icence, may talk like Cowley, of an humble station and quiet
obscurity, of the paucity of nature's wants, and the inconveniencies of
superfluity, and at last, like him, limit his desires to five hundred
pounds a year; a fortune, indeed, not exuberant, when we compare it with
the expenses of pride and luxury, but to which it little becomes a
philosopher to affix the name of poverty, since no man can, with any
propriety, be termed poor, who does not see the greater part of mankind
richer than himself.

As little is the general condition of human life understood by the
panegyrists and historians, who amuse us with accounts of the poverty of
heroes and sages. Riches are of no value in themselves, their use is
discovered only in that which they procure. They are not coveted, unless
by narrow understandings, which confound the means with the end, but for
the sake of power, influence, and esteem; or, by some of less elevated
and refined sentiments, as necessary to sensual enjoyment.

The pleasures of luxury, many have, without uncommon virtue, been able
to despise, even when affluence and idleness have concurred to tempt
them; and therefore he who feels nothing from indigence but the want of
gratifications which he could not in any other condition make consistent
with innocence, has given no proof of eminent patience. Esteem and
influence every man desires, but they are equally pleasing, and equally
valuable, by whatever means they are obtained; and whoever has found the
art of securing them without the help of money, ought, in reality, to be
accounted rich, since he has all that riches can purchase to a wise man.
Cincinnatus, though he lived upon a few acres cultivated by his own
hand, was sufficiently removed from all the evils generally comprehended
under the name of poverty, when his reputation was such, that the voice
of his country called him from his farm to take absolute command into
his hand; nor was Diogenes much mortified by his residence in a tub,
where he was honoured with the visit of Alexander the Great.

The same fallacy has conciliated veneration to the religious orders.
When we behold a man abdicating the hope of terrestrial possessions, and
precluding himself, by an irrevocable vow, from the pursuit and
acquisition of all that his fellow-beings consider as worthy of wishes
and endeavours, we are immediately struck with the purity, abstraction,
and firmness of his mind, and regard him as wholly employed in s