hods
of acquiring Riches; that may be the Work of another Essay; but to
exhibit the real and solid Advantages I have found by them in my long
and manifold Experience; nor yet all the Advantages of so worthy and
valuable a Blessing, (for who does not know or imagine the Comforts of
being warm or living at Ease? And that Power and Preheminence are
their inseperable Attendants?) But only to instance the great Supports
they afford us under the severest Calamities and Misfortunes; to shew
that the Love of them is a special Antidote against Immorality and
Vice, and that the same does likewise naturally dispose Men to Actions
of Piety and Devotion: All which I can make out by my own Experience,
who think my self no ways particular from the rest of Mankind, nor
better nor worse by Nature than generally other Men are.

'In the Year 1665, when the Sickness was, I lost by it my Wife and two
Children, which were all my Stock. Probably I might have had more,
considering I was married between 4 and 5 Years; but finding her to be
a teeming Woman, I was careful, as having then little above a Brace of
thousand Pounds, to carry on my Trade and maintain a Family with. I
loved them as usually Men do their Wives and Children, and therefore
could not resist the first Impulses of Nature on so wounding a Loss;
but I quickly roused my self, and found Means to alleviate, and at
last conquer my Affliction, by reflecting how that she and her
Children having been no great Expence to me, the best Part of her
Fortune was still left; that my Charge being reduced to my self, a
Journeyman, and a Maid, I might live far cheaper than before; and that
being now a childless Widower, I might perhaps marry a no less
deserving Woman, and with a much better Fortune than she brought,
which was but L800. And to convince my Readers that such
Considerations as these were proper and apt to produce such an Effect,
I remember it was the constant Observation at that deplorable Time,
when so many Hundreds were swept away daily, that the Rich ever bore
the Loss of their Families and Relations far better than the Poor; the
latter having little or nothing before-hand, and living from Hand to
Mouth, placed the whole Comfort and Satisfaction of their Lives in
their Wives and Children, and were therefore inconsolable.

'The following Year happened the Fire; at which Time, by good
Providence, it was my For