The essays, or councils, civil and moral, of Sir Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban with a table of the colours of good and evil, and a discourse of The wisdom of the ancients : to this edition is added The character of Queen Elizabeth, never before printed in English.

II. Of Death. (Book 2)

MEN fear Death, as Children fear to go in the dark: And as that natural fear in Children is encreased with Tales, so is the other. Certainly the contemplation of Death, as the wages of sin, and passage to another World, is Holy and Religious; but the fear of it, as a tribute due unto Nature, is weak. Yet in religious Me∣ditations, there is sometimes a mixture of vanity and su∣perstition. You shall read in some of the Friers Books of Mortification, that a Man should think with himself, what the pain is, if he have but his fingers end pressed

or tortured, and thereby imagine what the pains of Death are, when the whole body is corrupted and dissolved; when many times Death passeth with less pain, than the torture of a Limb: For the most Vital parts are not the quickest of Sense. And by him that spake only as a Philosopher, and natural man, it was well said; Pompa mortis magis terret, quam Mors ipsa, Groans, and Con∣vulsions, and discoloured Face, and Friends weeping, and Blacks, and Obsequies, and the like, shew Death terrible. It is worthy the observing, that there is no passion in the mind of Man so weak, but it mates and masters the fear of Death: and therefore Death is no such terrible Enemy, when a Man hath so many attendants about him, that can win the combat of him. Revenge triumphs over Death; Love slights it; Honour aspireth to it; Grief flieth to it; Fear pre-occupateth it. Nay we read, after Otho the Emperor had slain himself, Pity (which is the tenderest of Affections) provoked many to die, out of meer compassion to their Soveraign, and as the truest sort of Followers. Nay, Seneca adds Niceness and Satiety; Cogita quandiu eadem faceres; Mori velle, non tantum Fortis, aut Miser, sed etiam Fastidiosus potest. A man would die, though he were neither valiant nor mi∣serable, only upon a weariness to do the same thing fo oft over and over. It is no less worthy to observe, how little alteration in good Spirits the approaches of Death make. For they appear to be the same Men till the last instant. Augustus Caesar died in a complement; Livia, Conjugii nostri memor, vive, & vale. Tiberius in Dissimu∣lation, as Tacitus saith of him; Jam Tiberium Vires, & Corpus, non Dissimulatio deserebant. Vespasian in a jest, sitting upon the stool; Ut puto, Deus sio. Galba with a Sen∣tence; Feri, si ex re sit populi Romani, holding forth his neck. Septimius Sev••rus in dispatch; Adeste, si quid mihi restat agendum. And the like. Ce••••ainly the Stoicks be∣stowed too much cost upon Death, and by their great preparations made it appear more fearful. Better, saith he, Qui finem vitae extremum inter munera ponat Naturae.

It is as natural to die, as to be born; and to a little in∣fant 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 fixt, and bent upon somewhat that is 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.