["Silently meditating in the healthy groves, whatever is worthy of a wise and good man."--Horace, Ep., i. 4, 4.] Wiser men, having great force and vigour of soul, may propose to themselves a rest wholly spiritual but for me, who have a very ordinary soul, it is very necessary to support myself with bodily conveniences; and age having of late deprived me of those pleasures that were more acceptable to me, I instruct and whet my appetite to those that remain, more suitable to this other reason. We ought to hold with all our force, both of hands and teeth, the use of the pleasures of life that our years, one after another, snatch away from us: "Carpamus dulcia; nostrum est, Quod vivis; cinis, et manes, et fabula fies." ["Let us pluck life's sweets, 'tis for them we live: by and by we shall be ashes, a ghost, a mere subject of talk." --Persius, Sat., v. 151.] Now, as to the end that Pliny and Cicero propose to us of glory, 'tis infinitely wide of my account. Ambition is of all others the most contrary humour to solitude; glory and repose are things that cannot possibly inhabit in one and the same place. For so much as I understand, these have only their arms and legs disengaged from the crowd; their soul and intention remain confined behind more than ever: "Tun', vetule, auriculis alienis colligis escas?" ["Dost thou, then, old man, collect food for others' ears?" --Persius, Sat., i. 22.]