If the Stoic held that the goal of life is death, and that we live but to learn to die--if the Pythagorean believed in the transmigration of souls, and scrupled to shoot a woodcock lest he should dispossess the spirit of his grandam--how much more rational was the doctrine of the Epicurean, (after such a goodly catalogue of gormandizers!) that there was no judgement to come. Who has not heard of Guildhall on Lord Mayor's Day, ** and the Easter Ball at the Mansion-House? But we profane not the penetralia where even Common-Councilmen fear to tread! The City Marshals, and men in armour (_Héros malgré eux!_); the pensive-looking state-coachmen, in all the plumpness, pomp, and verdure of prime feeding, wig, and bouquet; the postilion, “a noticeable man,” with velvet cap and jockey boots; the high-bred and high-fed aristocracy of the Poultry and Cheapside, and their Banquet, which might tempt Diogenes to blow himself up to such a pitch of obesity, that, instead of living in a tub, a tub might be said to live in him, are subjects too lofty for plebeian handling. Cæsar was told to beware of the Ides of March; and are not November fogs equally ominous to the London citizen? If, then, by some culinary magic, he can be induced to cram his throat rather than to cut it,--to feast himself instead of the worms,--to prefer a minuet in the Council Chamber to the Dance Macabre in the shades below,--the gorgeous anniversaries of Gog and Magog have not been celebrated in vain. *