and deprived of the Due of being covered with a little Earth, and of the Tribute of a few Tears.  
Illamentatus atque insepultus quasi Cadaver putridum. All this is the Image of out Spirit, when it is left to itself alone; so that it may say with Job, Strangers persecute me, Servants fly from me, my Brothers know me not, and I can see no Friend that I have left, the Best looks on me with horrow. Et quem maxime diligebam, aversatus est à me.  
In a word, it concerns you to make yourself be beloved; the Helps you may expect from those that love you, are little less in number than the days you have to live: Of these days, says the Wiseman, some will be painful, and some will be days of rest: Some will be days of Fears, of Dangers, Misfortunes, and Despairs, others will bring Hope, Prosperity, and Success; but all these days, without distinction, will be days of Affliction, if you be left alone; whereas if you enjoy your Friends, they will be days of Happiness and Comfort.  
What had happened to our Forefathers, and happens yet every day, will befall you. At times of Adversity we feel not half our Pain, when others share in the sense of it, and are afflicted with us: at times of Prosperity our Joy is never perfect, until it be communicated, and that we see it conveyed into the Looks and Hearts of those that love us. It is even more satisfying to noble Minds, to weep in a time of mourning, whilst Friends mingle their Tears with ours, than to rejoice at a happy Success, when we have no body to impart it to, that can be touched with the same sense, and be unfeignedly pleased with what we tell them.  
Value those Persons infinitely, who feel your Sorrows and your Joys, who interest themselves, as much as you do in all your Affairs, and in all your Dangers; value them, for the World affords not any thing so rare; common it is enough to have Friends, each man has a quantity of them, but for what are they good? will they not prove, in the day of Battle, a company of Deserters and Fugitives, and be like a flock of Pigeons? At the least noise of Affliction coming upon you, where is that faithful and inseparable one, that will stick fast by you? where is the Eagle that dreads no Thunder?  
In such Conjunctures a Man may be said, to forsake even himself; you are a great and an able Man, you have much insight into the Affairs and Dangers of the State, and into those of your Neighbours, yet are you blind in Matters that touch yourself: no sooner are you left alone in what nearly concerns you, and that you have no person to consult with, except yourself, but your Understanding is quite at a loss, all your Reasonings prove Errors and Mistakes, and like a sick Physician, what you do for your Cure helps you only to perish the sooner. In a word, Multi Amici sint tibi, & consiliarius sit tibi, unus de mille: Have a thousand Friends, says the Wiseman, and out of them one Confident.    

MAXIM XVI.  Facta sum Coram eo, quasi pacem reperiens. Cant. viij. 

PARAPHRASE.  
I have met with Peace, when I was brought to contemplate my Spouse, in the condition he was in on Mount Calvary, bathed in his Blood, and in the condition he now is, lodged in the Bosom of God his Father, whilst he produces a Love as ancient as himself, and no less lasting.  
By the one I know, that he loves me infinitely; by the other, that he will ever love me, and that I have reason to begin to enjoy an inviolable Peace in this low World, since I expect to enjoy one in Heaven above, that shall last as long as God's Eternity.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Although my Conscience gives me no great Reproaches, say you, I have not yet that Peace you speak of; my Fears are in the same measure they were before, when I lived in disorder; all my Devotions, Austerities, and Alms change not the Decree of God Almighty's Justice, nor the Purposes of his Providence: How can I tell, but that I am one in the number of the Reprobate? It would be requisite, to make me enjoy a perfect Quiet, you could bring me the News, That my Name is written in the Book of Life, and an Eternal Place marked out for me, amongst the Blessed. In a word, Shall I go to Heaven? God knows this already, I would fain know it too; I wish some one might tell it me certainly, by the appointment of Him, whose Mercy and Justice have written all these Truths in his Mind before the Creation of the World.  
The Answer I can give you to this, is only the same that the great St. Gregory gave to a Lady very eminent in quality and devotion: this Lady, disquieted with Care, that ordinarily befalls Holy Souls, writ to that illustrious Prelate, who was her Director, and desired to know of him, Whether her Sins were forgiven her, and whether she might be at quiet touching her Salvation.  
What St. Gregory answered her with great Respect and Sincerity, was this; Quod vero Duicedo- tua suis in Epistolis subjunxit, se mihi importuam fore, etc. You threaten me, Madam, said he, that you will never leave writing to me, till such time as God shall have revealed to me, that you Sins are pardoned, and that the Divine Mercy has pronounced the Decree of your Predestination: the Trouble you should give yourself in writing to this end, would prove altogether ineffectual: to prevent it, and give you Comfort, I am ready to send you a present Answer. There are two Truths relating to your Question, of which I can give you my assurance▪ they are these; the first, That I am too great a Sinner to be one of those to whom God lays open the Books of his Eternal Science, or to whom he sends his Angels and Prophets with Orders to declare the Secrets of his Providence. The second, That the Account which you would have of the Certainty of your Salvation, must conduce more to your Harm than to your Comfort. Perpende, quaeso ducissima filia: Consider, I pray, my dear Daughter, that Security is the Mother of Negligence, and that you run the danger of having your Fervour abate, and to grow cold in the Exercises of a Devout Life, when you become too sure of your Recompense: Mater è negligentiae solet esse securitas.  
St. Gregory, you will tell me, said very well; but that desirable Favour I would pretend to, say you, if I durst, were to have God, at the same time he lets me know I am marked out for Paradise, bestow the Gift upon me out of his Goodness, that I should never abuse this Knowledge.  
This would be an extraordinary Favour, say you, but not without Example. It was granted to Abraham, as I have read, to whom God formally declared, That he was in the first Rank of the Elect: Abraham, said he to him, I know thee, because thou dost belong to me, and that thou shalt everlastingly belong to me. Something to this effect he said also to Isaac, to Jacob, to Moses upon the Mountain, and to the Prophet Jeremiah in his Mother's Womb; that happy Infant knew he was elected before he was born; all the Apostles besides knew certainly, that they were of this number: Rejoice ye, said our Saviour to them, for your names are written in Heaven. Our Blessed Lady, St. Marry Magdalen, St. John the Evangelist, St. Paul, and many others in times following, have learned, from his own Mouth, or by the means of his Angels, that they were expected in Heaven, and that their Crowns were there ready prepared for them. St. Theresia, after having seen the place was destined for her in Hell, had she not been drawn out of the World by the most powerful Grace of the Holy Ghost, had the Comfort and Happiness to see the place she was to possess in Paradise. What a Joy, what a Blessing is this! and which way, say you further, can a Man be at a moment's quiet in the time of this Mortal Life, unless we could know from God, by some miraculous means, that he, to whom we have consecrated ourselves, and who possesses us now, as the Purchase of his Blood, and the Inheritance of his Love, will not suffer any Power of the World, or Hell, to ravish us out of his Hands, to our Eternal Misery.  
You are in a Mistake, O Christian, we may receive this Heavenly Comfort and Joy without the help of Revelation or any miraculous Apparition: it is not at all requisite, that God should speak or appear to you, it will be sufficient if you can love him as the Saints have done before you: This Love will produce an interior Voice within you, or a supernatural Instinct: St. Paul calls it a Testimony of the Holy Ghost imprinted on our Hearts; St. Augustin, a Ray of the Glory of Paradise, which breaks forth in elected Souls, during the height and transports of their Fervour. Give it what name you please, I say, it is a Divine Help, which disperses and drives away all the black Clouds, all the Fears and monstrous Disquiets of your Imagination, and like the dawning of a bright day, brings a Serenity, and begets in you a Certitude of your Salvation, independent of any Revelation or Prophecy.  
True it is, that you will not say formally what the Heretics do, and what cannot be said without the highest Pride and Blasphemy; My Name, I am certain, is written and set down amongst the names of the Saints. But you may say that which true Love made St. Paul, and other blessed Persons, say, who loved in perfection, My Certainty is, that neither Death nor Life, Poverty nor Riches, nor the Torments and Cruelties of Tyrants, the Promises and Flatteries of the World, nor, in fine, all the force of Hell, shall ever separate me from the Charity of Jesus Christ: Certus sum; I am certain of it, and am not more assured that I am alive at this present, than I am assured, by the help of Grace, to continue faithful to my God, as long as ever my Heart can breathe. Donec superest halitus in me, & Spiritus Dei in Naribus meis.  
It is a most horrible and sinful Presumption, which makes the proudly-conceited of their Piety say, I know certainly, that God has been pleased to write me down in the number of his Elect, and that I cannot fail to go to Heaven. But it is a holy love that speaks when you say, I will love my God even to Death; Death, Time, nor Eternity shall not part me from him: Etiam si me occiderit, Sperabo in eum▪  
What Pride utters, in a most horrid Boldness and Blasphemy, since it undertakes to tell that which lies the most hidden in the Breast of God. To be able to say, without the help of Revelation, whose Names He has written secretly and eternally in his Heart by a gratuite Election, is to be no less than God. The Saying of Love is a holy Truth, and an humble Adoration of the Mercy and Grace of Jesus Christ, inasmuch as this speaks only of the Vow you have made to love God, and of the perpetual and irrevocable Resolutions and Decrees of Holiness, which yourself has written within your Conscience.  
Look altogether upon these Vows which your Love has created, and do not amuse yourself in reasoning upon Circumstances, as those do who first begin to love, and who, by making comparisons and scrupulous Reflections, entertain such Disquiets as drive them into a dark Labyrinth, out of which they can find no issue.  
When you are arrived at the degree of a fervent Love, you will be far from examining what the Success of that Love may be, and from harkening to the Fears and Anxieties of your blind and timorous Fancy.  
Being in this state, you will know the News of your Happiness, without your saying, I know it: you will not answer for any thing, but your Constancy and Perseverance in making good the Promises, of which Grace and Humility have been the inspiring Authors, and not Presumption. You will rejoice holily within, without questioning or informing yourself which way you come to know you shall be constant: and although in reality no Voice shall tell you this, yet you will be as secure, and as much at ease in the midst of all the dangers that shall surround you, as if Prophets and Angels had told it you.  
You will not hear any Voice that will declare this to you, but you will become sensible, that the Instinct or secret Testimony, of which St. Paul speaks, is a kind of thing more certain than Visions, clearer than Revelations and Prophecies, sweeter than the Consolations and Assurances you can receive from your spiritual Directors, and, in fine, more strong and powerful than all your Fears.  
Amongst all the Examples you see of such as fall from their Virtue, and in the height of the Reports of so many reprobated Persons, as are sounded in your Ears from all parts, able to make the Boldest tremble, you shall enjoy the Peace of the Elect.  
Your Solicitude will not be to question or make Doubts, whether you shall go to Heaven, or not, but will grow from the tediousness and length of years, and the delays that put off the happy day in which you are to see your Beloved. You will not beg of the Angels, to let you know, whether you shall bear them company one day in the Heavenly Jerusalem, and whether there be a place appointed for you there; but to let you know when you shall come thither, on what day, at which hour. O blessed Spirits! when will this be? Ye possess already him whom I seek, and whom you love; O Angels, I love as well as you, and cannot live without my God, yet all this while I see him not: Adjuro vos filiae Jerusalem; I conjure you, O Daughters of Jernsalem, to take pity on my Love, and tell me when I shall enter into the Glorious Palace of my Spouse, into the very place of that admirable Tabernacle, into the very Arms and Bosom of him who is the Object of my Sighs and Tears.  
You will look upon Heaven as an Inheritance that belongs to you, and will say with David, Laetatus sum in his quae dicta sunt mihi. I have heard a Divine Voice whisper to my Heart, which has left these few words imprinted in it, That we shall go into the House of God, and that after a moment or two of Labour and Affliction we shall get out of this Valley of Tears, and Region of Death, to be transported to the Habitation of Life and Immortality, where our Bliss and Enjoyment will be no less eternal than He is whom we love.  
Here you see what has been said and thought by such persons as have been in your condition, and by what means they have raised themselves above the power of Hell, and above all the Fears and Disquiets that torment the Weak and Pusilanimous. In a word, if you be assured that you have a Good Will, shut not that Peace out of your Heart, which has been promised you from Heaven by these words; Pax hominibus bonae voluntatis.    

