selected these instances, because the present age has need to be admonished, that there is no such invincible opposition between piety and true greatness, as some maintain, and others are ready to imagine.

To these considerations, we may add the uncertain event of wars and national commotions, both in their immediate and more remote consequences, often so very different from all that the greatest human sagacity would have judged probable; which should equally serve to check our presumption, and to moderate our fears; should neither suffer us to be vainly elated with success, nor to despair of the public in the most threatening conjuncture; much less to be played upon by every political prognosticator, to dance when he is pleased to pipe, or when he mourns, to sink down in hopeless dejection.

III. Further; a serious contemplation of the general vanity of the world, whatever

bosom. For this account we are indebted to the impartial Thuanus.

external form it assumes, máy, by lessening our expectations from it, at least help to mitigate the anguish of disappointment, which, we all know, is one of the bitterest ingredients in the cup of human misery. Proofs of this vanity urge us on every side, and, at intervals, make impression on every mind; yet men generally continue to hug the illusion they are under till it is torn from them by the hand of death. When Henry the Fourth of France was murdered by Ravaillac, just at the time he was entering upon his great enterprize, which it is supposed was projected with a view to reduce all Europe into one republic; his last words are recorded to have been, Ce n'est rien;

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'Tis nothing;" which I am willing to understand as expressing his sense, at that awful moment, of the vanity that cleaves to all worldly designs and expectations; a sentiment naturally arising from his situation, and which almost every man feels the truth of when he comes to die.

As man, when he is called from this world, enters into an unchangeable state of happiness or misery, reason tells him, that

he ought to value every thing on this side the grave, according to the help it may af ford him to avoid the one and secure the other. When he has learned this lesson, and is made thoroughly sensible of its im portance, he will look on human life with different eyes than he did before.

Those things which are generally regarded with dread, such as sickness, poverty, and disgrace, he will contemplate under a less frightful aspect, as serving to weaken his present attachments, and induce a serious consideration of what will be hereafter; and those things which are generally the objects of eager competition, will rather excite his caution than his envy, as by drawing men's affections to this life, they diminish their concern for the next.

When in like manner he views the affairs of nations in the light of futurity, he will see them to be of little importance, except as they relate to the interests of true religion and rational liberty; which are here placed together, as the latter is generally necessary to the success of the former. Whether the white or the red rose has the

prevalence, whether a certain province or branch of commerce is in the hands of one nation or another, he will regard as matters of small consequence in themselves considered. All wars of trade or ambition, further than as they affect the interests above-named, will give him no disturbance; or, at most, will excite only an emotion of pity or indignation, for human weakness or wickedness.

SECTION V.

Relieving Considerations amidst the many literary, political, and religious Contentions that so often agitate human Life; with some concluding Reflections.

FROM military feuds let us turn our attention for a moment to literary, political, and religious contentions, and try, as in the preceding cases, if we can discover any diminishing circumstances, which may help us to view them with more tranquillity.

I. It is disgraceful to human reason to find how much learned controversy has been lavished upon mere words and names. In the reign of Henry the Eighth, a curious dispute arose at Cambridge, concerning the right method of pronouncing the Greek tongue. Sir John Cheke, at the head of one party, stood up for a full and broad