[126] “We are a sufficient theme for contemplation, the one for the other.”—Sen. Epist. Mor. 1. 7. (A. L. l. iii. 6.) Pope seems, notwithstanding this censure of Bacon, to have been of the same opinion with Epicurus:—
“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan,
The proper study for mankind is man.”
Essay on Man, Ep. ii. 1. 2.
Indeed, Lord Bacon seems to have misunderstood the saying of Epicurus, who did not mean to recommend man as the sole object of the bodily vision, but as the proper theme for mental contemplation.
[127] Amare et sapere vix Deo conceditur.—Pub. Syr. Sent. 15. (A. L. ii. proœ. 10.)
[128] He refers here to the judgment of Paris, mentioned by Ovid in his Epistles, of the Heroines.
[129] Montaigne has treated this subject before Bacon, under the title of De l’incommodité de la Grandeur. (B. iii. ch. vii.)
[130] “Since you are not what you were, there is no reason why you should wish to live.”
[131] “Death presses heavily upon him, who, well known to all others, dies unknown to himself.”—Sen. Thyest. ii. 401.