MAXIM XVII.  Mulierem fortem quis inveniet? procul & de ultimis finibus terrae pretium ejus. Prov. xxxi. 

PARAPHRASE.  
It is not meant here, that there is not a strong Woman in the World, but that there is not the Man who is wise and happy enough to find her out; so hard it is to distinguish her from other Women, that disguise themselves, and deceive the Eyes of such as are the clearest sighted.  
If there be those notwithstanding that will attempt the search of her, see here her Figure, which I present them with, as a help to know her. They will judge by it, in my opinion, that if they were to go as far as the Indies to learn News of this Lady, she would deserve the Pains, and to have the Voyage undertaken for her alone, rather than for that number of things fetched from thence, infinitely less rare and precious.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It is not to be doubted, but that amongst the Felicities of this Life, one of the most desirable to Man, is to have Plenty, Order, and Peace settled in his Family.  
The Duty of effecting this Settlement belongs particularly to the Wife, the Honour and the Obligation of the Husband dispose of him wholly to the service of the Commonwealth, to whose Benefit he dedicates his Time and Pains, and by his excellent Qualities comes to merit one of the principal Places in the government of it.  
These two Employments have been assigned by Providence to the Master and Mistress of that Family of which Solomon speaks in the last of his Proverbs: both the one and the other carry themselves after such a manner, as make the Angels admire at the Grace which enlightens and enables them; and Men are at a loss to reckon which of the Pair deserves the best Preference.  
It is certainly an admirable Sight to behold this august Peer awing 
Nobilis in pertis vir ejus quando Sederit eam Senatoribus terrae.  the People into their Duty, or to see him preside in an Assembly of Senators at a time, when the Frame of the State is shaken, and in disorder; and yet such as consider the Carriage of the Wife at home in her Palace, see those things which make a no less glorious appearance in their Eyes: they are not to be distinguished one from another. The Character which they receive from the general Voice, says, That their Examples regulate all the Actions of their fellow-Citizens, and that they equally share, by their Merit, in all the Praises and Admiration of their Country.  
See here the first Lines of their Figures, which the Wiseman has drawn to present to future times, and to confute the Complaints and Tears of such as lay to Heaven the ill Success of their Marriage.  
This Woman, who is all Obedience to her Husband, reigns in her House at the same time he governs in the Senate; she exercises there a Sovereign Rule, but does it without noise or violence. Her power in this place is mighty, because it comes from Heaven: she does not seek, as other Lady's use, to raise up her Authority by the magnificency of her Attire, and yet she wears the richest Purple, 
Byssius & purpura Indumentum ejus.  and follows all the Rules of Decency and Custom in dressing herself, though she has no need of any Help to make her be respected and honoured by her Domestics; God has bestowed such a Garment on her, as we should all have worn, had our first Father but proved wise. Fortitudo & decus indumentum ejus. Solomon means, that there issues an Air of Greatness and Majesty from the Eyes of this Princess, which spreads itself over her like a Garment, and gives a certain lustre to her Face, her Words and Motions, such as cannot be expressed further, than that it ravishes all Hearts, and that it makes them happy who serve her, when her Commands give them the honour of obeying her, and the occasion to show, by their promptness and transport of Joy, the depth of their Respects.  
This is it which keeps the whole House in order, and puts every person, at each hour of the day, in the Place and Employment where he should be: the respectful Fears that fix them to their Duty, is not as in other Families, a Fear of being catched in their Faults and punished; all the Fear of this place is, the Fear of being faulty.  
She is not the Mistress only of her Domestics, but the Mother too: amongst the chief Rules of her Government, the first is, to look that they be not failing in any part of their Duties; the second, to see that nothing be wanting to them which Reason and Justice can claim for their support and comfort. Her constant Care is, to avoid giving them any just cause of complaint, yielding them still new occasisions of loving her, and of believing they are loved? her Goodness reaches to make them see, that she both approves of their Service, and considers their Persons.  
This frank and obliging Goodness extends itself to All without exception; it is but an ill Principle in a Master and Mistress, to choose out one in a Family where there is a number of Servants, and to repose their whole Trust on his show of Fidelity, discarding in a manner all the rest, for then his idle and rash Reports must needs make them commit a thousand faults, and cause more noise in a House in one day than there would be in a year, would they endeavour to make themselves beloved of all. To win Hearts, there lies the true and perfect Secret of Oeconomy in a Family, of Policy in a State, and of Hierarchy in the Sanctuary: whatsoever Government you may have, to make it happy, you must be taking and amiable; go not about to seek a more ingenious and uncommon method, GOD himself uses no other in his Eternal Empire: Vbi regnat aeternus Amor & aeterna Pulchritudo.  
This Lady we speak of neglects not to employ herself in Works befitting her Sex, performing curious things with her Needle; and though she has no farther Skill than what Nature put into her Fingers in her Childhood, yet she proves knowing enough to set Patterns, and give Directions to the most skilful Work-women, making herself admired of all the Ladies that spend the time of their Visits in seeing her work, and in learning of her, but they come too late to her acquaintance to be capable of imitating her. Quaesivit lanam & linum, & operata est consilio manuum suarum.  
These little Employments set not, says Solomon, the bounds to her Virtue, Capacity, and Industry. Manum suam misit ad fortia: She that knows how to employ her Fingers so well, knows also how to employ her Arm, and when Necessity requires it, can show that Heroic Courage, which gives her the Title of the strong Woman. Is she to resist any violent Assaults of her Neighbours, to withdraw ill-gotten Goods out of an Injust Possession, to maintain the Rights of Innocence against the Power and Subtleties of the Law, and relieve her oppressed Dependants? or, Is she to buy and sell, or to conquer such Obstacles as hinder her Designs, to increase the limits of her Lordships, by some advantageous acquisition, and to get a Victory over all the Policies of Envy and Treachery? This matchless Lady undertakes it, pursues it, and brings it to effect. Roboravit fortitudine brachium suum.  
Beyond all this, says the Prophet, her miraculous Genius has taught her the Art of trafficking; she knows how to transport the Grain and Profits arising from her Lands, as far as the Indies, and bring back in the same Ships the Riches of Ophir and Tharsus, with all the Gold and Silver and other things, of which her Family or her Country can stand in need. Facta est quasi navis institoris, de long portans panem. A fine Conceit it is of Solomon, That her Ships are the figures of her two Hands, wonderfully skilful, and wonderfully successful, both in giving out and receiving in; insomuch, as that God blessing these at home, blesses those when they are on the Sea, and the very Storms yielding an Obedience to the Benediction of God, pay them a Respect, and even help to bring them home to their Port.  
But in all this the Miracle of her Parts, which is the most charming, and best deserves to be published, is, that she has made her Husband the Richest of Men, without impoverishing or hurting any Person, and without giving occasion either to Heaven or Earth to complain of her: Confidit in ea Cor Viri sui, & spoliis non indigebit.  
There remains yet a Miracle in her Person, which in my opinion should make her admired by Posterity above all the rest, and that is, That in all this bustle of Traffic, and of the manage of her Household Affairs, she makes not the least show of any such matter, but in occasions where Decency engages her to be in the company of Knowing Men, ravishes them with the manner of her Conversation.  
Her delight and merit in these Conversations lies not in talking herself, nor in mixing her Opinions and Reasonings with their Arguments; she holds, that the Rules of Wisdom and Modesty forbidden her to appear before them, but in the quality of a Disciple, and that she ought to rank herself as Mary Magdalen did, at the Feet of our Saviour: Sedens secus pedes domini, audiebat verbum illius.  
True it is, that she has not studied, and would therefore be much in the wrong to reason with them upon high Mysteries: but, what is not to be found in other Women, she possesses three Sciences in perfection, which ravish these Masters of Learning.  
The first is, That she knows how to put Questions that are the most pertinent, and to offer the finest Subjects, on which they can exercise their Parts. The second is, That she knows how to conceive clearly, and without difficulty, the Answers which they make. The third, That she knows how to value them, and to show this value, by excellent and sincere Expressions; the truth of which appears in her Looks.  
The sovereign Pleasure of those Men who know great things, is not to vent them in the Schools: one of the chief and them in the Schools: one of the chief and most ancient Laws of the Schools is, That whatsoever is said there is to be contradicted, so that the Schools are as their Field of Battle, and the Standers-by as Witnesses of their Triumph.  
At least, it appears to me to be very well said of a solid Writer of our Times, That in those Conversations where the Unlearned have a great deal of Wit and Modesty, and the Learned a great deal of Wisdom and Eloquence, the Delight and Honour of both is not unequally matched.  
The great Character of this strong Woman is comprised in these words: Fallax gratia & vana est pulchritudo Mulier timens dominum ipsa laudabitur.    

