i. e. That Race, long tofs'd upon the Tufcan Waves, Of fhaded Algidus, beftrew'd with Leaves, Which, as keen Axes its green Honours lop, Non eft, ut putas, virtus, pater, i. e. You think that Fear to live a Virtue is, Rebus in adverfis facile eft contemnere mortem, i. l. The Wretched well may wish for Death, but he 'Tis Cowardice, not Valour, to fquat, as it were, in a Hole under a great Tomb, to avoid the Strokes of Fate. Valour never breaks its Way, nor goes out of its Path for the greatest Storm that blows: Si fractus illabatur orbis, i. e. Though Jove's dread Arm with Thunders rend the Spheres, Beneath the Crush of Worlds he nothing fears. The * Sen c. Thebais, Act i. Scene 1. v. 190, &c. † Mart. lib. xi. Ep. 57, Hor. lib. iii. Ode 3. v. 7, 8. 7. 15, 16. The avoiding of other Inconveniencies commonly pushes us upon this; nay, fometimes the Endeavour to fly from Death makes us run into the Mouth of it: Hic, rogo, non furor eft, ne moriare, mori* ? i. e. Can there be greater Madness, pray reply, Like those who, for Fear of a Precipice, throw themselves multos in fumma pericula mifit Venturi timor ipfe mali: fortiffimus ille eft, Ufque adeo mortis formidine, vitæ i. e. The Fear of future Evils makes Men run Ignominious Interment ordered for thofe who killed benfelves. } Plato (de Legibus, lib. ix. p. 660) prefcribes an igno minious Sepulture for him who has deprived his nearest and dearest Friend, viz. himself, of Life, and his destined Courfe of Years, when neither compelled fo to do by public Trial, anor by any fad and unavoidable Accident of Fortune, nor by any infupportable Difgrace, but by Cowardice, and the Weakness of a faint Heart. *Mart. lib. ii. Ep. 80. † Lucan. lib. vii. v. 104, &c. lib. iii. v. 79, &c. And | Lucret. And the Opinion which makes fo little of Life is ridicu- · lous; for, in fhort, 'tis our very Being, 'tis The Contemps our All. Whatever Things have a nobler and of Life ill more valuable Being may reproach ours, but founded. 'tis against Nature for us to despise and to make little Account of ourselves: This is a Difeafe peculiar to Man, for we don't perceive that any other Creature hates and defpifes itself 'Tis from a Vanity of the like Kind that we defire to be fomething else than what we are: The Effect of fuch a Defire does not concern-us, forafmuch as it is, contradicted and hindered in itself. He who wishes, that he were formed an Angel, does nothing for himself, and would be never the better for it; for, being no more, who should rejoice, and be fenfible of this Amendment for him? a Debet enim miferè cui fortè agréque futurum eft, i. e. For whofoe'er fhall in Misfortunes live, Security, Indolence, Impaffibility, a Privation from the Evils of this Life, for the purchafing whereof we make an End of it, are of no manner of Advantage to us: To no Purpose does that Man avoid War, who cannot enjoy Peace; and to no Purpose alfo does he avoid Labour or Pain, who has not wherewithal to relish Tranquillity. Among thofe of the Opinion firft mentioned, there has been a great Doubt, what are the most justifia- What are the ble Motives for Suicide, which they call Exoyov justeft Reasons · aywyn, i. e. a + reasonable Exit. For, tho' for Suicide. they fay, that Man must often die for trivial Causes, fince thofe * Lucret. lib. iii. v. 874, &c. This was the Expreffion ufed by the Stoics in that Cafe. See Diog. Laert. in the Life of Zeno, lib. vii. fect. 130. and Menage's Obfervations on this Paffage, p. 311, 312. Book II. those which detain us in Life are of no great Weight, yet there is to be fome Measure. There are fome fantaftic, fenfelefs Humours, that have prompted not only particular Men, but even Communities, to destroy themselves: Of this I have heretofore given fome Examples; and we read, moreover, of the Milefian Virgins, that, by a mad Compact, they hanged themfelves, one after another, till the Magiftrates made an Order, that the Bodies of all of them, who + fhould be found thus hanged hereafter, fhould be drawn by the fame Halter, ftark naked through the City. When Threicion advised Cleomenes to dispatch himself, by reafon of the ill State of his Affairs; and as he had efcaped the most honourable Death in the Battle which he had juft loft, to chufe this other, the fecond to it in Honour, and not to give the Conquerors an Opportunity to make him fuffer an ignominious Death, or a fhameful Life: Cleomenes, with a Courage | truly Lacedemonian and Stoical, refufed this Advice, as cowardly and unmanly. • That, fays be, is a Remedy which can never fail me, but which never ought to be made Ufe of, whilft there is yet a Spark of Hope remaining: That to live was fome⚫ times Conftancy and Valour: That he was defirous, that ⚫ even his Death fhould be of Service to his Country; and that he intended it fhould be an Act of Honour and • Virtue.' Threicion, ftill convinc'd, in his own Mind, that he was right, actually § killed himself: Cleomenes did the fame afterwards, but not till he had tried Fortune to the very laft. All the Inconveniencies in the World are not confiderable enough for a Man to chuse Death for the Sake of avoiding them. 6 What are to be the Limits of our Hopes. Hopes: Befides, there are fo many fudden Alterations in human Affairs, that 'tis not easy to judge when we are truly at the End of our + Plutarch of the worthy Deeds of Women. Sperat * Or rather Therycion, for Plutarch, from whom this whole Paffage is ta ken, calls him Onguxiwv. Plutarch, in the Life of Agis and Cleomenes, C. 14. § Idem, ibid. Sperat et in fævâ victus gladiator arenâ, Sit licet infefto pollice turba minax *. i. e. The Fencer, conquer'd in the Lifts, hopes on, The old Proverb fays, While there's Life, there's Hope. Ay, but, replies Seneca, fhall I rather think that Fortune can do all Things for the living Man, than that Fortune bas no Power over him that knows how to die? When Jofephus was in † fuch apparent and imminent Danger, a whole Nation, as it were, being rifen against him, that he had no visible Refource left; yet being, as he himself fays, advised by one of his Friends, in this Extremity, to dispatch himself, it was well for him that he still perfifted in Hopes, fince Fortune, contrary to all human Expectation, diverted the Accident, fo that he saw himself delivered from it without any manner of Inconvenience. On the contrary, Caffius and Brutus compleatly ruined the Remains of the Roman Liberty, of which Deaths fatal they were the Protectors, by that Precipita- by having been tion and Temerity with which they killed precipitant. themselves before the proper Time and Occafion. At the Battle of Serifolles in 1544, M. d'Anguien ¶ attempted twice to cut his Throat with his Sword, defpairing of the Fortune of the Day, which, indeed, went untowardly in the Part of the Field where he was pofted, and by such Precipitancy had like to have deprived himself of the Glory of fo noble a Victory. I have feen a hundred Hares escape under the very Mouths of the Greyhounds. There was a Man ++ who outlived his Executioner : Multa dies variufque labor mutabilis ævi Sulpitii Sev. Senec. Ep. 70. Montluc's Comment. P: 537. i. e. + Jofephus's Jewish Antiquities, tt Scnec. Ep. 13. Eneid. |