336 LECTURE VII. 



That ignorance may not, however, be 

 hereafter pleaded in mitigation of your ver- 

 dict, I deem it my duty, with the utmost 

 brevity, to represent the effects of different 

 opinions upon human actions. For this 

 purpose, I first select the case of a power- 

 ful monarch, called by historians Sardana- 

 palus J who chose, for reasons perhaps best 

 known to himself, to write his own epi- 

 taph, as follows. " Eat, drink, and be 

 merry ; for the rest is nothing;'* an epi- 

 taph, says Aristotle, fit for a hog. It can- 

 not be doubted, that Sardanapalus was 

 one of those who considered the grave to 

 be a "place of eternal rest." To show the 

 effects of the contrary sentiments, I would 

 ask, is it credible that Socrates, after drink- 

 ing the poison, would have calmly dis- 

 coursed on philosophical subjects with his 

 friends ; or that Brutus would have stabbed 

 the Roman he most loved, rather than 

 suffer his country to be enslaved, had they 

 not formed a proper estimate of human life, 

 and considered themselves but as perform- 

 ing a part, in the presence of immortal and 



