XL. charity do oblige us to believe) deferve as well, divers of SERM. them much better than ourselves: what reafon then can we have to conceive our cafe so hard, or to complain thereof? Were we the only perfons exposed to trouble, or the fingle marks of adverfe fortune; could we truly fay with the Prophet, Behold, if there be any forrow like my forrow; Lam. i. 12. we might feem a little unhappy: but fince we have fo much good company in our conceived woe; fince it is fo ordinary a thing to be poor and diftreffed; fince our cafe is, as the Poet fpeaketh, not rare, but commonly known, trite, and drawn out from the heap of lots offered to men by fortune P; fince pitiful objects do thus environ and enclose us; it is plainly reasonable, humane, and juft, that we fhould without murmuring take and bear our lot: for what privilege have we to allege, that we rather than others should be untouched by the grievances to which mankind is obnoxious? Whence may we pretend to be the fpecial favourites, minions, privadoes, and darlings of fortune? Why may not God well deal with us, as he doth with other men? what grounds have we to challenge, or to expect, that he should be partial toward us? why should we imagine, that he must continually do miracles in our behalf, caufing all thofe evils, which fall upon our neighbours all about, to fkip over us, bedewing us, like Gideon's fleece, with plenty and joy, while all the earth befide is Judg.vi.37. dry; caufing us, like the three children, to walk in this Dan. iii. 25. wide furnace, unfcorched and unfinged by the flames encompaffing us? Are we not men framed of the fame mould, are we not finners guilty of like offences, with the meanest peasant, the poorest beggar, the moft wretched flave? if fo, then a parity of fortune with any men doth become us, and may be due to us; then it is a perverse and unjust frowardness to be displeased with our lot: we may, if we please, pity the common ftate of men, but we P Nec rara videmus Quæ pateris: cafus multis hic cognitus ac jam Tritus, et e medio fortunæ ductus acervo. Juv. Sat. xiii. 8. Juv. Sat. xiii. 140. SERM. cannot reasonably complain of our own; doing fo plainly XL. doth argue, that we do unmeasurably overprize and over love ourfelves. When once a great king did exceffively and obftinately grieve for the death of his wife, whom he tenderly loved, a philofopher, obferving it, told him, "That "he was ready to comfort him by restoring her to life, "fuppofing only, that he would fupply what was needful "toward the performing it." The king faid, "He was "ready to furnish him with any thing." The philosopher anfwered, "That he was provided with all things necef"fary, except one thing:" what that was the king demanded; he replied, That if he would upon his wife's tomb infcribe the names of three perfons, who never mourned, she prefently would revive: the king, after inquiry, told the philofopher, That he could not find one fuch man: Why then, O abfurdeft of all men, faid the philofopher smiling, art thou not afnamed to moan as if thou hadft alone fallen into fo grievous a cafe; whenas thou canst not find one perfon, that ever was free from fuch domeftic affliction ? So might the naming one perfon, exempted from inconveniences, like to those we undergo, be fafely proposed to us as a certain cure of ours; but if we find the condition impoffible, then is the generality of the cafe a fufficient Пaygur ground of content to us; then may we, as the wife poet xax adviseth, folace our own evils by the evils of others, so frequent and obvious to us. κακὰ δι' ετί Menand. cienti fua Sen. de Ira, iii. 31. Nulli ad a- 5. We are indeed very apt to look upward toward those liena refpi- few, who, in fuppofed advantages of life, (in wealth, digplacent. nity, or reputation,) do seem to transcend, or to precede us, grudging and repining at their fortune; but feldom do we caft down our eyes on thofe innumerably many good people, who lie beneath us in all manner of accommodations, pitying their mean or hard condition; like racers, we look forward, and pursue those who go before 9 Ἔτι ὦ πάντων ατοπώτατε θρηνεῖς ἀναίδην, ὡς μόνος ἀλγεινῷ τοσύτῳ συμπλακείς, ὁ μηδὲ ἕνα τῶν πώποτε γεγονότων ἄμοιρον οἰκείο πάθος ἔχων εὑρεῖν. Jul. Ep. 36. Neque fe majori pauperiorum Turbæ comparet, hunc atque hunc fuperare laboret : Hor. Sat. 1. XL. us, but reflect not backward, or confider those who come SER M. behind us: two or three outfhining us in fome flender piece of profperity, doth raise diffatisfaction in us; while the doleful state of millions doth little affect us with any regard or compaffion: hence fo general discontent (pringeth, hence fo few are fatisfied with their conditions, an epidemical eyefore molefting every man: for there is no man, of whatsoever condition, who is not in fomne defirable things outstripped by others; none is fo high in fortune, but another, in wit or wifdom, in health, or ftrength, or beauty, in reputation or esteem of men, may seem to excel him he therefore looking with an evil or envious eye on fuch perfons, and with fenfelefs difregard paffing over the reft of men, doth eafily thereby lofe his eafe and fatisfaction from his own eftate: whereas if we would confider the case of moft men, we should see abundant reason to be satisfied with our own; if we would a little feel the calamities of our neighbours, we should little refent our own croffes; a kindly commiferation of others' more grievous difafters would drown the fenfe of our leffer disappoint ments. If with any competent heedfulness we view perfons and things before