that Death carrieth no evil along with it; for I fear least that be evil, I say not, to be insensible, but that we must lose our Senses.
M.
We can produce the best Authority for that Sentence which you would gain; now this both ought, and is wont to be of greatest moment in deciding all Causes; as first the consent of all An∣tiquity, who the less distance they were remov'd from their original and divine Extraction, did per∣haps discern truth more clearly. Therefore this one Principle was deeply engrasted in those old Sires, who liv'd in the non-age of time, that there was Sense after Death; nor would man by depar∣ture out of Life, be so rais'd up from the Founda∣tions, as to perish totally. And this may be col∣lected, as from many other Instances, so in parti∣cular from the Pontifical Sanctions about Cere∣monies at the places of burial, which they would never have observ'd with so much Devotion, nor aveng'd the breach of them under such inexpiable Penalties, had it not been imprinted in their minds, that death was not an Annihilation, but a removal and change only of Life, which used to conduct Men and Women of good Fame up to Heaven; and which continu'd in others, but was depress'd to the grosser Regions investing the Earth. After this Ritual, and the Opinion of our Ancestors,
In Heaven lives Romulus with the Gods in bliss;
as Ennius, compliant with Fame, sweetly sings. In like manner among the Greeks, and from them deriv'd to us, and as far as the Western Ocean is Hercules esteem'd, a God so powerful and propiti∣ous. From hence Bacchus born of Sem••le, and in like renown Castor and Pollux Brethren, Sons of Ty∣nearus,