When parents erect a funeral monument to their children, the inscription very frequently embodies the sentiment of Cato the elder, in Cicero de Senectute (c. 23), the inversion of the order of nature which the performance of such a duty by the parent involves. “Catonem, cujus a me corpus crematum est; quod contra decuit ab illo meum.” Thus in an inscription at Naples by Calvidius to his son, who had died at the age of 20; QUOD FILIUS PATRI FACERE DEBUIT PATER FECIT FILIO; and in another; QUOD FILIA PATRI FACERE DEBUERAT MORS IMMATURA FECIT UT FACERET PATER. The sentiment is concisely expressed in the following distich:—
Quod decuit natam patri præstare sepulto
Hoc contra natæ præstitit ipse pater.[82]
A mother, burying her son, who died at the age of 35, complains, HUNC LEGES LETI PRÆPOSTERÆ ERIPUERE MATRI, QUÆ UT ANNIS MORTE QUOQUE ESSET PRIOR. Parents not only call themselves infelicissimi, for the loss of their children, but impii and crudeles, because they survive them.
Children from their premature grave endeavour to moderate their parents’ grief, by laying the blame upon the Fates.
Nec tibi nec nobis æternum vivere cessit:
Quod pueri occipimus Fata querenda putes.[83]
A father justifies himself to his daughter, for not having died and mingled his ashes with hers, by his duty to his surviving children.
Quæ tibi cunque mei potuerunt pignora amoris
Nata, dari, populo sunt lacrumante data.
Et volui majora nimis; sed cura meorum
Fida tui prohibet me cinerem esse rogi.[84]
Mothers regret, under the loss of their children, that they had ever become mothers.
Cernis ut orba meis, hospes monumenta locavi,
Et tristis senior natos miseranda requiro.
Exemplis referenda mea est deserta senectus,
Ut steriles vere possint gaudere maritæ.[85]
Hæc quæcunque legis, devoto pectore, mater
Da lacrimas, et me sic peperisse dole.
Hic jacet, extinctus crudeli funere, natus
Ultima vivendi qui mihi causa fuit.[86]
The sentiment of the following inscription frequently occurs on monuments, and has been imitated in modern times. MATER MONUMENTUM FECIT MŒRENS FILIO, EX QUO NIHIL UNQUAM DOLUIT, NISI CUM IS NON FUIT.[87]