A Consolatory DISCOURSE To prevent Immoderate GRIEF For the Death of our FRIENDS.  
LONDON, Printed by R.W. for Francis Titan at the three Daggers in Fleetstreet near the Inner Temple gate, 1671.   

A Consolatory Discourse to prevent Immoderate Grief for the Death of our Friends.  

SECT. I. Wherein is shown the need of a Consolatory Discourse against the lost of our friends.  

The need of this discourse.  IT is left upon record by St. Hierom concerning Paulina, that though she was a Lady, whose passions were under admirable government in other things, yet when any of her children died, she was oppressed with so great a sorrow, that he had much ado to save her from being drowned in the floods of it. But it is not so great a wonder that a person of the tenderer sex should feel such a tempest, as that David a man of war, who had overcome so many enemies, should himself be overcome with grief for a disobedient son. It is said that a Lacedaemonian woman having sent five sons to a battle, stood at the Gates of Sparta to expect the event: and when she met one coming from the Camp, she asked him what was done. All thy five sons (said the man) are slain. Away thou fool (answered she again) I enquired not of this, but of the issue of the fight. When he told her that her Countrymen had got the better; then farewell my sons (said she) and let us rejoice that Sparta is saved. But David it seems had not attained to this feminine courage, 
2 Sam. 18.24.  for he sat between the gates waiting for news of the success, and when he heard of the loss but of one son, and he a Traitor to his Country, he could not contain himself till he came into the house, but went up to the chamber over the gate to lament his son, 
V 33.  as though he had lost the day by losing him. Nay he could not refrain so long till he came into the chamber, but he watered the stairs with his tears, and wept as he went up, saying; O my son Absalon, my son, my son Absalon, Would God I had died for thee, O Absalon my son, my son.  
This lamentation of his cannot but call to mind the tears which Achilles, another great warrior, shed over the grave of his friend Patroclus, where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, (as Homer speaks) he wept most horribly, as if he would have killed himself.  
This love is such a powerful thing, that if it hath placed any object in our heart, we can scarce suffer it to be taken from us, without rending and tearing our hearts in pieces. Such a strange union doth it make between two persons, that we can scarce give that man any welcome that brings us the news of a separation. And therefore some of the ancient Carthaginians (as I remember) knowing how hard it is to love those who bring us the tidings of the death of them that we love, would never send such a message but by the hand of some condemned man, whom they were never like to see again. I am ready here to interrupt my discourse, and in the very beginning to fall into a passion with myself, when I think how patiently we can suffer our souls to be divided from God whom we pretend to love. O Love! how great things should we do if we did but Love! how angry should we be at the temptation which would draw him from us whom our souls Love!  
Antonius Guevara had a Niece who was so passionately in love with a little Bitch, that at the death of it she fell into a Fever, 
Fpist. ad famil. pars 21.  and was fain to keep her bed. The good man did well rather to chide, than to comfort her, and to write a satire, rather than a consolatory letter to her: but yet in that strange passion of hers, we may clearly see how incident it is unto us to take heavily the loss of what we love.  
Now there is no greater love than that which is between near kindred and friends, and no man that knows the pleasure of it, would dissuade any from such love, and yet it is necessary that we should not mourn for them as if we loved nothing else; which will render it perhaps an acceptable piece of service unto some, if I endeavour to ease them of this kind of sorrow; and though I have touched but lightly upon other maladies (in the foregoing Treatise) yet I apply some particular plasters to this great and general sore.   

SECT. 2. Wherein is shown that we may grant nature leave to ease itself by moderate tears; and two Advices are given to keep us from making an ill use of this Grant.  

We may mourn moderately.  YOu must not think that it is in my design to take away your trouble, by taking you off from all love and friendship; for that would be as ridiculous as the device to cure drunkenness by cutting up all the Vines. I would not have a man to love none but himself, out of a fear that he should be troubled at the loss of them, as much as at the loss of himself. This would be to cure one evil by a greater, and to ease men of a short trouble, by letting them want the constant easement and sweetest comfort of our lives, which is our friends. Neither do I intent to write like a Stoic, and stupefy all your passions, so that you should not mourn at all, for that is an impossible thing, if we have any love. Grace doth not root out nature, nor quite dry up all our tears; but it rather makes our hearts more moist and tender, and causes it to express itself in a becoming affection unto others; as David and that Lady may teach us. They are sturdy, not generous, that are void of all grief: they are rather hard than constant, rather unexperienced than reasonable, that forbidden all sadness. But it is my design to bring you to a moderation both in love and in sorrow, that you may do as much as becomes good friends, but no more than becomes good men. Not to be sensible of evils, is not to be men; not to bear them patiently, is not to be Christians. It is neither to be hoped nor to be desired that we should shed no tears at all; but it is both necessary and attainable, that we should let them flow In measures Lacrymandum est, 
Sencea Epist. 63  sed non plorandum. We may weep, but we must not mail and lament. We must be natural, but we must be also reasonable: We must approve ourselves both to men and unto God; that they may see we are loving friends, and that he may see, we are his dutiful children. Est enim quaedam & dolendi modestia. For there is a dertain modesty even in mourning, and it is as unseemly to weep immoderately, as it is not to weep at all.  
And let none think that by this concession unto nature and decency, the wound will be made incurable; and that it is easter not to mourn at all, than to mourn moderately. These are but the dreams of heavy souls; that think that none can stand still, but they that are resolved never to stir. It is said indeed, that we may more easily abstain from a thing of which we never tasted, than refrain from it after a little acquaintance. But this must be understood of pleasure, and not of grief; When we have mourned a little, we shall soon see that there is neither pleasure nor profit in our mourning. Or if any one shall think it to be some pleasure, yet it will notwithstanding be easily moderated; because it is only the pleasure of being eased of our loads that oppressed us, not of being satisfied with the pressure of any delightful object. It is but the letting out of sadness, not the bringing in of any pleasure; and therefore when the heart is once eased of its burden, it will soon be persuaded to mourn no more; for that will be the bringing upon us a new burden.  
But then on the other side, as we may grant something unto nature, so we must be sure not to let it work alone. That we may weep moderately, it will be necessary to make resistance to our sorrows, and muster up all the consolatory arguments that are reposited in our minds. Nature will do its part without our help. We need not study how to weep enough, nor use any arguments to persuade ourselves into tears. It is a superfluous employment to strive to magnify our loss; for Fancy is apt to make it bigger than it is. It is a foolish trouble to be careful how to mourn, for tears will flow from us without any bidding. All our work must be to stop their passage as fast as we can, and to make them flow leisurely, not gush forth with too great a violence. Our Reason and Religion must be called up in all haste, to make as strong a dam as we are able to our sorrow, or else if it have its course, it may overflow us.  
He is a base Pilot that leaves his tackling in a storm, and suffers his ship to run along with the tempest; and no less ignoble and abject is his spirit, that permits himself to the gusts and Haericans of his own passions, and lets them drive him whither they, and not whither he himself pleases. But it is a degree of madness to use reason itself to make the blasts more terrible, and when the storm is too furious, by art and skill to conjure up more boisterous passions. Who would pity him that sets his reason against himself, and studies how to be as miserable as his mind can make him? We need not be so in love with grief, as to create it to ourselves. Nature as I said, knows how to mourn without our teaching. We had need think rather how to bear our natural troubles, than how to lay more upon our shoulders.  
But if we will make any opposition, we must begin before our passions are too strong. They are too powerful of themselves, and we must not let them gather more strength by our negligence. If we do not at the very first set ourselves in a posture of defence against them, they will seize upon our whole soul, and get every thing into their possession. As soon therefore as our grief stirs, we must strive to comfort ourselves, and not either help forward or suffer our grief. If we go and bewail our friends as much as we can, and think to cheer our souls afterward; we shall soon find that our souls are drowned with a flood, and that it will be a long time before it be soaked up. When we give the least leave to these passions, they will ask no leave of us afterward; but the soul will mourn like Rachel, and refuse to be comforted. As soon therefore as thou hearest of the death of thy friends, do not spend the time in bemoaning thyself, saying, Alas! what a friend have I lost! did ever any man part with such a person? where shall I find one comparable to him in wisdom, in love, in faithfulness, in all manner of sufficiencies to make a friend? Do not, I say, after this sort stand to aggravate thy grief; but instantly say, Why should a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins? why should I trouble and torment myself with my own thoughts; why should wind and tide run together? how many reasons have I to be contented? and spread them all before thine eyes, that they may dry up thy tears and cease thy sorrow. Labour, at least, that these thoughts may tread upon the heels of the other: and, as soon as may be, overake them, and get the mastery of them. And so doing, thou wilt weep as much as is fit, but no more than thou oughtest. Nature will be satisfied, and thou thyself not ashamed. None will think that thou art not grieved, and thou wilt feel that thy heart is comforted.   

SECT. III. Which shows rather what might be said, than what is said in this present Treatise for moderating our sorrow. But yet those examples which we have from others may move us to follow their rules, and so a brief touch is made upon them.  

The best and wisest persons have not mourned much.  BUt what comforts are these (may some say) which you bring us? with what reasons will you assist us?  
I suppose it will be of no great effect to answer, that the wisest persons have made their mourning short, and moderate; because I have already named two both good and wise that were excessive. And therefore I must endeavour to make men throughly wise, and furnish them with such reasons as will not suffer them to be oppressed with their sorrows. Yet me thinks it is observable, that the Egyptians mourned ten times as long as the children of Israel. Seven days ordinarily contented the people of God for their grief, (as you may see, Eccles. 22.12. Job 2.13.) whereas they that were strangers to the God of Israel, extended their mourning seventy days, as you may read, Gen. 50.3. yea the greatest mourning that the Israelites used for their two famous leaders, 
Numb. 20.29. Deut. 34.8.  Moses and Aaron, was prolonged but to thirty days, which is not half the time that those Heathens allowed. I think not fit neither to pass by the shortness of Abraham's grief for his dearest wife Sarah, who died as some of the Jews conjecture, for very grief when he was at Mount Moriah, thinking that her son was offered. This they gather from that expression, Gen. 23.2. Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her. From whence it was that he came I have nothing to affirm, yet this note of theirs is considerable, that in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 [to weep for her] there is a small Caph in the middle of great letters, 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  which may very well show they think, that his weeping was little and moderate, and not of the greatest size. That expression is likewise taken notice of by some, which follows in the next verse, He stood up from before his dead, as if it signified, that he turned his dyes from her, that so he might not be overcome with grief. We must not love to look on our losses; nor think that it becomes us to weep as long as we can. But we should learn by the manners of God's people, to do all we can to make our mourning short. Yea I might teach you from Heathens themselves, if examples would do us any good. 
Plutarch. in Lycurg.  Lycurgus' ordained that none should weep above eleven days, and that they should make no Funeral solemnities. 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plut. in Solone.  Solon likewise took them away, that so he might ease men of those howl and lamentations, which they use to make at their friend's Interment. Augustus as Seneca observes, though he lost all his children and Nephews, and was fain to adopt an heir, yet he was so little moved at their death, that he constantly went to the Senate, and neglected no Public affairs. Pericles likewise having lost two sons of great hope, within the compass of eight days, put on notwithstanding a white garment, and with a great constancy of mind went to deliberate about the necessities of the Commonwealth.  
All stories are full of such great souls, that after they had conquered others, at last conquered themselves also. I know it will cure no man to tell him that his neighbour was cured, yet these examples do commend to us the remedies which they used, and give us hopes that our griefs are not incurable.   

SECT. iv Which teaches us to consider what death is: First, Common; Secondly, Necessary; Thirdly, Good. And if we thought more of it, we should not be unwilling to part, neither doth the manner of parting make any considerable difference.  

What it is that must ease us.  THE cure of this distemper doth lie chief in a fullness of considerations, wherewithal our minds must be stored. Nothing can resist grief but a great mind; no mind can be great that is not big with truth; nothing can impregnate us with truth but serious advice and consideration in ourselves; and therefore we must provide ourselves with sufficient Antidotes that may be ready at hand when we have need of them. Our souls must be as an Apothecary, and our hearts must be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, or shop where all medicines are in a readiness against any grief or malady that shall invade us. If we have our remedies to gather, and to compound when our sickness comes, the mind will be so weak that it will not be able to make them. We have least power to consider when we are full of sorrow; our affections are ready to overly our reasons, and therefore we must have our medicines made before, that then we may have nothing else to do, but only to take them. And we shall find that to have so much labour in it (our stomaches being squeamish and nauseating) that we shall clearly see we need have nothing else to do.  

I. The first means is to consider what it is that we lament.  First then, Let us seriously consider, What is it that we grieve for? It is soon answered, that we mourn for the Death of those that we love. For their Death? What is that I beseech you? Is death such a strange and unusual thing that we should take it heavily? Are your friends the first that ever died? Are you the only persons that God hath singled out to be left alone? Do you not see that every thing in the world can cause death? 
Death is an usual thing.  The wind, the lightning, the fire, the smoke, the dust of the earth, the water, our meat and drink, our own passions, our joy, our sorrow, and a thousand other things can bring us to our graves. Why then should it be lamented, as if it were some wonder at which all the world should be astonished? Men fill the air with sighs, they beat the Heavens with their groans, they cloth themselves with darkness, and they pour out floods as in a tempest. Why what is the matter? Is the Sun fallen from its Orb? are all the lights of Heaven extinguished? are they carrying out the world's funeral? What is it then that causes this moan? A friend is dead. There is one man less in the world than there was. O wonderful! what a prodigy is this! One that was born to die, is dead! It had been a wonder indeed, if he had not died. Then we might have filled the earth with noises. Then there had been some cause for a tumult. But now it is rather a wonder that men should make such a stir at an ordinary and common thing, than that a thing so common should happen unto them. One would rather look to see no tears, than no death; and we might more easily excuse their not weeping at all, than we can these doleful lamentations.  

Death is necessary.  Is it not necessary that our friends should die? yea, it is so necessary, that it is a thing past, and cannot be recalled, when men weep most for it. If you can bring them back again with your tears, if there be any hopes that with the noise you make they should revive to comfort you; than you have leave to weep as much as you please. Is there any Elijah or Elisha that can stretch forth themselves upon them, and recover them to their warmth? Is there any Paul or Peter, or such great men that can raise them from the dead? Go then, and entreat them for to pity you. Beat your breasts, tear your hair, break your sleep with sorrow, macerate yourselves with fasting, that they may take some compassion upon you. But if all this pains be lost, never put yourselves into it; but say, Why should I have my labour for my pains? And did not all those men die again that they raised? Were they made immortal here upon the earth? what good would it do you to have them called to life again, if they must again die? How would you be able to part with them than if not now? What an uncomfortable life would you lead out of fear every day to fall into the same sadness? How desolate would you be even in their company, unless you learned not to be troubled nor distracted? And if that must be learned, then let us learn it now when it is as necessary as it would be then. Do you take it ill that the Apple rots, and your trees decay, and your  grow bear, and that any thing in this world is according to its nature? Why then do you bewail it with such passion that men die, which is as natural to them as it is to be born? Would you have God make the world anew for your sakes? will you not be contented unless he make a mortal thing immortal? Is it not sufficient that you know it must die, and that he gave it to you that it may be returned to him again? Did he ever promise you how long you should have it? may he not call for his own when he thinks good? do not other men pay this debt to nature as well as you?  
Seeing then it is both a common and a necessary debt, do not repine as if you did only pay it. He is an unworthy debtor, that returns what is lent with a reproach to his creditor. And therefore give it up cheerfully, perhaps he may intrust you with something better. While David saw that his child was alive, 
2 Sam. 12.  he earnestly besought of God that it might not die; but when once it had given up the ghost, he anoints his head, and puts on other garments, because he knew God was not bound to work a miracle, though he might be inclined to show mercy. While there was life, there was some hope of mercy: but when it was dead, there was no hope of a miracle.  
And yet there is one thing that may be pertinently observed in that story of David, which exceedingly argues our folly. Though God had said by a Prophet, that his child should die, yet he earnestly begged that it might live. Men are not so earnest for that which they may be assured God will do if it concern their souls, as they are for that which they have all reason to fear he will not do if it concern their bodies. Men would have him recall his word, and alter his decrees in temporal matters; but they little mind the obtaining of his promises, and the fulfilling of his Word in spiritual concernments. They would have life as long as they please, which they know he will not bestow, but they seek not for contentment which they may be assured he hath a mind to give. They would have him willing to let them enjoy their friends always, which cannot be, but they seek not to him, that they may be willing to part with them, though they must part with them, and he would make them willing.  

