Note 465 — ON THE PROGNOSTICS.
Francis Adams translation
The groundwork of the matters contained in this section is to be found in the Coacæ Prænotiones, 212; but it is greatly expanded and improved by our author. I need scarcely remark that the description of the features of a dying man is of classical celebrity. It is given in elegant prose by Celsus, ii., 6; and by Lucretius it is thus put into a poetical form:
“Item ad supremum denique tempus Compressæ nares, nasi primoris acumen Tenue, cavati oculi, cava tempora, frigida pellis Duraque, inhorrebat rictum, frons tenta minebat.” De Rerum Natura, vi., 1190.
Shakespeare’s description of the death of Falstaff, by the way, contains images which have always appeared to me to be borrowed (at second-hand, no doubt) from this and other passages of the present work: “For after I saw him fumble with the sheets, and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers’-ends, I knew there was but one way: for his nose was as sharp as a pin, and he babbled of green fields.—So he bade me lay more clothes on his feet: I put my hand into the bed and felt them, and they were as cold as any stone,” etc.—Henry V., ii., 3. Although perhaps it may be thought rather hypercritical, I cannot omit the present opportunity of making the remark, that it appears to me rather out of character to make the wandering mind of a London debauchee dwell upon images “of green fields.” One would have thought that “the ruling passion strong in death” would have rather suggested stews and pot-houses to the imagination of such a person.