Vanity is illustrated in the cause and effect of love, as in the case of Cleopatra.

Let man then contemplate nature in full and lofty majesty, and turn his eyes away from the mean objects which surround him. Let him look at the dazzling light hung aloft as an eternal lamp to lighten the universe; let him behold the earth, a mere dot compared with the vast circuit which that orb describes, and stand amazed to find that the vast circuit itself is but a very fine point compared with the orbit traced by the starts as they roll their course on high.

All the trouble in the world is due to the fact that man cannot sit still in a room.

It is the conduct of God, who disposes all things kindly, to put religion into the mind by reason, and into the heart by grace.

The world is ruled by force, not by opinion; but opinion uses force.

The gist is that good and evil are foreordained. What is foreordained comes necessarily to be after a prior act of divine volition...Rather, everything small and large is written and comes to be in a known and expected measure.

Let each of us examine his thoughts