Death is not only necessary but good.  For shame let us not continue in this kind of folly, to be angry at things necessary which we cannot avoid, and to neglect those necessaries which we cannot want.  
And since death is such a common thing, and so easy to be met with, that every thing in the world may bring it to us; let us further consider, that it cannot be very hurtful in itself, for all such things are more unusual and rare. God is not so unkind unto the world as to let the most noxious and poisonous things grow every where in the greatest plenty. Things of that nature are but thinly scattered through the world; they lie hid, and dare not commonly appear. Since death therefore is in every thing, since it lurks not for us like a Serpent in the grass, but the smallest thing in this world may strike us with it; let us verily persuade ourselves, that there is no such great harm in it as we imagine; especially considering that there is another life.  
I am sure that some as wise as we that mourn so much, have thought that death was the best thing that befalls the sons of men: And if we do not think so, it is because we think not of death itself. It is a common story which Pindar was first Author of, how that Agamedes and Trophonius, 
Plutarch. ad Apollon.  having built the Temple of Apollo, asked a reward of that God for their service. He promised that after seven days he would pay them well for their pains; at the end of which they both died in the midst of a sleep. This the world believed was a lesson to them, that God could do men no greater favour than to take them out of the miseries of life. Not long after this Pindar himself exemplified the same truth that he had taught. For when by the Ambassadors of Boeotia, he asked the Oracle, What was the very best thing that could befall men? The answer was, that Pindar knew well enough, 
V etiam Suidam in voc. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  if he did not lie when he wrote the story of Agamedes: but if he doubted, he should shortly know what it was. This he intrepreted to signify his death, which within a few days after happened.  
But perhaps we are not of this mind, and I need not go to an Oracle to know the reason, which is plainly this; We are acquainted with no other life but this. If the world had not so much of our hearts, we should not find any fault with the necessity of death, because it would become desirable. We should not then be so sorry for our friend's departure, as for our own stay. We should be glad that neither they nor we were necessitated to dwell there always, where there are so many troubles, that he is happiest who is soon freed from them.  
But there were many that thought not much of the goodness of death, who yet were comforted with the bare thoughts of necessity. How many Heathens might I tell you of who fled to this one truth for refuge, and found protection under it against the assaults of sorrow? Nothing is happened to me, but what happeneth to all. The first minute that we began to live, we began to die. This is not the first, but the last moment of death. It is now finished, but it was born when we were born.  
When one came and told Anaxagoras in the midst of a lecture that his child was dead, Hold thy peace, said he, I knew that I begat a son that was mortal, and so proceeded in his Discourse without any accents of grief, or a mournful tone. And so another said to his friend when he saw him weeping for his wife; I thought you had known that you married a woman and not a goddess. Do but remember then what the thing is that thou lovest, and thou must be willing either to leave, or not to love it. As they used to stand behind them that triumphed, and to admonish them, You are but mortal men; so let us say to ourselves when Love is in its greatest flames, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, 
Arrian. l. 3. cap. 24.  I love a dying person. What hurt is there while we embrace and kiss a child, to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, to morrow it may die? and so to discourse with our friends: To morrow either you or I may go away, 
To think of their death, doth not make our lives uncomfortable.  and never thus embrace any more. Doth it make our love the less? doth it make us avoid their presence? No, therefore we are so greedy of our friend's society, because we know not how long we may enjoy them. It makes love more fervently desirous to have all of them now, because it knows that it may have none of them ere it be long. It teaches us to use their friendship to the best advantages we can, because we are not like to have the use of it as long as we please. The knowledge of our departure, doth not part friends now, but makes them cleave the closer until they depart. Let us be willing they should die, and that will not abate of our love; for we cannot be willing until we have loved them as much as we can. We shall be loath they should go without the best testimonies of our love, and that will make us only improve our time to have the benefit of them, and they of us. Seneca tells in one of his Letters, 
Epist. 63.  that he who gave a great deal of good counsel to others not to grieve, was himself almost made an example of one overcome with grief. But the truth of it is (saith he) there was no other cause of that mourning which I must now condemn, but only this, I did not use to think that my friend might die before me. I only had in my mind that he was younger, much younger than myself; whereas I ought to have added, What is this to the purpose? Though he ought (I imagine) to die after me, yet he may die before me. Because I did not thus meditate, I received a stroke when I was unarmed, which went to my heart. But now I think both that all things are mortal, and that there is no certain order of mortality. That which may be at all, may be to day. And if you think that your friend may die to day, then why do you not begin to mourn, since his death is at hand, unless you mean to take it patiently when it comes? If you will lament the death of your friends so sadly, why do you not prepare your lamentations, seeing death may be so near? If you think it is not so near, than it is likely your sorrow will be violent when it comes, because sudden: If you think it is, and yet do not mourn, then why should you lament that so sadly at night, which you did not weep for at all, at noon? There were some creatures they say in Pontus, 
Plutarch.  whose life lasted but one day; They were born in the morning, and came to their full growth at noon, and grew old in the evening, and at night died. If these animals had been masters of the reason that we have, would they have lamented after our fashion? would they have mourned for one that chanced to die at noon, when as it could not live longer than night? No, that which is necessary, it is no great matter when it comes. And because we are of a longer life, our trouble at death is not to be the greater, but the less; For it is a greater wonder that we did not die many days ago, than that we die to day.  

The kind of death is not so considerable as death itself.  But some will say, that it is not death itself, but the kind of death that so troubles them. They could have been contented, if he had gone out of the world another way. But I beseech you, do you know what will please yourselves? Can you tell what sort of death it is that would content you? are there any that do not blame their hard fortune, and wail and mourn as if none were so miserable? are not men equally troubled if one die of a , and another of a Consumption, if their love be equal? It is very plain, that he that persuades himself to part with his friends, will not grieve for the manner of the parting. He that can overcome himself in the greater cause of grief, will not suffer the less so easily to overcome him. And therefore you see that men have always something to find fault withal. If a friend die in a far Country, than they say, Alas! that we should not see him before he died! how sad is it that we should not take our leave? If he die at home; then they say, who could endure to hear his groans? how sad was it to see him in the agonies of death? If he die and speak nothing, than they say, O if he might but have told us his mind, if he had left us any remembrances, it would have been some comfort. If he did speak, than they tell his speeches to every one, and say, O my sweet child, or friend, I shall never forget thy words. Would you have me put out of my mind his dying speeches? and so those say are a perpetual nourishment and food to their grief. If he die on a sudden, than they lament, because he was snatched, rather than went away. If he die of a lingering sickness, than they say he was nothing but skin and bone, a mere Anatomy; never any creature endured so much as he did. And so they complain they know not for what, for they would not have had him gone away so soon, but spun out his life, till he looked more ruefully. And indeed men never want some pretences for these complaints; but the true reason is, that they would not have had their Friends to die at all. In what glass soever this potion had been presented, they would have swallowed it with the same disgust. And I must confess it is very bitter, yet we should not study to make it worse than it is: but by digesting such considerations as these, receive it with a better countenance and take it down more easily. For which end let us proceed further and weigh what follows.   

SECT. V Which contains comforts against the loss of Children, Parents, Consorts, Friends, upon a due consideration what every one of them is.  

We must consider who the persons are that die.  LEt us consider well who it is for whom we make our lamentations. Who is it I say, that death hath taken away from us? Perhaps it is an Infant, a poor little weakling newly crept into the light. And this hath the least of wonder in it of all other things, that such a little spark of life should be blown out. 
Comforts against the loss of children.  A greater wonder it is that it was not strangled in the gate of the womb. A little while ago it had no life, and it is now but as it then was. We were once content without it; why cannot we be content without it now; It never loved us, nor was capable to show any affection to us, and therefore we may the better part with it. It was scarce tied to our heart, and therefore it need not make the strings crack. It was not unwilling to go out of the world, and if it had lived longer, death would have been more against its will. It hath lost no great matter, for it knew not the benefits of life. It hath cost us nothing, or we have been but at a small charge about it, and therefore our loss is not so great neither, as we make it. If it could have known the miseries of living, and it had been put to its choice, very likely it would not have chosen to live, but to be what now it is. It hath not blotted its soul by any sin, nor deflowered the Virgin purity wherein it was born. If it have any thing to complain of, it is only this, that it was born. And therefore let us be content; for it is better perhaps for it, and not much the worse for us. If we weep so much for an Infant, what shall we do for a man? Either let us now let down the sluice, or else expect that we shall then be drowned. If he had lived to be a man, it might have done as we do, miserably bewail the death of its children. And therefore either let us not thus bewail it; or else think it happy, that it lived not to be so miserable as we think ourselves: 
Unreasonable to mourn for one when we have more.  and both ways our grief will be cured.  
But suppose it be a child of a larger growth, whose death extorts these tears from us. Yet it is but one, and we may have many more remaining. Shall we lose all the content of a great many, because we suffer the want of one? If the life of this one would have pleased us so much, then how joyful should we be in the life of four or five? If it be such a grief to lose a child, then let us be thankful that we lie not under the miserable grief of losing them all. But if we cannot take this patiently, than I doubt we shall run mad with impatience, if God should take them all away. We must learn to part with more, by parting willingly with this one; for all must die too. Can he bear a stone weight, who cannot endure the load of one pound? and yet how justly may we fear that all the rest should shortly follow, seeing we fret so much at God's hand in this? Suppose that this was the most goodly child, yet not fairer sure than all the rest put together. Or if he was most beautiful, yet some of the others may be more wise. If this had all our love, than we may learn now how to divide our love equally, and take pleasure in loving more. If he loved us most, than he would have wished us (if he had thought of it) not to make ourselves miserable by mourning for him. 
Dion Chryst. Orat 30.  So Charidemus said to his friends when he was a dying; It is God's will that I should die, and there can nothing that is hurtful come from him, I am very willing to die, and I beseech you believe me in what I say, for I have a greater care to speak truth now, than any of you can have. Grieve not for me, for I grieve not; do not make yourselves miserable, for I think not myself to be so. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, As much as ever you are able refrain from all sadness, for no sad thing hath befallen me. Thus we should say to our friends, if we love them; and therefore their love to us should not make us sad, because they would have all they love to be cheerful. If they could tell us their mind, they would certainly bid us cease our mourning; and therefore let us end it of our own accord. Let there be such an harmony still between us in our wills and desires, that we may not be wailing and lamenting, when they are wishing we may be comforted.  

Or when we may have more.  But let it be supposed that it is an only child; yet are there not many hopes that you may have more? who gave you this? cannot he give you another? hath not he that hath the keys of the grave, the keys of the womb also? If one die, then as long as the world lasts, another shall be born. And if we desire children for the good of the world, than so they be born, it is no matter by whom. But if for our sake, than we may have them as well as others; though perpetual grief and sadness, you may be sure is not the way to procure them. Or if God will give us none, than we may adopt one. Any child will love us, as if it was our own, if it know not that it is any bodies else. Nay, any one will love and serve us for what we have, and instead of one, we shall have many that will thank us (more than he perhaps) to be our heirs: but if we have nothing, then why should we desire children for to leave them miserable? but as I said, why should we not hope for more, and those better than him we lost? with this hope David comforted Bathsheba his wife (2. Sam. 12.24) who bore a Jedidiah, a man beloved of the Lord. If we count it such a strange thing to die, than it should seem it is an ordinary thing to live, and so why should we not expect the new life of another? But if it be no strange thing to die, than (as I have said already) we may well be comforted. Or if we should have no more, yet this may be some comfort, that then we shall have no more to mourn thus sadly for. Yea, suppose thou art the last of thy family and name, (as was the great Scaliger, and Lipsius also another excellent Scholar) it is no great matter, seeing the world is not to last long. If thy name must have an end, what needest thou to trouble thyself when it ends? And if men can think it no harm to suffer their name to die of itself (as Scaliger did who would not marry) why shouldst thou be troubled if thine perish, after due care to preserve and uphold it?  

