--- title: Times and Seasons description: Issues of 1844 to 1845. authors: - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints editors: - Ebenezer Robinson - Don Carlos Smith - Smith, Joseph, Jr. - Taylor, John collections: - periodicals tags: - newspaper - times-and-seasons - nauvoo - nineteenth-century periodical: Times and Seasons volume: 5 number: 10 published: 1844-05-15 publisher: E. Robinson and D. C. Smith; later John Taylor publisher_place: Commerce and Nauvoo, Illinois language: en type: article reference: "“A TRUE PHILOSOPHER,” *Times and Seasons* 5, no. 10 (May 15, 1844): 542." printed_title: A TRUE PHILOSOPHER. source: url: https://archive.org/details/per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1844-05-15_5_10 transcription: Text from the Centerplace.org transcription (https://www.centerplace.org/history/ts/v5n10.htm), with its page breaks; this Internet Archive scan is the reference copy (its OCR was used only as a witness for OCR repair) identifier: per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1844-05-15_5_10 start_page: 542 end_page: 542 curator_note: A Mormon newspaper published by the church in Nauvoo; included for historical study. Inclusion does not imply endorsement. rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1844 (Nauvoo, Illinois); published before 1931, so public domain in the United States source: https://archive.org/details/per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1844-05-15_5_10 publication_year: 1844 --- # A TRUE PHILOSOPHER I cannot part with these good people (the Dutch Beers,) without mentioning that the only real philosopher I ever met with in my life was one of them. He was, indeed, pre-eminent among his neighbors, who gave him the name of "the philosopher;" and I cannot resist relating the method in which they put his pretensions to that title, to the proof. Having safely housed in his "stores," the produce of the year, he paid a visit to Cape Town on some business, and while there was attacked with a dangerous illness, which detained him some time. As soon as his health permitted, he set out on his return home. On the very day before, a fire reduced to ashes his barns, his crops, his wine stores, and their contents; all were destroyed-he was ruined. Knowing him to be on his road home, a group of friends waited his arrival at the entrance of the village, some to communicate the sad news, but many professedly "to see what the philosopher would do or say."-He heard-his serenity was undisturbed, his countenance altered not: not a complaint escaped him; but, on the contrary, a thanksgiving to Almighty God for the preservation of the lives of his family! "I wish," said I to him one day when we were talking over this misfortune [misfortune], "you would give me your receipt for preserving equanimity, under such circumstances." "It is a very simple one," he replied:-"when I heard what was gone, I ran over in my mind the many things great and good God had left me, and so I thanked him for them."-Baynes Ramble in the East, &c. An excellent rule for living happy in society, is never to concern one's self with the affairs of others, unless they desire it. Under pretence [pretense] of being useful, people often show more curiosity than kindness.