God being
all goodness, can love nothing but himself; he loves us
but for that part which is as it were himself, and the
traduction of his Holy Spirit. Let us call to assize the
loves of our parents, the affection of our wives and
children, and they are all dumb shows and dreams,
without reality, truth, or constancy. For first there is
a strong bond of affection between us and our parents;
yet how easily dissolved! We betake ourselves to a
woman, forgetting our mother in a wife, and the womb
that bare us in that which shall bear our image. This
woman blessing us with children, our affection leaves
the level it held before, and sinks from our bed unto
our issue and picture of posterity: where affection holds
no steady mansion; they growing up in years, desire
our ends; or, applying themselves to a woman, take a
lawful way to love another better than ourselves. Thus
I perceive a man may be buried alive, and behold his
grave in his own issue.
Sect. 15.--I conclude therefore, and say, there is no
happiness under (or, as Copernicus* will have it, above)
the sun; nor any crambe<102> in that repeated verity and
burthen of all the wisdom of Solomon: "All is vanity
and vexation of spirit;" there is no felicity in that the
world adores.
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