“Friends, whoever is well-versed in misfortune knows that when the wave of evils surges on mortals, he has a habit of fearing everything. But when godly grace flows favorably, he is wont to believe that happy winds will always blow.”
φίλοι, κακῶν μὲν ὅστις ἔμπειρος κυρεῖ,
ἐπίσταται βροτοῖσιν ὡς ὅταν κλύδων
κακῶν ἐπέλθῃ πάντα δειμαίνειν φιλεῖ:
ὅταν δ᾽ ὁ δαίμων εὐροῇ, πεποιθέναι
τὸν αὐτὸν αἰεὶ δαίμον᾽ οὐριεῖν τύχην.
NOTE: The sense of the Greek could not be more clear, but the metaphoric language, as well as the notoriously untranslatable “daimon” made this a really tough passage to render into intelligible English. I welcome improving suggestions!
Seems legit. It´s like when we use the word “spirit” – we use it not just for one case, but for many as well: Intelligence, God, soul, fate, etc…