in heaven, until they are at last dissolved with the universe and
then, together with the sun and moon, sublimed into an
intellective fire. So large a field and one of so great pleasures
Epicurus wholly cuts off, when he destroys (as hath been said) the
hopes and graces we should derive from the gods, and by that
extinguishes both in our speculative capacity the desire of
knowledge, and in our active the love of glory, and confines and
abases our nature to a poor narrow thing, and that not cleanly
neither, to wit, the content the mind receives by the body, as if
it were capable of no higher good than the escape of evil.


END OF ONE---------


THAT A PHILOSOPHER OUGHT CHIEFLY TO CONVERSE WITH GREAT MEN.

The resolution which you have taken to enter into the friendship
and familiarity of Sorcanus, that by the frequent opportunities of
conversing with him you may cultivate and improve a soil which
gives such early promises of a plentiful harvest, is an undertaking
which will not only oblige his relations and friends, but rebound
very much to the advantage of the public; and (notwithstanding the
peevish censures of some morose or ignorant people) it is so far
from being an argument of an aspiring vainglorious temper, that it
shows you to be a lover of virtue and good manners, and a zealous
promoter of the common interest of mankind.

They themselves are rather to be accused of an indirect but more
vehement sort of ambition, who would not upon any terms be found in