“There came before a certain king three wise men, a Greek, a Jew, and a Saracen, of whom the said king desired that each of them would utter some good and notable sentence.  Then the Greek said:  ’I may well correct and amend my thoughts, but not my words.’  The Jew said:  ’I marvel of them that say things prejudicial, when silence were more profitable.’  The Saracen said:  ’I am master of my words ere they are pronounced; but when they are spoken I am servant thereto.’  And it was asked one of them:  ‘Who might be called a king?’ And he answered:  ’He that is not subject to his own will.’”

The Dictes, or Sayings of Philosophers, of which, I believe, but one perfect copy is extant, was translated from the French by Earl Rivers, and printed by Caxton, at Westminister, in the year 1477, as we learn from the colophon.  I am not aware that any one has taken the trouble to trace to their sources all the sayings comprised in this collection, but I think the original of the above is to be found in the following, from the preface to the Arabian version (from the Pahlavi, the ancient language of Persia) of the celebrated Fables of Bidpai, entitled Kalila wa Dimna, made in the year 754: 

“The four kings of China, India, Persia, and Greece, being together, agreed each of them to deliver a saying which might be recorded to their honour in after ages.  The king of China said:  ’I have more power over that which I have not spoken than I have to recall what has once passed my lips.’  The king of India:  ’I have been often struck with the risk of speaking; for if a man be heard in his own praise it is unprofitable boasting, and what he says to his own discredit is injurious in its consequences.’  The king of Persia:  ’I am the slave of what I have spoken, but the master of what I conceal.’  The king of Greece:  ’I have never regretted the silence which I had imposed upon myself; though I have often repented of the words I have uttered;[12] for silence is attended with advantage, whereas loquacity is often followed by incurable evils.’”

   [12] Simonides used to say that he never regretted having
        held his tongue, but very often had he felt sorry for
        having spoken.—­Stobaeus:  Flor. xxxiii, 12.

The Persian poet Jami—­the last of the brilliant galaxy of genius who enriched the literature of their country, and who flourished two centuries after Saadi had passed to his rest—­reproduces these sayings of the four kings in his work entitled Baharistan, or Abode of Spring, which is similar in design to the Gulistan.