No man happy that depends upon fortune.

all others, a studious life is the least tiresome; it makes us easy to ourselves and to others, and gains us both friends and reputation.

HE THAT SETS UP HIS REST UPON CONTINGENCIES, SHALL NEVER BE QUIET.

NEVER pronounce any man happy that depends upon fortune for his happiness, for nothing can be more preposterous than to place the good of a reasonable creature in unreasonable things. If I have lost any thing it was adventitious, and the less money the less trouble; the less favour, the less envy: nay, even in those cases that put us out of our wits, it is not the loss itself, but the opinion of the loss that troubles us. It is a common mistake to account those things necessary that are superfluous, and to depend upon fortune for the felicity of life, which arises only from virtue. There is no trusting to her smiles: the sea swells and rages in a moment, and the ships are swallowed up at night, in the very place where they sported themselves in the morning; and fortune has the same power over princes that it has over empires, over nations that it has over cities, and the same power over cities that it has over private men. Where is the estate that may not be followed upon the heel with famine and beggary? that dignity, which the next moment

Uncertainty of human affairs ;--

may not be laid in the dust? that kingdom that is secure from desolation and ruin? The period of all things is at hand, as well as that which casts out the fortunate, as the other that delivers the unhappy; and that which may fall out at any time, may fall out this very day. What shall come to pass I know not, but what may come to pass I know so that I will despair of nothing, but expect every thing; and whatsoever Providence remits, is clear gain. Every moment, if it spares me, deceives me; and yet in some sort it does not deceive me, for though I know that any thing may happen, yet I know likewise that every thing will not. I will hope the best, and provide for the worst.

Methinks we should not

find so much fault with fortune for her inconstancy, when we ourselves suffer a change every moment that we live; only other changes make more noise, and this steals upon us like the shadow upon a dial, every jot as certainly, but more insensibly.

The burning of Lyons may serve to shew us that we are never safe, and to arm us against all surprizes. The terror of it must needs be great, for the calamity is almost without example. If it had been fired by an enemy, the flame would have left some farther mischief to have been done by the soldiers: but to be wholly consumed, we have not heard of many earthquakes so pernicious.

An instance thereof.

So many rarities to be destroyed in one night, and in the depth of peace to suffer an outrage Who would bebeyond the extremity of war. lieve it? but twelve hours betwixt so fair a city and none at all: it was laid in ashes in less time than it would require to tell the story. To stand unshaken in such a calamity is hardly to be expected, and our wonder cannot but be equal to our grief. Let this accident teach us to provide against all possibilities that fall within the power of fortune, all external things are under her dominion: one while she calls her hands to her assistance, another while she contents herself with her own force, and destroys us with mischiefs of which we cannot find the author. No time, place, or condition is excepted; she makes our very pleasures painful to us; she makes war upon us in the depth of peace, and turns the means of our security into an occasion of fear; she turns a friend into an enemy, and makes a foe of a companion; we suffer the effects of war without any adversary, and, rather than fail, our felicity shall be the cause of our destruction. Lest we should either forget or neglect her power, every day produces something extraordinary. She persecutes the most temperate with sickness, the strongest constitutions with the phthisick, she brings the innocent to punishment, and the most retired she assaults with tumults. Those glories that have

No true felicity in any thing.

grown up with many ages, with infinite labour and expence, and under the favour of many auspicious providences, one day scatters and brings to nothing. He that pronounced a day, nay, an hour, sufficient for the destruction of the greatest empire, might have fallen to a moment. It were some comfort yet to the frailty of mankind, and of human affairs, if things might but decay as slowly as they rise; but they grow by degrees, and they fall to ruin in an instant. There is no felicity in any thing, either private or public: men, nations, and cities, have all their fates and periods; our very entertainments are not without terror, and our calamity rises there where we least expect it. Those kingdoms that stood the shock both of foreign wars, and civil, come to destruction without the sight of an enemy. Nay, we are to dread our peace and felicity more than violence, because we are there taken unprovided, unless, in a state of peace we do the duty of men in war, and say to ourselves-Whatsoever may be, will be. I am to-day safe, and happy in the love of my country; I am to-morrow banished; to-day in pleasure, peace, and health; to morrow broken upon the wheel, led in triumph, and in the agony of sickness. Let us, therefore, prepare for a shipwreck in the port, and for a tempest in a calm. One violence drives me from my country, another ravishes that from me; and

All possessions are uncertain.

that very place, where a man can hardly pass this day for a crowd, may be to-morrow a desart. Wherefore, let us set before our eyes the whole condition of human nature, and consider as well what may happen, as what commonly does. The way to make future calamities easy to us in the sufferance, is to make them familiar to us in the contemplation. How many cities in Asia, Achaia, Assyria, and Macedonia, have been swallowed up by earthquakes! nay, whole countries are lost, and large provinces laid under water, but time brings all things to an end, for all the works of mortals are mortal. All possessions, and their possessors, are uncertain and perishable; and what wonder is it to lose any thing at any time, when we must one day lose all?

That which we call our own, is but lent us; and what we have received gratis, we must return without complaint. That which fortune gives us this hour, she may take away the next;

and he that trusts to her favours, shall either find himself deceived, or if he be not, he will at least be troubled because he may be so. There is no defence in walls, fortifications, and engines, against the power of fortune: we must provide ourselves within, and when we are safe there, we are invincible; we may be battered, but not taken. She throws her gifts among us, and we sweat and scuffle for them; never considering

VOL. I.