I have seen a hundred hares escape out of the very teeth of the greyhounds: "Aliquis carnifici suo superstes fuit." ["Some have survived their executioners."-- Seneca, Ep., 13.] "Multa dies, variusque labor mutabilis nevi Rettulit in melius; multos alterna revisens Lusit, et in solido rursus fortuna locavit." ["Length of days, and the various labour of changeful time, have brought things to a better state; fortune turning, shews a reverse face, and again restores men to prosperity."-- AEneid, xi.

425.] Piny says there are but three sorts of diseases, to escape which a man has good title to destroy himself; the worst of which is the stone in the bladder, when the urine is suppressed.
["In the quarto edition of these essays, in 1588, Pliny is said to mention two more, viz., a pain in the stomach and a headache, which, he says (lib.xxv.c.

9.), were the only three distempers almost for which men killed themselves."] Seneca says those only which for a long time are discomposing the functions of the soul.

And some there have been who, to avoid a worse death, have chosen one to their own liking.

Democritus, general of the AEtolians, being brought prisoner to Rome, found means to make his escape by night: but close pursued by his keepers, rather than suffer himself to be retaken, he fell upon his own sword and died.