Once upon a time a man decided to sneak into his neighbor’s fields and steal some wheat. “If I take just a little from each field, no one will notice,” he told himself, “but it will add up to a nice pile of wheat for me.” So he waited for the darkest of night, when thick clouds lay over the moon, he crept out of his house. He took his youngest daughter with him.

“Daughter,” he whispered, “you must stand guard, and call out if anyone sees me.”

The man stole into the first field to begin reaping, and before long the child called out, “Father, someone sees you!” . . . .

The Character Of A Happy Life

How happy is he born and taught
That serveth not another's will;
Whose armour is his honest thought,
And simple truth his utmost skill!

Whose passions not his masters are;
Whose soul is still prepared for death,
Untied unto the world by care
Of public fame or private breath;

Who envies none that chance doth raise,
Nor vice; who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by praise;
Nor rules of state, but rules of good;

Who hath his life from rumours freed;
Whose conscience is his strong retreat;
Whose state can neither flatterers feed,
Nor ruin make oppressors great;

Who God doth late and early pray
More of His grace than gifts to lend;
And entertains the harmless day
With a religious book or friend;

—This man is freed from servile bands
Of hope to rise or fear to fall:
Lord of himself, though not of lands,
And having nothing, yet hath all.

Sir Henry Wotton