Advice to young gentlemen, in their several conditions of life· By way of address from a father to his children. By the Abbot Goussault, counseller in Parliament. With his sentiments and maxims upon what passes in civil society. Printed at Paris 1697, and translated into English.

CHAP. XXV.

Ʋpon the same Subject.

I.

MY Dear Children, you ought to regard this Life as a passage to another, which never will have an end; this being so, you ought not to set your Affections upon any thing here below, seem it never so great and Charm∣ing. You ought early to begin to die to Ho∣nour, to Pleasure, and to your self.

II.

You ought to consider that your Salvation is the greatest business you have to do, and you cannot think too much of it, nor too soon.

III.

If you have nothing to reproach your self with, you will be quiet and easie in your sickness. One is not afraid of Death but when he has lived ill.

IV.

Let it not trouble you when you think of Death, but to the contrary, look upon it with Pleasure, as an end of all your Miseries, and as the beginning of a happy Life.

V.

When you see so many Persons of Quality, think no more of Death than if they were ne∣ver to die; that ought to engage you to enter into your self, and to reason justly upon this Practice; their insensibility ought to touch you, and you ought to be perswaded, that the less they think of Death, the more they ought to

think of it; and the less they fear it, the more they have reason to fear it.

VI.

Make use of the Blindness and Folly of others. Pleasures pass away, Greatness vanishes, and believe it, it is late, if not too late, to renounce the amusements of the World, when you can no more enjoy them.

VII.

Make Reflexion upon the difference that there is betwixt a Worldly Man; that is, with all the Pomp of this World; I mean one that has loved them to the end of his Life; and a good and pious Man, who has always labour'd to bury himself, living in an humble, obscure, and retir'd life; the one dies overwhelm'd un∣der the weight of his Honours, Pleasures, and Greatness; the other dies under the Weight of his Mortifications, his Fasting and Humiliati∣ons. They both die, but what difference in their Death, in the Thoughts and Consequence of one and the other; the World hath fought against them both, but they have ended the Battel in a different manner; the one is Con∣quer'd, and hath submitted to the Laws of the Conqueror, and the other hath triumphed over him; so that it might be said, that the Death of one is glorious, and may be envyed by those who look upon it with the Eyes of Faith; and the Death of the other ought to make those that live such a Life, to tremble.

VIII.

But without considering so morally, why should not you think often of Death, being that Experience teaches, that you must die? every step you make, leads towards your Grave; is it possible that you can do this without Reflexi∣on?

and that you can travel so long in the Way, and not sometimes think of the end that this way leads you to?

IX.

You live but to die, and always to think of Life, and of all that may make it pass away pleasantly, and never think of the time that must put an end to it, is a thing very extraordi∣nary for a Man of Sense.

X.

Our Sicknesses, our Wrinkles, our Gray Hairs, our Years past that cannot come again; and how little we can rely upon those that are to come; are all of them eloquent Tongues that teach us that we must die.

XI.

The different States of your Life are a look∣ing-glass continually before your Eyes, shewing your approaching Death, which already has laid his Hands upon you. You have been Infants, young, and Men grown up; all that is in or∣der of Nature; but when you are Old, what can you think or hope to become? Death with∣out doubt will follow Old Age, which will be the end of your Life, as Old Age has been the end of your precedent Ages.

XII.

You will ask me what are the means to think of Death, when one loves life so much? To that I answer, there is one way which is easie; that is, not to love Life so much.

XIII.

Why would not you think of Death, since it will end your Necessities, your Weaknesses, and your Miseries; it will finish a Voyage, at the end of which you will find a happy E∣ternity.

XIV.

If God, infinitely just, has Condemned Man to Death, as a punishment due to his Sin; the same God, infinitely good, has given Death to the same Man, as a Soveraign Remedy to all his Evils, and an infallible means to make him for ever Happy.

XV.

The nature of Man was created as a Vessel that ought to be fill'd with nothing but good and precious Liquors; but the Devil, jealous of his Happiness, having put the Poison of Sin in this Vessel which corrupted it. God was willing to repair that which the Devil had spoil∣ed; and not being willing the Poison should so possess our Nature, that it should always remain infected; he breaks this Vessel in pieces by Death, that the Poison might run out, and that re-uniting these divided pieces at the general Re∣surrection, this Nature might be mended, pu∣rified, and become as wholly different from it self.

XVI.

When you shall have quit the Care you had for the Grandeur and Riches of this World, and turned your Heart towards God; you will ea∣sily surmount the rest, and not look upon Life but with indifferency; your Treasure will be in Heaven; you will never lose the sight of it, and you will easily resolve to be soon with it, to enjoy it to all Eternity.

XVII.

You have no need of Faith, or Rhetorick to perswade you, that all must die; the Decree of God which for so many Ages has been in∣differently executed upon all Men, is an evident demonstration of it; and if you find any so ex∣travagant

as to doubt it; you need but to lead them from Tomb to Tomb, and the innume∣rable number of Bones that they may see there, will convince them of the Truth of it.

XVIII.

Death has her Lessons and Responses, and they are within us; let us ask her as long as we please, the greatest and most sensible of all her Lessons, the most precise and infallible of all her Answers will be, that we must die.

XIX.

Since that all that we have within us, teach∣es us, and speaks continually to us, that we must die; will it be strange to make this necessity of Death the Object of all your Thoughts and your Reflexions?

XX.

Since that all that are about you, cannot tell you the Day or Hour of your Death, will it be strange if you make this uncertainty the Ob∣ject of your Meditations; and that by a Spi∣ritual watchfulness make a serious considera∣tion of that which one Day must certainly ar∣rive, and of what will become of you.

XXI.

That you must die, is an undoubted Truth; you ought therefore to make all your Endea∣vours, and employ all your Cares to die well. It is the most natural consequence that you can draw from this Truth; but to employ all your cares without thinking of Death; and what good will it do you to think of it, except you think of it in such a manner, as the Thoughts of it will be to your Profit and Advantage?

XXII.

Your Soul that will survive your Body, does not that merit your care and pains? that you should make it happy for ever? does it

not deserve more your care and labour, than the mass of Flesh which it animates? What have you not done for this Mass? What cares have you not taken to preserve it? in this point I leave you to your own considerations.