The sovereign and final happiness of man with the effectual means to obtain itThe soveraign and final happiness of man with the effectual means to obtain it

Now suppose the World constant and faithful to you till the last hour of your Lives, will it not fail you then? And can that be the Happiness of a Man that attends him for a time and leaves him for ever? The most conspicuous difference of Men in this World is that of the Victorious over the Vanquished prostrate at his Feet. But Death makes them equal. Then the wretched Captive shall upbraid the proud Conqueror, Art thou become weak as we? art thou become like us? 'Tis no wonder then that the wise Preacher despises all the States of the present Life as Vanity. For the Fabric cannot be more solid than the Foundation, nor the Accident more real ⟨p. 19⟩than the Being on which it depends. On every side Death is in our view, and the Shadow of it approaching darkens our brightest Days. 'Tis no wonder then that he equals the Fool with the Wise. For all that Wisdom that is confined to mortal things dies with them. Nay he confounds Man with the Beast. One thing befalls them: as the one dieth so dieth the other, yea they have all one Breath, so that Man has no preeminence above them. While we regard him only with the Eye of Sense, what shall we see in his Life, but Folly mixed with Anxieties and Cares? and what in his Death, but wasted Spirits, the Springs of Motion disordered, and at last the living Frame dissolved into the Earth from whence it came?

Now suppose the World constant and faithful to you till the last hour of your Lives, will it not fail you then? And can that be the Happiness of a Man that attends him for a time and leaves him for ever? The most conspicuous difference of Men in this World is that of the Victorious over the Vanquisht prostrate at his Feet. But Death makes them equal. Then the wretched Captive shall upbraid the proud Conqueror, Art thou become weak as we? art thou become like us? 'Tis no wonder then that the wise Preacher despises all the States of the present Life as Vanity. For the Fabric cannot be more solid than the Foundation, nor the Accident more real ⟨p. 19⟩than the Being on which it depends. On every side Death is in our view, and the Shadow of it approaching darkens our brightest Days. 'Tis no wonder then that he equals the Fool with the Wise. For all that Wisdom that is confin'd to mortal things dies with them. Nay he confounds Man with the Beast. One thing befals them: as the one dieth so dieth the other, yea they have all one Breath, so that Man has no preeminence above them. While we regard him only with the Eye of Sence, what shall we see in his Life, but Folly mixt with Anxieties and Cares? and what in his Death, but wasted Spirits, the Springs of Motion disordered, and at last the living Frame dissolved into the Earth from whence it came?