Page:A Discourse of Constancy in Two Books Chiefly containing Consolations Against Publick Evils.pdf/203

182 flictions do also prove and try us; for otherwise how shall any Man be able to judge of his firmness and proficiency? If a prosperous wind do ever fill the Sail, the Pilot has no opportunity to display his skill; and if all things still evenly and happily succeed to Man, he shall lose the glory of his vertue; for the only undeceivable touch-stone of it, is affliction. It was a gallant Speech of Demetrius: Nothing seems to me more unhappy than that Man who ha's never tasted of Adversity, and it is most true. For our Great General doth not exempt such Men, but distrusts them; he doth not indulge, but discards and contemns them. He rases I say their names out of the Muster Rolls of his Legions, as a sort of feeble and unserviceable persons. Lastly, they adapt us to lead on others; for the courage and patience of good Men in their sufferings, is a light to this benighted World. They invite Rh