Et auram ab ejus halitu halitum suum dulcem reddere:
Solem porro nitidum illi esse inferiorem,
Ac lunam (si cuin illa comparetur) abjectissimam videri.
P. 244. This song occurs in "A Collection of Poems written upon several occasions, by several persons. London, 1673." Rilson has inserted it in his "Collection of Songs;" vol. i. p. 276, and ascribes it to Sir George Etherege? "The note of interrogation annexed to this name, (says Mr Park) bespeaks it as uncertainly ascribed to this witty and wanton author, who, in the licentious reign of our second Charles, was one of the mob of gentlemen who wrote with ease."
The concluding paragraph of Hume's Essay, entitled the "Epicurean," is so very similar to this song, that we might almost suppose he had merely dilated it, and turned it into prose. The reader will judge.
"But why does your bosom heave with these sighs, while tears bathe your glowing cheeks? Why disturb your heart with such vain anxieties? Why so often ask me, How long shall my love yet endure? Alps! my Celia, can I resolve this question? Do I know how long my life shall endure? But does this also disturb your tender breast? And is the image of our frail mortality for ever present with you, to throw a damp on your gayest hours, and poison even those joys which love inspires? Consider rather, that if life be frail, if youth be transitory, we should well employ the present moment, and lose no part of so perishable an existence. Yet a little moment, and these shall be no more, we shall be as if we had never been; not a memory of us be left upon earth, and even the fabulous shades below will not afford us a habitation. Our fruitless anxieties, our vain projects, our uncertain speculations, shall all be swallowed up and lost. Our present doubts concerning the original cause of all things, must never, alas! be resolved. This alone we may be certain of, that if any governing mind preside, he must be pleased to see us fulfil the ends of our being, and enjoy that pleasure for which we were created. Let this reflection give ease to your anxious thoughts, but render not your joys too serious, by dwelling for ever upon it. It is sufficient to be once acquainted with this philosophy, in order to give an unbounded loose to love and jollity, and remove all the scruples of a vain superstition; but while youth and passion, my fair one, prompt our eager desires,