Or when it is uncertain whether they, or none at all be better.  But then if thou hadst never so many children, yet who knows how they may prove? If they should be bad, than thou thyself wilt say, that it had been better they had never been. They that thou mournest for, because they are dead, might have given thee greater cause of mourning if they had lived. If the death of a child be sad, his wickedness would have been far sadder; for that is a worse death. He that dies doth trouble his Parents but once; but he that is bad, is a perpetual torment to them. He that is dead, cannot indeed help his Parents, but then he doth not hurt them, as many a bad one doth. For those that are dead we only grieve, we do not fear; but for those that are bad we fear perpetually, and we grieve also: yea all the sorrow we now conceive at their death, will not equal perhaps the mere fear which we should have had from their infancy, lest their life should prove bad.  
It is said in the life of John the Patriarch of Alexandria, that a Merchant came to him to pray for a son of his that was at Sea, that he might be safe. Within a month the child died, and his ship likewise was cast away. And when he was much troubled at this double loss, he thought one night that he saw the Patriarch standing by his bed, and saying to him, Thou desiredst me to pray that thy son might be safe, and behold now he is safe, for he is dead. If he had lived wickedly in his future course, than he could not have been safe. And besides their badness, suppose our children should have died of some infamous and base death, this would have troubled us more than death itself. Yea, some there have been that have sought their Parent's death, and what a trouble would this have been? Some have slain their fathers, and others their mothers, and who was there left to mourn then? If you be affrighted at these strange supposals (which sometimes have had a real truth) yet consider once more, that if they had not been bad, notwithstanding who knows what miseries they might have endured, worse than death? Can you tell what misfortunes might have befallen them, which might have made them wish they had died sooner? They are now dead, perhaps they have that which afterward they might have desired, and not so easily obtained. For how many and frequent occasions are there of sorrow here? To find a life without Crosses, we must seek among them, that last but from morn to night. And so great are the troubles and anguish which some endure, that their life is nothing else but a long continued death. Which made one of the Gymnosophists answer Alexander when he asked whether death or life was stronger? Life sure, for that bears the most evils. And suppose he that is dead should not have been miserable; yet now he is gone, if he might rise again, it is likely he would not, lest he should know again the fear and the pains of dying.  
He is freed from the vanity and vexation of life, and from the terrors and agonies of death. He hath left the evils of this world, as well as the goods; and is out of a capacity of suffering, as well as of enjoying any thing here. This is one of the comforts I remember which that great Divine Greg. Nazianz. gives his Parents against the loss of his dear Brother Caesarius 
* Orat. 10. p. 172. edit. Paris.  We are sad to think, saith he, that Caesarius shall rule and govern no more: but let us consider withal that none shall hereafter domineer or tyrannize over him. None shall fear or stand in awe of him more: but he shall not fear neither the insolences of a grievous Master, who is not worthy, perhaps, to be a servant. He shall heap up no more riches: No, nor shall he be envied by others, or tormented by his own desires of increasing wealth. Hypocrates, Galen and all the rest he shall expound no more: but he shall not labour under diseases neither; no, nor bear the burden of other men's miseries. He shall demonstrate Euclid, Ptolemy, and Hero no more: but he shall not be vexed neither with the proud Ignorance of empty people. Plato and Aristotle and Pyrrho and all their fellows can do him no more credit: nor shall he cast in his mind how to dissolve their little subtleties. What shall I remember more? Those high prized things, which are so greedily sought by all, wife and children, he shall have none: nor shall he mourn for them, or be lamented by them; either by leaving them to others, or being left himself a monument of calamity.  
All this is true, may some say; my child is free from all the dangers and miseries of this life, but if you knew what a rare Creature it was that I have lost, you would allow my continued complaints. The Heir of an illustrious House; the prop of his Family, the Hope of his Country; the child of a thousand Prayers, and that in the Spring and flower of his Age. What heart of Adamant would not sympathise with one in this condition? 
Some letters of the Ancients on this subject.  I'll answer you in the words of a great Friend of the Father now mentioned; who is ready to comply, with your sorrows, if you will be but as forward to receive his consolations? I confess saith St. Basil (in a letter of his to Nectarius 
* Epist. 188.  on this subject) that it is impossible to be insensible of your loss. There was no body but wished, when he was alive, that they had such a Son: and when he was dead, they wept for him as if he had been their own. Nay, if we would complain and abandon ourselves to weeping for this accident, the whole time of our life is not long enough for it. If all mankind would groan with us, they could not make a lamentation equal to this loss: no, though they should make a River with their tears. The Sun himself, if he were sensible, would shrink at such a spectacle. But if we will let the gift of God, which he hath put into our hearts, interpose; that sober reason which sets a measure to our Souls in prosperity; it will suggest many things which we have seen and heard to moderate us in these sad circumstances. It will tell us that this life is full of affliction; and that all places abound with examples of humane calamities. But above all, that it is the command of God not to lament the dead in the Faith of Christ, because of the hope of the Resurrection: and that there are great crowns laid up for great patience. If we suffer Reason to sing these things in our ears, we may find some moderate end of this evil. And therefore I exhort thee as a generous Combatant to fortify thyself against the heaviness of this stroke, and not lie down under the weight of sorrow. Being persuaded, that though the reasons of God's dispensations are out of our reach, yet we ought entirely to accept that which is ordered by one so wise and loving: although it be heavy and grievous to be born. For he knows how to appoint to every one what is profitable, and why he hath set unequal terms to our life. The cause is incomprehensible by us, why some are carried away sooner, and others tarry longer in this toilsome and miserable life: so that we ought in all things to adore his loving kindness, and not to take any thing ill at his hands. Remembering the great and famous voice of Job, who when he heard that his ten children were all struck dead in one moment, said; The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so it is come to pass. Let us make this admirable language our own. They are rewarded with an equal recompense by the just judge, who perform the same worthy actions. We are not rob of a child, but only have restored him to the lender; nor is his life extinct, but only translated to a better. The earth doth not cover our beloved, but Heaven hath received him: let us tarry a while and we shall be in his company. The distance of time is but short between the arrival of several travellers to their Inn: into which some are already turned, others are entering, and the rest are making great haste toward it: but they shall all come to one end. For though some perform the journey sooner, yet all are in the same road, and the same lodging expects them all.  
Thus that Holy man comforted Nectarius; and when he had done, he wrote the like consolatory letter to his wife 
* Epist. 189. : which is so full of good counsels, that I shall transcribe some of it. Those things, saith he, which befell us are not without Providence, as the Gospel teaches us. For there is not a Sparrow that falls to the ground without the will of our Father. Why should we go about to resist his will; seeing by all our strife we cannot repair what is already done, but we may lose and ruin ourselves. Let us not condemn the just sentence of God. We are not wise enough to discern his secret judgements. Our Lord makes a trial of thee, how much thou lovest him. Now is the time by patience to take thy portion with the Martyrs. The Mother of the Maccabees saw seven of her children put to death, with miserable torments; and neither sighed, nor shed ignoble tears: But she gave God thanks, that she had any thing to offer to him. It is a great affliction I confess, but there is a great reward for the Patience. When thou wast made a Mother and broughtest forth a Son; thou gavest God thanks: but didst thou not think then that, being mortal thyself, thou broughtest forth a mortal child? What is there strange then in this, that he who was mortal, is now dead? He died, perhaps thou wilt say, before his time. How knowest thou that? He died in a very good time, for any thing thou canst tell; for it is beyond the compass of our understanding to choose that which is most profitable for souls; and set the bounds of humane life.  
Much more he adds to the same effect, which he repeats also in other Letters on the like occasion. 
* To Elpidius Epist. 348. and also 201.  But after this, which was last said, what need is there of any more? The most solid comforts are those which are derived from this humble submission to Almighty God; and entire resignation of ourselves to his incomprehensible wisdom. Concerning which a modern writer 
* Mouns. Malherbe.  hath spoken such excellent words, that I cannot forbear to translate them hither. Our lives, saith he, are not all alike: their length is measured by the will of him that giveth them. He gathereth the fruit while it is green; he stays till it be ripe; and He lets it hang till it be rotten: whatsoever he doth, we own this submission to our Creator, to believe he doth nothing unjustly. He doth no wrong, neither to them he takes away young; nor to them whom he suffers to grow old. But to ask why he doth things with such diversity, is to question that which we shall not be resolved of, till we come to a place where there is a greater light: Now we are in such a darkness as renders all our curiosities unprofitable. There are plummets to sound the deep abysses of the Sea, but none for God's secrets. Believe me, and put this trouble out of your mind; it cannot stay there without diminution to your honour; and which is more (I must add) without disrespect to God. We wonder perhaps (to use the words of one of our own Nation 
* Dr. Donne letter to a Lady in mourning. , which is no less fruitful of good discourses than any other) To see a man, who in a Wood were left at his liberty, to fallen what Trees he would, take only the crooked, and leave the straightest: But yet that man hath, perhaps, a ship to build and not an house, and so hath use of that kind of Timber. Let not us, who know that in our Father's house are many Mansions, but yet have no model or design of that Building, wonder at his taking in his Materials: why he takes the young and leaves the old, or why the sickly over-live them who had better health. Then is the Will of God done in Earth as it is in Heaven, when we neither pretermit his actions, nor resist them, nor yet pass them over in an inconsideration, as though God had no hand therein; nor go about to take them out of his hands, as though we could direct him to do them better.  
I shall conclude this, with some considerations of the same writer, in a letter to a Friend of his that had lost her son. We do but borrow children of God, to lend them to the world. And when I lend the world a Daughter in Marriage, or a Son in any profession; the world doth not always pay me well again: my hopes are not always answered in that Daughter, or that Son. Of all that I lend to, the Grave is my best paymaster. That shall restore me my child, where he and I shall have but one Father; and pay me my Earth, when that Earth shall be. Amber, a sweet perfume, in the nostrils of his and my Saviour. Since I am well content to send one son to the Church, the other to the Wars; why should I be loath to send one part of either son to Heaven, and the other to the Earth? Comfort yourself in this, my Noble Sister; but above all in this, that it is the declared Will of God. In sicknesses and other worldly crosses, there are anxieties and perplexities; we wish one thing to day, in the behalf of a distressed child or friend, and another to morrow; because God hath not yet declared his Will. But when he hath done that by death, there is no room for any anxiety, for any perplexity, no, not for a wish; for we may not so much as pray for the dead. You know David made his child's sickness his Lent, but his death his Easter: He fasted till it was dead, but then he returned to his repast, because than he had a declaration of Gods Will. I am far from quenching in you, or discharging natural affections: but I know your easy apprehensions, and over-tenderness in this kind. And therefore since, in so numerous a family as yours, every year is like to present you with some such occasion of sorrow; I advise you in the office of a Friend, and a Brother, and Priest of God, not only to take this Patiently, as a declaration of God's present Will; but Catechistically, as an instruction for the future: and that God in this tells you, He will do so again, in some other of your Friends. For, to take any one cross patiently, is but to forgive God for once; but, to surrender one's self entirely to God, is to be ready for all that he shall be pleased to do.  
These General Antidotes being timely used, will preserve us from fainting under any other evil of this nature; and I need not be solicitous to prescribe more particular remedies against them. But if any expect I should; and tell me it is the death of their Parents which they bewail: they that brought them into the world, are themselves gone out of it: I desire to know of them, what wonder there is in this: If our Parents had not been to go out, 
Considerations about the death of Parents.  what need would there have been of bringing us in? If they were designed to stay always, then there had been no room for us. They might more easily remember their mortality than we; for there is no act that puts us more in mind of death, than that whereby we give another life. And it is but one of them it is likely that we have lost, we may then love the other the more. Or if both, yet we have least reason to complain about their death of all others; for both Nature, and they themselves, and we also would have them die before us. We complain that people die when they are young; and will we complain too when they die of old age? Then it seems we will have none die, and cannot be contented unless they live always. Would they have been willing to have been left childless without you? If not; then they have their choice to go first. Or are you so well in love with death, that it would have been more acceptable to you to have gone before? or so much in love with them, that on that account you had rather have died than they? Then know that your death would as much more have troubled them, than theirs doth you; as the love of Parents to their children transcends the love of all children unto them. It is very well then as it is. It is not handsome neither to complain when we are forty or fifty years of age, that our Parents are dead, for they could live no longer, or if they could, it would have been but a kind of death. If we will not cease to complain when we are of age, neither shall we ever cease when we grow older. For as Cardan tells us, A poor woman once came to his door to beg an alms, and though she were seventy years of age, yet she used this argument in her complaints, That she was a poor fatherless and motherless creature, and had none to take any care of her. We need the less of their care, when we can take care of ourselves.  
But perhaps they die before we are of age, and can take care of ourselves. Then we are least sensible of their loss, or if we are so considerate as to know that, we may consider also such things as these; There is none fatherless that hath God for his Father: and he that hath not, would be little better for his earthly Parents. If they were good, let us follow their example, and remember their Counsel: if they were bad, they would not have been true Parents to us; and it is well perhaps that we had not such an example to follow. They may live still in us, if they were good; if they were bad, we had need live the better; and spend those tears for their sins (which may entail curses on us) which we bestow upon them. But besides, it is observed by some, that the most eminent persons that have been in the world did lose their Parents when they were young, or else it is like they had not proved so eminent. The great Caesar and his successor Augustus, Alexander the Monarch of the World, Cicero the famous Orator, Galen the most excellent Physician, Aristotle the great Philosopher, are all examples of this truth. If these had enjoyed the support of their Parents to lean upon, they might not have tried their own sufficiency, nor exercised their abilities; or else they might have been wholly eclipsed by their lustre, and done nothing to be taken notice of in the World.  

And of Husband of Wife.  But my loss, will some sorrowful Creature say, is greater than all this: no loss than half myself is gone from me. Death hath ravished an Husband out of my bosom, and he the tenderest in the world. A sad case, I must confess; but it is well, since Death is so common, that he hath left one half and not taken all.  
Would he had, will that passionate soul reply: I cannot live in any joy, now that the better part of me is dead and gone. O that I had never lived to see this day; or not outlived it! Who can think of so wide a breach, and not be ready to go out at it? But stay a little, I beseech you: did you never think of this before now? Did you not take one another with this clause [Till Death us do part?] Death and you ought to have been better acquainted before this time. It sought your acquaintance long ago, and would have been as familiar with you as your Husband. Who spoke of parting with you, when you first came together: and now that you are parted, hath set you free again as you were before. If you like that State so well, you are at liberty to seek another self. If you do not like to be tied in such a yoke; Why do you mourn thus, for the gaining of your freedom? Or if you liked that person so well, as not to be able to think of any other; than you may have the glory to stand among the rare and noble examples of conjugal love and friendship: who have preserved the Image of their deceased Husband or Wife, so lively engraven in their hearts, that nothing could ever displace it, or blot it out.  
Alas! may some of the tenderer sex say (whose hearts are commonly most deeply wounded with this affliction) what a pitiful glory is this? and what a torment will it prove to me, to have only the image of such a person ever in my sight? It is not possible to keep myself from being in pain and anguish, when I feel that he is torn from me. Since God hath made Man and Wife not to be two but one flesh; How can I take this separation otherways, than as if my body was cut in sunder? In such language I remember St. Bafill represents the complaints of a desolate Widow: And if you please hear his Answer, in a letter to the Wife of Arinthaeus. 
* Epist 186.  Some part or other of which may help, perhaps, to compose the spirits of such persons, whom I cannot but pity above all other: and make them conceive some joy, when they look upon the Image of what they have lost. And if you meet with some things in it that have been said already; do not therefore skip it over hastily: For second thoughts of a good thing are better than the first; and the same thing in a new dress may meet with those affections, which it did not excite before.  
There is none, saith he, that doth not sigh for such a man. Who can be so stony hearted as not to shed a tear for him? Yet let us not complain that we are deprived of him, but give thanks to God who joined you together, that you have lived so long with him. To be bereft of an Husband, is common to you with all other women: But to dwell with such an one, it may be questioned whether any can glory in the like happiness. For to say the truth, God who made us all, created this man as an example of humane nature: so that all eyes were turned towards him, all tongues praised him; and many could not believe Arinthaeus to be dead, when they heard the sad tidings of it. But he hath suffered only that, which shall one day befall the Heavens, the Earth, and the Sun itself. He died also in his full splendour: and by his happiness in this world, did not forfeit that of the next. Translate therefore thy mind from things present, to the care of those that are to come: so that thou mayst be worthy by good works to enter into the same place of rest and repose. Spare thy aged Mother: Spare thy young Daughter: who have no other comforter left but thyself. Be an example of courage to the rest of women kind: and so moderate thy passions, that thine heart may not fail thee, nor thou mayst not be swallowed up of grief. And above all things look to the great reward of patience, which is promised by our Lord Jesus Christ; in recompense of what we do here. Do not think (as he adds in another Epistle to her 
* Epist. 202.  that any affliction idly befalls the servants of God, who are under his special care; but for a proof of their sincere love to our Creator. For as great labours bring the Athletae to their Crowns: So are Christians by these trials brought to perfection, if they receive with a becoming patience and all thanksgiving, whatsoever is ordered by our Lord. And there is nothing, I assure you, but is administered by the goodness of our Master: and therefore ought not to be received as grievous, though for the present it hurt our weakness. For though we know not the reasons by which every thing is done, as good, by our Master; yet this we ought to persuade ourselves, that what hath happened was profitable, either for us, because of the reward of patience; or for the soul departed, that it might not be farther engaged in a world so full of wickedness.  
These were the arguments whereby he comforted other persons as well as her: as appears by his letter to the Wife of Brison 
* Epist. 347. . To whom he adds these words: Let thy Children be as so many lively Pictures of him to comfort thee in his absence. Let thy thoughtfulness and care about their education, draw aside thy mind from these sad reflections. And by a constant solicitude to please God, the rest of thy life, thou wilt get an excellent ease and quiet to thy afflicted thoughts. For a preparation for our defence before Jesus Christ, and a study to be found among those that love him; will be sufficient to obliterate all our sorrow, so that we shall not be swallowed up in it.  
The same he writes to one that had lost an excellent Wife; 
* Epist. 346.  A person so fit for him, that they might see themselves in each other, as in a glass. But why should we contend with such a Law of God as is passed so many Ages ago. We are not the first, nor the only persons that suffer on this fashion. It is a common thing for all to die, though to have a good wife is peculiar to few, whom God blesses. The truth is, to grieve for a separation from a wife, is one of the gifts of God: For I have known many that have parted with them, just as if they had thrown off a burden.  
The rest I shall not recite, because I would leave some room for a long Discourse of another great Person 
* St. Chrysostom upor 1 Thess. Hom. 6. , addressed to disconsolate Widows: the sense whereof is this. I have lost (saith some sad soul) not only my companion, but my guide, my stay, my shield, my second self. I doubt not of the Resurrection, which St. Paul treats of: but what shall I do in the mean time? Much business I have to manage, but I am become only a fit prey for every Cormorant, who hath a mind to be unjust. The servants who before reverenced me, will now despise a silly Woman. If my Husband ever obliged any body: Alas! It will be soon forgot, now that he can do them no further kindness. But if he did them any wrong; they will be sure to take a severe revenge on me; who am not able to resist them. This is the thing, that breeds me all my anguish: set this aside, and his death would not give me such a torment. What shall we answer (saith St. chrysostom) unto this? Truly I could easily demonstrate, that not what they pretend, but an unreasonable passion is the cause of words so sad and doleful. If this were the cause of their lamentation, than they must never cease thus to bewail themselves. But if after a years time all these tears are dried up; its certain the want of their defence and comfort (which will then be most felt) is not the only cause of them. But let it be supposed that this is the fountain of all their sorrow; yet consider how much infidelity there is in it, that we should think it was They who took the care and patronage of us; not God. It cannot choose but provoke his displeasure, to see a Creature of his more beloved than himself: and therefore, perhaps, he took away thy Husband, because he was more to thee, than thy God. The only one of Israel is very Jealous; and cannot endure to be so slighted, that other things should have so much of our affections, as his excellent goodness: which is therefore to be beloved by us above all things, because it expresses a love to us above all other Creatures. What was the reason, I beseech you, that widowhood and Orphanage were so rare in the old times among good people? Why did Abraham and his Sarah, and Isaac live till a great old age? Truly, I think it was because Abraham loved God more than cither of them: And when God did but say to him, Kill thy Son; he went about it as readily, as if he had been to Sacrifice a Lamb. But we are heavy and dull: we are carried so headlong into the embraces of Creatures, that God is fain even against our wills to draw our affections to himself, by drawing them away from us. Do but love God more than thy Husband, and I will undertake that either thou shalt not fall into Widowhood; or shalt not feel it so great a mischief when thou fallest into it. And I have a good ground for what I avouch: for thou hast him for thy Husband and thy Defence, that never dies; and that loves thee infinitely more than any man can do. And if this reason be not sufficient to convince thee, I have a comparison that will do the business. Tell me; if thou hadst a Husband who loved thee so much, as if he had no soul but thine; one that was as much beloved of others as be loved thee; one so wise and discreet, that he was as much admired as loved; one so gentle and compliant, as if he was but wax to thy impressions, one that made thee shine as the Moon doth with the rays of the Sun: And suppose thou hadst a child by this dear person, who dies before be comes of age: Wouldst thou be miserably tormented and overwhelmed with sorrow and grief for the death of this child, while thou didst enjoy such a better love? No, in no wise. He that is so fair and beautiful in thine eyes, would supply the want of it, as the Sun doth the absence of the Stars. He that is now loved and esteemed, would quite obscure and hid all the others excellencies. Do but love God then more than this Husband, and his glory, which puts out the lustre of all other things; will make thee as little troubled at his death, as in the other case thou wouldst be for thy child's. Nay far less, one would in reason think; in as much as God is infinitely more above that Husband, than he above the Child.  
Besides, what is it, which thou receivest from thy Husband, that is comparable to what the love of God gives thee? Are they not pangs and labours, and, as the world goes, unkind words perhaps, and angry chide? Or if thou canst tell me of better things, what are they? What are fine  and Jewels, and honours, and such like things, to the Son of God; to the Brotherhood and Adoption; to the Kingdom and eternal Glory; to the life of God and coheirship with the only begotten? Wilt thou after all this tell me thou canst not but be passionately troubled for thy Husband's loss? Me thinks thou shouldst consider, that if thou wantest him; thou hast God. If thou wantest thy menial servants, and attendants; thou hast the guard of spiritual powers: The Dominions and Principalities of Heaven are thy Ministers. If thou sayest thy children want a Father, that cannot be, seeing God is the Father to the Fatherless. If thou fearest they shall want necessaries, tell thyself who gave them to thee, and whether the life be not more than meat, and the body than raiment. Or if thou fearest they shall not be so well provided for, as otherwise they might have been; how many could I tell thee of, that have been bred by Widows and proved famous? And, on the other side, how many that have had Fathers and been good for nothing? Put the fear of God in their hearts, and this will preserve them more than a Father. When the guard is set within, they will less need one without. This will be better than riches, and glory and promotion to them: this will make them famous both upon Earth and in Heaven.  
Do not set thine Eyes then on the youth, who by reason of his Father's greatness is girded with a Golden Belt, and rides on a Prancing Horse, and is taken into King's Courts, and hath many Tutors and Governors following him at the heels: But cast thine eye above, open the gate of Heaven by thy thoughts, look into that Stately Palace; behold the King of glory there sitting on his Throne; and if He whom thou admirest on Earth can be sooner admitted thither, than thy child: fetch a great sigh; fill the Heavens with noise and clamour; I do not forbid thy lamentations. But seeing neither riches, nor birth, nor any thing else is there preferred, but only Virtue and goodness, judge what reason thou hast to be content: and think how certain it is that nothing can make us dismally sad, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, if we will not be fools, but Philosophers.  
And for thyself, if thou complainest of being desolate and solitary, remember what the Apostle saith, 1. Tim. 5. 5. that such an one, Trusteth in God. This is only an opportunity to enjoy more of the chiefest Good. Thou hast more time and liberty to please God, now that thou hast none else to please. Thou art freed from all other bonds, to be tied faster to him. There are no chains, no restraints upon thee, to keep thee from doing what thou wouldst. Thou art separated from one Husband, to be united to a better. Thou hast not the fellow servant, but thou hast the Master. Thou hast not thy Husband to talk with thee, but God is thy Husband. When thou prayest, dost not Thou talk with God? When thou readest, doth not God talk with thee? And what doth he say to thee? Words more desirable, more sweet than can drop from any Husband's lips. If he speak never so kindly, the matter is not great; for he is but a fellow servant. When the Lord himself will be pleased to embrace and speak lovingly to his handmaid, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, This is a strange piece of service. And observe, I beseech you, how he serves and waits upon us: Hear in what words be bespeaks our affections. Come unto me all you that are weary and heavy laden, and you shall find rest to your Souls. And again by the Prophet he cries, Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the Son of her Womb? Yea she may forget, yet I will not forget thee. What charms are there in these words? And what can have more of Honey in them, than those expressions in the Song of Songs, My Love, my Dove, my fair one, my Paradise, etc. And yet this is the language of God to men. If we will not rest satissted in so tender a kindness, there is no Remedy, but we must be miserable.  
To this purpose writes that excellent Person, with an Elegance, which, though I could not imitate yet, I could not but follow; till I have run beyond the bounds within which I intended to confine this discourse. And yet the minds of such persons, as I am now treating withal, is many times so clouded by their sorrow; that it will be charity to try all other means to brighten and clear them. I shall recommend therefore to them, before I take leave of this Argument, the advice of a great man in a neighbouring Country not many years ago 
* Mouns. du Vair.  sent to a Lady oppressed with an obstinate grief for the loss of a dear Husband. His words are to this sense. Come to yourself again, Madam, and think what you are a doing. You drive away and estrange from you that very thing, which you love above all the world, and may enjoy continually, if you please. For where I pray you, do you think that is which you so much cherished and loved? You will Answer me, in Heaven: And so it is, I make no question, full of Joy and content among the blessed. But withal you believe that things above are so separated from us, that they can be no more re-joined to us, as long as we live. Oh how much are you deceived! God himself who is the highest and furthest from our Natures, is continually in us to give us unspeakable joy from his presence; if our souls be fit to harbour and entertain him. The holy Angels are continually about us, if we take care to draw them to us. And how do we know, that blessed souls in whom the faith of a holy love could never die, would not come to visit us, if we made ourselves fit to receive them, and they found nothing in us contrary to their nature and happiness, which hindered us from going towards them? And what greater obstacle can there be unto it, than tears and sorrow? The wings that must carry us up thither, are our thoughts; which animated by our desires and the ardours of an holy friendship, must never cease beating till they raise us up to that which we look for. And what do our tears but wet the wings of our thoughts, and hinder the flight of them. Do you not see that among the vapours which arise from the Earth, those which proceed from rivers and marshes and other moist places, stop in the middle region of the air, and melting there return from whence they came? whereas those which come from drier matters, soar up higher, till being inflamed they turn into Comets and other Celestial fires. Do you believe in like manner, that your thoughts, though never so pious, can never mount high if they be clogged and wet with abundant tears. Let them be beated by the sacred flame of your holy friendship, and purified from worldly contagion; and taking their flight through a calm and undisturbed spirit, as through a clear and bright air: you will questionless overtake that which is fled from you; and embrace that blessed soul, and grasp the splendour of that eternal light, wherewith it is clothed. And you will find it as if it consented to your desires, coming down again all along your thoughts as by a thread, giving you a more perfect rejoicing therein than can be imagined. It will dwell in you (at least by the lively image of your vehement thought) and seem as if it were yourself. For we find that in corporeal things, a violent imagination makes us believe we see and touch that which is farthest from us. Try, Madam, that which I say, and you will find it most true. Make use of this troublesome grief, which you cannot be rid of, to spur your desires, to be rejoined to that, at the loss of which you so much repine. Thus Herald  
To which me thinks, I hear some that this way is too sublime for their spirits. They cannot mount themselves on this fashion, but cleave fast to these Terrestrial objects. It may be so; and all that I can say to such is this; that next to God and our blessed Saviour, whom they apprehend, I hope, every where, to take care of those that commit themselves to the Fatherly Providence of the most supreme Reason; they should entertain themselves in the company and embraces of their remaining friends: whose presence is most delightful, and converse most comfortable. And all of them put together; may make a sensible Image of a dead Husband.  
I know they will say, but these Friends may die too, and then what shall I do? I have told you already, and therefore have the less to add on this subject. Yet I shall remember you of the words of Seneca 
* Epist. 63.  concerning the death of a Friend which are to this purpose. If thou hast other friends besides this, 
Of the Death of Friends.  is it not a great reproach to them of their unworthiness, that all of them are not able to comfort thee for the loss of one? If thou hast no more, than thou hast done thyself a greater wrong than God hath done thee; for he hath taken but one, and thou hast made never an one. God makes men (as is said by some) and we make friends. And if thou be'st desirous of more, and findest such need of them, thou hast leisure now to go and seek them. He can never want friends, that wants not Virtue. He loved not one well, that cannot love any more than one. Is it not a ridiculous folly for a man to shrug and cry when he hath lost his coat, rather than go to fetch another garment to cover him from the cold? If he be taken away whom thou didst love, seek another whom to love. It is far better to repair thy loss, than to mourn for it. And if thou canst not find another to thy mind, How couldst thou be a friend to him that is dead, if thou hast no power to help thyself? why should not a good man find enough in God and himself? The want of nothing, can make thee want Virtue; and he that hath that, hath enough. Nay, every good man is thy friend if thou be'st good: and they that never saw thy face before, if they see thy goodness, will be good unto thee. 
Ap leius de Philos. Mor.  Bonos omnes oportet inter se amicos esse, etsi sint minus noti: All good men ought to be friends, though they be not much acquainted.  
I have passed over this last particular (as you see) very swiftly, because I observe my discourse swells to a greater bigness than I intended: And in some of the following considerations you shall find satisfaction to every one of these cases, if you will but concoct them.   