MAXIM XVIII.  Salus animae melior est omni auro & argento; & Corpus Validum quam Census immensus. Eccles. xxx. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Know, you who have a 
Non est census super censum salut is nec oblectam●ntum super gaudium Cordis.  mind to be rich and happy in this Lower World, that there is no greater Treasure than the Health of Body, and that you can aim at no Happiness beyond the Joy of Heart: Lose not these good things by running after other, and be convinced that an Empire is not to be compared to them.  
Death is to be preferred 
Melior est mors quam Vita amara & requies aeterna quam languor perseverans.  before a Life of Bitterness and Affliction; and it is more easy to be at rest in a Grave, than to lie languishing on a Bed, and suffer for several years the insupportable Weariness and Pains of a lasting Malady.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Life and Health are two of God's Presents, which deserve to be cherished and tenderly preserved.  
The Wise man fails not in this Care concerning Health, and it really is one of the most considerable Rules of Wisdom, never to do what may hurt it, but still to govern it with discretion.  
The true method that is to be observed in relation to Health, is to tend it, as we would do a young Child of quality, taking the care neither to spoil him by too fond humouring and compliances, nor by unreasonable constraints and severities.  
To effect this, it is evident, that we must both allow and deny ourselves many things; but, What are those things? and, at what times? These are two Difficulties, which are the ground of many Disputes, such as are not well determined, because we do not apply ourselves to the right and sole Mistress, who can justly do it.  
Some People consult their Physicians, many take Advice of their Sensual Appetite, and blindly do what it counsels them; others, which are the clearest sighted, apply themselves to Nature, and consult with her alone.  
Indeed, the Physician often undertakes the matter, but it may be he exceeds in this the limits of his Title and Profession. Physic was instituted by God for the recovery of Health, it may be questioned whether it were intended for the preservation of it. At least, we may conclude thus far, That Physicians are of no use to such as find themselves well, and all nothing. Add to this, That Experience teaches us, that those who consult their Physician in time of health, to learn how to preserve it, and live a long time, learn only by his Remedies how to become sick and destroy themselves.  
Such Persons as hearken to their Sensuality soon learn the way to die, and fly to the Tomb before the time; though the Truth is, the Cordials it prescribes are excellent, as Mirth, Wine, Good Cheer, Sleep, Play, and Ease, but it makes us take too much of them: and as the excess of good things makes the most mortal Poison, so this kills more Men by its Baits than die in the Field by the Sword, or are destroyed in a Sedition by Violence and Injustice. Assuredly those are but ill Advices for our Health, which come from our blind Appetite, and very dangerous Instincts are its interior Persuasions and Impulses.  
Nature, in this point, is the sole and true Mistress to whom we are to hearken; she knows what is requisite for a Man, the quantity of Nourishment, and the quality; how much time he is to allow for Labour, how much for his Diversion, how much for Sleep, what is to be the measure of each thing: She knows all this, and what is to be most admired; she has inward motions and certain ways of informing us in every matter, which are marvellously intelligible; at least, the Man that is wise understands them very well, and seldom deceives himself in them: it may be said, that it is one of his principal and choicest Knowledges to distinguish thee Calls of Reason and Necessity from those of the Passions; and that amongst his Principles, the most holy and best observed one by him is, not to grant any thing to the latter, nor refuse any thing to the former.  
An ancient Writer has truly said, That one of the most important Affairs of Wisdom lodged in the Mind of Man, is to well distinguish between those Voices or Calls which are within Man, they have been reckoned to be six or seven, Reason, Instinct, Humour, Appetite, Temptation, Inspiration, and Grace; each one of these Domestics lodged within us has his Call, or Impulse, by which he puts us upon Actions pleasing to him, and makes us to will as he does.  
Their Ends are infinitely differing and opposite, but the great difficulty, and the original from whence arise all our Misfortunes, is, that their Voices are much alike, and that it is easy to be deceived in them.  
Sensual Appetite counterfeits in its Call the Voice of Reason and Necessity; Humour, that of Instinct and Nature: Temptation, that of Inspiration and Grace. Now, to take one for the other, to resist this, and comply with that, is no less than to perish.  
Happy are the Wise! It is Wisdom only that is able to distinguish amongst this Confusion of Voices; at every Call of our Heart, and every Impulse we feel, she informs us to whom the Voice belongs.  
From this admirable Intelligence of the Wise it comes that they are able to choose the ways of preserving their Health, by following the Orders of the Physician that is within them, and understands their Interior; whereas the Misfortune of the other Physician is, that they cannot penetrate so far with their Sight; they see but the outside of the Sick Person, and must divine for all the rest.    

MAXIM XIX.  Vtere quasi homo frugi his quae tibi apponuntur. Eccles. xxxi. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Feed and nourish yourself, that you may live, and eat not but for your Sustenance: take no more than Nature requires, and what is necessary to support its Strength and Life: comply not with your Sensual Appetite, and let your Heart never feel so much shame and apprehension of your becoming like to a Beast, as in those Actions in which they resemble us, and that are common to us with them.  
A good and noble Heart 
Cor splendidum in epulis epulae enim ejus diligenter fiunt.  is chief shown by the manner of ordering his Table, such a Heart will cause it to relish of its own frankness, of its cleanness and purity; an indecent Table is the mark of a negligent Mind and a disorderly Life.  
Engage not yourself to be at those Feasts where you must strive to win the Prize, and contest who shall 
Diligentes in vino noli provocare.  carry away the Honour of being the most immodest and the least sober of the Company; this is a War in which many have died miserably on the Bed of Dishonour, full of all the Shame and all the Crimes of Brutality: What Death can be more infamous and fatal?  
Disorderly Repasts are the destruction of Mankind, and the Punishment of Intemperance is the same in our days as it was in the time of the first Sinner; I mean, it is Death.  
What differs, is, that the Gluttony of the First Man condemned us only to die at an old Age, and in our extreme Caducity; whereas our Gormandizing sentences us to die in our Youth. There are few that die of old Age, most People fall by their Excess: 
Vinum in ju●unditatem creatum est & non inebrietatem.  Wine was created to solace and fortify, not to extinguish our Reason, nor to weaken our Minds.  
Wine drank with moderation 
Exultatio animae, & Corporis Vinum moderate sumptum.  begets Strength in the Understanding, Joy in the Heart, and Health in the Body.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Man's Body, so long as it is supported by an Immortal Soul, is the most upright and the most beautiful of all Bodies, but when it comes to be separated from this, of all Carcases it is the most hideous and frightful; there is not that Corruption which is so horrid to behold, nor a Stench that is more insupportable.  
In like manner the Action of eating and drinking, when it is dead, and is not animated by some spiritual aim or intention to please God, is undoubtedly one of the most shameful Actions, and most unbeseeming a Man, and such as the Angels behold with the greatest aversion.  
But when it is accompanied and helped by that supernatural Intention, it is both honourable and holy, and we have few things without us, by which we can more handsomely show our Dignity and Difference from Beasts, than by this, although it seems to put us into the same rank and equality with them.  
The manner of Eating for Beasts is, to eat at all hours, to eat souly and greedily. to eat by themselves, and hardly to endure the company of another Beast: the way of Eating for Man should carry Marks of the Superiority and Sovereignty that belongs to him: Decency, Neatness, Order, and Magnificency, with other royal Properties, should adorn his Table, who is the Master of Beasts, to show the distance there is between him and his Slaves.  
He ought to be regular, as to the hours of Eating, a thing not impracticable by the poorer sort; to be neat and clean in what belongs to it, which is not hard to be compassed by such as are the least rich, and to have his Table handsome, and of free accesS to his Friends, which is not to be dispensed with in Persons of great quality, and is ordinary enough with those of a small fortune, who have large Hearts, such as esteem nothing their own, in which a Friend has not a share.  
The very Angels, in the opinion of the holy Bishop of Geneva, could not dispense with this, were they transformed to Men, and to come and converse with us in the World, they would live like Angels to their very Table. Here lies the Honour of a Spiritual Nature, to be able to descend to the resemblance of Beasts, by Actions, in which it resembles them less than ever; and where it appears more clearly than in any other occasion, how infinitely far our Nature is raised above them!    

