The Major Works Quotes

“Lastly, If length of Days be thy Portion, make it not thy Expectation: rekon not upon long Life, but live always beyond thy Account. He that so often surviveth his Expectations, lives many lives, and will hardly complain of the shortness of his Days. Time past is gone like a shadow; make Times to come, present; conceive that near which may be far off; approximate thy last times by present Apprehensions of them: live like a Neighbour unto Death, and think that there is but little to come. And since there is something in us that must live on, joyn both lives together; unite them in thy Thoughts and Actions, and live in one but for the other. He who thus ordereth the Purposes of this Life, will never be far from the next; and is in some manner already in it, by an happy Conformity, and close Apprehension of it.”
― Thomas Browne, The Major Works

“And if any have been so happy as truly to understand Christian annihilation, extasis, exolution, liquefaction, transformation, the kisse of the Spouse, gustation of God, and ingression into the divine shadow, they have already had an handsome anticipation of heaven; the glory of the world is surely over, and the earth in ashes unto them.”
― Thomas Browne, The Major Works