482

Seeking one's company.  Are we then seeking too much if we seek the company of men who have grown gentle, well-tasting and nutritious, like chestnuts which have been put on to the fire and taken from it again at the proper time? Who expect little from life, and would rather take this as a gift than as something they have earned, as though the birds and the bees had brought it to them? Who are too proud ever to be able to feel themselves rewarded? And are too serious in their passion for knowledge and for honesty to have time or inclination for fame?  Such men we should call philosophers; and they themselves will' always find a more modest name.