MAXIM XX.  Si dormieris non timebis; quiesces, & suavis erit, sommus tuus. Prov. iii. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Be faithful to God all day, and your Sleep will be disturbed by no Fears in the Night; you will spend it happily, for nothing within you will want its Repose, and your Rest will be perfect, because it will be entire, both Body and Soul enjoying it.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Sleep is duly reckoned amongst the Blessings and the Eases which God had been pleased to mix with the Bitterness and Troubles of this miserable Life.  
We cannot term it better, than to call it a Present, which is sent us each day from the Creator, and which enters into our Veins, as a prevention to Diseases, and a help to repair our Strength, interrupting for seven or eight hours all the Toils and Displeasures of the Day.  
St. Augustine calls it a Contrivance of the Supreme Goodness, which like a Mother who tends the Cradle of her beloved Child, comes softly to us a nights, to rock us asleep, and drive from about us whatsoever may disappoint the good Rest it designs us.  
Thus this Goodness keeps from us Cares, Fears, Disquiets, and all Thoughts of Business, of Law-Suits, Projects, and Designs: this it is that stops them in their way, and hinders their access into our Mind, by sudden Vapours drawn out of its stock of Love, which quite forbidden their entrance.  
This it is also which can keep our Mind from being a Disquiet to itself, and hinder it from spending the hours of night in toiling and employing itself indiscreetly: this Goodness ties up its Hands, if I may so express it; I mean, that it finds out certain Chains, by which it fastens all the Faculties of our Soul to their repose, and keeps them in a state of stillness and inaction, but does all this so sweetly, and with such a care of hurting us, that in the height of this fettering and violence we feel nothing but Content and Pleasure: Dormeis & suavis erit somnus tuus.  
In a word, if according to the holy Father's interpretation of these words, Lazarus Dormit, it signifies to be dead, to be in that condition we may learn in laying ourselves to sleep, that there is nothing more easy than to die.  
I say then, that Sleep in us is one of the Wonders of God's Providence, and that it is an allusion, what some People hold, who say, it is a shameful Spectacle to the Angels to see a Wise Man drowned in Sleep: the Angels have come down to behold a God sleeping in his Cradle, and they have adored him with as great respect there, as they adore him in Paradise.  
Sleep is so far from being an Infamy to us, that many learned Doctors have been bold to say, it is one of the most honourable Conditions belonging to our Nature, and the least contrary to Grace.  
Devout Persons are continually complaining, that there scarce passes an hour in the day in which they fall not into some light Faults, and become displeasing to God by unavoidable Weaknesses and Lapses. This Misfortune does not befall them a nights; the time of Sleep is the only time, in which they perfectly keep their Innocence: the same Grace and Virtue they have at the hour they go to sleep, the same is found in them entire at the moment they awake: their happy Soul, surrounded with the Vapours I have spoken of, is like the Sun hidden by a black Gloud; as much as it is obscured by that hideous Darkness, it still retains notwithstanding all its Lustre, and comes forth as bright and beautiful as it ever was before.  
I say further, and I say this after the holy Fathers, who have experienced it, and other of the Learned who have writ it, That what never befell the Sun, which is to become more glorious and bright, being beset with Rain and Clouds, than it was in clear weather, has happened to great Saints at the times they have been seized with sleep. Such was the time which God chose to visit the chief of the Apostles in, the beloved Disciples, the magdalen's, the Catherines, and Theresia's, and other illustrious Saints, who have been then elevated even into the Rank of Seraphims, by the most sublime Acts of Love and Sanctity: Ego dormio & Cor meum vigilat. But this is not the proper place for expounding these words, since I should step too far from my Subject; to the Point.  
It cannot but be owned, that Sleep may be abused and turned into a shameful Brutishness: A Misfortune, says St. Chrysostom, that ought never to be seen; but it is seen too often, and never fails to happen when we lay ourselves to rest, forgetting to follow those Rules which Wisdom and Providence have prescribed to us, to the end we may not sleep like Beasts.  
In truth, it must be confessed, to behold a Man risen from Table, where he has carried himself like an Atheist, and plunged both Body and Soul in the Filth of a scandalous Drunkenness, to see him throw himself on the Ground, and sleep in the face of Heaven; can there be a more shameful Spectacle! Let him be an Holofernes, attended and worshipped by an Army of an Hundred thousand Men, all this Attendance hinders him not in that condition from being a Horror to the Angels, and being a Woman's Victim, who cuts off his Head, and carries it safe away, whilst Devils seize the Remains of that drunken Carcase. Quasi Cadaver putridum, illamentatus atque insepultus, descends in profundum laci.  
This way of sleeping is certainly the most dismal thing that can happen to Man. The King Sedecias having known that he was made the Sport of the Court of Babylon, whilst he slept after this manner, died through the displeasure he took at it. Alexander, Socrates, Cato, and other of those old Worthies, have blushed at their being in such a condition before they came to be quite awake, so much sense remaining with them in the midst of their Folly: and they have wept, in having hid it from the Eyes of the World, to find they could not hid it from themselves.  
I own besides, that it is not a proper means to cause quiet and good Sleeps, to have our Bed and Chamber too richly and voluptuously adorned; what Rest can there be taken in the view of so great Debts, or Couzenages, or Pride? How many dreadful Cries, says Salvian, are heard all night within the Conscience of that Man, whose wretched Sleep costs so much Money, and so many Sins? Can he spend the hours any other way, than in sadly thinking and in saying to himself, Menses vacuos & Noctes laboriosas Enumeravi mihi. For these twenty years I have done nothing towards my Salvation, my days have been days of Debauch, of Impieties, of Wrongs to the Poor; my nights have been nights of Disquiet, Torment, and Despair; Menses Vacuos & Noctes laboriosas.  
Think, when you go to take your rest on this rich Bed of State, that such was the Bed from which a Balthasar beheld the Hand of God writing on the Wall the Sentence of his Death, and his Damnation signed in Heaven.  
That the rich Glutton, whilst he took the pleasure of seeing himself thus magnificently lodged, heard a Voice whisper in his Ear, telling him, he was expected in another World, and that he must die within an hour; Et haec quae Parasti, Cujus erunt?  
That an Antiochus, instead of meeting here with that sweet Rest you seek, found burning Flames kindled within his Bowels, with colics and Convulsions, which have made him roar like one in Hell, turning his stately Bed into a Scaffold, where his interior Executioners have torn him for several months, till Death has come and pulled him out of their Hands to put him into infernal ones. Mortuus est & sepultus in inferno.  
But I go beyond my Argument: what I maintained, is true, That Sleep taking possession of you, according to the Rules of Providence, puts you into a condition that is not only necessary, but honourable.  
The Rules of this Providence are fitted to your Conveniency and Needs, do you conform yourself therefore exactly to them, and accustom yourself to follow as near as you can all its Commands and Counsels.  
You desire that your Sleep may be sweet and peaceable, Providence would have it so too, and has chosen for it the night time; do not you change this for the day, and go not to Bed at Five a Clock in the morning, when the Sun does rise.  
It would not have you spend above seven or eight hours in sleeping, do not employ ten or eleven in it, but mind what the Physicians say, That a Man who lies in Bed ten or eleven hours, comes out of it ever less healthful; and what the Casuists add, Ever less innocent and pure than he went into it.  
The Eye of God, says St. Gregory, abhors the sight of a Man in Bed at Noon: And if ever you be found there so late, he will send Solomon's Ghost to your Bedside, which pulling you by the Arm, will repeat those words inspired long since into him, on purpose to be said to the Sluggards of all times; Vsque quo Piger dormies? quando Consurges a Somno tua? Paululum dormies paululum dormitabis paululum Conseres Manus ut dormias: & veniet tibi quasi Viator Egestas, & pauperies quasi vir Armatus. Till when, O Slothful, will you sleep? have you not rubbed your Eyes, and stretched your Arms sufficiently? has not your Head been more than once raised and let fall again upon the Pillow, ask a little time, and yet a little longer, and for a third about, still a little longer time, until that God's Malediction enters within your Walls, followed by Disorder, Libertinism, and Poverty, which will spare your Family as little as it has done such as have been richer than yours? Pauperies quasi Vir Armatus.  
This is not all; what the same Providence recommends particularly to you, to make your Sleeps sound and quiet, is, that you employ yourself in the day time, taking so much Pains about your Affairs, as that you may find at night, when the time comes of your going to Bed, something of Weariness in your Body, but in your Mind no manner of Disquiet, no Sin in your Conscience, nor any Disturbance from your Passions, to hinder the rest prepared for you by the Divine Goodness. Act so well, as that your Designs, your Undertake, Hopes, and even your Joys as well as Griefs, may be laid to sleep with you, and lodge that quiet Silence in your Soul, as may make it not be troubled by itself, or any thing about it, so that you may have cause to say, at the time of shutting your Eyes, In pace in idipsum dormiam, & requiescam; quoniam tu domine Singulariter in spe Constituisti me.  
The last and most important Rule is, That your last Action before you sleep, and the first after you wake, must be to pray. Be sure you fail not to begin and end this way, each day you have to live, and take often into your Mind this true Saying of the Holy Fathers, That Sleep is the Figure of our Death, and Waking the Figure of our Resurrection. The last words of a dying Man, are, to recommend his Soul to God, In Manus tuas, Domine, commendo animam meam; the first when he rises again, will be to pay his Adoration to God, when stretching out his Arms towards his Maker, he shall raise himself up to him, by Acts of a perfect Love and Holiness, Dormivi & Somnum cepi & exurrexi, & adhuc sum tecum. This is the true method of the Devotion of Christians for each day of their Life.  
Remember what I have said in another place, That all times are proper for the exercising Acts of Holy Love, since the God you love is near you at all times: When the Sun goes away he is not gone, says Solomon; God is at your Bed's head in the silent beginning of the Night, discoursing with your Mind by private Inspirations, and helping you to rest holily, through the sweetness of this interior Conversation.  
In the Morning he is also with you, expecting to meet with an Expression from you of the Trust you repose in him, such as may show you deposit with him all your Cares of every day: and whereas he fails not to be present before you at the moment of your waking, fail not on your part to raise your Eyes and stretch your Arms out to him, Anima mea desider avit te in Nocte sed & Spiritu meo, in praecordiis meis de mane vigilabo ad te. O my Beloved, said a holy Soul, how innumerable have my Thoughts been of you this Night, how many Sighs, how many Tears have you cost me! I ran after you through Desert places, where it was all darkness. De Mane Vigilabo ad te. Question not, my Beloved, but that I love you, since the first motion of my waking Heart tends to inquire, whether I be so happy as to be beloved by you still this day, and to learn, that you are nearer me than I imagined by my Fears.    

