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mail of pleasure, when, after a wretched scene of vanity and woe, his animal nature is worn to the stumps, wishes and dreads death, by turns, and is sick of living without having ever tried or known the true life of man."*
Vivit, et est vitae nescius ipse suae.
Without all doubt, the main purpose of man's existence is to please his Maker, and to be happy in himself by inward order, by purity and innocence of mind. No being can be pleasing to the infinite pattern of all goodness, but in as far as he is what he ought to be, in conformity with his Maker's purpose in his creation. Inward order and rectitude must, in their very nature, therefore, create agreea ble sensations, which are as conducive to bodily health, as bodily health is to cheerfulness of mind.
Hope, again, is a most safe and serviceable cordial, both in health and disease; but Religious hope is the only one which is enduring, which, like a true friend, faithful unto death, cheers and sustains us when all other hopes are leaving us, and all earthly joys are fading from our view.
A mind bereft of this, is deprived of an unfailing spring of comfort, and will have all its reflexions dimmed with the sickly colouring of despondency, if not darkened by the pencil of despair. Is bodily health, caeteris paribus, as likely to make its abode with such an unhappy individual, as the man who in looking back upon the past has
" The gay conscience of a life well spent."
And, in looking forward, sees, with the gladdened
- Berkeley's Minute Philosopher, Dialogue 2, p. 80.
