A vizier was walking through his garden in the cool of the evening, toward a new

fountain. Bent over the water toward his reflection; considered the day, the years,
the caliph’s generosity, his fabulous good fortune. A ring slipped from his finer and
fell. It was his favorite ring, and just at the moment of impact he was gripped by an
insane desire: if only the ring would not fall into the water! It did not fall; a thin layer
of oil must have formed over the water, the ring remained suspended. As the wish
had before, a strange fear now gripped him, for this could not last; it was such a
peaking effect, such a cresting of fortune, that the wave would have to break. It had
probably already broken, for as the vizier returned to the palace he was seized by the
caliph’s watch and thrown into prison. His slanderers had won out. In the dungeon
he remained many years as a forgotten prisoner of the state, come to terms with his
fate. Of his wishes there remained only one, almost laughably small: before his death
he would like to eat pomegranate seeds one more time. The sympathetic warden
brought him some, but at just that moment a rat rushed in from the passage,
overturned the bowl, and are up all the seeds. Again a strange joy went through the
old man: things could not go on like this; it was such a peaking effect, such a cresting
of misfortune, that the wave would have to break. Had broken, in fact, for on that
evening the caliph came to his cell: his slanderers had been toppled; he restored the
vizier to his offices.

Things will not remain the way they are just because they are the way they are.