Chap.XVIir. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 251 



when God and Nature has appointed that he flioidd die. Whereas 

 a man, who has no profpect of happincfs in a future life, cannot 

 leave this life, and the many good things he may enjoy in ir, with 

 any comfort or peace of mind, but muft confider himfelf as deprived 

 of all happinefs : In fhort, he muft die a painful and miferable death, 

 efpecially if he leave behind him relations and friends whom he 

 loved, and in vvhofc fociety he had great pleafure. The Chriftian 

 religion, therefore, not only enables us to fupport the greateft mif- 

 fortunes while we live, but makes us die with the hope of being 

 much happier in the life to come, than we can be in this. 



Our future happinefs, however, cannot be that in which many 

 people in this life make their happinefs to confift ; I mean fca- 

 fual pleafures, and thofe of vanity and ambition : But it muft be 

 purely intelled.ual, produced by the contemplation of the wifdom, 

 the goodnefs, and the beauty of the works of God. Now in ordci* 

 to enjoy this highcft pleafure in a future life, a man muft be pre- 

 pared for it in this life : And it is not fufficient that he is not vitious 

 or wicked, but he muft have cultivated his undcrftanding by arts 

 and fciences, and by the other ftudies I have mentioned, and fo 

 have prepared his mind for the more perfect knowledge which 

 he will have in a future ftate. In this way his mind will ac- 

 quire the fenfe of pleafure, not fenfual, but intellcdlual, and fo 

 be prepared for the enjoyment of that pleafure in the next world: 

 For it is a law of nature, and agreeable to the order of things in this 

 univerfe, that no animal, and indeed I may lay no thing, fliould 

 proceed from one ftate to another immediately and dircdly, with- 

 out being previoufly prepared for that other ftate. Before, there- 

 fore, fuch a man comes to enjoy that happinefs, which I have 

 mentioned, in a future ftate, he muft firft go to another ftate, 

 in which he is to prepare his mind in the way I have mention- 

 id. But if he be wicked or vitious, he muft go to a ftate dif- 



I i 2 ferent 



