It was an high speech of Seneca (after the manner of the Stoics):
_That the good things which belong to prosperity are to be wished; but
the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired. Bona rerum
secundarum optabilia, adversarum mirabilia._ Certainly, if miracles be
the command over nature, they appear most in adversity. It is yet a
higher speech of his than the other (much too high for a heathen): _It
is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man, and the
security of a god. Vere magnum, habere fragilitatem hominis,
securitatem dei._ This would have done better in poesy, where
transcendences are more allowed. And the poets indeed have been busy
with it; for it is in effect the thing which is figured in that
strange fiction of the ancient poets, which seemeth not to be without
mystery; nay, and to have some approach to the state of a Christian:
that _Hercules, when he went to unbind Prometheus_ (by whom human
nature is represented), _sailed the length of the great ocean in an
earthen pot or pitcher_: lively describing Christian resolution, that
saileth in the frail bark of the flesh through the waves of the world.
But to speak in a mean. The virtue of prosperity is temperance; the
virtue of adversity is fortitude; which in morals is the more heroical
virtue. Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity is
the blessing of the New; which carrieth the greater benediction, and
the clearer revelation of God's favour. Yet even in the Old Testament,
if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs
as carols; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost hath laboured more in
describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Salomon.
Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is
not without comforts and hopes. We see in needleworks and
embroideries, it is more pleasing to have a lively work upon a sad and
solemn ground, than to have a dark and melancholy work upon a
lightsome ground: judge therefore of the pleasure of the heart by the
pleasure of the eye. Certainly virtue is like precious odours, most
fragrant when they are incensed or crushed: for prosperity doth best
discover vice; but adversity doth best discover virtue.
_Francis Bacon._