Pars sanitatis velle sanari fuit. SENECA.

To yield to remedies is half the cure.

PYTHAGORAS is reported to have required
from those whom he instructed in philosophy a
probationary silence of five years. Whether this
prohibition of speech extended to all the parts of
this time, as seems generally to be supposed, or
was to be observed only in the school or in the
presence of their master, as is more probable, it was
sufficient to discover the pupil's disposition; to try
whether he was willing to pay the price of learning,
or whether he was one of those whose ardour was
rather violent than lasting, and who expected to
grow wise on other terms than those of patience
and obedience.

Many of the blessings universally desired, are
very frequently wanted, because most men, when
they should labour, content themselves to complain,
and rather linger in a state in which they
cannot be at rest, than improve their condition by
vigour and resolution.

Providence has fixed the limits of human
enjoyment by immoveable boundaries, and has set
different gratifications at such a distance from each other,
that no art or power can bring them together. This