The harmony of the divine attributes in the contrivance and accomplishment of man's redemption…

1. The shortness of its duration. 2. If it brings only a slight pleasure. 3. If that pleasure be attended with torments.

All which are contrary to the essential properties of the supreme Good, which is perpetual, and sincere without the least mixture of evil, and produces the highest delight to the Soul. Now all these concur to vilify worldly things:¹ 1. They are short in their duration: Not only the voice of Heaven but of the Earth declares this, That all flesh is grass, and the glory of it as the flower of the grass. Life the foundation of all Temporal enjoyments is but a Span: The ⟨p. 60⟩longest Liver can measure in a thought the space of time between his Infant-state and the present hour: how long soever, it seems as short to him as the twinkling of an eye. And all the glory of the flesh, as Titles, Treasures, Delights, are as the flower of the grass, which is the most tender amongst Vegetables, and of so weak a subsistence, that a little breath of Wind, the hand of an Infant, the teeth of a Worm can destroy it. The pleasures of Sin (under which Secular Greatness and Wealth are comprehended) are but for a season. ²They are so short lived, that they expire in the birth, and die whilst they are tasted. Again; they bring only a slight pleasure, being disproportionable to the desires of the Soul. They are confined to the Senses, wherein the Beasts are more accurate than Man, but can't reach to the upper and more comprehensive Faculties. Nay they cannot satisfy the greedy Senses, ³much less quiet the spiritual and immortal Appetite. What the Poet speaks with astonishment of Alexander's insatiable Ambition, Aestuat infelix angusto limit mundi,

All which are contrary to the essential properties of the supreme Good, which is perpetual, and sincere without the least mixture of evil, and produces the highest delight to the Soul. Now all these concur to vilifie worldly things: