An honest poor man is the proof of misery, where patience is put to the
trial of her strength to endure grief without passion, in starving with
concealed necessity, or standing in the adventures of charity. If he be
married, want rings in his ears and woe watereth his eyes. If single, he
droppeth with the shame of beggary, or dies with the passion of penury.
Of the rich he is shunned like infection, and of the poor learns but a
heart-breaking profession. His bed is the earth and the heaven is his
canopy, the sun is his summer's comfort and the moon is his winter
candle. His sighs are the notes of his music, and his song is like the
swan before her death. His study, his patience; and his exercise,
prayer: his diet the herbs of the earth, and his drink the water of the
river. His travel is the walk of the woful and his horse Bayard of ten
toes: his apparel but the clothing of nakedness, and his wealth but the
hope of heaven. He is a stranger in the world, for no man craves his
acquaintance; and his funeral is without ceremony, when there is no
mourning for the miss of him: yet may he be in the state of election and
in the life of love, and more rich in grace than the greatest of the
world. In sum, he is the grief of Nature, the sorrow of reason, the pity
of wisdom, and the charge of charity.