I would not make man worse than he is, nor his condition more miserable
than it is. But could I though I would? As a man cannot flatter God, nor
overpraise him, so a man cannot injure man, nor undervalue him. Thus
much must necessarily be presented to his remembrance, that those false
happinesses which he hath in this world, have their times, and their
seasons, and their critical days; and they are judged and denominated
according to the times when they befall us. What poor elements are our
happinesses made of, if time, time which we can scarce consider to be
any thing, be an essential part of our happiness! All things are done in
some place; but if we consider place to be no more but the next hollow
superficies of the air, alas! how thin and fluid a thing is air, and how
thin a film is a superficies, and a superficies of air! All things are
done in time too, but if we consider time to be but the measure of
motion, and howsoever it may seem to have three stations, past, present,
and future, yet the first and last of these are not (one is not now, and
the other is not yet), and that which you call present, is not now the
same that it was when you began to call it so in this line (before you
sound that word present, or that monosyllable now, the present and the
now is past). If this imaginary, half-nothing time, be of the essence of
our happinesses, how can they be thought durable? Time is not so; how
can they be thought to be? Time is not so; not so considered in any of
the parts thereof. If we consider eternity, into that time never
entered; eternity is not an everlasting flux of time, but time is a
short parenthesis in a long period; and eternity had been the same as it
is, though time had never been. If we consider, not eternity, but
perpetuity; not that which had no time to begin in, but which shall
outlive time, and be when time shall be no more, what a minute is the
life of the durablest creature compared to that! and what a minute is
man's life in respect of the sun's, or of a tree? and yet how little of
our life is occasion, opportunity to receive good in; and how little of
that occasion do we apprehend and lay hold of? How busy and perplexed a
cobweb is the happiness of man here, that must be made up with a
watchfulness to lay hold upon occasion, which is but a little piece of
that which is nothing, time? and yet the best things are nothing without
that. Honours, pleasures, possessions, presented to us out of time? in
our decrepit and distasted and unapprehensive age, lose their office,
and lose their name; they are not honours to us that shall never appear,
nor come abroad into the eyes of the people, to receive honour from them
who give it; nor pleasures to us, who have lost our sense to taste
them; nor possessions to us, who are departing from the possession of
them. Youth is their critical day, that judges them, that denominates
them, that inanimates and informs them, and makes them honours, and
pleasures, and possessions; and when they come in an unapprehensive age,
they come as a cordial when the bell rings out, as a pardon when the
head is off. We rejoice in the comfort of fire, but does any man cleave
to it at midsummer? We are glad of the freshness and coolness of a
vault, but does any man keep his Christmas there; or are the pleasures
of the spring acceptable in autumn? If happiness be in the season, or in
the climate, how much happier then are birds than men, who can change
the climate and accompany and enjoy the same season ever.