Religio medici : to which is added, Hydriotaphia; or, Urn-burial; a discourse on sepulchral urns / by Sir Thomas Browne ; with a preliminary discourse and notes, by J.A. St. John. 1841.

  • Browne, Thomas, Sir, 1605-1682.
Date:
1838
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Religio medici : to which is added, Hydriotaphia; or, Urn-burial; a discourse on sepulchral urns / by Sir Thomas Browne ; with a preliminary discourse and notes, by J.A. St. John. 1841. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    of Digby. The critic, at this stage of the business, appears to have grown exceedingly capricious and hard to please; since it was but carrying one step further his contempt of death, which, nevertheless, finds great favour in the eyes of our courtly and ingenious observer. “ I must needs acknowledge,” he says, “ that where he balanceth life and death against one another, and considereth that the latter is to be a kind of nothing for a moment, to become a pure spirit within one instant; and what follow- eth of this strong thought, is extreme handsomely said ; and argueth very gallant and generous reso- lutions in him.” But if we take this unearthly view of the matter,— and I admire those who can,—why should not his sto- ical disdain of fame, (affectation, perhaps, no less than the other,) equally command our admiration ? The epitaph, in itself, is nothing. Few live long in the memory of mankind through those “ sepul- chral lies,” or truths, which are engraved upon their tombs. He would express, by this place, his rea- diness to encounter total oblivion, to be blotted out from all human registers, to leave behind him upon earth no more trace than the cloud which swept turbulently during the celebration of his obsequies through the sky. And is not this every way as “ gallant and ge- nerous a resolution” as his indifference in the mat- ter of life and death P Perhaps, if our thoughts were sifted to the bottom, it might be found that many of us scarcely care to live at all, except for the purpose of writing our names ineffaceably on