Page:The life and strange surprizing adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, mariner- who lived eight and twenty years all alone in an un-inhabited island on the coast of America (IA lifestrangesurpr01defo).pdf/13

 that thee Things were all either too far above me, or to far below me; that mine was the middle State, or what might be called the upper Station of Low Life, which he had found by long Experience was the bet State in the World, the mot uited to human Happines, not expoed to the Mieries and Hardhips, the Labour and Sufferings of the mechanick Part of Mankind, and not embaras'd with the Pride, Luxury, Ambition, and Envy of the upper Part of Mankind. He told me, I might judge of the Happines of this State, by this one thing, viz. That this was the State of Life which all other People envied; that Kings have frequently lamented the mierable Conequences of being born to great Things, and wih they had been placed in the Middle of the two Extremes, between the Mean and the Great; that the wie Man gave his Tetimony to this as the jut Standard of true Felicity, when he prayed to have neither Poverty or Riches.

He bid me oberve it, and I hould always find, that the Calamities of Life were shared among the upper and lower Part of Mankind; but that the middle Station had the fewet Diaters, and was not expos'd to so many Viciitudes as the higher or lower Part of Mankind; nay, they were not ubjected to o many Ditempers and Uneainees either of Body or Mind, as thoe were, who by vicious Living, Luxury and Extravagancies on one Hand, or by hard Labour, want of Necearies, and mean or inufficient Diet on the other Hand, bring Ditempers upon themelves by the natural Conequences of their Way of Living; That the middle Station of Life was calculated for all kind of Virtues and all kind of Enjoyments; that Peace and Plenty were the Hand-maids of a middle Fortune; that Temperance, Moderation, Quietnes, Health, Rh