misses his object and is gone astray. Besides, wherein hast thou been
injured? For thou wilt find that no one among those against whom thou art
irritated has done anything by which thy mind could be made worse; but
that which is evil to thee and harmful has its foundation only in the
mind. And what harm is done or what is there strange, if the man who has
not been instructed does the acts of an uninstructed man? Consider
whether thou shouldst not rather blame thyself, because thou didst not
expect such a man to err in such a way. For thou hadst means given thee
by thy reason to suppose that it was likely that he would commit this
error, and yet thou hast forgotten and art amazed that he has erred. But
most of all when thou blamest a man as faithless or ungrateful, turn to
thyself. For the fault is manifestly thy own, whether thou didst trust
that a man who had such a disposition would keep his promise, or when
conferring thy kindness thou didst not confer it absolutely, nor yet in
such way as to have received from thy very act all the profit. For what
more dost thou want when thou hast done a man a service? art thou not
content that thou hast done something comformable to thy nature, and dost
thou seek to be paid for it? just as if the eye demanded a recompense for
seeing, or the feet for walking. For as these members are formed for a
particular purpose, and by working according to their several
constitutions obtain what is their own; so also as man is formed by
nature to acts of benevolence, when he has done anything benevolent or in
any other way conducive to the common interest, he has acted conformably
to his constitution, and he gets what is his own.




BOOK X.