A treatise of the passions and faculties of the soul of man With the…A treatise of the passions and faculties of the soule of man With the…

Here then we may discover Corruption in this Passion, when the mind ready upon every present apprehension to play the Prophet in forecasting future events, shall out of weak grounds, and too high a conceit of those means which it hath, so build unto it self peremptory imaginations for the future, as that thereby it is made in it self light & opinionative, and upon occasion of disappointment, is to seek of that patience to sustain it, which by a wise intermixtion of fear and caution might have been retained.

Here then we may discover Corruption in this Passion, when the mind ready upon every present approhension to play the Proph•t in forecasting future events, shall out of weake grounds, and too high a conceipt of those means which it hath, so build unto it selfe peremptory imaginations for the future, as that thereby it is made in it selfe light & opinionative, and upon occasion of disappointment, is to seeke of that patience to sustaine it, which by a wise intermixtion of feare and caution might have been retained.

And as there is an error in the •rust and affiance, so there may be in the use of those means: For though divine Hope hath but one Anchor to rest upon, and therefore hath but one manner of being produced; yet these lower Hopes, of which I speak, do always depend upon the concurrence of divers means, and those likewise have their reference unto divers circumstances. And therefore those which have not the wisdom of combining their Ayd•s, and of fitting them unto casual occurrences, may to no end nourish in themselves imaginary and empty presumptions. And this is that which maketh all worldly hopes so full of ⟨p. 250⟩lightness and uncertainties, Leves spes & cer•aminas, ¹as the Poet calleth them; because it may fall out, that the neglect of but some one circumstance; the not timing or placing our actions right; the not accommodating our means to the variety of of occasions; the miscarrying in some one complement or ceremony; the having of our minds, either too light and voluble; or too fixed and constant or too spread and wandering; or too narrow and contracted; or too credulous and facile; or too diffident and suspicious; or too peremptory, resolute, or hasty; or too slow, anxious, and discursive; or too witty and facetious or too serious and morose, with infinite other the like weaknesses (some whereof there is not any man quite freed from) may often notwithstanding the good store of other aids, endanger and shipwreck the success of our endeavours: so that in the prosecution of a hope, there is something alike industry, to be used as in the trial of Mathematical conclusions, the Mediums whereunto are so touched and dependant upon one another, that not diligently to observe every one of them, is to labour in vain, and have all to do again.