deludes us; It never ceases to whisper in our ears, "Others have been
much sicker without dying; your condition is not so desperate as 'tis
thought; and, at the worst, God has done other miracles." Which happens
by reason that we set too much value upon ourselves; it seems as if the
universality of things were in some measure to suffer by our dissolution,
and that it commiserates our condition, forasmuch as our disturbed sight
represents things to itself erroneously, and that we are of opinion they
stand in as much need of us as we do of them, like people at sea, to whom
mountains, fields, cities, heaven and earth are tossed at the same rate
as they are:

"Provehimur portu, terraeque urbesque recedunt:"

["We sail out of port, and cities and lands recede."
--AEneid, iii. 72.]

Whoever saw old age that did not applaud the past and condemn the present
time, laying the fault of his misery and discontent upon the world and
the manners of men?

"Jamque caput quassans, grandis suspirat arator.
Et cum tempora temporibus praesentia confert
Praeteritis, laudat fortunas saepe parentis,
Et crepat antiquum genus ut pietate repletum."

["Now the old ploughman, shaking his head, sighs, and compares
present times with past, often praises his parents' happiness, and
talks of the old race as full of piety."--Lucretius, ii. 1165.]

We will make all things go along with us; whence it follows that we