'Tis the general complaint of these times, and perhaps of those past, that charity grows cold; which I perceive most verified in those which most do manifest the fires and flames of zeal; for it is a virtue that best agrees with coldest natures, and such as are complexioned for humility. But how shall we expect charity towards others when we are uncharitable to ourselves? Charity begins at home, is the voice of the world; yet is every man his greatest enemy, and as it were, his own executioner. Non occides, is the commandment of God, yet scarce observed by any man; for I perceive every man is his own Atropos, and lends a hand to cut the thread of his own days. Cain was not therefore the first murderer, but Adam, who brought in death; whereof he beheld the practice and example in his own son Abel, and saw that verified in the experience of another which faith could not persuade him in the theory of himself.

V. There is I think no man that apprehends his own miseries less than myself, and no man that so nearly apprehends another's. I could lose an arm without a tear, and with few groans methinks be quartered into pieces; yet can I weep most seriously at a play, and receive with a true passion

the counterfeit griefs of those known and professed impostures. It is a barbarous part of inhumanity to add unto any afflicted party's misery, or endeavour to multiply in any man, a passion whose single nature is already above his patience; this was the greatest affliction of Job, and those oblique expostulations of his friends a deeper injury than the downright blows of the devil. It is not the tears of our own eyes only, but of our friends also, that do exhaust the current of our sorrows, which falling into many streams, runs more peaceably, and is contented with a narrower channel. It is an act within the power of charity, to translate a passion out of one breast into another, and to divide a sorrow almost out of itself; for an affliction like a dimension may be so divided, as be so divided, as if not indivisible, at least to become insensible. Now with my friend I desire not to share or participate, but to engross his sorrows, that by making them mine own I may more easily discuss them; for in mine own reason, and within myself, I can command that, which I cannot intreat without myself, and within the circle of another. I have often thought those noble pairs and examples of friendship not so truly histories of what had been, as fictions of what should

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be; but I now perceive nothing in them but possibilities, nor any thing in the heroick examples of Damon and Pythias, Achilles and Patroclus, which methinks upon some grounds I could not perform within the narrow compass of myself. That a man should lay down his life for his friend, seems strange to vulgar affections and such as confine themselves within that worldly principle, charity begins at home. For my own part, I could never remember the relations that I held unto myself nor the respect that I owe unto my own nature, in the cause of God, my country, and my friends. Next to these three I do embrace myself: I confess I do not observe that order that the schools ordain our affections, to love our parents, wives, children, and then our friends; for excepting the injunctions of religion, I do not find in myself such a necessary and indissoluble sympathy to all those of my blood. I hope I do not break the fifth commandment if I conceive I may love my friend before the nearest of my blood, even those to whom I owe the principles of life; I never yet cast a true affection on a woman, but I have loved my friend as I do virtue, my soul, my God. From hence methinks I do conceive how God loves man, what happiness

there is in the love of God. Omitting all other, there are three most mystical unions; two natures in one person; three persons in one nature; one soul in two bodies. For though indeed they be really divided, yet are they so united as they seem but one, and make rather a duality than two distinct souls.

VI. There are wonders in true affection; it is a body of enigmas, mysteries, and riddles, wherein two so become one, as they both become two: I love my friend before myself, and yet methinks I do not love him enough; some few months hence my multiplied affection will make me believe I have not loved him at all; when I am from him I am dead till I be with him, when I am with him I am not satisfied, but would still be nearer him. United souls are not satisfied with embraces, but desire to be truly each other; which being impossible, their desires are infinite, and must proceed without a possibility of satisfaction. Another misery there is in affection; that whom we truly love, like our own we forget their looks, nor can our memory retain the idea of their faces; and it is no wonder, for they are ourselves, and our affection makes their looks our own. This noble affection

falls not on vulgar and common constitutions, but on such as are markt for virtue; he that can love his friend with this noble ardour, will in a competent degree affect all. Now if we can bring our affections to look beyond the body, and cast an eye upon the soul, we have found out the true object, not only of friendship but charity; and the greatest happiness that we can bequeath the soul, is that wherein we all do place our last felicity, salvation; which though it be not in our power to bestow, it is in our charity and pious invocations to desire, if not procure and further. I cannot contentedly frame a prayer for myself in particular, without a catalogue for my friends, nor request a happiness wherein my sociable disposition doth not desire the fellowship of my neighbour. I never hear the toll of a passing-bell, though in my mirth, without my prayers and best wishes for the departing spirit; I cannot go to cure the body of my patient but I forget my profession and call unto God for his soul; I cannot see one say his prayers, but instead of imitating him I fall into a supplication for him, who perhaps is no more to me than a common nature; and if God hath vouchsafed an ear to my supplications there are surely many happy that