But I dare say that, in answer to this, some may assert their belief that there need not be mourning for every death, but only for untimely deaths, because of the failure of the dead to gain what are commonly held to be the advantages of life, such as marriage, education, manhood, citizenship, or public office (for these are the considerations, they say, which most cause grief to those who suffer misfortune through untimely deaths, since they are robbed of their hope out of due time); but they do not realize that the untimely death shows no disparity if it be considered with reference to the Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. p. 743, Ion, No. 54. common lot of man. For just as when it has been decided to migrate to a new fatherland, and the journey is compulsory for all, and none by entreaty can escape it, some go on ahead and others follow after, but all come to the same place; in the same manner, of all who are journeying toward Destiny those who come more tardily have no advantage over those who arrive earlier. If it be true that untimely death is an evil, the most untimely would be that of infants and children, and still more that of the newly born. But such deaths we bear easily and cheerfully, but the deaths of those who have already lived some time with distress and mourning because of our fanciful notion, born of vain hopes, since we have come to feel quite assured of the continued tarrying with us of persons who have lived so long. But if the years of man’s life were but twenty, we should feel that he who passed away at fifteen had not died untimely, but that he had already attained an adequate measure of age, while the man who had completed the prescribed period of twenty years, or who had come close to the count of twenty years, we should assuredly deem happy as having lived through a most blessed and perfect life. But if the length of life were two hundred years, we should certainly feel that he who came to his end at one hundred was cut off untimely, and we should betake ours elves to wailing and lamentation. It is evident, therefore, that even the death which we call untimely readily admits of consolation, both for these reasons and for those previously given. For in fact Troïlus shed fewer tears than did Priam; A saying of Callimachus; cf. Cicero, Tusculan Disputations , i. 93 (39); Plutarch, Moralia , 211 A. and if Priam had died earlier, while his kingdom and his great prosperity were at their height, he would not have used such sad words as he did in his conversation with his own son Hector, when he advised him to withdraw from the battle with Achilles; he says: Homer, Il. xxii. 56. Come then within the walled city, my son, so to save from destruction All of the men and the women of Troy, nor afford a great triumph Unto the offspring of Peleus, and forfeit the years of your lifetime. Also for me have compassion, ill-starred, while yet I have feeling; Hapless I am; on the threshold of eld will the Father, descended from Cronus, Make me to perish in pitiful doom, after visions of evils, Sons being slain and our daughters as well being dragged to be captives, Chambers of treasure all wantonly plundered and poor little children Dashed to the earth in the terrible strife by the merciless foeman, Wives of my sons being dragged by the ravishing hands of Achaeans. Me, last of all, at the very front doors shall the dogs tear to pieces, Ravening, eager for blood, when a foeman wielding his weapon, Keen-edged of bronze, by a stroke or a throw, takes the life from my body. Yet when the dogs bring defilement on hair and on beard that is hoary, And on the body as well of an old man slain by the foeman, This is the saddest of sights ever seen by us unhappy mortals. Thus did the old man speak, and his hoary locks plucked by the handful, Tearing his hair from his head, but he moved not the spirit of Hector. Since you have, then, so very many examples regarding the matter, bear in mind the fact that death relieves not a few persons from great and grievous ills which, if they had lived on, they would surely have experienced. But, out of regard for the due proportions of my argument, I omit these, contenting myself with what has been said touching the wrongfulness of being carried away beyond natural and moderate bounds to futile mourning and ignoble lamentation. Crantor Mullach, Frag. Philor. Graec. iii. p. 149. says that not being to blame for one’s unhappy state is no small alleviation for misfortunes; but I should say that it surpasses all others as a remedy for the cure of grief. But affection and love for the departed does not consist in distressing ourselves, but in benefiting the beloved one; and a benefit for those who have been taken away is the honour paid to them through keeping their memory green. For no good man, after he is dead, is deserving of lamentations, but of hymns and songs of joy; not of mourning, but of an honourable memory; not of sorrowing tears, but of offerings of sacrifice,—if the departed one is now a partaker in some life more divine, relieved of servitude to the body, and of these everlasting cares and misfortunes which those who have received a mortal life as their portion are constrained to undergo until such time as they shall complete their allotted earthly existence, which Nature has not given to us for eternity; but she has distributed to us severally the apportioned amount in accordance with the laws of fate.