Plutarch De Tranquillitate Animi 5

[5] Plato, ¹ for instance, compared life to a game of dice in which we must try, not only to throw what suits us best, but also, when we have thrown, to make good use of whatever turns up. But with circumstances, though it is not in our power to throw what we please, yet it is our task, if we are wise, to accept in a suitable manner whatever accrues from Fortune and to assign to each event a place in which both what suits us shall help us most and what is unwanted shall do least harm. For those who are without skill and sense as to how they should live, like sick people whose bodies can endure neither heat nor cold, are elated by good fortune and depressed by adversity; and they are greatly disturbed by both, or rather by themselves in both and as much in what is called good as in the bad. Theodorus, ² called the Atheist, used to say that he offered his discourses with his right hand, but his audience received them with their left; so uninstructed persons, when Fortune presents herself adroitly on their right, often gauchely substitute their left hands in receiving her and cut a sorry figure. But men of sense, just as bees extract honey from thyme, the most pungent and the driest of plants, ³ often in like manner draw from the most unfavourable circumstances something which suits them and is useful.

[5] For Plato compared our life to a game at dice, where we ought to throw for what is most commodious for us, but when we have thrown, to make the best of our casts.

We cannot make what chances we please turn up, if we play fair; this lies out of our power. That which is within our power, and is our duty if we are wise, is to accept patiently what Fortune shall allot us, and so to adjust things in their proper places, that what is our own may be disposed of to the best advantage, and what hath happened against our will may offend us as little as possible. But as to men who live without measures and with no prudence, like those whose constitution is so sickly and infirm that they are equally impatient both of heats and colds, prosperity exalts them above their temper, and adversity dejects them beneath it; indeed each fortune disturbs them, or rather they raise up storms to themselves in either, and they are especially querulous under good circumstances. Theodorus, who was called the Atheist, was used to say, that he reached out his instructions with the right hand, and his auditors received them with their left hands. So men of no education, when Fortune would even be complaisant to them, are yet so awkward in their observance, that they take her addresses on the wrong side. On the contrary, men that are wise, as the bees draw honey from the thyme, which is a most unsavory and dry herb, extract something that is convenient and useful even from the most bitter afflictions.