during his last Moments, and thinks he discovers in them a greater Firmness of Mind and Resolution than in the Death of Seneca, Cato, or Socrates.  There is no question but this polite Authors Affectation of appearing singular in his Remarks, and making Discoveries which had escaped the Observation of others, threw him into this course of Reflection.  It was Petronius’s Merit, that he died in the same Gaiety of Temper in which he lived; but as his Life was altogether loose and dissolute, the Indifference which he showed at the Close of it is to be looked upon as a piece of natural Carelessness and Levity, rather than Fortitude.  The Resolution of Socrates proceeded from very different Motives, the Consciousness of a well-spent Life, and the prospect of a happy Eternity.  If the ingenious Author above mentioned was so pleased with Gaiety of Humour in a dying Man, he might have found a much nobler Instance of it in our Countryman Sir Thomas More.

This great and learned Man was famous for enlivening his ordinary Discourses with Wit and Pleasantry; and, as Erasmus tells him in an Epistle Dedicatory, acted in all parts of Life like a second Democritus.

He died upon a Point of Religion, and is respected as a Martyr by that Side for which he suffer’d.  The innocent Mirth which had been so conspicuous in his Life, did not forsake him to the last:  He maintain’d the same Chearfulness of Heart upon the Scaffold, which he used to shew at his Table; and upon laying his Head on the Block, gave Instances of that Good-Humour with which he had always entertained his Friends in the most ordinary Occurrences.  His Death was of a piece with his Life.  There was nothing in it new, forced, or affected.  He did not look upon the severing of his Head from his Body as a Circumstance that ought to produce any Change in the Disposition of his Mind; and as he died under a fixed and settled Hope of Immortality, he thought any unusual degree of Sorrow and Concern improper on such an Occasion, as had nothing in it which could deject or terrify him.

There is no great danger of Imitation from this Example.  Mens natural Fears will be a sufficient Guard against it.  I shall only observe, that what was Philosophy in this extraordinary Man, would be Frenzy in one who does not resemble him as well in the Chearfulness of his Temper, as in the Sanctity of his Life and Manners.

I shall conclude this Paper with the Instance of a Person who seems to me to have shewn more Intrepidity and Greatness of Soul in his dying Moments, than what we meet with among any of the most celebrated Greeks and Romans.  I met with this Instance in the History of the Revolutions in Portugal, written by the Abbot de Vertot. [2]