MAXIM XXI.  Non habet amaritudinem Conversatio illius, nec taedium Convictus illius. Sap. viij. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Such as converse familiarly with GOD learn how to converse well with Men; their Hearts are free from peevishness and gall, and their discourse in company proves neither tiresome nor offensive.  
To become acceptable to Men it our daily Conversation, we must follow the Rules that are to be observed, for preventing our being displeasing to God in the interior Discourses of our Thoughts.   

REFLECTIONS.  
Amongst all the Entertainments Nature has provided for us, to give ease to the tediousness our Banishment, during this mortal Life, there is not any so decent and so pleasing as the meeting of Company to converse one with another.  
This Inclination of mutually communicating our Thoughts, was born in us with our immortal Soul; they both derive themselves from the same origin, that is, they come from the Bosom of God; the one and the other is framed according to the Pattern of what passes eternally amongst the three Persons of the Trinity, Persons adorable and infinitely happy, because their Society and Communication is eternal.  
To converse with his Likeness is the Eternity of God, the Life of an Angel, and as for Man, it is the cure of the Cares and Pains of his Mortality, whilst he sojourns here below amongst Beasts: One of our Privileges and most glorious Elevations above them is, that they cannot partake of this Benefit.  
It is a sad thing nevertheless, that amongst all the Customs divinely instituted, this, which both Nature and Grace has settled amongst us, should be blackened with the greatest Faults, and be the most shamefully abused of any.  
No Man but knows how things go in this kind, how numerous the Sins are that grow from unchaste and detracting Tongues, and how many Tears these daily cause: All our Misfortunes, in a manner, spring from this Fountain head.  
You would know which way this may be remedied, the Remedy has been asked and fought for during these many years, but no one can boast of having found it out as yet, and there is cause to fear it never will be found; indeed, we may well doubt it, but yet we need not doubt withal, but that each particular Person may acquit himself of all the Duties belonging to a Civil Life, and frequent company, when it ought to be done, without injuring his Fidelity to God, or the Obligation he lies under, not to expose himself to the manifest danger of mortal Sin.  
The Means which the Holy Scriptures and our Spiritual Guides propose for this, are several; I here present you with a short Collection of their Counsels and Instructions relating to this Subject.  
1. When you are invited, says Solomon, to go into such Company as will present you with Poison hid in the bottom of the most delicious Liquors, and where you are sure to meet with the blackest Crimes, mixed with the most inviting Pleasures, that is, when they go about to draw you into one of those Houses, from whence you never fa●l to return, but more faulty, and a greater Sinner than you went in; whatsoever Reasons may be urged, or Entreaties made, or Violence used to you, take heed you never yield; resist, and be constant in your resistance; go not to seek for Pleasure and Sin, where you must meet with Death and Hell: Viae domus ejus, penetrantes in interiora Montis, Prov. seven.  
2. When you happen to be making other Visits, in which you have been harmlessly engaged, without the foresight of any hurt or danger, if nevertheless there appears such, says St. John the Evangelist, as soon as any signs of it be shown, as soon as you hear any bold Blasphemy pronounced, or words of high Impudence, which scandalise you, and terrify your Conscience; fly away without deliberation, and suffer not the Health of your Soul to be longer exposed to so bad an Air, in a place where amongst all that are about you, laughing without control, there is not one perhaps but has the Plague and Sin lodged in his Heart: Exite de illa populus meus, ut ne participes sitis delictorum ejus, & de plagis eis non accipiatis. Apoc. xviii.  
3. But if matters stand in that way, as will not allow you to take your flight, at least take the liberty to speak and declare your Mind boldly, do like the Prophet Isaiah, arm your Looks with the Zeal and Anger of a Seraphim; put on a Forehead of Brass, not to be daunted nor made ashamed, and let your Temper show a Courage without Pity. In this posture present yourself before these Libertines, who neither regard God's Presence, nor yours, and by some generous Remonstrance, that may set before their Eyes the Infamy of their Brutishness, make them hid their Heads and Faces for shame;  Videant, & sentiant, & urantur. This was the way of the ancient Prophets, and is still the way of such as are true Saints in the Church of the Son of God.  
4. But then, in case you should find your Courage and Parts not sufficient for this Undertaking, and that you should fear, instead of confounding the Sinners, they might scandalise the Company, by turning Devotion into Ridicule: Keep your Tongue silent, says the Prophet, but let your Eyes speak.  
You must, says he, make these Atheists see in your Eyes and Looks a dreadful Sadness and Horror, when they begin to open their Mouths, and vomit up in the presence of Persons of Honour the Filth and Corruption that lies within their Souls: Per tristitiam vultus, corrigitur animus delinquentis. Say not a word, but be sad; this way has had Success in the correcting of Sinners, whom Noise and Dispute could never soften.  
Imitate that generous Nun of St. Clare's Order, who having heard some obscene Compliments that were made her by a company of Debauchees, shown first in her Cheeks a sudden Fire of Anger, which presently after turned into a dying Paleness and inconsolable Sadness, both accompanied with so many moving Tears, as touched at the very instant the Hearts of these Wretches, making them retire away in confusion, and putting them upon beginning a Penance in the Church two or three days after, which lasted with them to the end of their Lives. Per tristitiam vultus, Corrigitur animus delinquentis.  
After all, the greatest Masterpiece of Human Wit in such occasions, is shown when a Man of great Parts and rare Expression, without saying any word of Offence to these ill persons, as soon as he perceives them ready to take the liberty of mocking at the Mysteries of Religion, knows how with Address, at the first word of Impiety, to break off the Discourse, and introduce in its room another, so taking and agreeable, as may draw the attention of the whole Company, and give that satisfaction even to the Libertines themselves, as may make them ashamed of the brutish things they were going to utter, when they compare them with his noble Thoughts and way of Conversation.  
This was the Artifice practised by Solomon, when those unbelieving Princes appeared before his Throne, who were ready to reason indiscreetly against the Truths of his Religion: without showing any Signs that he would contradict them, or make them see their Ignorance, he began to entertain them with Discourses of the Greatness of the God whom he adored, speaking so divinely on this Subject, as raised their admiration so high by the things he said, as that hours passed away with them in pleasure, without minding how the time went; and all this while they laid their Fingers upon their Lips, lest some Word or Noise should come out, that might interrupt him: Sermonicante me, plura, manus ori suo imponent.  
This is, I say, an admirable way to divert ill Discourses, but such as I must ingeniously confess is somewhat too high to be proposed as an Example.  
It is easy to admire a Man who discourses at this rate, but where lies the Means to imitate him? The undertaking of it, by one less wise, would have but a sad effect.  
For, as nothing is more divine and ravishing than the Eloquence of a Solomon, who is able to speak before all Companies to the Dignity of the Matter on any Subject, though never so unforeseen, and to entertain them for many hours, without any stop of their Admiration; so there is nothing more distasteful than to light into the conversation of such Persons as are always talking, and never talk to the purpose, yet will not suffer one to interrupt them.  
Those are not the Persons nevertheless most to be apprehended; such as these you must take the greatest care to avoid.  
I have observed, that Indiscreet Persons are amongst Company just the same thing as those we call Heedless and Blockheads are amongst Wares in a Storehouse; where these come, there is always something thrown down, broken, or spoiled, and Matter ever made for Complaint and Chiding The like happens by our Conversation in the Visits we make one-another; for, whereas great store of Company meets in these occasions, and that Discourse must therefore fall upon variety of Subjects, some unlucky Matter still happens, for want of Care to prevent it: when People meet thus, they usually strive to divert themselves by harmless Raileries, entering into some little War of mutual Reproaches and Repartees, very pleasing to Persons of Wit; but when there happens to be such there as want Discretion and Judgement, and know not the Rules of Civility or Common Sense, it is a Misfortune to be one of the Company: There ever happens then, in these Sport and Wrestle of Good Humour, some Blow to be given that goes beyond Play, and fetches Blood; there is ever some Mind wounded, some considerable Secret disclosed, some Confidence betrayed; there is some Person of Worth that reputes him of having come amongst Fools, that treat him ill, taking his Civilities for Injuries; there is ever some one of a jealous and nice Temper, that goes away with a bleeding Heart.  
Non habet amaritudinem Conversatio illius, nec taedium Convictus illius: It is the Property of Wisdom to make our Conversation become like that of the Angels, yielding us all the Joys of Mind that a familiarity of Souls can produce amongst Persons who perfectly love one-another.  
A Wise Man, whilst he converses, has ways of letting lose his Heart to his Friends, ways of jesting, and making himself merry with them to the full scope of Friendship, without ceasing nevertheless to continue all this while admirably wise, and without breaking one Law of Decency or Respect: he can likewise, at times of magnificent Entertainments, and upon occasion of public Rejoices, where Heaven would have him edify good Company, by conforming himself to their Example, according to the Rules of Honour and Fitness; he can, I say, add a Liveliness and Lustre to the Serenity of his Words and Countenance, not only able to ravish with Pleasure those he entertains, but to infuse a Piety into them, much sooner than the unbecoming and constrained Devotions which the Scrupulous are seen to practice in Churches.  
You will ask me perhaps in what Book Wisdom has put down the Rules of such an extraordinary Conduct; I answer you, In None: Wisdom sends Men into Company, and about their Affairs, without saying a word to them; Mitte Sapientem & nil dicas illi: but when they come there, it inspires them secretly with the Words they are to say, and the Actions they are to do.  
I conclude this Subject with two words of Advice; the first, Make yourself wise: the second, When you are so, go boldly into Company, and do as you please.    

