will never afford an opportunity of deciding. But this, at
least, may be maintained, that we do not always find visible happiness in
proportion to visible virtue. All natural and almost all political evils, are
incident alike to the bad and good: they are confounded in the misery of a
famine, and not much distinguished in the fury of a faction; they sink together
in a tempest, and are driven together from their country by invaders. All that
virtue can afford is quietness of conscience, a steady prospect of a happier
state; this may enable us to endure calamity with patience; but remember that
patience must suppose pain.«
 

                                 Chapter XXVIII

                Rasselas and Nekayah continue their conversation

»Dear princess, said Rasselas, you fall into the common errours of exaggeratory
declamation, by producing, in a familiar disquisition, examples of national
calamities, and scenes of extensive misery, which are found in books rather than
in the world, and which, as they are horrid, are ordained to be rare. Let us not
imagine evils which we do not feel, nor injure life by misrepresentations. I
cannot bear that querulous eloquence which threatens every city with a siege
like that of Jerusalem, that makes famine attend on every flight of locusts, and
suspends pestilence on the wing of every blast that issues from the south.
    On necessary and inevitable evils, which overwhelm kingdoms at once, all
disputation is vain: when they happen they must be endured. But it is evident,
that these bursts of universal distress are more dreaded than felt: thousands
and ten thousands flourish in youth, and wither in age, without the knowledge of
any other than domestick evils, and share the same pleasures and vexations
whether their kings are mild or cruel, whether the armies of their country
pursue their enemies, or retreat before them. While courts are disturbed with
intestine competitions, and ambassadours are negotiating in foreign countries,
the smith still plies his anvil, and the husbandman drives his plow forward; the
necessaries of life are required and obtained, and the successive business of
the seasons continues to make its wonted revolutions.
    Let us cease to consider what, perhaps, may never happen, and what, when it
shall happen, will laugh at human speculation. We will not endeavour to modify
the motions of the elements, or to fix the destiny of kingdoms. It is our
business to consider what beings like us may perform; each labouring for his own
happiness, by promoting within his circle, however narrow, the happiness of
others.
    Marriage is evidently the dictate of nature; men and women were made to be
companions of