"There is no good without ill in the world, But everything is mixed in due proportion,"-- we ought not to be disheartened or despondent; but as musicians drown their worst music with the best, so should we take good and bad together, and make our chequered life one of convenience and harmony. For it is not, as Menander says, "Directly any man is born, a genius Befriends him, a good guide to him for life," but it is rather, as Empedocles states, two fates or genii take hold of each of us when we are born and govern us. "There were Chthonia and far-seeing Heliope, and cruel Deris, and grave Harmonia, and Callisto, and AEschra, and Thoosa, and Denaea, and charming Nemertes, and Asaphea with the black fruit." Sec. XVI. And as[752] at our birth we received the mingled seeds of each of these passions, which is the cause of much irregularity, the sensible person hopes for better things, but expects worse, and makes the most of either, remembering that wise maxim, _Not too much of anything._ For not only will he who is least solicitous about to-morrow best enjoy it when it comes, as Epicurus says, but also wealth, and renown, and power and rule, gladden most of all the hearts of those who are least afraid of the contrary. For the immoderate desire for each, implanting a most immoderate fear of losing them, makes the enjoyment of them weak and wavering, like a flame under the influence of a wind. But he whom reason enables to say to fortune without fear or trembling, "If you bring any good I gladly welcome it, But if you fail me little does it trouble me,"