MAXIM XXII.  Proposui hunc adducere mecum ad convivendum, Sciens quoniam mecum Communicabit de bonis. Sap. viij. 

PARAPHRASE.  
I have met with Peace of Heart by conversing with God, his Presence is a Rising Light, that disperses the Darkness, lays the Winds, quiets the Storms within us, and begets in Man a Celestial Tranquillity.  
Amongst the Felicities of this Life, a principal one is, the Peace or Interior Quiet, which our dying Saviour left in the World, to be the Inheritance of his Elect.  
We lose this Peace by many and differing Occasions. Here follow several Maxims, which may help you to prevent this Disorder, and to keep those dreadful Noises from entering within you, which outward and unforeseen Accidents do produce.  
'Tis true, that these terrible Sounds are very frequent, but Peace, says the Spouse, is where my God is, and where I have the Blessing to converse with him.   

REFLECTIONS.  
I said, that these Noises were frequent, and I may say withal, that they are universal.  
There are many Storms and Agitations in the Air we breath, many upon the Earth where we dwell, which we count so firm, many, and more than any where else, are in the immortal Soul, by which we live. There scarce passes an hour wherein our Thoughts are not tossed several ways, and our Reason does not fall at odds with our Passions.  
In like manner Cities, Provinces, and other Assemblies of Men, are but so many Seas, where it is a rare thing to meet with a calm day: we sail all of us upon these Tempestuous Billows, but yet it does not necessarily follow, that our Minds should be shaken by them. Man's Soul depends not on the Vessel that wafts it, much less on the tempestuous Noises resounding round about him. or the strange Revolutions, that amaze so many Persons; give an Ear you may to them, but have nothing to do there, more than to behold the busy Meddlers in the midst of those Whirlwinds, going this way, and that way, as they are carried and driven.  
How sweet a thing it is to observe with a calm Spirit the Tempest of a Mind where Passion reigns without control.  
Whensoever the Winds begin to rise, let us make haste to get into the Haven, let us fly to God as long as the Storm lasts, let us remain close to this dear Spouse, conversing with Him, and ask His Counsels: Then whilst we enjoy the sweet of this Divine Familiarity, supported between His Arms, let us from thence behold the strange Agitations of the World, and tell Him what our Thoughts are of them.  
Treat with God in these conjunctures as you use to do with the Persons you love: When there happens some unexpected Change in the Public Affairs, or that there starts up some News of high importance, it is a Pleasure to us to tell it one-another, and to communicate our Opinions and Conjectures thereupon. Take the same Pleasure with God, and show him what you think of it, and all you have been told: True it is, All this is known to him before it was ever spoken of, but it is no less true, that he loves you, and that he would learn from yourself not only what passes in your own House and private Closet, but in the Common wealth also, and amongst the People. As soon as you shall hear of any Matter happening strangely and unexpectedly, and that makes a great noise and disturbance, go and discourse with him about it, who expects you to this end; say to him with David, That the Waters have 
Elevaverunt flumina vocem suam.  raised their Voices; That there are great Tempests upon the Sea, and great Tumults in the World; That Chance has altered the Affairs of the Earth, and made strange Changes in the Stations of Men, by setting up and pulling down beyond belief, although our Eyes behold it: Mirabiles Elationes Mar●●. But, my God, you may say to that which is most to be wondered at in these Downfals, is, to see the Man who rises upon another's Ruin imagine he is seated at that height for ever. These little Infects carried up by the Waves to the Clouds, look upon themselves with as much Pride in this Elevation, as if they were seated upon firm Rocks, and forget that their Station depends wholly upon the Winds: all these Waves which Fortune has stirred up, and raised so high, will make but a moment's appearance; at the same time they are risen from their lowness, they are returning back to it again.  
The Ambitious, who mount thus high and get at such a distance from their former littleness, rise to this pitch, only to make the greater noise in the World by their Fall, and these very Mountains of their Greatness turn to their ruin, by falling back upon them, where they miserably perish, and lie buried in this Rubbish.  
But the Reports of these Changes amongst Creatures are of small importance; the News that pleases and concerns me most, and which my Heart is continually repeating, as the Angels are still telling it over and over to one another without cease, is, that he whom we love does never change: Mirabiles elationes Maris Mirabilis in altis dominus: You, my God, are the same this day that you ever were, and will eternally be the same: the immovable perpetuity of your Power, and of your Word, makes the Glory and Happiness of those that serve you, Idem ipse es & anni tui non deficient, yet give me leave to say, that what appears the most to be admired, and most pleases me, is, that at the same time when your infinite Goodness gives me the News of the Perseverance of your Grace and Protection on my behalf, I can return you the News of the Eternity of my Love. The Heavens and Earth will change; my Goods, my House, my Friends, my Health, my Body, my Fortune, and my Life, must also change; they are changing at this instant, and at every hour they change, but my Love shall never alter: I will love you as long as I shall live, as often as I shall draw my Breath, as lastingly as you will be my God. Deus Cordis mei, & pars mea Deus in aeternum.    

MAXIM XXIII.  Erit allocutio Cogitationis meae, & toedii mei. Sap. viij. 

PARAPHRASE.  
With God will I deposit all my Cares, my Fears, and Troubles; should his Providence and Justice deny to allow me that Consolation my Hope's aim at, at least I shall have the Happiness to have talked with him, and shown sure Marks of my Respect, and the Trust I repose in him.  
From the Disturbances that happen in the World, let us pass to those which particularly touch and concern ourselves: let us make God acquainted with the Disquiets and Pains we undergo, by reason of our Affairs, and let us address ourselves to him in the same words, which being dictated by him heretofore to a holy Spouse, had a miraculous effect. Confirma me Deus, & respice ad opera Manuum mearum, ut hoc, quod credens Cogitavi per te fieri posse perficiam.   

