"Children's Books - Defoe, Daniel - Robinson Crusoe" - читать интересную книгу автора (Children's Books)

mankind. He told me I might judge of the happiness of this state by
one thing, viz., that this was the state of life which all other
people envied; that kings have frequently lamented the miserable
consequences of being born to great things, and wished they had been
placed in the middle of the two extremes, between the mean and the
great; that the wise man gave his testimony to this as the just
standard of true felicity, when he prayed to have neither poverty
nor riches.
He bid me observe it, and I should always find that the calamities
of life were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind; but
that the middle station had the fewest disasters and was not exposed
to so many vicissitudes as the higher or lower part of mankind. Nay,
they were not subjected to so many distempers and uneasiness either of
body or mind as those were who, by vicious living, luxury, and
extravagancies on one hand, or by hard labor, want of necessaries, and
mean or insufficient diet on the other hand, bring distempers upon
themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living; that
the middle station of life was calculated for all kind of virtues
and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the handmaids
of a middle fortune; that temperance, moderation, quietness, health,
society, all agreeable diversions, and all desirable pleasures, were
the blessings attending the middle station of life; that this way
men went silently and smoothly through the world, and comfortably
out of it, not embarrassed with the labors of the hands or of the
head, not sold to the life of slavery for daily bread, or harassed
with perplexed circumstances, which rob the soul of peace, and the
body of rest; not enraged with the passion of envy, or secret
burning lust of ambition for great things; but in easy circumstances
sliding gently through the world, and sensibly tasting the sweets of
living, without the bitter, feeling that they are happy, and
learning by every day's experience to know it more sensibly.
After this, he pressed me earnestly, and in the most affectionate
manner, not to play the young man, not to precipitate myself into
miseries which Nature and the station of life I was born in seemed
to have provided against; that I was under no necessity of seeking
my bread; that he would do well for me, and endeavor to enter me
fairly into the station of life which he had been just recommending to
me; and that if I was not very easy and happy in the world it must
be my mere fate or fault that must hinder it, and that he should
have nothing to answer for, having thus discharged his duty in warning
me against measures which he knew would be to my hurt; in a word, that
as he would do very kind things for me if I would stay and settle at
home as he directed, so he would not have so much hand in my
misfortunes, as to give me any encouragement to go away. And to
close all, he told me I had my elder brother for an example, to whom
he had used the same earnest persuasions to keep him from going into
the Low Country wars, but could not prevail, his young desires
prompting him to run into the army, where he was killed; and though he
said he would not cease to pray for me, yet he would venture to say to
me, that if I did take this foolish step, God would not bless me,