THE CONCLVSION. 



hearts with empty words : btr rather it is, to plunge your felves in- 

 to a felicity, you were never able to imagine, or to frame it to your 

 mifguidcd thoughts any (bantling of. 



But nature pulleth me by the cares, and warneth me from being 

 fo wrongful! to her, as to conceive, that fo wife a governefte fhould 

 to no advantage , condemns mankinde fo long a banimment, as 

 the ordinary extent of his dull life, and wear-Home pilgrimage here 

 under the funne reacheth unto. Can we imagine, (bee would allow 

 him To much lay fie time, to effeft nothing in ? Or can wee fufpeft 

 that (bee intended him no further advantage^hen what an abortive 

 child arriveth unto in his mothers worabe? For wlwtfo ever the 

 netts and toyles of difcoufe can circle in \ all that he, who but once 

 knoweth that himfelfe is, can attaine unto as fully, as hee that is en- 

 riched with thcfcience of all things in the world. For the connex- 

 ion of things, is fo linked together, that proceeding. from any one, 

 you reach the knowledge of many ;.and from many, you cannot 

 fai'e of attaining of all : fo that a feparated foule , which doth but 

 know her felfe , cannot chufe but know her body too - r and frorn- 

 her body > (hee cannot miflie in proceeding from the caufes of them 

 both, as farre as immediate caufes doe proceede from others over- 

 them : and as litle can (hce bee ignorant , of all the effects of thofe 

 caufes (he reacheth unto. And thus , all that huge mafic of know- 

 ledge, and happinefle which we hive confidered in our laft reflecti- 

 on, amoumeth to no more, then thefilliefi foule buried in warme 

 bloud,can and will infallibly attaine unto,when its time commeth. 

 We may then aflure our (elves, that juft nature hath provided and 

 dtfigned a greater meafurc of fuch felicity for longer livers: and 

 fo much greater, as may well be worth the paines and hazards, of 

 fo miserable and tedious a paffage, as here ( my foule ) then drug-* 

 gleft through. For certainely, if the dull persecution, which by 

 natures inftitution , hammereth out a fpirituall foule from groffe 

 fitfh and bloud, can atcheive fo wondrous an effeft , by fuch blunt 

 instruments, as are ufed in the contriving of a man : how canitbee 

 imagined, but that fifty or a hundred yeares beating upon far more 

 fubtile elements, refined in fo long a time, as a child is becomming 

 a man, and arriving to his perfect diicourfe , muft ncceflarily forge 

 out in fuch a foule, a ftrange and admirable excellency* about the 

 unlicked forme of an abortive embryon ? Surely , thofe innumerable 

 Urokes (every one, of which oiaketh a frrong imprcffion in the foule, 



I i j 3 upon 