SECT. VI Which directs how to quiet ourselves by comparing ourselves, both with ourselves and with others; and there are five ways of comparison insisted on.  

III. To compare ourselves with ourselves and others, a way to be contented. We were not so well once, or not better; and yet not so grieved.  COnsider so far as to make comparisons. And first of all compare thyself now with what thou once waste, yea with what thou once wast not. There was a time when thou thyself wast not so much as dead, for thou wast not at all, nor hadst any capacity of joy or sorrow. Hath God dealt unkindly with thee in giving thee a being capable of both? Wouldst thou have refused a being (if we may suppose an offer to be made to nothing) unless he would have given thee nothing but joy, and never taken away what he gave thee? unless thou hast a mind to be gave thee? unless thou hast a mind to be nothing, be contented with what thou art. Then thou hadst not these relations, for thou hadst not thyself. Why shouldst thou mourn now that thou hast them not, since thou hast thyself? Is there not more reason to be thankful for a being, though capable of mourning, than to be troubled at the occasion of it? Surely thou dost not desire to cease thy mourning, by ceasing to be. Ease thyself then of thy grief by the being that God hath given thee. If thou couldst not mourn then, Do not mourn now. But then consider, that since thou hadst a being, there was a time when thou hadst none of these relations, no wife, nor children, nor friends which thou art deprived of. Yet thou didst not then weep and lament, and trouble thyself as now thou dost. Seeing thou art what thou wast, be contented as thou wast. What difference is there between that time and this? Thou wast as much without them then, as now thou art; why shouldst thou not be as much contented now as then? All the difference between those that want a thing, and those that lose it, is only this; that they who lose it once had that, which they that want it never had. Now shall we be the more troubled because we once had it? one would think that their trouble should be the greatest that neither have it, nor ever had it. We have reason to be more pleased that we had it, if there were any good in it: and if there was none, than we have no reason to be displeased that we have it not. Say, hadst thou rather never have enjoyed thy friends, than now be deprived of them? Was thy condition worse or better heretofore? If it was but equal to thy present, than thou hast reason to be equally pleased: Remember how thou wast then, and be so now. If it was worse then; why shouldst thou be now worse troubled? If it was better then, why didst thou change it, seeing thou knewest that all must die? No question it is better to have enjoyed a good thing, than never to have known it. And therefore seeing thou art no worse now than thou wast once, but hast been better than once thou wast, be not more troubled than thou wast once; yea, be less troubled.  

We may be worse.  But secondly, compare thy present condition with what thou mayst be. This is not the worst that may befall thee in such a world of miseries. Suppose then that thou shouldst lose all thy children as Job did, and then lose thy whole estate; that the Sea should swallow one part, and the fire burn another, and thiefs rob thee of a third, and bad debtors quite undo thee. Suppose after all this, that a fire should begin to burn in thy own bones, and that should break into boils, and they should break into scabs, and thou shouldst be poor, even to a Proverb, as that holy man was. Must thou not be contented then? But how is that possible, seeing thou canst not be contented now? If such a shower of tears fall from thine eyes for this little loss, then sure thou wilt make a flood or a deluge. But what wilt thou do at last after all thy lamentations? Wilt thou kill thyself? Then it seems thou takest death to be the end of all troubles; and I wonder thou shouldst be so troubled at that which hath eased thy friend of them. Or what else wilt thou do? comfort thyself? Try how thou canst do that now, for if thy stomach refuse cordials in this distemper, never expect that it will digest them, when thou wilt be far more sick and apt to vomit them up again. If Job had cursed the day wherein he was born at the first breach that God made upon his estate, what expressions of grief (below a great sin) had he left for himself when he sat upon the dunghill? The good man took the first losses so patiently, that all the rest which befell him could not move him to greater impatience. Do thou remember him, and say to thy soul, Come, be quiet, this is not the worst that may betid us; we have no such cause to cry as we may have; Let us learn Patience against a time when we may have more need of it.  
And then if we should be brought to the very dust, and fall as low as the dung of the earth, yet there is another way of considering what may be besides this. 
We may be better.  We may be as happy again, as now we account ourselves miserable. Our sorrow may be turned into joy, as our joy hath been turned into sorrow. Weep may endure for a night, but joy may come in the morning, according as I have said in the former discourse; And so it was with Job whom God blessed in his latter end, 
Job 42.12.  more than in his beginning. We have seen the end of the Lord (saith the Apostle James) that the Lord is very pitiful, 
Jam. 5.11.  and of tender mercy. But then this pity of his is to be obtained only by Patience. If we cannot be contented, it is needful, we may think, that he should teach us it still by greater losses.  

We have more than we want.  Thirdly, Compare what thou hast lost, with what thou hast not lost. God leaves commonly more than he takes. He takes away thy children perhaps, but thou hast thy Husband, and he is better than ten sons. Or if thou hast lost thy Husband also, yet thou hast thyself; and why should a living man complain? And thou hast God himself, whom nothing can take away from thee. Or if thou hast him not, yet thou mayst have him; and who knows but that therefore thou hast lost thy friends, because thou hast not him? God hath taken them away, that thou mayst seek after him. Wouldst thou have been willing that all thou hast should have been lost rather than this one friend? Shall God raise him from the dead, and all the rest go into his Tomb? Wilt thou have all, or else take comfort in none? Then God may well take away all, and let thee have something to cry for. Yea, who is there destitute of all friends and comforters? Job himself was not so spoiled, that they had rob him of his friends. Though they did add indeed to his grief, yet it was their mistake, and not their want of love. And if we should have no better, than we may give God thanks, that he lets us see more than all our friends. Yea, it is a great mercy that God gives us time to cease our grief and trouble. And perhaps we have riches, and a pleasant dwelling, delightful walks, etc. Or if we have not; and can bear that patiently; then we may soon learn how to bear this. Do the poor people of Norway weep when they eat, 
Barthol. cent. 4. Hist. An. cap. 16.  because their bread is made of the barks of trees, and sometimes of chaff; not of Corn as ours is? If there were no trees, nor chaff, nor no such thing to fill their mouths, they might well cry; but as long as we have what is needful, we should be content, for nothing is so needful as that. Let us not then weep because we have not so many friends as we had, for we have more than we deserve. Let us not mourn as though we were desolate, when we want but one; no more than we complain of hunger when we have all variety of cheer, except one dish that we love most. But  

We have more than many others.  Fourthly, Let us compare ourselves (if you please) with others. In other cases this is a thing we love to do, though there be so much danger in it that it may undo us. If we be guilty of any fault, than we comfort ourselves in comparisons, and think that we are not so bad as others. Now that which we are apt to do when we do ill, we ought to do when we think we suffer ill. Is God more unkind to us than to any of our neighbours? Do not we see that many of our neighbour's children are dead as well as ours? Many of them have lost four or five, and we have lost but one. Nay, many of them never had any, and yet they do not therefore mourn, and besmear their faces with tears, and break their hearts with sighs. Our case is the very same now that we have none; but only that it is a little better, because we had once some. And how thankful should we be that we had them so long, if it be desirable to have them at all? But then we may say further to ourselves, How many of them have lost their friends in the late Wars? How many hath the sword made Widows, and the blood of how many of their children hath it drunk? Ours were taken away by the hand of God, but theirs were taken away by the hands of men. Our friends died in their beds, and theirs died in the field; Ours went, and theirs were driven out of the world. Come, let us go comfort our neighbours that have lost more than we, for they stand more in need of comfort. If they stand in need of none, then no more do we.  
It was very handsomely discoursed by Socrates (as Plutarch relates) That if we could all agree to put all the troubles and calamities of men into one heap, 
De Consol. ad Apollon.  on this condition, that after every man had brought his and thrown them there, than they should all come again and take every man an equal portion of them, there would be a great many that now complain, who would rather take up what they brought, and go their ways contented with them.  
And so Antimachus an Ancient Poet, when his Wife died whom he loved exceedingly, he went and writ a Poem bearing her name, wherein he reckoned up all the calamities that he could remember had befallen any in the world. By this means he did deter himself from grief; for how can one suffer the miseries which others endure, if he cannot bear this light one of his own?  

It is better with us than with those of former times.  Fifthly, Let us compare ourselves with the Ancient Christians. Their children were snatched out of their arms by the hands of Tyrants. They see their brains dashed out against the stones; their friends were buried in fires, or banished into strange places, and they had no comforters left but God and themselves; and their chiefest comfort was, that they must shortly die the same death. But notwithstanding all this, and much more, they did not take it heavily, but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 (as Photius speaks) They bore it all thankfully, 
Epist. 234.  and blessed God who could tell how to govern the world beyond all the thoughts of men. Let not us who suffer but common things, weep with an extraordinary sorrow, when they who suffered most unnatural deaths did bear it with more than natural courage. They might have been allowed to have wept blood, rather than we to shed tears. And yet they rejoiced as if their friends had been offered in Sacrifice to God; and we weep as if they had been put to some shameful torments for their crimes. Shall we mourn more for the death of a friend, than they for a butchery? What arguments had they to comfort them which we have not? What Scripture had they before their eyes to stay their tears, which we read not? If either of us have more to comfort us than the other, it is we; for we have their most excellent example. And when I think of the Mother of the seven Brethren mentioned in the Maccabees, 
Mac. 2.7.  she calls my thoughts back a little further than the times of Christ. Did she wring her hands when she saw the skin of her son flayed off from his head? Did she cast any tears into the fire wherein another of them was fried? No, she speaks as cheerfully as if they were not stripping them of their skins, but clothing them with a royal robe: She looks upon them, not as if they lay upon a pan of coals, but in a bridal bed. She exhorted them, being filled with a courageous spirit, saying, 
V 21, 22.  I cannot tell how you came into my Womb, for I neither gave you breath, nor life, neither was it I that form the members of every one of you. But doubtless the Creator of the world, who form the generation of man, and found out the beginning of all things, will also of his own mercy give you breath and life again, as you now regard not your own selves for his sake. This marvellous woman (as she is called, v. 20.) knew very well that she did not give them life, and therefore why should she take so heavily their death? She considered they were none of hers, and why should not the owner take them? She knew that she did not lose them, but only restore them. That life sometimes is not worth the having. That unless God will have us live, no wise man would desire to live. That none gives any thing unto God, though it be his own, but he gives them something better. And therefore she said, Die my sons, for that's the way to live.  
What poorness of spirit than is it, that we cannot see a soul put off her  without so much ado? That a Jewish woman could see seven souls torn out of their body with more courage, than a Christian man can see one soul quietly departed and leave its lodging? I would wish every one to save his tears till some other time, when he may have some greater occasion for them. If he will weep much, let it be when he sees the bodies of his children or friends so mangled as theirs were. But if he would not weep out his eyes then, let him weep soberly, and not as if he were drunk with sorrow now.   

