em. The day would fail me,
should I be inclined to defend the cause of poverty: the thing is
manifest, and nature daily informs us how few things there are, and how
trifling they are, of which she really stands in need.

XXXVI. Let us inquire, then, if obscurity, the want of power, or even the
being unpopular, can prevent a wise man from being happy. Observe if
popular favour, and this glory which they are so fond of, be not attended
with more uneasiness than pleasure. Our friend Demosthenes was certainly
very weak in declaring himself pleased with the whisper of a woman who was
carrying water, as is the custom in Greece, and who whispered to another,
"That is he--that is Demosthenes." What could be weaker than this? and yet
what an orator he was! But although he had learned to speak to others, he
had conversed but little with himself. We may perceive, therefore, that
popular glory is not desirable of itself; nor is obscurity to be dreaded.
"I came to Athens," saith Democritus, "and there was no one there that
knew me:" this was a moderate and grave man who could glory in his
obscurity. Shall musicians compose their tunes to their own tastes; and
shall a philosopher, master of a much better art, seek to ascertain, not
what is most true, but what will please the people? Can anything be more
absurd than to despise the vulgar as mere unpolished mechanics, taken
singly, and to think them of consequence when collected into a body? These
wise men would contemn our ambitious pursuits, and our vanities, and would
reject all the honours which the people could voluntarily offer to them:
but we know not how to despise them till we begin to repent of having
accepted them. There is an anecdote related by Heraclitus the natural
philosopher, of Hermodorus the chief of the Ephesians, that he said, "that
all the Ephesians ought to be punished with death, for saying, when they
had expelled Hermodorus out of their city, that they would have no one
amongst them better than another; but that if there were any such, he
might go elsewhere to some other people." Is not this the case with the
people everywhere? do they not hate every virtue that distinguishes
itself? What! was not Aristides (I had rather instance in the Greeks than
ourselves) banished his country for being eminently just? What troubles,
then, are they free from who have no connexion whatever with the people!
What is more agreeable than a learned retirement? I speak of that learni