A miser who was also timid found a golden lion and said, "I don't know what is to become of me in this adventure. Terror robs me of my wits, and I cannot decide what to do: I am torn between my love of riches and my natural cowardice. For what chance or what god has made a golden lion? What is happening to me sets my soul at war: it loves the gold, but it fears the work wrought from the gold; desire drives me to seize it, my character to hold back. O fortune that offers and does not let one take! O treasure that gives no pleasure! What then? How shall I deal with it? I will go and bring my servants here to take the lion with that troop of allies, and I, from a distance, will watch them do it."
*Wealth is useless to those who dare neither touch it nor put it to use.
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