Nec pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum ære lavantur.—Sat., ii, 149.
[715] See that saddest but most beautiful of the odes of Horace—To Delium, II, 3.
... Et nos in æternum
Exilium impositura cymbæ.
[716] In a similar spirit the dying emperor Augustus inquired if he had played his part well in the farce of life, and asked the applause of his courtiers.
Δότε κρότον
Καὶ πάντες ὑμεῖς μετὰ χαρᾶς κτυπήσατε.
[717] The Swedish poet Georg St. Jernhjelm ordered to be written on his tomb the pagan sentiment, VIXIT DVM VIXIT LAETVS—“While he lived he lived merrily.”
[718] “God counts even the bristles of the swine,” says Tertullian, “much more the hairs of his children.”
[719] The following proposes a practical test of the existence of spirits: TV LEGIS ET DVBITAS MANES ESSE SPONSIONE FACTA INVOCA NOS ET INTELLIGES—“You who read this epitaph and doubt whether spirits exist, invoke us, and by our answer you will know.”
[720] Thus in Rock’s Hierurgia, a standard Romanist authority, such expressions as REQ IN PACE are explained sometimes in defiance of the grammatical construction of the context, as signifying “Mayest thou rest,” as if REQVIESCAS, instead of, in analogy with numerous other examples, “he rests,”—REQVIESCIT. Sometimes the cardinal word is entirely omitted, as in the expression, IN PACE ET BENEDICTIONE, which is quite unwarrantably translated, “May you rest in peace and benediction.”
[721] Sometimes the modernized form of the language indicates the late origin of graffiti found on ancient monuments, as in the following, PREGA ILA PER SILVINA, VIVI ILA NEL DIO CRISTO.