her of Bacchus, who was seized by King Midas, and as the
price of his deliverance taught him that ostensibly fine maxim that the
first and the greatest of goods was not to be born, and the second, to
depart from this life with dispatch (Cic., _Tuscul._, lib. 1). Plato
believed that souls had been in a happier state, and many of the ancients,
amongst others Cicero in his Consolation (according to the account of
Lactantius), believed that for their sins they were confined in bodies as
in a prison. They rendered thus a reason for our ills, and asserted their
prejudices against human life: for there is no such thing as a beautiful
prison. But quite apart from the consideration that, even according to
these same pagans, the evils of this life would be counterbalanced and
exceeded by the goods of past and future lives, I make bold to say that we
shall find, upon unbiassed scrutiny of the facts, that taking all in all
human life is in general tolerable. And adding thereto the motives of
religion, we shall be content with the order God has set therein. Moreover,
for a better judgement of our goods and our evils, it will be well to read
Cardan, _De Utilitate ex Adversis Capienda_, and Novarini, _De Occultis Dei
Beneficiis_.

261. M. Bayle dilates upon the misfortunes of the great, who are thought to
be the most fortunate: the constant experience of the fair aspect of their
condition renders them unaware of good, but greatly aware of evil. Someone
will say: so much the worse for them; if they know not how to enjoy the
advantages of nature and fortune, is that the fault of either? There are
nevertheless great men possessed of more wisdom, who know how to profit by
the favours God has shown them, who are easily consoled for their
misfortunes, and who even turn their own faults to account. M. Bayle [287]
pays no heed to that: he prefers to listen to Pliny, who thinks that
Augustus, one of the princes most favoured by fortune, experienced at least
as much evil as good. I admit that he found great causes of trouble in his
family and that remorse for having crushed the Republic may have tormented
him; but I think that he was too wise to grieve over the former, and that
Maecenas apparently made him understand that Rome had need of a master. Had
not Augustus been converted on this point, Vergil would never have said of
a lost soul:

_Vendidit hic auro patriam Dominumque potentem_
_Imposuit, fixit leges pretio atque refixit._

Augu