of alteration. Thou also art in a perpetual change, yea and under
corruption too, in some part: and so is the whole world.
XVIII. it is not thine, but another man's sin. Why should it
trouble thee? Let him look to it, whose sin it is.
XIX. Of an operation and of a purpose there is an ending, or of an
action and of a purpose we say commonly, that it is at an end:
from opinion also there is an absolute cessation, which is
as it were the death of it. In all this there is no hurt.
Apply this now to a man's age, as first, a child; then a youth,
then a young man, then an old man; every change from one age to another
is a kind of death And all this while here no matter of grief yet.
Pass now unto that life first, that which thou livedst under
thy grandfather, then under thy mother, then under thy father.
And thus when through the whole course of thy life hitherto
thou hast found and observed many alterations, many changes,
many kinds of endings and cessations, put this question to thyself
What matter of grief or sorrow dost thou find in any of these?
Or what doest thou suffer through any of these? If in none of these,
then neither in the ending and consummation of thy whole life,
which is also but a cessation and change.