SECT. VII. Several reasons are given against immoderate sorrow, which are comprised in 14. Questions which we should make to ourselves. The reason and spirit of them you may see in the Margin, at the beginning of every particular.  

iv We must think with what reason we weep.  AFter we have taken this course with ourselves, we shall be the more prepared to hearken unto reason. And let us proceed from making comparisons, to ask ourselves some Questions, and stay till they give a good answer. Let us know of ourselves why we are so sad and heavy? Let us speak to our souls, and say, Tell me, what is the matter? What is the cause of all this grief? Thou art a rational creature, what reason hast thou for all this sorrow? Thou art not to be pitied merely for thy tears, if thou canst cry without any cause. Hideous things appear sometimes before us to affright us; but they are the Chimeras of a childish imagination, and not things really existent. Let us bid fancy then to stand aside a while, and let reason speak what it is that so troubles us. Children cry who cannot speak, and we are not much troubled at it, because they cry for they know not what; Unless we therefore can tell why we weep, no body will pity us, because it is not weeping that we are to mind, but the cause of men's weeping. Let me then propose these questions to be answered, some of which will discover that there is no cause of sad lamentations when our friends die. And if there be no cause that the fountain of tears should run, that is cause enough to stop it up.  
1. For whose sake dost thou weep? For the sake of him that's dead, or for thy own? 
No cause of mourning immoderately for their sakes who are dead.  Not for him that is dead sure; for we suppose him to be happy. Is it reasonable to say, Ah me! What shall I do? I have lost a dear friend that shall eat and drink no more? Alas! He shall never hunger again; never be sick again, never be vexed and troubled; and which is more, he shall never die again. Yet this is the frantic language of our tears, if we weep for the sake of him that is gone. Suppose thy friend should come to thee, and shake thee by the hand, and say, My good friend, why dost thou lament and afflict thy soul? I am gone to the Paradise of God, a sight most beautiful to be beheld, and more rare to be enjoyed. To that Paradise am I flown, where there is nothing but joy and triumph, nothing but friendship and endless Love. There am I where the head of us all is, and where we enjoy the light of his most blessed face. I would not live if I might again, no not for the Love of thee. I have no such affection to thy society (once most dear unto me) that I would exchange my present company to hold commerce with thee. But do thou rather come hither as soon as thou canst. And bid thy friends that they mourn not for thee when thou diest, unless they would wish thee to be miserable again. If we should have such a short converse with one of our acquaintance, what should we think? what should we say? Should we fall a mourning and crying again? Would it open a new sluice for our tears to flow out? Would we pray him to go to Heaven no more, but stay with us? Would we entreat him to beg of God that he might come and comfort us? If not, then let us be well content, unless we can give a better reason for our immoderate tears, than our love to him. Holcoth reports of a learned man, 
ja 4. Sap. v. 7.  that was found dead in his Study with a Book before him: A friend of his was exceedingly amazed at this fight when he first came into the room: But when he looked a little further, he found his forefinger pointing at this place in the book of Wisdom, c. 4. v. 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. Though the just be prevented with death, yet shall he be in rest. And when he observed this, he was as much comforted, as he was before dejected. We have no reason to lament them who are made immortal, and that live with God. If we respect them only, we should carry them forth as the Egyptians did the great Prophet of Isis when he died, not with howl and sorrow, 
Heliod. l. 7. Aethiop.  but with hymns and joy, as being made an heir 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, with our Betters, and gone to possess most glorious things.  
The truth of it is, if it were rational Love to him that expresseth these tears, than we should not begin them so soon, nor make such a noise, and cry when men are a dying. For the sad countenances and the miserable lamentations wherewith we encompass sick men's beds, make death seem more frightful to them, than it is in itself. What misery am I falling into (may a man think) that causes them to make such a moan? What is this death, that makes even them look so ghastly who are not like to die? What a mischief is it to leave so many sad hearts behind me, and to go myself (it should seem by them) to some sad and dismal place also? I tell you, a dying man had need have a double courage, to look both death and them in the faces, or else their indiscreet shrieks and lamentations will make a poor soul fall into such dark and cloudy thoughts. Men are fain therefore to say that it is indeed Love to themselves that forces them thus to bemoan the death of their friends. 
Nor for our own sakes that are alive.  But what are you, that cannot be contented one should be made much better, by making of you a little worse? Is this the great Love you pretend to your friend, that you are extremely sorry he is gone to Heaven; are you a friend, that look more at your own small benefit, than at his great gain? was he not much beholden to you for your love, that would have had him lived till you were dead, that he might have been as miserable in mourning for you, as you think now yourselves to be? But what is it I beseech you, that you thus bemoan yourselves for? Because that you are now miserable? No, it seems that you are not miserable enough, and that makes you weep so much. If you had some greater trouble befallen you, that would put the lesser out of your mind. If you were sick or in pains, or had lost all your goods, these things could take your mind off from this loss; Why then cannot the enjoyment of your health, and case, and plenty do as much for you? 
2. Sam. 19.7.  When Joab did but threaten David that they all would leave him, unless he would be comforted, than he could wipe his face, and appear in public as a man well pleased. Fear of losing his Kingdom, put away the grief for the loss of his son. And therefore let us not speak of our being forlorn and miserable by this loss; for at last we find it is not so. But how doth it appear that mere self-love is the original of these tears? Suppose this person to have been at so wide a distance from us for a year or two, that no tidings of him could come to us. Did we weep and lament all that while because he was not with us? Did not the thoughts that he lived, and hopes to see him again comfort us? And yet, was he not then in a manner dead, when we neither saw, nor felt nor heard from him? What help did we receive from him at that distance; or wherein did he pleasure us? If we did not account our selyes so miserable all that time as to spend it in tears; we ought not to do it now. We are now as we were then: in all things the very same; save only in the knowledge that he is dead. But was he not dead as I said, to us before? Was he not like a man in another World? What was there that he did for us, which we do not now receive at his hands? Let us be as quiet now, as we would have been on such an occasion: Especially since we know our Friend still lives, and we have hope to see him again. Natural affection, I confess, in either case will make us big with sighs, and burst forth often into tears. We feel we are not as we were before. There is something wanting, which we formerly enjoyed. And it is an old acquaintance perhaps, which Nature cannot but be loath to part withal. Get a new Nature then; and that will mend all. Though the first motions be so free, that they own no tribute to reason: Yet when they come, we shall be careful not to follow them. If we do, it will not be very far. Religion and reason, if we harken to them, will teach us to restrain ourselves. Religion (as a great person 
* Joseph. Scalig. Epist. 139. ad Is. Casaub.  speaks) will not suffer us not to will what God wills: And Reason will teach us to bear those things with an equal mind, which do not happen to us alone; and which we cannot by all our tears make not to have happened. They will not let us expect that time should take away this sickness from us. That is the Remedy of vulgar spirits: Sapientis est, tempus ipsum antevenire, & dalori ipsi nascenti occurrere. It is the part of a wise man to outstrip time and get before it: To prevent a grief that is a growing and strangle it in the very birth. And indeed from hence we conclude that it is not mere Natural affection neither, to which We commonly own our sadness and sorrows: but the freshness and presence of the cause of them. For time, as was said, will make us forget them; or if our parents had died a little after we were born, we should never have wept when we came of age, to think that they were departed. It is no hard matter then for a considerate person to cease his grief, seeing it depends upon such small causes. And if any one shall say that it is Love to the good of the world that makes him mourn for the loss of an useful person; He hath reason to rejoice that he loves the good of men so much. For than he will labour to do much good in the world himself; and he will persuade all the friends he hath remaining, that they would do all the good they can, and repair that loss.  

Our friends if Good, are not lost.  II. But let me further ask you, Was thy friend God's friend also, or was he not? If he was the friend of God, as well as a friend of thine, why should not he have his company rather than thou? If he was not God's friend, than he could not be thine neither. No man can love us aright, that doth not love God, and if he do love God, why should we think much that he goes to God? But supposing he was very dear to us; then I say, that if he was Bad, thou oughtest to have mourned for him before this. For than thy tears might have done some good, which now are altogether unprofitable. Seven days (saith the son of Sirach. 
Eccles. 22.12. ) do men mourn for him that is dead; but for a fool, and an ungodly man, all the days of his life. But if he were a Good man, than thou needest not mourn now, for thou mayest hope to see him again, if thou art Good. Thus thou mayest comfort thyself, My friend is not gone, but gone before. He is separated from us, but not lost. He is absent, but not dead. He hath taken a journey into a far Country, and there I may go to see him. What matter is it whether my friend return to me, or I go to him? None but this, that if he be in a better place, than it is better than I go to see him, than that he come to see me. Should we not desire to be better ourselves, and not to have him made worse? then let us contentedly follow as fast as we can, hoping there where he is to embrace again. We cannot expect him in our house, but he expects us in his. He cannot come down to us, but we may go up to him. He cannot come back, but we may follow after. And there is no difference (as I said▪) between his visiting of us at our home, and our going to see him at his, but only this, that it is a great deal better for us to see him there where he is, and not where we are now ourselves. Let us not mourn therefore for that which cannot be, but rejoice for that which may and will be. And let it comfort us that we shall come together again, but in a better place than we would have it; we shall have our desires fulfilled, but in a more excellent manner than we desire. And if in the mean time he can do us any good, we may be sure we shall not want it.  

As they are nor lost, so we have had them long.  III. Ask yourselves again, Why should you mourn more for your loss, than be glad for your enjoyment? If there be so much reason to lament the absence of this friend, than it should seem his enjoyment was very valuable. Think therefore of the sweetness thou hadst in that, which thou wouldst purchase again with so many tears. Is there no comfort but only in things present? Is it not a piece of our folly to forget what we have enjoyed? Shall we only think what delight we have lost, and not of what we have had? We do not know whether we have lost any, but only that which we had; and that we may think of as much as if he were alive. Of what we have enjoyed we are certain, but there is no certainty of what we should have found in our friend for the time to come. Think then of the time past, and rejoice that thou didst find so sweet a friend. Imagine not how long thou mightest have enjoyed him, but think how long thou didst. It was but natural to lose him; but it was supernatural to enjoy him. All men are born to die, but all men are not born to live so long before they die. All men have acquaintance, but all men have not friends. Therefore he that hath a friend, and hath him so long; is to acknowledge that God is very much his friend. He was not ours, but was given us by God; or rather he was not given, but only lent. We had not the propriety, but only the use, We have not lost any thing that was our own, but only restored that which was another's. And therefore now that he is taken away, we are not to be angry that God requires his own, but to be thankful, that he hath lent us so long that which was none of our own. And assure yourselves there is nothing more unreasonable than to mourn that God gave us a thing no longer; and not to rejoice that he gave us that which is so desirable, at all. Cease your tears I beseech you, unless you will show that you deserved to have wept a little sooner. Either say that he was not worth the having, and then you need not weep at all; or else give God the thanks that you had a person so worthy, and that will stay your immoderate weeping.  
Nay, will some passionate person say, but this will rather augment our grief, when we think that he was so much worth unto us, and yet is gone. But that is our fault, if we will think more and oftener that he is not, than that he was. How can any body help you, if you will needs look more upon his departure, than upon his stay? Seeing there is more reason that you should please yourself in what is past, it is to be supposed that your thoughts will be more upon it; and if they be, you cannot be sad: But if they be not, than you are not to be cured by reason, but by something else. When you are apt to fetch a sigh, and say, Oh my dear friend is gone! Call it in again, and say, Thanks be to God that I had such an one to lose. Who would not be willing to spend some tears after so much joy; But then the remembrance of the joy will command that the tears do not overflow. It is an excellent saying of Seneca, 
Habui illos tanquam amissurus amisi tanquam babeam. Epist. 63.  I ever think of my friends with joy; For I had them as if I should lose them, and I have lost them as if I had them. If we could but think of them as dying while they are alive, than we should more easily think of them as alive when they are dead. If we could be willing to part with them when we have them, we should think that we have them when we have parted with them. And the truth is, we cannot please ourselves long in the remembrance of them, unless it be accompanied with some joy. I do not advise you to forget your friends, and put them out of mind, but to remember them, and keep them in your thoughts. But how short a remembrance (saith the same Seneca) must that be, which is always joined with grief and sorrow? If we would remember one always, we must remember him with pleasure; For no man will return willingly to that which he cannot think of without his torment. And if there be any little grief intermixed with our thoughts, yet that grief hath its pleasure. As the sharpness of old Wine doth make it more acceptable to men's palates, and as Apples are more grateful for their sour sweetness; so Attalus was wont to say, That the remembrance of our friends is the more pleasant, for that little sorrow that is mingled with it.  

And we have many more remaining.  iv Ask yourselves again, Why so many mourn for one? Can that one have mourned more for you all, than every one of you do for him? If you will weep, weep only your part, and do not weep as if there was none else to weep but yourselves. If a man that was not acquainted with the world, should see ten, or twenty, or perhaps a greater number sitting in a room, and miserably bemoaning of themselves, would he not ask what Town was burnt, or what Family was dead that caused so many mourners? How much then would he be astonished when he heard the Answer, that you had lost a friend, a child, or some one of your other relations? What? Are there so many tears due (would he think) from every man of these upon the score of one Creature only? Must so many be ready to die, because one hath taken his leave of them? Can there be no comfort found among so many of you against the death of a single person? Me thinks you should all of your together weep no more for the death of one, than that one would have wept for you, if you had been dead altogether. Look therefore upon one another, and say, You are still left behind, and I am left, and here are twenty more of our friends alive; how is it then that we are discontented, as if we had not lost one, amongst us all, but every one of us had lost one? If there had been but one of us left, what could he have done more, than what every one of us doth? Can he shed more tears for the loss of us all, or make himself more sad than we now are? Either let us say, that one and ten are equal, or let us not shed as many tears for one as we would for ten; much less ten times as many tears as there would be for that number. For but one would weep for ten, and here are ten that weep for one. Divide your grief then, and let every one bear a part, but not the whole; for that is, as if you had none to bear it with you.  

Or if we have not, God is still ours, who rules the world, and not we.  V Ask thyself, Who is it that governs the world? Is it the will of God, or thy will that thou prayest may be done? Shall not he that made a thing have leave to dipose of it as he thinks good? By what Law is it that he shall not do what he pleases with his own? Must we have our wills in all things, and must not he have his will also? Must not he be pleased as well as we? If we think it so reasonable to have what we will; than it is more reasonable that he should have what pleases him. Now if our will and his will cannot stand together, which shall bend and submit themselves to the other? Is not his will most wise? If he had considered better, would he have done otherwise? Can we have told him what would be most fit for us? If we had been of his Counsel, should not this friend have been taken away? Doth he will things because he will? Perhaps there is no reason at all for our wills, and we are in love with a thing, we we know not why: shall we think that he is so in like manner? Or if we have any reasons, are not his better? We would have the life of a child that he may be a comfort unto us; God will have us to part with him, that he himself may be our only comfort. We should choose his life, that he might enjoy the things that we have got: But God thinks fit that he should die, that we may put our estates to better uses, whereby we are assured he may be more glorified. Or perhaps we desire our children may live for God's glory sake, that they may honour and serve him in the World: But cannot he tell what is best for his own glory? Is he so careless of that as to take away the things without which he cannot be served? Let us then cease our complaints unless we would have him to let us govern the World. But he was taken away, will some say, before his time, else I should be content. I shall answer this as Photius doth (who accords with Basil the great, 
Epist. 234.  before mentioned,) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Let me hear no such word I beseech you, a word too bold to be spoken, and more bold to be thought. Before the time do you say? Then why was he not thought to come before the time, when he came out of his mother's Womb? There is no reason for it but this, that it was the will and pleasure of God that he should be born at such a time. And must God appoint the time of his birth, and we set the time of his death? Did the Workman give him a being in good time, and take him to himself, not knowing the fittest season? From a drop he made him to become a lump of flesh. He form the flesh into parts, he brought him into the light, and he kept him in his infancy and childhood. Was any of these out of due time? Why then should it be out of season when he translated him to another life? Let us do therefore as David did, who prayed and wept as long as he could hope the decree of God was not absolute concerning his child's death; but when he saw that it was irreversible, he comforted himself. Let us always say as Job doth, The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away, and blessed be the Name of the Lord. And let this be further considered to the enforcing of this truth, that if the will of the Lord must be born, than it must be done. And his will is, that we should take all things patiently, yea, cheerfully from his hands. And therefore if we mourn immoderately, what do we but only add sin unto our pain? As there is a time to laugh, so there is a time to weep: But there is no more time to weep superfluously, than there is to laugh idly and profusely. Both in the one and in the other we must be wholly subject to the Will of God. But that Will of God, as I said, is very wise in every thing, and therefore he intends to turn our mourning into laughter, and by every sad thing that doth befall us, to make our hearts glad. He always gives something better than he takes away, if we would but seek after it; and ofttimes he takes one thing away that we may seek after the better. But alas, our blindness is so great, that we value not that which brings us profit, unless it be sweet to our taste. We let our passion judge, and not our reason; and therefore we think there is no good in a bitter cup, and no danger in a pleasant draught. We lament and mourn when we ought to think ourselves great gainers; and we rejoice and leap, when perhaps a cross of the greatest burden hath befallen us. Let us stay a while therefore, and expect the end of things before we mourn too much. And let us but desire to be cured, rather than pleased; to have our souls amended, rather than our fancy humoured; and we shall have great reason to thank God for every thing that comes to us.  

