Socrates
proceeded from very different Motives, the Consciousness of a well-spent Life, and the prospect of a happy Eternity. If the ingenious Author above mentioned was so pleased with Gaiety of Humour in a dying Man, he might have found a much nobler Instance of it in our Countryman
Sir Thomas More.
This great and learned Man was famous for enlivening his ordinary Discourses with Wit and Pleasantry; and, as
Erasmus
tells him in an
Epistle Dedicatory
, acted in all parts of Life like a second
Democritus
.