b our lot. For in the
course of long time a man may see many things which he would not desire
to see, and suffer also many things which he would not desire to suffer.
The limit of life for a man I lay down at seventy years: and these
seventy years give twenty-five thousand and two hundred days, not
reckoning for any intercalated month. Then if every other one of these
years shall be made longer by one month, that the seasons may be caused
to come round at the due time of the year, the intercalated months will
be in number five-and-thirty besides the seventy years; and of these
months the days will be one thousand and fifty. Of all these days, being
in number twenty-six thousand two hundred and fifty, which go to the
seventy years, one day produces nothing at all which resembles what
another brings with it. Thus then, O Croesus, man is altogether a
creature of accident. As for thee, I perceive that thou art both great
in wealth and king of many men, but that of which thou didst ask me I
cannot call thee yet, until I learn that thou hast brought thy life to
a fair ending: for the very rich man is not at all to be accounted more
happy than he who has but his subsistence from day to day, unless also
the fortune go with him of ending his life well in possession of all
things fair. For many very wealthy men are not happy, 32 while many who
have but a moderate living are fortunate; 33 and in truth the very rich
man who is not happy has two advantages only as compared with the poor
man who is fortunate, whereas this latter has many as compared with the
rich man who is not happy. The rich man is able better to fulfil his
desire, and also to endure a great calamity if it fall upon him; whereas
the other has advantage over him in these things which follow:--he is not
indeed able equally with the rich man to endure a calamity or to fulfil
his desire, but these his good fortune keeps away from him, while he is
sound of limb, 34 free from disease, untouched by suffering, the father
of fair children and himself of comely form; and if in addition to this
he shall end his life well, he is worthy to be called that which thou
seekest, namely a happy man; but before he comes to his end it is well
to hold back and not to call him yet happy but only fortunate. Now to
possess all these things together is impossible for one who is mere man,
just as no single land suffices to supply all tings for itself, but one
thing it has and another it lacks,