tainty of this life, (which is a second misery) for not only it is most short, but the brevity itself is most uncertain and doubtful. For who is there, that attaineth to the age of three, or four score? how many are extinguished at their very entrance into the world? how many perish in the flower of their youth? You know it not, saith Christ, when your Lord is to come; whether in the first watch, or second, or third, or in the cock-crowing. Which, that thou mayest the better understand, call to mind especially thy domestic friends, and other men placed in dignity and authority, whom inexorable death have, at divers ages, (some younger, some older) suddenly taken out of this world, dissipating their vain and long-life promising hopes.
Ponder, fourthly, the inconstancy and mutability of this present life, never continuing in one state. The disposition of the body often changeth, not always enjoying health, but subject to frequent diseases; but if thou reflect upon the mind, thou shalt see, that, like the troubled ocean, it is tossed up and down with the boisterous winds of her untamed passions, inordinate appetites, fluctuating cogitations, which upon every occasion do disturb her quiet. Consider, lastly, the instability of the goods of fortune, as they term them, to how many chances they are obnoxious, never suffering the temporal substance to stand still in one stay, thereby to make men happy and
