d better men for the future. If we have made obvious mistakes, we
should not try, as we generally do, to gloss them over, or to find
something to excuse or extenuate them; we should admit to ourselves
that we have committed faults, and open our eyes wide to all their
enormity, in order that we may firmly resolve to avoid them in time to
come. To be sure, that means a great deal of self-inflicted pain, in
the shape of discontent, but it should be remembered that to spare
the rod is to spoil the child--[Greek: ho mae dareis anthropos ou
paideuetai].[1]

[Footnote 1: Menander. Monost: 422.]

SECTION 13. In all matters affecting our weal or woe, we should be
careful not to let our imagination run away with us, and build no
castles in the air. In the first place, they are expensive to build,
because we have to pull them down again immediately, and that is
a source of grief. We should be still more on our guard against
distressing our hearts by depicting possible misfortunes. If these
were misfortunes of a purely imaginary kind, or very remote and
unlikely, we should at once see, on awaking from our dream, that the
whole thing was mere illusion; we should rejoice all the more in
a reality better than our dreams, or at most, be warned against
misfortunes which, though very remote, were still possible. These,
however, are not the sort of playthings in which imagination delights;
it is only in idle hours that we build castles in the air, and they
are always of a pleasing description. The matter which goes to form
gloomy dreams are mischances which to some extent really threaten us,
though it be from some distance; imagination makes us look larger and
nearer and more terrible than they are in reality. This is a kind of
dream which cannot be so readily shaken off on awaking as a pleasant
one; for a pleasant dream is soon dispelled by reality, leaving, at
most, a feeble hope lying in the lap of possibility. Once we have
abandoned ourselves to a fit of the blues, visions are conjured up
which do not so easily vanish again; for it is always just possible
that the visions may be realized. But we are not always able to
estimate the exact degree of possibility: possibility may easily
pass into probability; and thus we deliver ourselves up to torture.
Therefore we should be careful not to be over-anxious on any
matter affecting our weal or our woe, not to carry our anxiety to
unreasonable or injudicious limits; but coolly and dispassio