ΓΟΟ
ί'Ιι. If they that have been a long Time in a Smith’s Shop,commonly have a Dirty Face, do you wonder that I thathave been so many Days with two Friends that were sick,dying, and are now buried, should look a little more sad thanI used to do, especially when they were both of them myvery dear Friends ?
Mar. Who are they that you talk of?
Pit. I suppose you know George Balcaricus, don’t you ?
Mar. I know him by Name, and that's all; I never saw'his Face.
Ph. I know the other was wholly a Stranger to you ; hisName was Cornelius Montius. They were both of them myparticular Friends, and had been so for many Years.
Mar. It was never my Lot to be by where any one wasdying.
Ph. But it has been mine too often, if I might have hadmy Wish.
Mar. Well,but is Death so terrible a Thing as they makeit ?
Ph. The Way to’t is worse than the Thing itself; so thatif a Man could free his Mind from the Terror and App>' e 'hension of it, he would take away the worst Part of it. And,in short, whatsoever is tormenting, either in Sickness or inDeath itself, is render’d much more easy by Resignation tothe Will of God ; for, as to the Sense of Death, when th eSoul is departing from the Body, I am of Opinion, they ar ceither wholly insensible, or the Faculty is become very dulland stupid ; because Nature, before it comes to that Point,lays asleep and stupifies all the sensible Faculties.
Mar. We arc born without Sense of Pain, as to ourselves-
Ph. But we are not born without Pain to our Mother.
Mar. Why might we not die so ? Why would God mak eDeatn so full of Pain ?
Ph. He was pleased to make Birth painful and dangero ll jto the Mother, to make the Child the dearer to her ; anDeath formidable to Mankind, to deter them from layh 1 #violent Hands upon themselves ; for when we see so man)