[1112] From Cowley, who says of life, in his ode on Life and Fame:
Vain, weak-built isthmus, which dost proudly rise
Up betwixt two eternities.—Warton.
[1113] Kennet's Pascal, p. 160: "We have an idea of truth, not to be effaced by all the wiles of the sceptic."
[1114] The stoic took his stand upon virtue, and with a stern faith in the all-sufficiency of moral excellence he calmly defied the trials of life.
[1115] Johnson, in his translation of Crousaz, says he cannot determine whether any one has discovered the true meaning of the words "in doubt to act or rest." The language is vague, and incapable of an interpretation which is generally true; but the probable sense seems to be that man is in doubt whether to embrace an active belief, or whether to resign himself to a passive, inert scepticism.
[1116] First edition:
To deem himself a part of God or beast.
Kennet's Pascal, p. 30, furnished the hint for the line: "What, then, is to be the fate of man? Shall he be equal to God, or shall he not be superior to the beasts?"
[1117] Man is not born only to die, but death has the present life on one side of it, and immortality on the other. Man does not reason only to err, but to establish a multitude of mighty truths.
[1118] "Such is the reason of man that he is equally ignorant whether, etc."