us, we shall easily discern, that what abfolutely feemeth great and weighty is indeed comparatively very fmall and light; that things are not fo unequally difpenfed, but that we have our full fhare in good, and no more than our part in evil; that Socrates had Ei Guyreason to suppose, that, if we should bring into one common ras flock all our mishaps, fo that each should receive his portion auxías,st of them, gladly the most would take up their own, and gotov ixasov, their ways; that consequently it is both iniquity and folly Si vis gratus effe adverfus Deos, et adverfus vitam tuam, cogita quam multos antecefferis. Sen. Ep. 15. Nunquam erit felix, quem torquebit felicior. Sen. de Ira, iii. 31. Vid. ib. That at worst we are, Extremi primorum, extremis ufque priores. Hor. Epift. ii. 2. καιμεν εἰς τὸ διελέσθαι το ἕκασον, ἀσμένως ἂν τὰς πλοίες τὰς αὐτῶν λαβόντας ἀπελθεῖν. Plut. Apoll SERM. XL. vitus eft magna for tuna, &c. Sen, ad Polyb. 26. 6. If even we would take care diligently to compare our state with the state of those whom we are apt moft to Magna fer- admire and envy, it would afford matter of confolation and content unto us. What is the ftate of the greatest perfons, (of the world's princes and grandees,) what but a state encompassed with snares and temptations numberlefs; which, without extreme caution and conftancy, force of reason, and command of all appetites and paffions, cannot be avoided, and feldom are? What but a ftate of pompous trouble, and gay fervility; of living in continual noise and stir, environed with crowds and throngs; of being fubject to the urgency of bufinefs and the tediousness of ceremony; of being abufed by perfidious fervants and mocked by vile flatterers; of being expofed to common cenfure and obloquy, to misrepresentation, misconstruction, and flander; having the eyes of all men intent upon their actions, and as many fevere judges as watchful spectators of them; of being accountable for many men's faults, and bearing the blame of all miscarriages about them; of being refponfible, in confcience, for the miscarriages and mishaps which come from the influence of our counfels, our examples, &c. of being peftered and pursued with pretences, with fuits, with complaints, the neceffary result whereof is to displease or provoke very many, to oblige or fatisfy very few; of being frequently engaged in refentments of ingratitude, of treachery, of neglects, of defects in duty, and breaches of truft toward them; of being conftrained to comply with the humours and opinion of men; of anxious care to keep, and jealous fear of lofing all; of danger and being objected to the traitorous attempts of bold malecontents, of fierce zealots, and wild fanatics; of wanting the most solid and favoury comforts of life, true friendship, free conversation, certain leisure, privacy, and retiredness, for enjoying themselves, their time, their thoughts, as they think good; of fatiety and being cloyed with all forts of enjoyments: in fine, of being paid with false coin for all their cares and pains, receiving for them scarce any thing more, but empty fhews of refpect, and hollow acclamations of praifet; (whence the Pfalmift might SERM, well fay, Surely men of low degree are vanity, and men of XL. high degree a lie; a lie, for that their state cheateth us, Pfal. Ixii. 9. appearing so specious, yet being really fo inconvenient and troublesome.) Such is the state of the greatest men; fuch as hath made wife princes weary of themselves, ready to acknowledge, that if men knew the weight of a crown, none would take it up"; apt to think with Pope Adrian, who made this epitaph for himself: Here lieth Adrian the Sixth, who thought nothing in his life to have befallen him more unhappy, than that he ruled: fuch, in fine, their ftate, as upon due confideration we should, were it offered to our choice, never embrace; fuch indeed, as in fober Nihil difficilius quam judgment, we cannot prefer before the moft narrow and bene impeinferior fortune: how then can we reasonably be difpleafed rare. Diowith our condition, when we may even pity emperors and opife, in clef. apud kings, when, in reality, we are as well, perhaps are much Aureliano. better, than they? 7. Farther, it may induce and engage us to be content, to confider what commonly hath been the lot of good men in the world: we shall, if we furvey the hiftories of all times, find the best men to have fuftained most grievous. croffes and troubles y; fcarce is there in holy Scripture recorded any person eminent and illuftrious for goodness, who hath not tafted deeply of wants and diftreffes. Abraham, the father of the faithful, and efpecial friend of God, was called out of his country, and from his kindred, to wander in a strange land, and lodge in tents, without any fixed habitation. Jacob fpent a great part of his life * Perfonata felicitas. Sen. Ep. 80. Adulandi certamen eft, et unum omnium amicorum officium, una contentio quis blandiffime fallat. Sen. de Benef. vi. 30.-Vid. optime differentem.-Vid. et de Clem. i. 19.-Et ad Polyb. 26. "Antigonus. Nefcitis amici, quid mali fit imperare, &c. Saturn, apud Vopifc. * Hic fitus eft Adrianus VI. qui nihil fibi in vita infelicius duxit, quam quod imperavit. Lud. Guicciard. P. Jovius in vit. y Confider what calamities great, powerful, glorious men have endured; Crofus, Polycrates, Pompey, &c. Sen. de Ira, iii. 25. Οἱ τῶν Ἑλλήνων ἄρισοι πενία διέζων παρὰ πάντα τὸν βίον. (Ariftides, Phocion, Epaminondas, Pelopidas.) El. xi. 9, 11, 43. Lamachus, Socrates, Ephialtes. Abel, Noe, &c. Chryf. tom. vi. p. 107. |