extinction, but a change of abode only, what can be more desirable? And
if it, on the other hand, destroys, and absolutely puts an end to us,
what can be preferable to the having a deep sleep fall on us, in the
midst of the fatigues of life, and being thus overtaken, to sleep to
eternity? And, should this really be the case, then Ennius's language
is more consistent with wisdom than Solon's; for our Ennius says,

Let none bestow upon my passing bier
One needless sigh or unavailing tear.

But the wise Solon says,

Let me not unlamented die, but o'er my bier
Burst forth the tender sigh, the friendly tear.[30]

But let us, if indeed it should be our fate to know the time which is
appointed by the Gods for us to die, prepare ourselves for it with a
cheerful and grateful mind, thinking ourselves like men who are
delivered from a jail, and released from their fetters, for the purpose
of going back to our eternal habitation, which may be more emphatically
called our own; or else to be divested of all sense and trouble. If, on
the other hand, we should have no notice given us of this decree, yet
let us cultivate such a disposition as to look on that formidable hour
of death as happy for us, though shocking to our friends; and let us
never imagine anything to be an evil which is an appointment of the
immortal Gods, or of nature, the common parent of all. For it is not by
hazard or without design that we have been born and situated as we
have. On the contrary, beyond all doubt there is a certain power which
consults the happiness of human nature; and this would neither have
produced nor provided for a being which, after having gone through the