VIII

And did you happen to observe, Ischomachus (I asked), whether, as the
result of what was said, your wife was stirred at all to greater
carefulness?

Yes, certainly (Ischomachus answered), and I remember how piqued she
was at one time and how deeply she blushed, when I chanced to ask her
for something which had been brought into the house, and she could not
give it me. So I, when I saw her annoyance, fell to consoling her. "Do
not be at all disheartened, my wife, that you cannot give me what I
ask for. It is plain poverty,[1] no doubt, to need a thing and not to
have the use of it. But as wants go, to look for something which I
cannot lay my hands upon is a less painful form of indigence than
never to dream of looking because I know full well that the thing
exists not. Anyhow, you are not to blame for this," I added; "mine the
fault was who handed over to your care the things without assigning
them their places. Had I done so, you would have known not only where
to put but where to find them.[2] After all, my wife, there is nothing
in human life so serviceable, nought so beautiful as order.[3]

[1] "Vetus proverbium," Cic. ap. Columellam, xii. 2, 3; Nobbe, 236,
fr. 6.

[2] Lit. "so that you might know not only where to put," etc.

[3] Or, "order and arrangement." So Cic. ap. Col. xii. 2, 4,
"dispositione atque ordine."