The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [32]
15. He had the scribe take out and read the transcript of his discussion with the chamberlain; and then he and the scribe recounted the occurrences of the night before.
16. The king said to the chamberlain, ‘You who have much were prepared to give nothing to someone who asked for little. The goatherd had very little, but gave it all to someone who asked.
17. ‘This confirms what I argued in our debate: that those with little tend often to be kind because they know what it is to lack means, and they understand that kindness returns on itself in due time.
18. ‘But those who have much grow selfish and inconsiderate, and wish to have nothing to do with people who do not equal them socially and in means.
19. ‘So you yourself have refuted your own argument, and you will now learn not only what the truth is, but what it feels like.’
20. And the king ordered that the goatherd and his family be lodged in the chamberlain’s palace, and the chamberlain in the goatherd’s hut; and recommended the moral of this tale to all who heard it.
Chapter 22
1. On a day of fair weather and sunshine, Philologus saw his friend Toxophilus strolling in a meadow while intently reading a book, and went to him, saying,
2. ‘You study too closely, Toxophilus.’ To which the other replied, ‘I study without effort, for the matter pleases and instructs me, which is all delight.’
3. Said Philologus, ‘We physicians say that it is neither good for the eyes to read in bright sunlight, nor wholesome for the digestion to read so soon after dinner.’
4. ‘I will never follow physic either in eating or studying,’ said Toxophilus, ‘for if I did I am sure there would be less pleasure in the one, or profit in the other. But what news brings you here?’
5. ‘No news,’ replied Philologus, ‘just that as I was walking I saw several of our friends go to archery, there to shoot at the butts; but you were not with them.
6. ‘So I sought you, and found you looking on your book intently; and thought to come and talk with you, lest your book should run away with you.
7. ‘For by your wavering pace and earnest look I perceived that your book was leading you, not you it.’
8. ‘There you are right,’ said Toxophilus, ‘For truly my thoughts were going faster than my feet.
9. ‘I am reading a treatise of the mind, which says how well-feathered minds fly true and high, while those with moulted and drooping feathers sink always to base things.’
10. Said Philologus, ‘I remember the passage well; it is wonderfully expressed. And now I see it is no marvel that your feet failed you, for your well-feathered thought was flying so fast.’
11. ‘So it was. But perhaps I should go now and practise archery,’ said Toxophilus, ‘for you put me in mind of a different duty;
12. ‘It is a fair day for exercise, and it is as necessary to mingle pastimes with study for the mind’s health, as eating and sleeping are for the body’s health.
13. ‘Aristotle himself says that although it were a fond and childish thing to be always at play, yet play may be used for the sake of earnest matter too;
14. ‘And as rest is the antidote of labour, so play is the relief of study and business.’
15. ‘And I have heard it said,’ Philologus replied, ‘that study is like husbandry, in which we till the ground and sow with seed to reap thereafter;
16. ‘For I heard myself a good husbandman at his book once say, that to rest from study some time of the day and some time of the year, made as much for the increase of learning as to let the land lie fallow for a season.’
17. Thus persuaded, Toxophilus went with his friend to the butts to shoot arrows as well-feathered as Plato’s thoughts; and by that rest and diversion found refreshment for his mind.
Chapter 23
1. One evening, when the old woman’s grandchildren demanded a story, she asked them,
2. ‘Have you heard about the sisters who hunted deer in the clouds and caught the wind in a net?’ They shook their heads.
3. So she pointed at the space under a tree which served as the village school, and said,
4. ‘When I was