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Side 109 av 113
Let me tell you, Scholar, that Diogenes walked on a day, with his
friend, to see a country fair; where he saw ribbons, and looking-glasses,
and nutcrackers, and fiddles, and hobby-horses, and many other
gimcracks; and, having observed them, and all the other finnimbruns
that make a complete country-fair, he said to his friend, " Lord, how
many things are there in this world of which Diogenes hath no need!"
And truly it is so, or might be so, with very many who vex and toil
themselves to get what they have no need of. Can any man charge God,
that He hath not given him enough to make his life happy? No,
doubtless; for nature is content with a little. And yet you shall hardly
meet with a man that complains not of some want; though he, indeed,
wants nothing but his will; it may be, nothing but his will of his poor
neighbour, for not worshipping, or not flattering him: and thus, when
we might be happy and quiet, we create trouble to ourselves. I have
heard of a man that was angry with himself because he was no taller;
and of a woman that broke her looking-glass because it would not shew
her face to be as young and handsome as her next neighbour's was. And
I knew another to whom God had given health and plenty; but a wife
that nature had made peevish, and her husband's riches had made purse-
proud; and must, because she was rich, and for no other virtue, sit in the
highest pew in the church; which being denied her, she engaged her
husband into a contention for it, and at last into a law-suit with a
dogged neighbour who was as rich as he, and had a wife as peevish and
purse-proud as the other: and this law-suit begot higher oppositions, and
actionable words, and more vexations and lawsuits; for you must
remember that both were rich, and must therefore have their wills.
Well! this wilful, purse-proud law-suit lasted during the life of the first
husband; after which his wife vext and chid, and chid and vext, till she
also chid and vext herself into her grave: and so the wealth of these
poor rich people was curst into a punishment, because they wanted
meek and thankful hearts; for those only can make us happy. I knew a
man that had health and riches; and several houses, all beautiful, and
ready furnished; and would often trouble himself and family to be
removing from one house to another: and being asked by a friend why
he removed so often from one house to another, replied, " It was to find
content in some one of them". But his friend, knowing his temper, told
him, " If he would find content in any of his houses, he must leave
himself behind him; for content will never dwell but in a meek and
quiet soul ". And this may appear, if we read and consider what our
Saviour says in St. Matthew's Gospel; for He there says—" Blessed be
the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed be the pure in heart,
for they shall see God. Blessed be the poor in spirit, for theirs is the
kingdom of heaven. And, Blessed be the meek, for they shall possess
the earth." Not that the meek shall not also obtain mercy, and see God,
and be comforted, and at last come to the kingdom of heaven: but in the
meantime, he, and he only, possesses the earth, as he goes towards that
kingdom of heaven, by being humble and cheerful, and content with
what his good God had allotted him. He has no turbulent, repining,
vexatious thoughts that he deserves better; nor is vext when he see
others possess of more honour or more riches than his wise God has
allotted for his share: but he possesses what he has with a meek and
contented quietness, such a quietness as makes his very dreams
pleasing, both to God and himself.
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