And he rules it better than we could do.  VI And this will lead me to another consideration, concerning the Goodness of God in all that he doth. Ask thyself therefore, Doth not God do all things for our good? Do we wish better to ourselves than God doth? Hath not He the greatest care of all his creatures, to see that it be well with them? Did he make them for any other end than that they might be happy? Is there the least Sparrow as I said before, that falls to the ground without our Father's Providence? Then Mankind must needs be under a greater love, and none of them can die by chance, but by his direction. And above all other men, He hath a singular care over the persons of good Christians, the very hairs of whose heads are all numbered. If not so much as an hair can drop off without Him, much less can any body of them fall into their graves, but He hath a hand in it. But still He hath a more special Providence over such Christians as are Fatherless and Widows, helpless and destitute of all succour. And therefore as it was his goodness that took their friends away, so much more will his goodness take care of them whom he hath left none else to take care of. He considers us not only as his children, but as children placed in the midst of such and such circumstances, as desolate and sad, as left only to his Providence and tuition. And therefore it is that the Psalmist saith, 
Psa. 10 14.  Thou art the helper of the Fatherless. And in another place, A Father of the fatherless, 
Psa. 68.5.  and a Judge of the widow, is God in his holy babitation. 
Psa. 69.23.  I am poor and sorrowful, let thy salvation set me up on high. Yea and all good men are full of compassion to such persons: So that The blessing of those that are ready to perish come upon them; 
Job 29 12, 14.  and they cause the widow's heart to sing for Joy.  
It is an excellent saying of the Royal Philosopher Antoninus, 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, etc. Lib. 2. Sect. 11.  worthy to be engraven upon our minds; If there be a God, than nothing can be hurtful to us, for he will not involve us in evil. But if either there be none, or he take no care of men's matters, what shall I live for in a World that is without a God, or without a Providence? But there is a God, and he cares for men also, and hath put it into their power not to fall into those things which are truly evil. And for the rest that befall us, if any thing of them had been evil, he would have provided that we should have been able not to have fallen into that neither. But if this great person had known also that God leaves us not alone to our own power, when he sends any thing upon us, but that he hath a peculiar love to his servants when they are in trouble, and affords them his assistance: He would have said on this sort, If we be not alone without God, than nothing need discomfort us, for he is the God of all comfort. If we be alone, than we had need to be most discomforted for that, and never endure in a condition without God. But we are not alone, and we are least alone when we are alone; and have him most, when we have other things lest. Therefore he hath put it into our power not to be troubled, but to go to him for comfort in all that befalls us; and if there were no comfort in him for us in such cases, than they should not have befallen us. Let us not therefore mourn as long as we have a God, and as long as all things make us seek for our comfort in him.  
VII. 
Grief will end, let us end it.  Let us ask ourselves, How long we intent to mourn? Doth any man intent to continue it all his life? Then he may fall into the follies of Augustus, who made the image of his Nephew whom he dearly loved, be placed in his Bedchamber, that he might Kiss it and Embrace it daily, Or the dotage of Alexander will be a fit punishment for us, who built Temples, and commanded sacred solemnities every year for his beloved Ephestion. Do you intent every year to have a funeral Sermon? To go and weep over their graves at that time, as you do when they are first put into them? If not, set some measures to your mourning, for of itself it knows no measure. And if you intent not to weep always, why can you not cease now? If it be not a thing to be lamented for ever, why should it be so sadly lamented at all? Decency indeed doth require some mourning, and natural affection must be allowed its tears; but we must stay them as soon as may be, and not mourn as if we thought we could never mourn enough. For if we think so, than we must mourn always, or else we show that we had no reason to mourn so much. But if any man be resolved to let the sorrow take its course, and run as far as ever it can, let me tell him, that either his sorrow will spend him, or else it will spend itself, and so be cured without any thanks at all to him. It is a trite thing which I am going to add, but (to speak with Seneca) I will not therefore forbear to speak it, because it is spoken by all: So it falls out that he who will not put an end to his own grief, time will end it for him. But this is most dishonourable as hath been already said, to expect, till it put an end to itself, when it can run no longer, and not to end it our own selves by not permitting it to run at all without our leave. To be weary of weeping is the basest remedy for grief. It is far better for us to leave grief, than to let it leave us. It is a shame to let time conquer that, which hath conquered us. Seeing it must cease, let it cease by our valour and strength, not by its own weakness. Let it die by our hands, and not merely because it can live no longer.  
We are weary of nothing sooner than of grief, and therefore let us cease that, which if we would, we cannot long continue. It is well observed by Pliny the second, 
Lib. 5. Epist. 16.  that as a crude wound is very angry under the Surgeon's hand, but in a short time doth both suffer it and require it; so a fresh grief doth use to reject and despise all comfort, but shortly after not only receives it most courteously, but also desires and expects it. And seeing if it can find no comfort, it will fairly cease itself; it is more like men, that we should comfort ourselves and put a period to it.  

It may do us much harm before it end.  VIII. Ask thyself again, To what purpose is all my mourning? Every wise man intends some good to himself in what he doth; and therefore unless sorrow will do us some good, it is a foolish thing to indulge unto it. But can any man that hath had his fill of it, tell us what satisfaction it hath given him? May we not put all our gains in our eyes (as the Proverb is) after they have wept so immoderately? Doth any man say he is glad that he mourned so much? Then he had best mourn again if there be so much gladness and profit in it. Had we not better say with David concerning his child when it was dead, I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me? I may bring myself in sorrow to my grave, but I cannot bring him up from the dead. I cannot water him with my tears, as we do a dry plant, that he may spring up again, but I may easily drown myself, and learn others by my example not to weep so much for me. What I would not have them do for me, why should I do for another? Why should I make myself miserable, and make no body else the better? The truth is, if there were only no good in it, it were the less matter; but it doth us likewise not a little harm. 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 etc. Pho. Epist. 234.  Though it will end of itself, yet it may breed us no small trouble before it end. This is all the comfort that such a man hath, and it is a very poor one; that if his grief do not kill him, it will kill itself: But many an one hath grief destroyed; many a body hath it distempered; and given most mortal wounds also to the soul itself. Many affections move the soul most vehemently, but none more than grief, which hath been the cause of madness in some (as Plutarch hath observed) and in others hath bred incurable diseases, and made others destroy themselves. And this it may do either naturally, for nothing eats the heart so much as grief; nothing casts such a damp on the vital spirits as immoderate sorrows; or else providentially by God's anger, who is displeased to see us so angry and repining, and often inflicts worse things upon us than those which we causelessly make the matter of so doleful complaints. Let us therefore cease that which brings such troubles before it cease itself; and when it is ceased, gives us a new sorrow, to think that we should be so unreasonably sorrowful.  
We must write upon this, as well as upon inordinate joys, Vanity of vanities, all is vanity and vexation of Spirit. And therefore let us not be troubled now, lest we be troubled more afterward, to consider how foolishly we were troubled. The Fable of Niobe which tells how she turned herself with sorrow into a stone, doth but signify the stupidity and dulness that waits upon grief, and the excessive melancholy into which it sometime casts us, which renders us as insensible as a stone. Take heed how you grow in love with sadness, for it hath no profit wherewithal to recompense your affection to it; but pays your folly only with itself, and such diseases as ordinarily use to accompany it. And we should be the less in love with it, because there are so many occasions of it in our lives. We need not weep so much for the loss of one thing, for we must expect continual losses. The world is not such a place that we should take care to spend all our tears at one time; we shall have occasion enough for them, if we have ●●y mind to weeping. Let us bestow therefore the less upon one, because there are so many objects to solicit our sorrows. And if our souls be tender, and apt to receive the impressions of doleful things, we have the more need to comfort ourselves; for every grief will but make us still more apt to grieve.  
And besides what a folly is it thus to die with continual grief for him, who if he did grieve to die, his grief continued but a little while: He died but once; why should we die always? It is certain we must die, but of all deaths let us not die with grief; and much less for grief about that which we see we cannot avoid ourselves. But let us be furthest of all from making our life a perpetual death; and grieving for that, which by grief we may so soon run ourselves into.  

Weep no more for thy friend, than thou wouldst have had him weep for thee.  IX. Ask thyself again, Whether two friends do not think that one of them must die first? Do we not see that in the common course of things, one man goes before another to his grave? Who then (if it had been permitted to thy choice) wouldst thou have appointed to be the leader unto the other: Wouldst thou have given thyself the pre-eminence, and resolved to have shown him the way? Then death it seems is a good thing; for if it were evil, we can scarce believe thy self-love is so little as to wish it might be thy portion before another. And if it be good, than thou mayest soon satisfy the pretence of loving them better than thyself, by being glad that they enjoy it before thyself. Or wouldst thou have had both gone together and been enclosed in the same Coffin, and interred in the same grave? Then it seems it is no such great matter to die as thou makest it, seeing thou art so willing to die also. And if it be no great matter for thee to live, then no more was it unto him. If the sorrow of living without him, be greater than the sorrow of dying with him, why then was not he desirous that thou shouldst die? And why did he pray for thy life and health when he died? And if he would not have thee to die also when he died, why dost thou then live in a kind of death, and enjoyest not thyself, nor the pleasures of life? Either resolve to die also, or else to live as a man should do.  

If his death be, so sad, thou wilt not be able to bear thy own.  X. Ask thyself, How can I take my own death? Certain it is that thou must die also; but if thou canst not part with a friend, how canst thou part with thyself? How wilt thou endure that soul and body should be separated, if thou canst not shake hands with another body distinct from thine? Are not they the most ancient friends? Is not their union most strict and close? Can two men cleave so together as thy soul embraces its companion? What then wilt thou do when their bonds shall be untied, if thou canst not bear the rapture of lessr cords of love? What wilt thou think when thy soul sits on thy lips, and give thy body a farewell kiss, if thou canst not close the eyes of thy friend without so many tears? Will thy soul mourn after thy body is dead, as thou dost now lament the death of thy friend? Will it groan and sigh, to think of the hole where its flesh lies? Will it sight to think that its old companion is then become the companion of worms? If not; then let it not groan so heavily for a less matter that is now befallen it. If it will; then why art thou troubled for thy friend, and not for thy own self, to think how sad thou must one day be? The fear of thy own death, must more than equal thy sorrow for the death of another man. And how canst thou have time to think of any thing else, if thou dost fear it? Or if thou dost not fear it; how canst thou fall under thy sorrow, who hast overcome so great a sear?  
Dost thou intent to go crying out of the World? If not, then be not now dismayed at that which thou must bear so valiantly thyself. Then do not mourn so much for the loss of another's life, which will but put self-love into a most piteous case, when thou comest to yield up thy own. Death is no strange thing (as I have said) for we must all die. But then why should we mourn so much, if it be such an usual thing? If we mourn excessively, it is a sign we think not of the commonness of it, and then how shall we take our own death, seeing it is such a stranger to our thoughts? Let us but comfort ourselves upon solid grounds against our own departure, and I will warrant you that shall cure all our other lamentations. Let us but dare to die ourselves, and we shall not dare to cry so much for any man's death.  
Isidore of Pelusium thinks that our Saviour, 
Lib. 23 Epist. 173.  did not mourn for his friend Lazarus because he was dead (for he knew that he was going to raise him from the dead) but because he was to live again: And to come from the haven where he was arrived, back again into the waves and storms; from the crown which he enjoyed, to a new encounter with his enemies.  
If thou dost not believe his interpretation, yet dost thou believe the thing? Dost thou seriously consider that the misery of this world is so great, that we should rather weep that we are in it, than that others are gone out of it? Then I ask thee again, whether when thou art dead and well, thou wouldst willingly live again? If not, than thou knowest what to say to thyself concernning thy friend's death. If thou wouldst, than it seems thou canst be contented with this grief; and I will not go about to comfort thee, seeing thou lovest life with all the miseries thou createst to thyself.  
But the very truth is, we are so sensible of our bodies, and have so little feeling of our souls or divine things, that it is ready to make us think we are not, when our bodies are dead. This makes death such a terrible thing. this makes both our own and others death so heavy, because it seems as if there were an extinction of us. That which we feel not, nor have any sense of within us, is as if it was not. And therefore if we feel not heavenly things, and perceive not that we have a soul; we shall receive death as if it was the loss of ourselves, and then who can but be sad? Let us live therefore in a sense of such things as may make us die willingly, and think that we ourselves are not lost; and then we shall not think that we have lost our good friends, nor lay their death so much to heart.  

Nor wilt thou be able to help others to bear their sorrows.  XI. Ask thyself likewise, How wilt thou be able to comfort others, if thou canst not comfort thyself? It should seem by thy tears that thou art very ambitious of the name of a friend; but if thou be not able to comfort thy friend, what is he the better for thee? And how didst thou deserve to have the friend which thou hast lost? If thou art able, or hast ever given any comfort unto others, administer then the same cordials to thyself. Why should not that satisfy thee, which thou expectedst with so much reason should satisfy them? What thou wouldst say to another if his friend was dead, that say to thyself. And if thou wouldst wonder that he should reject all comfort, then do not make thyself a wonder. Didst thou never tell any man that it is a shame to be impatient, when we can cure ourselves? That they suffer nothing but what God and nature have appointed; that we must all expect such losses; that no body knows whose turn is next? Take then thy own counsel, and be not such a Physician as cannot cure himself at all. Is thy distemper different from theirs? Are there not the same griefs and maladies in their minds? Then the same medicine will cure thee that thou gavest them. Or if it would not cure them, than thou wast much too blame that didst not seek a better both for them and thee. Or is thine some strange loss, the like to which never any suffered? Then this may comfort thee, that thou shalt never suffer the like again. For it would be more strange, if a thing that never came before should twice fall upon one man. It it be so strange to thee, than thy courage will be as strange to others. If thou art drawn into an example of sufferings, than thou mayst render thy self an example to all of patience and contentedness. And so Seneca saith of the Brother of Drusus, that though Drusus died in the midst of his embraces, and with his kisses warm upon his mouth; though he died in the very height of his fortune, with the most warlike Nations dead at his feet; yet he not only put a measure to his own grief, but taught all the Army how to be moderate also. And indeed he could not have stopped the tears of others, unless he had been of so brave a spirit as first to stop his own. If thou art a friend therefore unto any, let them all learn of thee how to be well satisfied. Comfort thyself as thou hast comforted others, or else as thou dost intent to comfort them. And let it be seen by thy worthy behaviour toward thyself, that thou art worthy to be a friend to another person.  

Death doth sometime befriend us.  XII. Ask thyself again, Whether friends only be mortal? Do none die but they that love us? Must not all our enemies and they that hate us die also? Death then that makes thee sad, may give thee comfort. As it puts an end to some comforts, so it is the common end of all miseries. Though we may not wish for the death of any, yet it is no harm to think that they must die who hate us, and their rage shall not last for ever. If nothing can cease their malignity, yet death can. It hath done us then no such wrong, but what it can repay us with the same hand that did it. Though we have now no friend, yet shortly we may have no enemy neither. This was one support to the Christians under their persecutions, that though their enemies (like Saul) did breath out nothing but threaten and slaughters against them, yet their breath was but in their nostrils, and might soon evaporate and vanish away. Julian, called the Apostate, had done more hurt to the Christians than the ten Persecutions, if death had not suddenly wounded him with one of his arrows.  
The Marian flames had devoured in all likelihood a great many more bodies, if death had not shortened her reign, and so extinguished the fires. We have no reason then to look upon it as unkind, which may do us so many courtesies: not to accuse that of cruelty to us, which destroys the cruelty of others towards us.  
XIII. And now may you not well make one question more to yourselves, 
Contentment hath more to say for itself, than grief hath.  and say, Is there not more reason to be comforted, than there is to be sad? If there be (as certainly there is) what should hinder your comfort, if you live by reason? If you do not live by it, than nothing that a man can say will comfort you. Nothing will cheer us unless we think of it, and make it our own by meditation: neither will any thing sadden us unless we think of it also. Seeing then they are our own thoughts that make us either sad or merry, and we have more comfortable thoughts than heavy, we cannot but be of good cheer, if we will not be enemies to ourselves. All that we can say for our sadness is, that we have lost a friend, a very dear and perhaps only friend. But you have heard that there are more in the world, and that you have not lost this; and that you have more comforts remaining than are taken away; and that if you had none but God, you had enough; and if you will read again what hath been said, twenty other reasons will offer themselves to cheer, for one that arises to make you sad. If there was no reason at all to be sad, than none need spend any time in giving comfort: But if they be very few in compare with others, and we are made to follow the most and strongest reasons, than he is not to be pitied, who notwithstanding the small reason of his sorrow, will not be of good comfort.  
The greatest cause that I know of this sort of trouble, is when many that we love die soon after one another. So it happened to that Prince (which the L. Mountaigne speaks of) who received the news of his Elder Brother's death, 
L. 1. Essay cap. 2.  whom he highly esteemed, with a great deal of constancy; and shortly after the tidings of his younger Brothers decease, in whom he placed much hope, did not alter the smoothness of his countenance. But when one of his servants died not long after that, he suffered himself to be so far transported, that he quitted his former resolution, and gave up himself to all grief and sorrow. The reason of this was not from the love that he bore to his person more than the rest, but (as he well faith) because being top full of sorrow before, the next flood must needs break the banks, or overflow all the bounds of patience.  

