There was a scent of jasmine in a shrubbery, and one I know thrilled with
joy, not for the jasmine's scent but for all there was--for the light in a
window, a memory, the whole of life. He was called away from the jasmines
after, but he had been paid beforehand for that little mishap.
And so it is; the mere grace that we are given life at all is generous
payment in advance for all the miseries of life--for every one of them.
No, do not think we have the right to more sweetmeats than we get. A
wanderer's advice: no superstition. What is life's? All. But what is
yours? Is fame? Oh, tell us why! A man should not so insist on what is
"his." It is comical; a wanderer laughs at any one who can be so comical.
I remember one who could not give up that "his." He started to lay a fire
in his stove at noon, and by evening he got it to burn at last. He
couldn't leave the comfortable warmth to go to bed, but sat there till
other people got up, lest it should be wasted. A Norwegian writer of stage
plays, it was.
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