Synthesized answer
The passages suggest that true happiness involves a desire to share one's joy and abundance with others who are in need. Kings, for instance, find their happiness perfected in conferring honor, riches, and health upon those who lack them [1]. This act of communication and propagation of happiness is a natural outflow of experiencing joy oneself.
Furthermore, the concept of God is presented as a generous landlord who provides for his tenants hourly and quarterly, renewing mercy every minute, though men often fail to understand this lest they be converted and healed [2]. Man also possesses the capacity to create "creatures" in the form of thoughts, which can be vast and far-reaching, even exceeding the physical limitations of their creator [3]. Fear is described as a stifling spirit that can hinder speech and defense [4], but the passages also suggest that fear of God should not impede devotion, raising a question about conflicting commands [4]. The passages also touch upon the importance of candid proceedings in medical consultations, where remedies for the present case are prescribed rather than dwelling on past or future possibilities [5].
Synthesized from the book passages below. Chat with the book on Feynman for follow-up.
From the book
ey descend, as God, to a communication of their abundances with men, according to their necessities, then they are gods. No man is well that understands not, that values not his being well; that hath not a cheertulness and a joy in it; and whosoever hath this joy, hath a desire to communicate, to propagate that which occasions his happiness and his joy to others; for every man loves witnesses of his happiness, and the best witnesses arc experimental witnesses; they who have tasted of that in themselves which makes us happy: it consummates therefove, it perfects the happiness of kings, to…
case; we are all prodigal sons, and not disinherited; we have received our portion, and mispent it, not been denied it. We are God's tenants here, and yet here, he, our landlord, pays us rents; not yearly nor quarterly, but hourly and quarterly; every minute he renews his mercy, but we will not understand, lest that we should be converted, and he should heal us . I. PRAYER.
ng, to which something in man doth not answer, so hath man many pieces, of which the whole world hath no representation. Enlarge this meditation upon this great world, man, so far as to consider the immensity of the creatures this world produces; our creatures are our thoughts, creatures that are born giants; that reach from east to west, from earth to heaven; that do not only bestride all the sea and land, but span the sun and firmament at once: my thoughts reach all, comprehend all. Inexplicable mystery! I their creator am in a close prison, in a sick bed, any where; and any one of my…
My weakness is from nature, who hath but her measure; my strength is from God, who possesses and distributes infinitely. As then every cold air is not a damp, every shivering is not a stupefaction; so every fear is not a fearfulness, every declination is not a running away, every debating is not a resolving, every wish that it were not thus, is not a murmuring nor a dejection though it be thus; but as my physician's fear puts not him from his practice, neither doth mine put me from receiving from God, and man, and myself, spiritual and civil and moral assistances and consolations. VI.…
hat the proceedings may be apert, and ingenuous, and candid, and avowable, for that gives satisfaction and acquiescence. They who have received my anatomy of myself consult, and end their consultation in prescribing, and in prescribing physic; proper and convenient remedy: for if they should come in again, and chide me for some disorder, that had occasioned and induced, or that had hastened and exalted this sickness, or if they should begin to write now rules for my dict and exercise when I were well, this werc to antedate or to postdate their consultation, not to give physic. It were rather…