Complete. From “Resolves, Divine, Moral, and Political.”

THE TOO eager pursuit of a thing hinders enjoyment; for it makes men take indirect ways, which, though they sometimes prosper, are never blessed. The covetous man, being mad for riches, practices injurious courses, which, God cursing, brings him to a speedy poverty. Oppressions will bring a consumption upon thy gains. Wealth amassed by unjust and improper means, like a rotten sheep, will infect thy healthful flock. We think by wrong to secure ourselves from want, when it is that only which unavoidably brings it on us. He that longs for heaven with such impatience as to kill himself, that he may be there the sooner, may by that act be excluded thence; nay, though we be in the right way, our haste will make our stay the longer. He that constantly rides upon the spur tires his horse ere his journey ends, and so is there the later for making such unusual speed. He is like a giddy messenger, who runs away without his errand, and so loses time notwithstanding his nimbleness. When God has laid out man a way, in vain he seeks a nearer one. We see the things we aim at, as travelers do towns in hilly countries; we judge them near, at the eye’s end, because we do not see the valleys and the brook that interpose. So, thinking to take shorter courses, we are led about through ignorance and incredulity. We go surest when we do not post precipitately. Sudden risings have seldom sound foundations. We might toil less and avail more. What jealous and envious furies gnaw the burning breast of the ambitious fool! What fears and cares affright the starting sleeps of the covetous! If anything happen to warrant them, it crushes him ten times more heavily than it would do the mind of the well-tempered man. All who affect things over-violently do over-violently grieve in the disappointment. Whatsoever I wish for I will pursue easily, though I do it assiduously. And if I can, the diligence of the hand shall go without the leaping bounds of the heart. So, if it happen well, I shall have more content, as coming less expected. Those joys clasp us with a friendlier arm which steal upon us when we look not for them. If it fall out ill, my mind not being set on it will teach me patience under the saddening want. I will cozen pain by not caring for it; and plump my joys by letting them surprise me. As I would not neglect a good when it offers, so I would not fury myself in the search of one.