The Handbook

The will of Nature may be learned from things upon which we are all agreed. As, when our neighbor’s boy has broken a cup, or the like, we are ready at once to say, These are casualties that will happen; be assured, then, that when your own cup is likewise broken, you ought to be affected just as when another’s cup was broken. Now apply this to greater things. Is the child or wife of another dead? There is no one who would not say, This is an accident of mortality. But if any one’s own child happens to die, it is immediately, Alas ! how wretched am I! It should be always remembered how we are affected on hearing the same thing concerning others.