M. CORNELIUS FRONTO
out, and through ignorance of the facts we are coveting what is evil, as though it were to our advantage, and, on the other hand, turning away from what is good, as though it were to our harm,[1] whereas death itself, which seems grievous to all, brings rest from toil and care and trouble, and freeing us from these most wretched fetters of the Lody transports us to those serine and delightful assemblies of souls where all joys are to be found. I would more readily believe that this is so than that all human things are governed either by no Providence or by one that acts unfairly.[2]
5. But it death be rather a matter for welcome than for mourning, the younger each one attains to it the happier must he be accounted and the greater favourite of the Gods,[3] released as he will have been the sooner from the ills of the body, and the sooner called forth to inherit the privileges of an enfranchised soul. Yet all this, true though it be, makes little difference to us who long for our lost ones, nor does the immortality of souls bring us the slightest consolation, seeing that in this life we are bereft of our best-beloved ones. We miss the well-known gait, the voice, the features, the free air; we mourn over the pitiable face of the dead, the lips sealed, the eyes turned, the hue of life all fled. Be the immortality of the soul ever so established, that will be a theme for the disputations of philosophers, it will never assuage the yearning of a parent.
6. But however these things have been ordained
- ↑ cp. Marcus, Thoughts, iv. 58; ix. 2; x. 36.
- ↑ ibid. ii. 11; vi. 44.
- ↑ cp. the well-known fragment of Menander, ὃν οἱ θεοὶ φιλοῦσιν ἀποθνῄσκει νέος.
