ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND.

Chian, who, selling much choice wine to others, asked for some sour wine for his own supper; and one of his slaves being asked by another, what he had left his master doing, replied, "Asking for bad when good was by." For most people overlook the advantages and pleasures of their individual lives, and run to their difficulties and grievances. Aristippus, however, was not such a one, for he cleverly knew as in a scale to make the better preponderate over the worse. So having lost a good farm, he asked one of those who made a great show of condolence and sympathy, "Have you not only one little piece of ground, while I have three fields left?" And when he admitted that it was so, he went on to say, "Ought I not then to condole with you rather than you with me?" For it is the act of a madman to distress oneself over what is lost, and not to rejoice at what is left; but like little children, if one of their many playthings be taken away by anyone, throw the rest away and weep and cry out, so we, if we are assailed by fortune in some one point, wail and mourn and make all other things seem unprofitable in our eyes.