to be pitied, when the person
on whom it is executed is deprived of means of suffering under it: for as
the avenger will look on to enjoy the pleasure of his revenge, so the
person on whom he takes revenge should be a spectator too, to be
afflicted and to repent. "He will repent it," we say, and because we
have given him a pistol-shot through the head, do we imagine he will
repent? On the contrary, if we but observe, we shall find, that he makes
mouths at us in falling, and is so far from penitency, that he does not
so much as repine at us; and we do him the kindest office of life, which
is to make him die insensibly, and soon: we are afterwards to hide
ourselves, and to shift and fly from the officers of justice, who pursue
us, whilst he is at rest. Killing is good to frustrate an offence to
come, not to revenge one that is already past; and more an act of fear
than of bravery; of precaution than of courage; of defence than of
enterprise. It is manifest that by it we lose both the true end of
revenge and the care of our reputation; we are afraid, if he lives he
will do us another injury as great as the first; 'tis not out of
animosity to him, but care of thyself, that thou gettest rid of him.

In the kingdom of Narsingah this expedient would be useless to us, where
not only soldiers, but tradesmen also, end their differences by the
sword. The king never denies the field to any who wish to fight; and
when they are persons of quality; he looks on, rewarding the victor with
a chain of gold,--for which any one who pleases may fight with him again,
so that, by having come off from one combat, he has engaged himself in
many.

If we thought by virtue to be always masters of our enemies, and to
triumph over them at pleasure, we should be sorry they should escape from
us as they do, by dying: but we have a mind to conquer, more with safety
than honour, and, in our quarrel, more pursue the end than the glory.

Asnius Pollio, who, as being a worthy man, was the less to be excused,
committed a like, error, when, having written a libel against Plancus, he
forbore to publish it till he was dead; which is to bite one's thumb at a
blind man, to rail at one who is deaf, to wound a man who has no feeling,
rather than to run the hazard of his resentment. And it was also said of
him that it was only for hobgoblins to wrestle with the dead.

He who stays to see the author die, whose writings he intends to
question, what does he s