Why Ills Prevails and Goods Not?

 

Once there was a time when Goods and Ills entered equally into the concerns of people, so that the Goods did not prevail to make them altogether blessed, nor the Ills to make them wholly miserable. It was due to the foolishness of mankind the Ills multiplied greatly in number and increased in strength, until it seemed as though they would deprive the Goods from all share in human affairs, and banish them from the earth. The later, therefore, be took, themselves to heaven and complained to Jupiter of the treatment they had received, at the same time praying him to grant them protection from the Ills, and to advise concerning the manner of their intercourse with humanity. Jupiter granted their request for protection, and decreed that for the future they should not go among men openly, and so be liable to attack from the hostile Ills, but singly and unobserved, and at infrequent and unexpected intervals. Hence it is that the earth is full of Ills, for they come and go as they please and are never far away; while Goods, alas! come one by one only, and have to travel all the way from Heaven, so that they are very seldom seen.