For the proud man despises justly (since he thinks
truly), but the many do so at random.
He does not run into trifling dangers, nor is he fond of danger,
because he honours few things; but he will face great dangers, and
when he is in danger he is unsparing of his life, knowing that there
are conditions on which life is not worth having. And he is the sort
of man to confer benefits, but he is ashamed of receiving them; for
the one is the mark of a superior, the other of an inferior. And he is
apt to confer greater benefits in return; for thus the original
benefactor besides being paid will incur a debt to him, and will be
the gainer by the transaction. They seem also to remember any
service they have done, but not those they have received (for he who
receives a service is inferior to him who has done it, but the proud
man wishes to be superior), and to hear of the former with pleasure,
of the latter with displeasure; this, it seems, is why Thetis did
not mention to Zeus the services she had done him, and why the
Spartans did not recount their services to the Athenians, but those
they had received. It is a mark of the proud man also to ask for
nothing or scarcely anything, but to give help readily, and to be
dignified towards people who enjoy high position and good fortune, but
unassuming towards those of the middle class; for it is a difficult
and lofty thing to be superior to the former, but easy to be so to the
latter, and a lofty bearing over the former is no mark of
ill-breeding, but among humble people it is as vulgar as a display
of strength against the weak.
Pages:
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126