In Dialog. cui tit. Guilielmus.  And so Hier. Cardan tells us, that after he had partiently born many reproaches, and the cruel infamous death of a son of great hopes; and the dangerous sickness of another son, and the death of his Parents, and Wife, with many other evils; yea and after he wrote a Book of Consolation against all these evils; yet he was overcome with grief at the death of an English youth, whom he brought from Dover with him, as he passed from Scotland, in the time of Edward the sixth. And he gives the same reason for it that the other doth; Fatigatum multis adversis, oppressit me haec extrema infaelicitas; being wearied before with many griefs, this last unhappiness made me fall to the ground. It was not its strength, but his own foregoing weakness that made him fall. It was not heavy, but it came upon the back of many other loads, and so oppressed him.  
But something had been said to this also; For holy Job was in the same condition and far worse; one messenger did tread upon the heels of an other to bring him tidings of his misery, and yet he was patiented, though he himself likewise was in his own body most sadly afflicted. We have the same grounds of comfort that he had, and abundance more than was known in those younger times. And when one cause of trouble falls upon the neck of another, we can add one reason likewise unto another, and so be comforted. For our troubles can never be so many, as the causes of our consolation are. Yea, one single reason of those that I have propounded will answer all. Do we not know very well that all friends are mortal? Then it can be no new thing (if we well consider it) for two or three to die after we have lost one: But the loss of one doth rather mind us of the mortality of all. And doth not God govern the world in the death of the last as well as of the first? Then there is no less wisdom and goodness in it when many die, than when one. He that can solidly comfort himself in the death of one, will not be immoderately troubled for the loss of more. If we let our grief indeed work underground, while nothing of it appears: if our hearts be loaded with it, though our eyes look not heavily before others, than it is no wonder if it do at last break forth. When the heart is overcharged, and can find no other way to ease itself. But if we take a course to comfort our hearts at the very first, and make them truly contented; or if we let not the grief settle itself, but labour to dislodge it, than we shall be the better disposed to bear such another cross with the like patience. For then a new trouble doth not come upon the other, but only follows after it: it doth not add to the former, but only comes in its stead; it doth not augment, but only renew our grief.  

We should not be the more troubled, because we understand our trouble.  XIV. And now is it not time to conclude these questions, and to say to yourselves, Why should not reason do that which little or no reason can do? The more we are men, shall we be the less in peace, and cry like children? Nay, children weep while they see their Parents put into the Grave, and within a day or two they forget their sorrows; why cannot we do so also? Though they know not their loss, yet they know not the reasons neither why they should not be discontented for their loss. Though they have little understanding of their sufferings, yet they have as little knowledge of our comforts and supports. And as for brute creatures, you see that they make a doleful noise for the loss of their young a very short while, and then they remember it no more. Some of the people of Cous (if I forget not) used at the age of seventy years either to kill their Parents, or pine them to death, and to rejoice much at it. They though that they had lived long enough, and that it was both a misery to themselves, and a great burden to their children to have them continue any longer. The Caspians also and some of the people of old Spain had the like custom, which we well call inhuman and barbarous. But why cannot understanding teach us that, which want of understanding taught them? Why should Barbarism make them rejoice at what they did themselves, and Christianity make us sad at what is done by God and the order of things? St. Hierome reports that in his time there was at Rome, a man who had had twenty Wives, married to a woman who had had two and twenty Husbands. There was great expectations which of them should die first; and when the man buried her, his neighbours crowned him with Laurel, and caused him to bear a bough of Palm in his hand, in token of a Victory, at his wife's funerals. It seems that men can sport at death if they list, and laugh at that which makes so many cry. Why then cannot reason make us moderately sad to bear that, which humour and fancy can make men not to lament at all? Why cannot our Religion do more with us, than the people or our friends, who it is like can laugh us sometimes out of our sorrows?  
If I have not said too much in this argument, I have some confidence, that I have not said too little. And indeed I have said more than I first intended, and so much that if any have the patience to read it through, me thinks the very length of the discourse should make them forget their sorrows, and by thinking so long upon another thing, they should not remember what they thought upon before. One soul is scarce big enough to hold all these considerations, and the thoughts of grief also. Here are so many that they are able to thrust sorrow out of doors by their multitude, if not by their strength and force.  
And yet notwithstanding I must detain you a little longer before I give your thoughts leave to turn themselves to other things. For I am of the mind that all these considerations will only assuage the grief, and pricking of the wound; but will not quite heal it, and take away its putrefaction. I shall therefore commend two or three things, for the pressing out all the filthy matter, for the closing of the sore, and to make the soul perfectly whole and sound.   

SECT. VIII. Some other things are proposed for the perfect cure of the soul; The first of which is deadness to the world; and the casting out false opinions. The second is the changing of our sorrow into another kind. The third is the Life of our Lord Jesus.  

I. It is not their death, but the life of something else that troubles us.  BE dead to all things, and thou wilt not be offended that they die. Mortify thy spirit to the world and all things that are in it, and when thou hast left them, it will seem no wonder that they leave thee. Think with thyself often that thy friends are dead, that thou seest them carried to the grave, that thou beholdest worms crawling out of their eyes and mouth, and try how thou art able to bear that thought. Think that he or she that lies in thy bed by thy side, is as cold as a stone; think that thou embracest the carcase of thy dear friend, and ask thy soul how it can brook it, Think thus often, and though thy soul may start at the first, yet at last it will be patiented. That little sadness will banish and chase away all the greater, that else would seize on thee hereafter. There will be little to do when death comes, if thou constantly dost this. Thy soul will be so lose from them, that thou wilt not give a shrike: none will hear the strings crack when you are separated. Death will not be a breaking of your society, but a fair and easy untying of it. Nothing will happen to you but what you have looked for long before; and you shall be able to say, This is not the first time that I have seen my dear friend dead. Yea, think with thyself that thou seest thy own body laid in the grave, and that thou feelest thyself as cold as a clod of Earth. Think that thou art turned into rottenness and dirt; and that thou art forgotten by thy neighbours. If thy soul can endure these thoughts, then why should it be troubled at the death of another? This is a kind of death to be so separated from thy body in thy thoughts. It is all one not to be in the body, and not to feel that thou art in it. Raise thy mind then up toward heavenly things; fix thy thoughts on God and the life to come; think that thou seest thyself in heaven among the Saints of God; and while thy soul is there, it is not in thy body here below. This kind of death differs from that which will be hereafter, in this only; that then thou wilt be more perfectly out of thy body. But if there be no trouble in this separation which thou now makest even whilst thou art in it, There will be far less trouble (one would think) quite to part with it, and to get from it.  

We must not let false opinions live.  And the way to be dead to these earthly things, is, to change our opinion of them, and to see them to be what indeed they are, empty and unsatisfying, changeable and unconstant. Of this I have spoken before in the former discourse, but seeing in it a thing so great and fundamental to our contentment, let me again present you with it. We are the cause of our own grief, by magnifying the things of the world to such a value, that the loss of them shall be worth so many tears. We think that they are happy who are rich and honourable, though they be never so wicked and unskilful how to live. 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, etc. L. 1 cap. 19  We presently cry up a man for wise, and what not? Who (to use Arrianus his phrase) is preferred by Caesar, though it be but to be Groom of his close-stool. And on the contrary, we despise virtue if it be in a threadbare coat, and count him a fool who is unfortunate. No wonder then, that we cry and whine like children, when we lose any of these worldly things; seeing we think ourselves more happy than men in the enjoyment of them. We think that we are undone when we part with that which we have such an high opinion of; and there is no way to make us think that all is safe, but by altering of that foolish opinion. We expect what cannot be, and will not be content with what may easily be. We cannot make the things of this world to be still and quiet, but may make ourselves so, and the way to that quietness is well to consider their inconstancy, and that our happiness is in something better.  
It was a good rule which Pythagoras gave to all his Scholars, and is the same that I would have you learn, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Do not walk in the high way, i. e. Do not follow the common opinions, be not led by vulgar and popular apprehensions. Rectify the ordinary conceits which you have carelessly entertained of things, and judge of them as they are in themselves, and not as they are reputed of. If we would do thus, then that which is the cause of our sorrow, would be the cause of our tranquillity; because nothing hath left us, but that which we knew would not stay with us. We mourn now because things are so inconstant; but then we should not mourn, because we knew them to be inconstant. If we could make it good that any of these things are ours, than I might avouch it, that they would never have left us: But if they were not ours, why are we offended, that God doth what he will with his own? And besides, shall we▪ who are so inconstant, oblige all things besides ourselves to constancy? Shall we whose desires are so restless and uncertain, expect that all things but only we should be stable and quiet? No, let us look into ourselves, and we shall find so much difficulty to settle them, that we shall not wonder that other things are unsettled. And again, if things be so mutable, why should we not think (as I have already said) that they will one day change to what we would have them? But suppose they should, what are we the better? If our opinion be not turned too, we shall be as much afraid to lose them again, seeing they are so unconstant; as now we are desirous to have them by the benefit of their inconstancy. We must therefore alter our esteem of things now, else we shall only change our trouble, but not be rid of it, when things are changed. Adeo nihil est miserum nisi cùm putes, etc. So certain it is, that nothing is miserable, but when we think it is so; and that nothing will make us happy unless we think that we are happy. And we had better think so now, than stay to be taught this lesson by the dear experience of a great many troubles. Let thine estate be never so prosperous, yet if thine heart be unmortified, thou wilt never be the nearer, but rather the further off from settlement. For they that have the greatest abundance, are the soon disturbed by every trisle, because they are not used to have any thing go contrary to their humour.  
But if thou wilt take any comfort from the unconstancy of things, let it be this; That if thou thinkest thyself therefore unfortunate, because those things are gone that were joyful, than thou mayst think thyself happy enough, seeing the things that are unpleasant are going away also. And think I beseech you once more, and be of this opinion, That there is nothing better in this world to thee than thyself. As long therefore as thou hast thyself, why shouldst thou be troubled, especially if thou thyself thinkest never the worse of thyself, because thou art poor and destitute of friends? For these take away nothing of thyself, nor can any thing in the world deprive thee of thyself. And as Boethius well saith, This is the condition of humane nature, that it then only excels all things here, when it knows itself, but when it doth not, it is below the very Beasts: For it is natural for them to be ignorant; but for a man it is the basest vice, especially when he is ignorant of himself.  
There was a Fable among the Heathens which wise men understood to contain in it great Philosophy. In the midst of this sad discourse, it will please you perhaps, if I relate it; and it will please you a great deal more for to learn and live by it. After Jupiter had made the world, he thought that men would not be restrained from sin without rewards and punishments; and so he made two great barrels, the one full of good things, the other full of bad, to be sent down among men as there was occasion. Pandora being very desirous to know what was in these barrels, did one day broach them, and all the good things flew out towards heaven, and all the bad towards hell. Hope only and Fear remained in the bottom of these Casks; the former in that of Evil things, and the latter in that of Good. When this was done, Jupiter threw down these empty Tubs to the earth, and all mortals ran at the rareness of the sight to see what they could find in them. Some looked into the one, and some into the other, and though both of them were empty, yet they thought verily that the one was full of good, and the other full of evil. And ever since it came to pass that here below we have nothing but a fancy or conceit of Good mixed with fear and jealousy; and a mere conceit of Evil, with some hope in the compound of it. The Moral of it is this, That the things of this world are but empty Goods, and inconsiderable Evils. They are our own opinions that trouble us with the shadow of evil, and that flatter us on the other side with a fair show of Good. All substantial Good is in heaven, and all dreadful misery is in hell. If we go to heaven, we are well enough whatsoever we lose; if we fall into sin and so into hell, we cannot be well, though we should enjoy all the world; and while we stay here below, there is no good thing we enjoy but is accompanied with fear: and no evil we suffer but is attended with Hope. And there is no hope like that which is laid up in Heaven, of enjoying a bliss sincere and pure, without any allay at all. Let us turn our minds then toward these heavenly things which they did but dream of in the dark ages of the world. Let us hearty believe the Gospel which hath brought to light eternal life: And then we shall think ourselves happy enough if we lose not those things: and perhaps the death of our friends and such like crosses befall us, that we may not lose them.  
The Almighty Goodness draws our thoughts and affections, by these means, from transitory comforts: and calls them up thither where we hope our Friends are arrived. See, saith he, here is your Home; here is your resting place; here is the immortal Inheritance that never fades away. If you love yourselves, mind the way hither: and suffer nothing to turn you out of it. Whatsoever cross befalls you, take it up and carry it along with you: Let it only spur you to make the more haste to Eternal joys. Where when we are once seated aloft, amidst those glorious objects which then shall encompass us; with what contempt (as an ingenious Person 
* M. Malh. to the Princess of Conty.  speaks) shall we look down upon this Morsel of earth, which men have divided into so many Kingdoms; or upon this drop of water, whereof so many Seas are composed. How shall we smile to see men so busy about the necessities of a Body, to which we no sooner give one thing, but it asks another: and so disquieted through a weakness of spirit which daily troubles them, as to unwish that to day, which the day before they wished for. Enter, if it be possible, into these generous thoughts before hand. Begin to speak of the World, as you will do when you have forsaken it. Acknowledge it to be a place, where you must daily lose something, till you have lost all. And by these and the like Meditations, let your soul assuredly conceive, that having had its Original from Heaven, it is one of the number of those, which must one day return thither.  
In the mean time, when the days of Mourning come, and sorrow will not be denied its place: let me recommend this advice to every man. As soon as it is possible, 
II. Our tears should be kept for that which is the cause of death, and all our tears.  Turn thy sorrow for thy friend into sorrow for thy sins. Remember that thy tears may be due to some other thing, and the cure of that will cure all thy other griefs. If thou art not a Christian, than it is thy duty to mourn neither for one thing nor other, but only to bewail thyself. Let the dead bury the dead (as our Saviour said) do thou presently follow after thy Lord with tears. Take no care of funerals, think of no earthly thing, but only how thou mayest be a Christian. And if thou art so, than thou oughtest to rejoice that thy sins are pardoned, and that thou hast not the greatest cause of grief; and this joy sure will swallow up all thy sorrows. There is scarce any thing so considerable in our bodies that is seen, as our tears; for they are the most notable expressions of what is in our hearts. The hands (as Ant. Guevara observes) do work, the feet do walk, the tongue speaks, but it is the heart only that weeps. The eyes are but the sponges of the heart, through which its affections are drained and dried up. An afflicted heart hath neither hands to labour, nor feet to walk, nor can it find a tongue to speak, but tears are all that it hath to tell you what it wants. And therefore we ought to reserve these for some greater thing than our dead friends, which our heart ought much to be affected withal. As our Saviour said to the women of Jerusalem when he was going to the most cruel sufferings, so might our friends say to us when they are a dying, Weep not for us, but weep for yourselves, if you be dead while you are alive. Mourn more than you do, if you have not yet mourned for your sins and amended them: But if you have, then rejoice in the favour of God, and bless him for his Son Jesus, who is better to thee than ten Sons, or all thy friends which thou lamentest. Are our sins dead as well as our friends? have we buried them in the grave of our Lord? are we risen again to an heavenly life? Let us go then to God, and pray to him, and praise him, and this will give us ease. But if we be troubled for sin; then sure we shall not add another sin by immoderate sorrow, and forgetfulness of God's goodness. If it be sin we hate; then bitter complaints and discontents must all be hated. Would you indispose yourself to pray, to praise God and meditate in his sacred Word; Would you render yourself unfit to receive the Sacrament of his most blessed body and blood? If not; then mourn but so much as will not hinder any of these, and you have leave to mourn as much as you please. Stop but here; and there is no man will lay any restraints upon you. But then how short your mourning must be, you will soon guests, and the Sun must not go down upon your grief, no more than it must upon your wrath. But if you take no great care whether you disturb your souls or no; than you have most reason to mourn for that carelessness and neglect. Go then and bewail your unkindness to God, your unthankfulness for his mercies, and unbelief of his Gospel; for you can never take your hearts in a better time, than when they are so sad, and inclined to be sorrowful. Tell them that now they are very well disposed for a necessary business; and bid them look if there be not something else to bewail that is more considerable. Ask thyself, hast thou not deserved this and ten times more? Wilt thou add another sin, when thou shouldst cease all sins? Hast thou not been careless of seeking God? Hast thou not foolishly wasted thy precious time? And art thou not troubled at all for that? Yea art thou now impatient, as if God dealt hardly with thee? And wilt thou spend more time badly, when thou art taught by the death of thy dear friend how short it is? It is most incongruous thus to bewail the death of a child or acquaintance, when thou art like to die thyself both body and soul. And when thou hast mourned for thy sins, thou wilt be taught thereby how little thou oughtest to mourn for thy losses. For even our tears for sin must not be immoderate, and therefore much less must we dare to let them flow in abundance for our losses. So you know the great Apostle commands the Corinthians to comfort him that had been guilty of a great sin, and receive him again into the Church now that he repent, left perhaps such an one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow, 2 Cor. 2.7. I wish all those who are ready to destroy themselves with grief, would seriously consider this, that we may not over-load our hearts with grief, for our sins themselves, which are the causes of all other sorrows.  
We cannot please the Devil better than by discontent. He would fain oppress every good man with some passion or other; let us take heed how we join with him against ourselves. If we have left his service, that is enough to provoke him. If we have bid defiance to his pleasures, this doth incense him, and we must expect that he will endeavour to overcome us with griefs.  
The Devil is mad against all good men; and therefore let all those who have irritated him against them, beware how they now prove cowards, and execute his vengeance for him with their own hands. Let us take heed (as Photius excellently expresseth it) lest we be good at stirring up and provoking the envy and rage of our adversary; but naught at resisting and overcoming him by patience and perseverance to the end. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  
But if we must needs weep for the loss of something here, let it be for the afflictions of the people of God. Let us mourn to see the Church sit like a widow in her black garments. Let it pity us to see the blood of God's servants shed like water upon the ground. If our own sins do not trouble us, let us weep to see the wickedness of the world, and let our eyes run down with tears, to think that men do not keep Gods Law. Some such channel we should cut for our tears, and not let them spend themselves on this fashion about our own personal troubles. This is a method both to stop our tears, and likewise to make them useful to us while they run. It is a way to ease us of our present grief, and of all others also. We shall exchange that sorrow that would have troubled us, for a great deal of joy and comfort. Whereas our worldly grief would have left the heart sad, this will leave it light and merry. 
III. The life of our Lord Jesus gives us the greatest comfort against death.   
Believe throughly that the Lord Jesus lives, and so thou mayst both expect a resurrection from the dead, and likewise hope for comfort from him when thou art left sad and desolate. The body itself doth not die any more than corn doth; which dies, that it may live and spring up again with large gain and advantage. Are we loath to throw the corn into the ground, and do we not patiently expect till the harvest comes? Why should we then bury our friends with so many tears, seeing they are but laid in the Womb of their mother again, that by the power of God they may have a better birth? The Heathen could say much to comfort themselves, but they knew not this comfort; for indeed they were rather contented, than comforted. Those that did think themselves most wise, and judged that they had the best supports, did only dream that the soul make take another body, and shift its place at several times: But we know that there will be a time, when even our scattered ashes will fly into one another's embraces again; and a new life will breath into our dust, and make it stand upon its feet. And then in the mean time, if our condition be never so sad, and we be left at alone; why do we not solace ourselves in the great compassion of our High Priest, who hath a feeling of all our miseries which we endure? Can we expect that ever he should love us more than when we are like unto him in sufferings? We should be so far from being sad at what befalls us, that we should think, if our condition was a little worse, we should be more dear unto him than now we are, when nothing extraordinary is happened to us. No man can be alone as long as he lives who hath said, I will not leave you comfortless like fatherless children, I will come to you. Did not he bid his Disciples to be well content, when he himself died? Did he not leave his peace with them, and bid them that their hearts should not be troubled? And what is the death of one of our friends, to the departure of the best friend to the world that ever was, from his little flock of friends? Did not Christ know what he said, when he was going to die? Did he advise them not to be troubled, when it was impossible that they should be otherwise? And if they were not to be troubled then, I am sure we have less reason to be troubled now; both because we have a less loss to bewail, and we have a stronger and more excellent comfort against our loss. Our friends are as much below him, as his state in the grave was beneath that to which he is now advanced in the Heavens. Their hearts were not to be troubled when He that is the Lover of the world was held in the chains of death, because they knew that he would lose them; Why then should we be disturbed for the death of one that loves us only, when we know that Christ is risen, and that he is in the Heavens; Angels, Authorities, and Powers being made subject to him. If an Angel was necessary for our comfort, we should not want his Ministry. He is so full of Love and compassion towards us, that if he did not think he had left Cordials enough to support us, he would come himself to cheer us, and raise our friend, as he did Lazarus, from the dead. But now we may well live in hope, and he hath given us strong consolution and good hope through grace. Let us have patience but a little, and we shall not be capable of mourning any more; All tears shall be wiped off from our eyes, sighing and sorrow shall fly away.   

