Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/188

166 and goodly house; one hath a wife to his mind, and another a trusty friend.

Antipater of Tarsus, the philosopher, when he drew toward his end and the hour of his death, in recounting and reckoning up all the good and happy days that ever he saw in his lifetime, left not out of this roll so much as the bon-voyage that he had when he sailed from Cilicia to Athens. And yet we must not forget nor omit those blessings and comforts of this life which we enjoy in common with many more, but to make some reckoning and account of them: and namely to joy in this, that we live; that we have our health; that we behold the light of the sun; that we have neither war abroad nor civil sedition and dissension at home; but that the land yieldeth itself arable and to be tilled, and the sea navigable to every one that will, without fear of danger; that it is lawful for us to speak and keep silence at our pleasure; that we have liberty to negotiate and deal in affairs, or to rest and be at our repose. And verily the enjoying of these good things present will breed the greater contentment in our spirit, if we would but imagine within ourselves that they were absent; namely, by calling to mind eftsoons what a miss and desire those persons have of health, who be sick and diseased. How they wish for peace, who are afflicted with wars. How acceptable it is either to a stranger or a mean person and unknown, for to be advanced unto honour, or to be friended in some famous and puissant city. And contrariwise, what a great grief it is to forego these things when a man once hath them. And surely a thing cannot be great or precious when we have lost it, and the same of no valour and account all the while we have and enjoy it: for the not being thereof, addeth no price and worth thereto.

Neither ought we to hold these things right great and excellent, whiles we stand always in fear and trembling to think that we shall be deprived and bereft of them, as if they were some worthy things: and yet all the time that they be sure and safe in our possession, neglect and little regard them as if they were common and of no importance. But we ought to make use of them whiles they be ours, and that with joy, in this respect especially, that the loss of them, if it shall so fall out, we may bear more meekly and with greater patience. Howbeit, most men are of this opinion (as Arcesilaus was wont to say), that they ought to follow diligently with their eye and cogitation the poems, pictures and statues of others, and come close unto them for to behold and peruse exactly each of them; yea, and consider