Page:The Emperor Marcus Antoninus - His Conversation with Himself.djvu/209

This page needs to be proofread.

Meditations, &c.
29

a Lion, the Foam of a Boar, and many other Things, if you take them singly, are far enough from being handsome, but when they are looked on as parts of somewhat else, and consider'd with Reference, and Connexion; are both Ornamental, and Affecting. Thus, if a Man has but Inclination and Thought enough to examine the Product of the Universe; he'll find the most unpromising Appearances not unaccountable; and that the more remote Appendages have somewhat to Recommend them. One thus prepared will perceive the Beauty of Life, as well as that of Imitation; and be no less pleased to see a Tyger Grin in the Tower, than in a Painter's Shop. Such a one will find something agreeable in the Decays of Age, as well as in the Blossom of Youth: I grant many of these Things won't Charm us at the first Blush: To Pronounce rightly, a Man must: be well affected in the Cafe, and throughly acquainted with the Methods and Harmony of Nature.

III. Hippocrates who cured so many Diseases, was not able to Recover himself: The Chaldeans who foretold other Peoples Death, at last: met with their own. Alexander, Pompey, and Julius Cæsar, who had destroyed so many Towns, and Cut-off so so many Thousands in the Field, were

forc'd