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February 18th, 1686.
Right Honourable and dearly beloved in our sweet Lord,
I Have had often blushes with my self, when I thought upon my omitting to write unto you; but I may say, it was neither voluntary nor wilful, but necessitate: For, a man under such various exigencies of providences, as I am, cannot be master of his own purposes. And beside, that I am daily looking out; either to be presently ⟨k⟩illed, where I may be found, or else draged into a prison or scaffold. Various; weighty and perplexing Occurences, day by day, come inevitably into my way; which take up my thoughts, filling my spirit with care, my hands with business. But, if I had proven as forgetful of you, as I have been blocked up from saluting you with a line from my hand; I had been far out of my duty before the Lord, and grosly ungrateful toward you. Howbeit, right honourable and dearly beloved, I need not insist in apoligizing for my self with you; for I know, ye have such a feeling of our burdens, that ye commiserate our case, and pity our perplexities: Therefore, I'll break off this, and go on in what the Lord giveth me to say.
There is no rational creature, which doth not set some one thing or other before its eyes, as its main end and chief good; and according to the various predominants in sensual and mad-men, are their various main ends. Hence it is that there did result so many different opinions among heathen philosophers, about man's chief good. But, here is the great mistake withfoolish,
