Feeling Stressed Today? Take Some Advice from Herodotus

Herodotus, Metropolitan Museum of Art

“People with bows string them when they need to use them and unstring them when they’ve finished with them. If they kept them strung all the time, the bows would break, and then they wouldn’t be able to use them when they needed them. It is no different with people’s temperments. Anyone who is serious all the time and never allows himself a fair measure of relaxation will imperceptibly slide into madness or have a stroke.”

–Amasis, king of Egypt, in Herodotus’ The Histories