All they shall speak and say unto thee, Art thou also become weak as we? art thou become like unto us?
Ver. 10. Art thou also become weak as we?] Interrogatio sarcastica et insultabunda. Hast thou also a Hic situs est, here he lies, or Mortuus est, here he died, set upon thy tombstone? This if thou hadst forethought, thou wouldst have better behaved thyself while alive: the meditation of death would have been a death to thy passions, and an allay to thine insolencies. Virgil saith, if swarms of bees meet in the air, they will sometimes fight as it were in a set battle with great violence; but if you cast but a little dust upon them, they will be all presently quiet.
“ Hi motus animorum atque haec certamina tanta,
Pulveris exigui iactu compressa quieseunt. ”
- Georg., lib. iv.
Had Nebuchadnezzar or his successors bethought themselves of their mortality and of death's impartiality, they would have been more moderate.