It is not possible to get wealth
from the common stock and at the same time honour. For no one puts
up with the smaller share in all things; therefore to the man who
loses in wealth they assign honour and to the man who is willing to be
paid, wealth, since the proportion to merit equalizes the parties
and preserves the friendship, as we have said. This then is also the
way in which we should associate with unequals; the man who is
benefited in respect of wealth or virtue must give honour in return,
repaying what he can. For friendship asks a man to do what he can, not
what is proportional to the merits of the case; since that cannot
always be done, e.g. in honours paid to the gods or to parents; for no
one could ever return to them the equivalent of what he gets, but
the man who serves them to the utmost of his power is thought to be
a good man. This is why it would not seem open to a man to disown
his father (though a father may disown his son); being in debt, he
should repay, but there is nothing by doing which a son will have done
the equivalent of what he has received, so that he is always in
debt. But creditors can remit a debt; and a father can therefore do so
too. At the same time it is thought that presumably no one would
repudiate a son who was not far gone in wickedness; for apart from the
natural friendship of father and son it is human nature not to
reject a son's assistance.
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