’Tis a Point of Good Discretion to make a Virtue of Necessity, and to
Content our selves without what we cannot get, though we have never so
much a Mind to’t; for ’tis a Turn of Art to seem to Despise what we
cannot Compass, and to put off a Miscarriage with a Jest; Beside, that it
is Better to have People think a man could Gain Such or such a Point if
he Would, then that he Would, but cannot.
The _Foxes_ Put-off in This Fable, is a most Instructive Point of
Philosophy towards the Government of our Lives; Provided that His
Fooling may be made Our Earnest; as it would be much for our Honour
and Quiet so to be. No man shall ever be Miserable, if he can but keep
Clear of the Snare of Hopes and Fears; and _Antidote_ himself against
the Flatteries of the One, and the Alarms of the Other: It is a High
Point of Christian, as well as of Civil Prudence; for a Man to say Thus
to Himself before-hand, of a Thing that he has a Mind to [_If I cannot
get it, I shall be Better without it._] Or if he can but say after the
Missing of it, [_It was better Lost then found._] Now if we cannot Arrive
at the Pitch of making This Indifference a Virtue indeed, we may however
so Disguise it yet, (though in a case of Necessity) as to make it Look
like one: Not but that it would be much better if we could Attain to the
Perfection it self, as well as we may in Appearance Cover the Disgrace.
I knew a Fine Lady once, and she was a Woman of Sense, Quality, and
a very Generous Mind. She lay under Mortifications in abundance, and
yet was never Observ’d to be Peevish or Angry upon any Provocation
Whatsoever; and the Reason she gave for’t was This: [_It Will make Me
Look Old_,] So that it is not so much the want of Ability to master our
Affections, as the want of Resolution to go thorough with the Experiment.
This is a way to keep us Firm in All Tryals: or if He, that upon a True
Principle, lives without any Disquiet of Thought, may be said to be
Happy: It Emproves all our Disappointments into Providences, when he can
let fall the Vain Desire of any thing without feeling the Loss of it. It
comes All to a Case now, upon the force of the Moral, whether we Quit,
as the _Fox_ did the _Grapes_, because he could not come at them, or as
the _Wolf_ did the _Sheep_, because he durst not Venture upon ’em. But be
it either the One or the Other, there’s a Virtue, and a Blessing in’t,
Both ways, in getting the Better of our Passions: which might certainly
be done, if we had but half the Tenderness for our Minds and Consciences,
that we have for our Carcasses, and our Fortunes.