out any loose and extravagant
agitation.

XVI. He who is greedy of credit and reputation after his death, doth
not consider, that they themselves by whom he is remembered, shall soon
after every one of them be dead; and they likewise that succeed those;
until at last all memory, which hitherto by the succession of men
admiring and soon after dying hath had its course, be quite extinct.
But suppose that both they that shall remember thee, and thy memory with
them should be immortal, what is that to thee? I will not say to thee
after thou art dead; but even to thee living, what is thy praise? But
only for a secret and politic consideration, which we call oikonomian or
dispensation. For as for that, that it is the gift of nature, whatsoever
is commended in thee, what might be objected from thence, let that now
that we are upon another consideration be omitted as unseasonable. That
which is fair and goodly, whatsoever it be, and in what respect soever
it be, that it is fair and goodly, it is so of itself, and terminates in
itself, not admitting praise as a part or member: that therefore
which is praised, is not thereby made either better or worse. This I
understand even of those things, that are commonly called fair and
good, as those which are commended either for the matter itself, or for
curious workmanship. As for that which is truly good, what can it
stand in need of more than either justice or truth; or more than either
kindness and modesty? Which of all those, either becomes good or fair,
because commended; or dispraised suffers any damage? Doth the emerald
become worse in itself, or more vile if it be not commended? Doth gold,
or ivory, or purple? Is there anything that doth though never so common,
as a knife, a flower, or a tree?

XVII. If so be that the souls remain after death (say they that will not
believe it); how is the air from all eternity able to contain them? How
is the earth (say I) ever from that time able to Contain the bodies
of them that are buried? For as here the change and resolution of dead
bodies into another kind of subsistence (whatsoever it be;) makes place
for other dead bodies: so the souls after death transferred into the
air, after they have conversed there a while, are either by way of
transmutation, or transfusion, or conflagration, received again into
that original rational substance, from which all others do proceed:
and so give way to those souls, who before coupled and associated u