SECT. IX. The Conclusion. Which contains an advice to those that are in love with sorrow. And an advice for the reaping profit by this Book. And a brief recapitulation of the chief matters in it.  

Let no man therefore be in Love with tears.  REmember than I beseech you, whosoever you are that cast your eyes on these lines, what I said at the beginning. Take heed you do not indulge yourselves in your tears. Est enim & dolendi quaedam ambitio, for there is a certain ambition even in mourning, and men think that they shall be the better thought of for their grief. But assure yourselves, that if we study to exceed one another in grief, it is but just with God that we should never want misery enough, seeing we are so ambitious of it. If we will mourn immoderately, when he would have us to be patiented; we shall not keep ourselves patiented, when perhaps there is little or no cause to mourn. When the air is disposed to rain, it is a long time before we can recover fair weather; and every little cloud will fall a Weeping, which at another time would have been dry and barren. And just so it is with those that strive to gather as many clouds as they can to overcast them, and make them sad. It is so long before they can disperse them all, that every little thing renews their grief; as if a cheerful day should never shine upon them more.  
It was a very handsome device that one of the Ancient Philosophers used to comfort Arsinoe, when he observed her to Weep immoderately for her Son's death. Let me entreat you said he, to lend me your patience till I tell you this story: On a time Jupiter conferred honour upon all the lesser Gods or divine Powers, and there was none of them wanting but only Sorrow. When all the rest were gone away rejoicing, she came and begged some honour also with many tears and entreaties. Jupiter having conferred all honours that were worth any thing upon the other Heavenly Powers, He grand to her all that which men bestow upon their dead friends (viz. grief and tears) as best befitting her quality. Now all these little Deities (said this wise man) do love those most that love and honour them, and so doth Sorrow also. They bestow most of their gifts on their Votaries, and those that pay them constant services, and they care not for those that observe none of their ceremonies. If you therefore bestow no honour upon Sorrow, than she will not love you, nor come to you: But if you studiously seek how to please her, and honour her by tears and lamentations, and all such sad things that are the offices wherein she delights; she will be in Love with you, and you shall never want her company, nor be without occasions of doing continual honour to her. She will be continually supplying thee with tears to pour upon her Altar, and filling thee with sighs, which are the incense which she loves thou shouldst evaporate toward Heaven. By this Art the wise man stayed her tears; for she knew that he meant, that if we give way to grief we shall never want it: and much more if we seek for arguments to aggravate it, it will stick so fast unto us, that it will never forsake us. Though love and respect to our friends, and the natural affection which distinguisheth us from beasts, do allow and require moderate sorrow and sadness of our spirit; yet an intemperate grief and afflicting of our souls is uncreasonable, for it doth them no good: and it is unnatural; for it doth both our body and mind abundance of harm, and let me add likewise, that it is unchristian, and argues that we have little hope in God either for ourselves or others. God hath done us the honour to make us Priests unto himself; and you know it was the Law for the Priests, that none of them should mourn for a dead friend, unless he was of their nearest kindred; And therefore let us take heed how we make ourselves unclean for the dead, by Weeping so, that we should unfit ourselves for any Christian service, which God hath appointed us for our constant employment. Can you mourn and praise God too? Can you pour our your souls to God, while you pour out these tears of grief? Can you pray in faith for other things, and not be able to believe that you can live without a friend? Can you read seriously, when your eyes are sore with the sharpness of your sorrow? Can you meditate of heavenly things, while your thoughts are filled with the images of such doleful objects? If not; know that you defile your Priesthood, and that you must instantly cleanse yourselves, that you may be fit continually to offer up spiritual sacrifices unto God.  
And for a conclusion of this discourse, remember what I said in the former Treatise, That you must lay these foundations and grounds of comfort within yourselves, 
He must write these things in his heart, who would find the comfort of them.  or else you will always be troubled. It is something within us that must satisfy our minds, and not the enjoyment of any outward good; and therefore we must work these principles into our hearts, for even They if they be without us, will not profit. We either think it is the thing we want which will cure us, when as it is without us; or else that we have reasons enough to comfort us, when as alas! we want them also, because we let them lie without us, and have them not in our minds. We have more ways than one to abuse and deceive ourselves. At first we think that if we had what our hearts desire at this present, we should never be disquieted: And when by reason and experience we find it otherwise, than we make a great many good principles upon which to rest our souls, but they are at a great distance also from our hearts; and when we should use them, they are none of our own no more than any thing in this world.  
Let these two things then settle themselves in our minds, which will lead us into the right way of fortifying our souls both against this and all other trouble. First, Never think that the things which thou wantest will cure thee; for they will rather make the wound wider, and enlarge thy wants. The more we have, the more we desire still to have; and the way to think we have enough, is not to desire to have too much. It is very well observed by Plutarch, 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  that it seems to us as if our clothes did give us heat, when as they are cold of themselves, and in a great heat we shift our clothes to make us cool. Just so do men think, that the things without them will afford them content; and that if they had a sumptuous house, and had riches at command, and were encompassed with servants, and had their friends to bear them company, they should live most sweetly and deliciously; when as experience teaches us, that we are still desirous of some change in one thing or other about us. It is the heat of our own bodies that keeps us warm, which our clothes do only contain and keep in, that it may not fly abroad, and disperse in the air: and so is it the liveliness and strength of our own spirit that must make us live merrily, and which gives all the pleasure and grace to these outward things which minister to our comfort. They can only help to maintain and increase our delights; but our delight must arise from a more certain cause within ourselves. Add one heap of riches to another, build great houses, invite to thyself friends and lovers; unless thou dost free thyself from thy own desires, unless thou dost put an end to thy fears and cares, and such like things, thou dost but like him that administers Wine to a man in a , or Honey to a Choleric person, or meat to him that is troubled with the Colic; which do not strengthen, but destroy them. The less we have, the better it is, unless we desire but a little. And therefore it is of absolute necessity, that we form to ourselves such strong principles as will moderate our desires, and make them reasonable. But then let me tell you in the second place, That a good Book, and a Treatise of the Principles of Contentment may be without us as well as any thing else. We think that we have good reasons of being quiet which will comfort us upon all occasions. But where are they? In our Book? That is no more ours, than our money that bought it, unless the Book be in our heart. We must labour to write these truths on our souls, and turn them into the reason of our minds. Things of faith we must make as if they were things of reason: and things of reason we must make as sensible as if they beat continually upon our eyes and ears. Let us colour and die our souls with these notions, or else they will do us but little good. If this Book lie by us, and not in us, it will be little better than wast Paper. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, 
Arrian. L 2. cap. 9  etc. saith Epictetus. For it is one thing to have Bread and Wine in a Cupboard; and another thing to have them in our body. When they are eaten and drunk, they turn into flesh and blood, and make us lusty and strong: but when they lie by us, we think indeed we have them, but they afford us no nourishment or refreshment at all. Even so it is in these things, If we inwardly digest them, and turn them (as it were) into the substance of our souls, they will make us of a lively complexion; but else we may be pale with fear, and pine away with grief; and it is not their fault, but our own. And as he that doth not eat when he should, may have no stomach when he is weak, but presently vomit up his food again: So he that minds not these things till he be sick of his troubles, and in great need of comfort, will find his soul (it is most likely) very impatient of the remedy, and it will be a trouble to him but to read that which will quiet him.  
Thus I observe it was with a very great man, a person endowed with an extraordinary measure of wisdom: who rejected himself in a time of sorrow, all those counsels that he had skilfully administered to others. Julius Scaliger I mean, who writing to a friend of his to comfort her in her Mourning 
* Epist. 67. ad Marg. Vitelliam. , beseeches her to remember, how far it is from common Prudence, Not to lay down that grief for our own sake, which we have taken up for the sake of another: and that it is not the part of a sound judgement to accuse the fates as if they had done us wrong, and to take a severe punishment for it upon ourselves. Consider also, where is that person we Weep for? If in Heaven, what need is there of our howl? If in misery, why do we add loss to loss, evil to evil, and because he is miserable against our will make ourselves freely and willingly miserable? But this above all things I would have you keep in mind, that you have nothing, which you have not received; and therefore you own thanks, even now, for what you had, to him from whom you received it: and ought not to reproach him for calling home his own. For all the benefits bestowed on Mortals are like all things here, stand withering, and cannot last for ever: nay unsteady, inconstant and never equal. If therefore we enjoy any of them, we must place it among our felicities, that we were owners of it: And when by the severe Laws of the Universe it is snatched from us, we must refresh ourselves with the remembrance of it, as if it were present, and not vex and torment ourselves, because of its absence. Many things like to these, and perhaps better, he saith he could suggest if he thought it needful. And yet this very counsellor, I observe, when his turn came to weep, was strangely overcome with sorrow, for the death of a little son of his; but a child of great hopes. He cries out lamentably, and bewails himself without measure, saying, In illo vivebam, in illo interii 
* Oratio in luctu Audesti si two. , I lived in him, and in him I died. I know he is happy, and therefore I do not bewail him in myself, but myself in him: by whose fall I am fallen also. I say I bewail myself, who die a new kind of way, and am killed by another's death. And then reckoning up the arguments whereby his friends studied to comfort him (the very same wherewith he thought he could comfort others) he despises them all, as not worth a straw; telling them, that they expressed indeed a great deal of humanity to him, but not much wisdom. For his loss was so incomparable, that there was no hope he should ever cease to lament it. In this I believe he found himself happily mistaken: For time which ends all things, will end our grief, though we strive never so obstinately to hinder it. His proceeding is slow (as one speaks) but the effect is infallible. But we may learn by such examples as this the necessity of concocting our own thoughts, and settling ourselves upon our own rules and prescriptions. Otherwise we shall be in danger (as he pathetically expresses his misery) to celebrate the obsequies of our friends in a sadder manner than the Heathen did. For they sacrificed to their Ghosts only with the blood of Beasts; but we shall offer up to their memory, all our counsels, and be at the charge of losing our very Reason.  

A recapitulation of the chief things that have been said.  Meditate therefore seriously of what hath been said. Think that you are not losers by your friends gains, and that there is no reason to be sorrowful when they are filled with joy. We love ourselves indeed better than we do them, and are troubled at our own loss, not at theirs; but then if the loss be our own, we can tell better how to repair it. This is our comfort; that it is in our own hands to ease ourselves, if we be the cause of our own trouble. Consider often that it is as natural to die as it is to be born, That God gives us every thing upon this condition, that we should be content to give it up again when he pleases to call for it. That God is a loving Father, and doth every thing for the best. That he would have us love him more, when he leaves us nothing else to love. That nothing can be dismally sad, which by his grace and our care may be turned into joy. That we ought to turn our sorrow into care, lest there be something worse to sorrow for; even the sin of our immoderate sorrow. That we ought to live so, that we may comfort ourselves with hope we shall see our friends again that die in the Lord. That seeing we must die too, and others must weep for us; by our life we must leave them something to comfort them, in hope that we are better, than if we were with them. We must often consider how much of our grief depends on mere fancy, and not on things. We were perhaps at a great distance from our friends while they lived, and did but seldom see them. The case is not much altered now that they are dead. If we have sustained a loss, we do but double it by losing our own quiet and comfort also. And yet there is more cause of thankfulness than of repining; both that we had them so long, and also that God hath taken away only them. Our grief at last must cease; and that which will end it then, may end it now. Or if it must end itself by its own weariness, it is a shame that Religious reason cannot do more than mere length of time can do. It is but as we ourselves would have it, who would have been loath to have died first. Or else it is as they would have it, who would have been loath to have outlived us, and been so sad as we make it necessary to be. They are not quite gone away, but only gone before. And by sorrow we may tread too fast upon their heels. Let us henceforth place our chiefest comfort in God; for if one be taken away, then so may another. There will be every day new matter of trouble; and unless we be better provided against it, we shall be every day miserable. This world is the place of sorrow; and therefore seeing there are things enough to trouble us, let it not be our work to create trouble to ourselves. Trouble is a thing that will come without our call; but true joy will not spring up without ourselves. If any sorrow should oppress us, it must be for our sins. And when we mourn for them, let us be sorrowful we were no more thankful for such enjoyments as we have now lost. Let these tears also teach us to take off our affections from worldly things; all the pleasure of whose possession is scarce big enough to compensate the trouble of parting with them. And above all, remember that Jesus died and entered into the Grave, as well as we; and that by his Resurrection he hath opened the gate to immortal life; and is in glory at God's right hand; and expects your coming thither where he is, out of this calamitous place, and that, in the mean time, you should not disparage your hope in him, by impatience under the loss of any other thing. And then your wisdom to distinguish the value of this world from the next; and your Religious fear to offend our merciful Father, and lose his blessing, by repining at what he doth: will undoubtedly preserve you, from all inordinate and undutiful sorrow, be the cause of it never so great.  
FINIS.