“Continual success” in obtaining those things which a man from time to time desireth, that is to say, continual prospering, is that men call “felicity”; I mean the felicity of this life. For there is no such thing as perpetual tranquility of mind, while we live here; because life itself is but motion, and can never be without desire, nor without fear, no more than without sense. What kind of felicity God hath ordained to them that devoutly honour Him, a man shall no sooner know, than enjoy; being joys, that now are as incomprehensible as the word of schoolmen “beatifical vision” is unintelligible.

The form of speech whereby men signify their opinion of the goodness of anything, is “praise.” That whereby they signify the power and greatness of anything, is “magnifying.” And that whereby they signify the opinion they have of a man’s felicity, is by the Greeks called μακαρισμός , for which we have no name in our tongue. And thus much is sufficient for the present purpose, to have been said of the “passions.”