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serve how little alteration in good spirits the approaches of death make; for they appear to be the same men till the last instant. Augustus Cæsar died in a compliment: *"Livia, conjugii nostri memor vive, et vale:" Tiberius in dissimulation, as Tacitus saith of him, +" Jam Tiberium vires et corpus, non dissimulatio, deserebant:" Vespasian in a jest, sitting upon the stool, +" Ut puto Deus fio:" Galba with a sentence, §" Feri, si ex re sit populi Romani," holding forth his neck: Septimius Severus in dispatch, || "Adeste, si quid mihi restat agendum," and the like. Certainly the Stoics bestowed too much cost upon death, and by their great preparations made it appear more fearful. Better, saith he, ¶"qui finem vitæ extremum inter munera ponit naturæ.' It is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little infant, perhaps the one is as painful as the other. He that dies in an earnest pursuit is like one that is wounded in hot blood; who, for the time, scarce feels the hurt and therefore a mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is

* Live mindful of our wedleck, my Livia, and farewell.

The bodily strength of Tiberius began now to fail him; but not his dissimulation.

I fancy I am about to become a god.

§ Strike, if it will be beneficial to the Roman people.

Approach, if there is any more business for me to transact.

"Who counts it Nature's privilege to die."-Dryden.

good, doth avert the dolours of death: but above all, believe it, the sweetest canticle is, *" Nunc dimittis," when a man hath obtained worthy ends and expectations. Death hath this also, that it openeth the gate to good fame, and extinguisheth envy: "Extinctus amabitur idem."

BACON.

1. I HAVE often thought upon death, and I find it the least of all evils. All that which is past is as a dream; and he that hopes or depends upon time coming, dreams waking. So much of our life as we have discovered is already dead; and all those hours which we share, even from the breasts of our mother, until we return to our grandmother the earth, are part of our dying days; whereof even this is one, and those that succeed are of the same nature, for we die daily; and as others have given place to us, so we must in the end give way to others.

2. Physicians, in the name of death, include all sorrow, anguish, disease, calamity, or whatsoever can fall in the life of man, either grievous or unwelcome: but these things are familiar unto us, and we suffer them every hour; therefore we die daily, and I am older since I affirmed it.

* An allusion to the Song of Simeon, "Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace."

The same person when dead shall be beloved.

3. I know many wise men that fear to die; for the change is bitter, and flesh would refuse to prove it; besides, the expectation brings terror, and that exceeds the evil. But I do not believe that any man fears to be dead, but only the stroke of death : and such are my hopes, that if Heaven be pleased, and Nature renew but my lease for twenty-one years more, without asking longer days, I shall be strong enough to acknowledge, without mourning, that I was begotten mortal. Virtue walks not in the highway, though she go per alta; this is strength and the blood to virtue, to contemn things that be desired, and to neglect that which is feared.

4. Why should man be in love with his fetters, though of gold? Art thou drowned in security? Then I say thou art perfectly dead. For though thou movest, yet thy soul is buried within thee, and thy good angel either forsakes his guard or sleeps. There is nothing under heaven, saving a true friend, who cannot be counted within the number of moveables, unto which my heart doth lean. And this dear freedom hath begotten me this peace, that I mourn not for that end which must be, nor spend one wish to have one minute added to the uncertain date of my years. It was no mean apprehension of Lucian, who says of Menippus, that in his travels through hell he knew not the kings of the earth from other men, but only by their louder cryings and tears; which was fostered in them through the remorseful memory of the good days they had seen,

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and the fruitful havings which they so unwillingly left behind them he that was well seated, looked back at his portion, and was loth to forsake his farm; and others either minding marriages, pleasures, profit, or preferment, desired to be excused from death's banquet: they had made an appointment with earth, looking at the blessings, not the hand that enlarged them; forgetting how unclothedly they came hither, or with what naked ornaments they were arrayed.

5. But were we servants of the precept given, and observers of the heathen's rule, memento mori, and not become benighted with this seeming felicity, we should enjoy it as men prepared to lose, and not wind up our thoughts upon so perishing a fortune. He that is not slackly strong, as the servants of pleasure, how can he be found unready to quit the veil and false visage of his perfection? The soul having shaken off her flesh, doth then set up for herself; and contemning things that are under, shows what finger hath enforced her; for the souls of idiots are of the same piece with those of statesmen, but now and then nature is at a fault, and this good guest of ours takes soil in an imperfect body, and sonis slackened from showing her wonders; like an excellent musician, who cannot utter himself defective instrument.

upon a

6. But see how I am swerved, and lose my course, touching at the soul, that doth least hold action with death, who hath the surest property in this frail act;

his style is the end of all flesh, and the beginning of incorruption.

This ruler of monuments leads men for the most part out of this world with their heels forward, in token that he is contrary to life; which being obtained, sends men headlong into this wretched theatre, where being arrived, their first language is that of mourning. Nor in my own thoughts can I compare men more fitly to any thing, than to the Indian figtree, which being ripened to his full height, is said to decline his branches down to the earth; whereof she conceives again, and they become roots in their own stock.

So man having derived his being from the earth, first lives the life of a tree, drawing his nourishment as a plant, and made ripe for death he tends downwards, and is sowed again in his mother the earth, where he perisheth not, but expects a quickening.

7. So we see death exempts not a man from being, but only presents an alteration; yet there are some men, I think, that stand otherwise persuaded. Death finds not a worse friend than an alderman, to whose door I never knew him welcome; but he is an importunate guest, and will not be said nay.

And though they themselves shall affirm that they are not within, yet the answer will not be taken: and that which heightens their fear is, that they know they are in danger to forfeit their flesh, but are not wise of the payment day: which sickly uncertainty is the occasion that, for the most part, they