Produced by David Widger
Translated by Charles Cotton
Edited by William Carew Hazilitt
1877
XIII. Of judging of the death of another.
XIV. That the mind hinders itself.
XV. That our desires are augmented by difficulty.
XVI. Of glory.
XVII. Of presumption.
When we judge of another's assurance in death, which, without doubt, isthe most remarkable action of human life, we are to take heed of onething, which is that men very hardly believe themselves to have arrivedto that period. Few men come to die in the opinion that it is theirlatest hour; and there is nothing wherein the flattery of hope moredeludes us; It never ceases to whisper in our ears, "Others have beenmuch sicker without dying; your condition is not so desperate as 'tisthought; and, at the worst, God has done other miracles." Which happensby reason that we set too much value upon ourselves; it seems as if theuniversality of things were in some measure to suffer by our dissolution,and that it commiserates our condition, forasmuch as our disturbed sightrepresents things to itself erroneously, and that we are of opinion theystand in as much need of us as we do of them, like people at sea, to whommountains, fields, cities, heaven and earth are tossed at the same rateas they are:
"Provehimur portu, terraeque urbesque recedunt:"
["We sail out of port, and cities and lands recede."
—AEneid, iii. 72.]
Whoever saw old age that did not applaud the past and condemn the presenttime, laying the fault of his misery and discontent upon the world andthe manners of men?
"Jamque caput quassans, grandis suspirat arator.
Et cum tempora temporibus praesentia confert
Praeteritis, laudat fortunas saepe parentis,
Et crepat antiquum genus ut pietate repletum."
["Now the old ploughman, shaking his head, sighs, and compares
present times with past, often praises his parents' happiness, and
talks of the old race as full of piety."—Lucretius, ii. 1165.]
We will make all things go along with us; whence it follows that weconsider our death as a very great thing, and that does not so easilypass, nor without the solemn consultation of the stars:
"Tot circa unum caput tumultuantes dens,"
["All the gods to agitation about one man."
—Seneca, Suasor, i. 4.]
and so much the more think it as we more value ourselves. "What, shallso much knowledge be lost, with so much damage to the world, without aparticular concern of the destinies? Does so rare and exemplary a soulcost no more the killing than one that is common and of no use to thepublic? This life, that protects so many others, upon which so manyother lives depend, that employs so vast a number of men in his service,that fills so many places, shall it drop off like one that hangs but byits own simple thread? None of us lays it enough to heart that he isbut one: thence proceeded those words of Caesar to his pilot, more tumidthan the sea that threatened him:
"Italiam si coelo auctore recusas,
Me pete: sola tibi causa est haec justa timoris,
Vectorem non nosce t