I abominate those mad exhortations of this other discomposed soul,

"Dum tela micant, non vos pietatis imago
Ulla, nec adversa conspecti fronte parentes
Commoveant; vultus gladio turbate verendos."

["While swords glitter, let no idea of piety, nor the face even of a
father presented to you, move you: mutilate with your sword those
venerable features "--Lucan, vii. 320.]

Let us deprive wicked, bloody, and treacherous natures of such a pretence
of reason: let us set aside this guilty and extravagant justice, and
stick to more human imitations. How great things can time and example
do! In an encounter of the civil war against Cinna, one of Pompey's
soldiers having unawares killed his brother, who was of the contrary
party, he immediately for shame and sorrow killed himself: and some years
after, in another civil war of the same people, a soldier demanded a
reward of his officer for having killed his brother.

A man but ill proves the honour and beauty of an action by its utility:
and very erroneously concludes that every one is obliged to it, and that
it becomes every one to do it, if it be of utility:

"Omnia non pariter rerum sunt omnibus apta."


["All things are not equally fit for all men."
--Propertius, iii. 9, 7.]

Let us take that which is most necessary and profitable for human