hey are entirely governed; they, at once,
broke loose from all temptations to vice; and, instead of being
slaves to their inordinate appetites, they applied themselves to
virtue and good works; and by these means, they altered their
conduct, and became men of good and sober lives. When, therefore,
in process of time, they see themselves brought by a long series of
years to their dissolution, conscious that, through the singular
mercy of God, they had so sincerely relinquished the paths of vice,
as never afterwards to enter them; and moreover hoping, through the
merits of our Saviour Jesus Christ, to die in his favour, they do
not suffer themselves to be cast down at the thoughts of death,
knowing that they must die. This is particularly the case, when,
loaded with honour, and sated with life, they see themselves arrived
at that age, which not one in many thousands of those, who live
otherwise, ever attains. They have still the greater reason not to
be dejected at the thoughts of death, as it does not attack them
violently and by surprize, with a bitter and painful turn of their
humours, with feverish sensations, and sharp pains, but steals
upon them insensibly and with the greatest ease and gentleness;
such an end, proceeding intirely from an exhaustion of the radical
moisture, which decays by degrees like the oil of a lamp; so that
they pass gently, without any sickness, from this terrestrial and
mortal to a celestial and eternal life.

O holy and truly happy regularity! How holy and happy should men,
in fact, deem thee, since the opposite habit is the cause of such
guilt and misery, as evidently appears to those who consider the
opposite effects of both! so that men should know thee by thy voice
alone, and thy lovely name; for what a glorious name, what a noble
thing, is an orderly and sober life! as, on the contrary, the bare
mention of disorder and intemperance is offensive to our ears.
Nay, there is the same difference between the mentioning these two
things, as between the uttering of the words angel and devil.

Thus I have assigned my reasons for abandoning intemperance, and
betaking myself intirely to a sober life; with the method I
pursued in doing so, and what was the consequence of it; and,
finally, the advantages an blessings, which a sober life confers
upon those who embrace it. Some sensual, inconsiderate persons
affirm, that a long life is no blessing; and that the state of a
man, who has passed h