REFLECTIONS.  
There are usually lodged in our Hearts certain Designs upon which our whole Faculties are bend, such as our Imagination works upon night and day, to find out the Means may make them succeed, in spite of the Difficulties and Hindrances in their way: if your Mind be taken up with any of this nature, instead of applying yourself unprofitably to Men, who either cannot or will not assist and comfort you, go and talk with God, tell him all the secret Thoughts of your Heart on this occasion: Exurge in occursum meum & vide, tu domine Deus Virtutum. I confess, O my Lord, that the Undertaking which you see disquiets me, when I look on it on each side, shows me nothing but ill Presages and Dangers of Ruin: would you please to look into it, you will own, that it stands in a sad condition, and that I am to be pitied.  
I neither can nor aught to forsake it; I have begun it in the view of Men and Angels, and both my Reputation and my Conscience are concerned in it; the Honour of your Name, to which I have consecrated my Blood and Life, the Good of my Neighbour, the Fidelity I own to many Persons of worth, who have built their Hopes upon my Word, would call for Vengeance against me, should I desist. All the indispensable Laws of Necessity bind me to a Perseverance, and to stand up with Courage against all Obstacles: but my best Helps fail me, my Money, my Credit, and Favour: those other Advantages, of which I had a prospect formerly, have also disappeared of late; and such as I may expect will come, approach with a very slow pace; the worst of it is, that in the mean while Time runs speedily on, so that through the Delays which Accidents cause, Death draws near and tells me, tho' all the rest should not be wanting, yet Time must fail me: I hear, methinks, its Voice every moment, like that of an Enemy at hand, threatening to destroy with myself all my Designs and Hopes, and lay us together in one Grave: What can I do in this Condition?  
You that Rule in Hearts, O my God, you that infuse into them whatsoever you please, whose Hands hold the Keys of every Treasure, and have Strength to stop the Current of Time, notwithstanding its violence, give me leave, O my Lord, to lift up my Eyes, and lay open my Sorrows to you; you cannot but see my Tears, but than you see my Sins withal, and yet your Mercy is not the less for that; if I be an Ingrateful Wretch, you are a GOD: it is none of my intent to demand Miracles of you, I only dare presume to pour out my Tears at your Feet, and tell you with trembling, poor Nothing as I am, that your Pity asks of you great matters for me, and that your powerful Hand can do all things.  
True it is, my dearest Lord, as you inwardly tell me, that perhaps the succeeding of this Enterprise may less conduce to the Good of my Neighbour, and the Honour of your Name, than my Patience and Resignation would do, whilst you suffer Misfortune and Death to overthrow all my Designs, and me to perish under the ruins of my Labours; or else should I live, and bear quietly the weight of my Ruin, perhaps it would prove more pleasing to you, than if I should pass my days in Happiness and Honour, by the lucky accomplishment of what you put into my Mind.  
It belongs to you, O my God, to determine which will please you best, who know how I shall appear before your Eyes in either Condition: but give me leave to say, that you who like to see this humble Resignation in the Souls you cherish and have chosen; do not condemn in them however the ardent Desires of effecting such Designs as they may hope will bring Glory to your Name.  
You are pleased when they say amorously and sincerely; I am ready for all, do your Will with me; my Religion and my Life are bend to adore the Decrees of your Wisdom; I adore them, and offer myself a Sacrifice to them, but, my God, view my Heart, and do not refuse to your Love the knowing my Inclinations, and the harkening after my Sighs.  
Well, my Divine Master, I look without Terror upon the Destruction you propose of my Designs and me; my whole Being adores your Providence, and answers, Non sicut ego Volo, sed sicut tu; but yet you forbidden me not the Freedom, no more than you did to Daniel, to discover my Desires to you, and to send out my Sighs in your presence. I am a Nothing, and less yet than so, but nevertheless, amidst this Nothingness, wherein it is my due to place myself: I have a Voice and Tears able to reach to the Sublimity where you are; I call then, and I weep, trusting that you cannot behold the Tears which flow from my Eyes, whichout having the Will to know their Meaning; Shall I tell it you, my God, I weep to obtain Comfort from you, for the weakest of all your Creatures, to obtain that your Power may be glorified by granting me the Helps necessary for the accomplishment of that Work on which your Inspiration and Grace have put me: I speak after the Example of Judith, whose Resignation and Humility hindered her not from expressing her Desires to you. Confirma me domine, & respice ad opera manuum mearum, ut hoc, quod Credens Cogitavi per te fieri posse perficiam.  
In short, the thing that would bring me an infinite deal of Comfort, were, That the Angels, after having seen my Heart's submission to your Orders, and been Witnesses that I am ready, like Abraham, to sacrifice to you what is most dear to me in the World, and give up to your Will all my Desires, though never so just and pleasing, might have Right to say the same of me, which they said to you heretofore, speaking of David, Desiderium animoe ejus tribuisti ei, & voluntate labiorum ejus non fraudasti eum.  
I must confess, O my God, that you have no need of me to honour you either on Earth or in Heaven, since you are able by a word speaking to produce millions of Angels and Seraphims, and millions of new Worlds, whereby you may receive more honour in one day than you can have from me during Eternity. I do own it, O Infinite Greatness, and yet you that know all things, O Adored Origin of all my Erterprises, and Eternal Centre of my Peace and Affections, you must needs know, that amongst the accidental Joys of the Future Life, the greatest, and those which will touch us the nearest, will be to see how our little Designs of this World here below, undertaken and happily accomplished through your Benediction, will prove an inexhaustible Spring, from whence you will derive all the Glory that we are obliged to wish you.  
Allow me then, O my God, to aspire after this Happiness, and to beg that you will crown my weak Endeavours with that Success, by which I may hope you will be eternally honoured: for, what is Time to me, or Eternity itself, unless I be something to you in it?    

MAXIM XXIV.  Veni, dilecte mi, Egrediamur in agrum, Commorremur in Villis. Cant. seven. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Where there is such a Love amongst Men, as that they cannot live with any ease asunder, nor enjoy themselves without a mutual communication of their Thoughts, it makes them usually call upon one another in these words; Come, let us leave the Town, and retire together into the Country.   

REFLECTIONS.  
When a Man is placed on the great Theatre of this World, by holding some honourable Employment in the Affairs of State, or in those of Justice, it is doubtless a Condition that affords some happy Moment's, tho' often but sad Days, and never fails to give occasions of vexation.  
After a Man has been sitting in some Court, toiled with a Business that has lasted seven or eight hours, his Body and his Mind quite spent with Weariness, when he returns home in hope of getting a little Quiet, what a thing it is for him to find waiting at his Gate a number of Supplicants, who follow him into his Hall, up to his Chamber, into his very Closet, begging a moment's audience, whilst at the same time his Heart begs of him a little Respite to breath in, and cannot obtain it? What a kind of Life is this? Is it not for a Man to be banished from himself in his own House, and to be divorced from all that is dear to him in the World?  
Observe, that besides ourselves there are three sorts of Persons which are no less dear to us, and stick as close to our Hearts as does our Life, I mean our Family, our intimate and faithful Friends, and above all, our God and Maker.  
To pass whole days then, far from these precious Shares of us; to see from morning to night only Strangers, Men troublesome, and whose Business it is to persecute and torment us; I say once more, what is it but a Real Banishment?  
And what Help is there for these Troubles? what Means is there to breath in quiet, at least for some little time, unless it be to take our flight, as Nature and Heaven has taught us to do, and to carry with us into some Country Solitude those inseparable Persons, whom our Heart is still calling for at every moment's absence? Veni dilecte mi, says the Wife to her Husband, the Son to his Father, says one true Friend to another, says the Understanding Man to himself, says the Devout Soul to its God; Veni dilecte mi, egrediamur in agrum Commorremur in Villis.  
It is in this Solitude where you truly enjoy your Family, and your Family enjoys you, where you have nothing to do more than to mind it, by which you give yourself the Satisfaction you own to your excellent good Nature: here it is where you find a renewing of your Life, with the possession of these beloved Persons, a Life that was lost before in a labyrinth of public affairs, where one meets with all manner of ways, except that of getting out of it, and with all manner of Persons, except those we care for: Vbi omnia nisi tu, sed quid omnia sine te?  
You will own, in this agreeable Retirement, the Truth of what a great Person of our Country said, who lived in this latter Age, That a Man whom Heaven has well allotted in Wife and Children, is in his own House, by the possession of them at the highest pitch of Honour that Ambition can aim at, and that no Employment can be more glorious and pleasing to him, than to rule there in sweet Peace, where he duly and perfectly loves, and is beloved.  
In this same Solitude it is, that you also truly enjoy your Friend; here his Time, his Life, and his Mind will be yours, as much as his own; here walking together in some solitary Grove, communicating your Thoughts, and entertaining one-another upon several Subjects, either of Morality, History, or Policy, when you find that your Conceptions make a pleasing Impression in your Friend, and that his Answers bring you a suitable Return, you will have cause to make to one-another the noted Compliment of those ancient Friends: Alter alteri, Theatrum sumus; I am your Theatre, and you are mine. To have your attention to what I say, and receive your sincere and undissembled Approbation, is an Honour more charming to me, than it would be to have the applause of Kings and Courts, or to be famed to after times by the Pens of the most celebrated Writers: Alter alteri, Theatrum sumus.  
The Delight you take in this kind is perfectly completed, when in conclusion of Serious Discourses you come to enjoy the Freedom of diverting one another by an easy communication proper for this purpose; than you let lose your Soul to all that is charming in Merriment and Jesting, and take the whole Pleasure that a familiarity of Hearts does usually beget.  
At such a time as this you will be ready to think of that fine Expression of Cicero used to his dearest Friend, Vnam tecum apricationem in Lucretino tuo sole malim, quam ista omnia Regna: I vow, my dear Atticus, that I would choose to possess one little Chamber near you, in your Country House, rather than all those Kingdoms, to which the great Leader of our Armies does aspire.  
In fine, O Christian, in this same Solitude it is, where you have the Pleasure perfectly to enjoy yourself, such a Pleasure as you are continually sighing after, during the Troubles and Toils of the Employments you are in; but be mindful, that the surest way to be right with yourself, is to be perfectly so with God: Veni dilecte mi, egrediamur in agrum, Commorremur in Villis.    

