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 smoke: learn then to despise this miserable world, and all its enjoyments, with which thou must part so soon, whether thou wilt or not.

2. Consider, that as nothing is more certain and inevitable than death, so nothing is more uncertain than the time, the place, the manner, and all other circumstances of our death. "O my soul," says St. Francis Sales, "thou must one day part with this body: but when shall that day be? Shall it be in winter or in summer? In the city or in the country? By day or by night? Shall it be suddenly, or on notice given thee? Shalt thou have leisure to make thy confession? Shalt thou have the assistance of thy ghostly father? Alas! of all this thou knowest nothing at all: only certain it is, that thou must die; and that, as it almost always happens, much sooner than thou imaginest."

3. Consider, that death being so certain, and the time and manner of it so uncertain, it would be no small comfort, if a man could die more than once, that so, if he should have the misfortune once to die ill, he might repair the fault by taking more care a second time. But, alas! we can die but once; and when once we have set our foot within the gates of eternity, there is no coming back. If we die once well, it will be always well: but if once ill, it will be ill for all eternity. Oh! dreadful moment, upon which depends an endless eternity! O blessed Lord, prepare us for that fatal hour!

4. Consider the folly and stupidity of the greater part of men, who, though they daily see some or other of their friends, acquaintance, or neighbours carried off by death, and that very often in the vigour of their youth, very often by sudden death, yet always imagine death to be at a distance from them: as if those arrows of