Combat of him. Revenge triumphs over DEATH; Love flights it; Honour courts it; fear of Difgrace chufes it; Grief flies to it; Fear anticipates it. Nay we read, that after Otho the Emperor had flain himself, even Pity (which is the tendereft of Affections) provoked many to die with him, out of mere Compaffion to their Sovereign, and as the trueft fort of Attendants. Nay, Seneca adds Nicenefs, and Satiety ; Cogita quamdiu eadem feceris; Mori velle, non tantum förtis, aut miser, sed etiam faftidiofus poteft. "Confider how "long you have done the fame things;

A Man would die, tho' he were « neither valiant, nor miferable, only ❝ upon wearinefs of doing the fame "Things over and over again.

Nor is it lefs obfervable, how little Alteration, in a generous and brave Mind, the approach of DEATH makes; for those Men bear the fame Spirit, even to the laft Moment. Auguftus Cafar died in a Compliment; Livia, Conjugii noftri memor vive, & vale. Tiberius, in Diffimulation;

fimulation; for Tacitus fays thus of him; Fam Tiberium, vires & corpus, non diffimulatio, deferebant. Vefpafian, in a Jeft; for eafing himself upon the Stool; Ut puto, Deus fio. Galba with a Sentence: Feri, fi ex re fit Populi Romani; holding forth his Neck at the fame time. Septimius Severus, in the difpatch of Bufinefs: Adefte, fi quid mihi reftat agendum; and the like of others. . Cer tainly the Stoicks beftow'd too much Coft upon DEATH: For by their grand Preparations against it, they have made it appear more terrible. Better he, Qui finem vita extremum inter munera ponat naturæ. For 'tis as natural for Men toDye, as to be Born; and an Infant, perhaps, feels as much Pain in This, as the other.

He that dies in the Profecution of fome earnest Defire, is like one that is wounded in hot Blood, who does not feel the Blow. Therefore a Mind fix'd and bent upon fomewhat that is good, fteals from the Pains of DEATH. But when all is done, the sweetest of Canticles is, Nunc dimittis; when a Man hath

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obtain'd his Ends, and worthy Expe &tations. There is this alfo in DEATH, that it opens the Gate to good Fame, and extinguishes Envy.

Extinctus amabitur idem.

III. Of Unity in Religion. Religion being the chief Band of

human Society, 'twere fit, that it

felf also were contain'd within the due Bands of true Unity and Charity. Quarrels and Divifions about Religion, were Evils unknown to the Heathen. And no wonder, since the Religion of the Heathen confifted rather in Rites, and external Worship of their Gods, than in any constant Confeffion and Belief. For it is easy to guess what kind of Faith theirs was, when the chief Doctors and Fathers of their Church were Poets, But it is one of the Attributes of the true God, that he is a Jealous God: Therefore his Worship will endure no Mixture or Partner. We fhall therefore fpeak a few Words concerning UNITY

in the Church; namely, What are the Fruits thereof; what the Bounds, and what the Means.

THE Fruits of UNITY (over and above that it is highly pleafing to God, which is all in all) are Two principally. The one regards thofe that are Without the Church; the other those that are Within. For the former, it is certain, that Herefies and Schifms are of all others the greatest Scandals in the Church; being even worse than Corruption of Manners. For as in the natural Body, Wounds, and a Solution of Continuity, are worse in Kind than corrupt Humours; fo is it in the fpiritual Body. So that nothing doth fo much keep Men out of the Church, and drive them out of the fame, as Breach of UNITY: And therefore whenfoever it cometh to that pass, that one faith, Ecce in deferto; another, Ecce in penetralibus; that is, while fome Men seek Christ in the Conventicles of Hereticks; others in an outward Face of a Church; that Voice had need continually to found in Men's Ears, nolite exire, go not out.

THE

THE great Doctor of the Gentiles (whofe peculiar Vocation and Miffion enjoined him to have a special care of thofe Without) faith: If an Infidel or an Heathen Man enter your Congregati ons, and hear you speak with divers Tongues, will be not say that you are mad? And certainly it is little better, when Atheists and profane Perfons do fee fuch Contentions, and fo many dif cordant Opinions in Religion; for this turns them from the Church, and makes them to fit down in the Chair of the Scorners. It may feem too light a Thing to be cited in fo ferious a Treatise, but yet it excellently well expreffes the Deformity of the Thing. A great Master of Scoffing, in his Catalogue of Books of a feigned Library, amongst the rest, fets down a Book with this Title, The Antick-Dances, and Gefticulations of Hereticks. For every Sect of them has a certain ridiculous Pofture, and Deformity of Cringe, peculiar to itself; which cannot but move Derifion in Libertines, and depraved Politicks, who are apt to contemn Holy Things,

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