MAXIM XXV.  Donum & Pax est, electis ejus. Sap. iii. 

PARAPHRASE.  
Peace, the most precious Gift of the Holy Ghost, dwells in the Hearts and Houses of the Elect.   

REFLECTIONS.  
It will signify little to have Riches in your Family, if you want Peace in it: How many mighty and wealthy Houses do we see become the Horror and the Scandal both of Heaven and Earth, by their domestic Discords!  
Two unruly Horses put into a Boat, where there is a Company of Passengers. that fight and drown with themselves all these Persons, who go about to part them, is the true Figure of that Man and his Wife who are daily renewing of old Quarrels and Disputes, and flying to their Kindred and Friends with their Complaints; their Children dissatisfied both with Father and Mother, join in a Scandalous Faction, and do all they can to defame and ruin them; their Servants, ill exampled, carry abroad all the Reproaches they make one to another, and divulge them far and near, with the Disorders of their Master's and Mistress' Life, whether true or false: In fine, the Curses and Blasphemies which their Fury begets ringing continually in the Ears of their Neighbours, to show the deplorable Condition of their Temper and Affairs, are to be reckoned as so many Tempests, that come from Heaven with its Malediction, ready to make the Earth open under their Feet, and swallow them up with their Unhappy Family, in which, according to St. Gregory, the Fire of Hell is already kindled, for a beginning of their Damnation, which is to end in everlasting Despairs.  
Get you Peace within your Doors; to effect which, follow the Counsel of that old Philosopher, who seeing a Man transported with Fury, asked him, what it was gave him that high Displeasure, and at whom he was so angry: At my Shadow, answered this furious Man, I run after it as fast as I can, to stop it; I call, and threaten it with Oaths, and with my Sword, and use all ways to bring it to my Will, but to no purpose, which makes me mad. What would you have with it? I would have it, says he, stand still, and not move. Stand you still yourself, replied the Philosopher, and make no manner of motion, do not you stir, and you will see it will obey you presently, and keep itself in the posture you would have it. What would you be at, added he? You call to your Shadow to be wise, and at the same time you play the Fool, and forget that this Shadow is not to be ruled by your Words, but your Example.  
Do as I have said; get Peace into your Family, seek to lodge it there from the beginning, by taking a due Authority upon you, which is not to be done by entering into it with Heats and Fury, so to show that your Temper will exempt no Body from its Severity; this would be to declare, that you would have your Shadow, that is, the People under your Obedience, be as mad as yourself, and to make the turbulence of your Spirit shake the whole Frame of your House, and turn every thing in it the wrong side upwards: where a Madman governs, there will not be any thing seen but Folly and Madness in that Family.  
To take a true possession of your Authority, says St. Gregory, you must make it appear by your Words, and by the Temper of your Mind, which you set before the Eyes of your Domestics, that you love your own Duty, and that you would have those that live under you like their Duty also after your Example, and apply themselves to it, not by chiding and noises, but as their pleasures and content.  
To succeed in this, the whole Point lies, according to the Opinion of that holy Doctor, in making yourself to be both feared and loved by your Family: Make yourself, says he, to be feared, without bringing forth one word of heat and inconsiderate rashness: make yourself to be loved, without using any unfitting Compliances and Familiarities, and least of all such Fondnesses, as will sooner gain you Contempt than win you Hearts: In the presence of your Servants and Children there should not be too great a freedom of Words, rather a Reserve, but let the Air of your Face show all the Sweetness and Humanity imaginable, accompanied with a certain Gracefulness able to beget in those you govern a high opinion of your Virtue, and a respectful and true love for your Person, joined to an earnest desire to please you.  
Fellow herein the Rules of Wisdom, and not the Example of some Masters, who indeed use not any words, but yet by their angry Silence and cursed suspicious Looks do accuse the first they meet with, and distaste every one that comes near them, causing this way more noise and disorder in a Family, than others do by letting lose the Reins to the violence of their Choler.  
The most beneficial matter that I can propose here to you, is to place often before your Thoughts the Picture of that happy Family, which the Prophet David has drawn, ranked about a Table at the time of their Repast, with a Decency, that the Angels seem to invite one another to behold and admire: This Family is composed posed of a Master who has no other design in his governing, but to please God; of a Mistress that has no other aim in this low World, but to be pleasing to her Husband, and to see her Children grow up in Grace and Wisdom; of Children, that have in a manner but one Heart, Nature and Education having begot this conformity amongst them, which does happily increase with their Age. In this Piece is seen besides Peace, Piety, Prosperity, and Abundance crowning this Family in this Life, and God beholding it, with expectation to receive it into another Life infinitely more happy, which he has prepared for it. Donum & Pax est electis ejus. Ecce sic benedicitur homo qui timet Dominum.    
FINIS.   

A TABLE OF THE TEXTS of SOLOMON, On which the foregoing Reflections are grounded.  

A Preliminary Maxi. FAciendi plures libros nullus est Finis: finem loquendi pariter omnes audiamus. Eccl. xii. 12. Pag. 1  
Maxim I. Optavi & datus est mihi sensus: Invocavi & venit in me spiritus sapientiae. Venerunt autem mihi Omnia bona cum illa. Sap. 7. p. 9  
Maxim II. Stultus illudet peccatum: & inter Justos morabitur gratia. Prov. 14. p. 19  
Maxim III. Donec Aspiret dies, & inclinentur Umbrae Vadam ad Montem Myrrhae & ad Collem thuris. Cant. iv. p. 29  
Maxim IV. Vadam ad Collem thuris. Cant. iv. p. 38  
Maxim V Generositatem illius Glorificat, Contubernium habens Dei. Sap. viij. p. 43  
Maxim VI Fons vitae, Eruditio Possidentis. Prov. xuj. p. 58  
Maxim VII. Dedit illi Sapientiam Sanctorum honest avit illum in laboribus. Sap. x. p. 66  
Maxim VIII. Mundum tradidit disputationi eorum, ut non inveniat homo, opus quod operatus est Deus ab initio usque ad finem. p. 76  
Maxim IX. Curam habe De bono Nomine: hoc enim permanebit magis tibi, quam Mille thesauri pretiosi, & magni. Eccles. xli. p. 84  
Maxim X. Coacervavi mihi argentum & aurum substantias Regum ac Provinciarum: omnia quae desideraverunt oculi mei, non Negavi iis: & Vidi in Omnibus vanitatem & Afflictionem animi. Eccl. two. p. 93  
Maxim XI. Mendicitatem & Divitias ne dederis mihi. Prov. xxx. p. 100  
Maxim XII. Magnificavi opera mea Aedificavi mihi domos: Supergressus sum Opibus Omnes qui ante me fuerunt. Eccl. two. p. 109  
Maxim XIII. Vidi Servos in equis, & Principes ambulantes Super terram, quasi servos. Eccles. x. p. 116  
Maxim XIV. Unusquisque in arte sua, sapiens est. Eccl. xxxviii. p. 122  
Maxim XV. Multi Amici sint tibi, & Consiliarius sit tibi unus de Mille. Eccl. vi. p. 129  
Maxim XVI. Facta sum Coram eo, quasi pacem reperiens. Cant. viij. p. 137  
Maxim XVII. Mulierem fortem quis inveniet? procul & de ultimis finibus terrae pretium ejus. Prov. xxxi. p. 148  
Maxim XVIII. Salus animae melior est omni auro & argento; & Corpus Validum quam Census immensus. Eccles. xxx. p. 159  
Maxim XIX. Utere quasi homo frugi his quae tibi apponuntur. Eccl. xxxi. p. 165  
Maxim XX. Si dormieris non timebis; quiesces, & suavis erit, somnus tuus. Prov. iii. p. 169  
Maxim XXI. Non habet amaritudinem Conversatio illius, nec taedium Convictus illius. Sap. viij. p. 181  
Maxim XXII. Proposui hunc adducere mecum ad convivendum, Sciens quoniam mecum Communicabit de bonis. Sap. viij. p. 193  
Maxim XXIII. Erit allocutio Cogitationis meae, & taedii mei. Sap. viij. p. 199  
Maxim XXIV. Veni dilecte mi, Egrediamur in agrum, Commorremur in Villis. Cant. seven. p. 207  
Maxim XXV. Donum & Pax est, electis ejus. Sap. iii. p. 213