my passion, or
bring me to a perfect resignation to whatsoever is allotted for me. 'Tis
now done, I hope, and I have nothing left but to persuade you to that,
which I assure myself your own judgment will approve in the end, and
your reason has often prevailed with you to offer; that which you would
have done then out of kindness to me and point of honour, I would have
you do now out of wisdom and kindness to yourself. Not that I would
disclaim my part in it or lessen my obligation to you, no, I am your
friend as much as ever I was in my life, I think more, and I am sure I
shall never be less. I have known you long enough to discern that you
have all the qualities that make an excellent friend, and I shall
endeavour to deserve that you may be so to me; but I would have you do
this upon the justest grounds, and such as may conduce most to your
quiet and future satisfaction. When we have tried all ways to happiness,
there is no such thing to be found but in a mind conformed to one's
condition, whatever it be, and in not aiming at anything that is either
impossible or improbable; all the rest is but vanity and vexation of
spirit, and I durst pronounce it so from that little knowledge I have
had of the world, though I had not Scripture for my warrant. The
shepherd that bragged to the traveller, who asked him, "What weather it
was like to be?" that it should be what weather pleased him, and made it
good by saying it should be what weather pleased God, and what pleased
God should please him, said an excellent thing in such language, and
knew enough to make him the happiest person in the world if he made a
right use on't. There can be no pleasure in a struggling life, and that
folly which we condemn in an ambitious man, that's ever labouring for
that which is hardly got and more uncertainly kept, is seen in all
according to their several humours; in some 'tis covetousness, in others
pride, in some stubbornness of nature that chooses always to go against
the tide, and in others an unfortunate fancy to things that are in
themselves innocent till we make them otherwise by desiring them too
much. Of this sort you and I are, I think; we have lived hitherto upon
hopes so airy that I have often wondered how they could support the
weight of our misfortunes; but passion gives a strength above nature, we
see it in mad people; and, not to flatter ourselves, ours is but a
refined degree of madness. What can it be else to be lost to all thin