ife, we may appropriate to our use and employ as we
think best. Everyone without exception may, by sovereign right
of nature, do whatsoever he thinks will advance his own interest.

IX. Nothing can be in more harmony with the nature of any
given thing than other individuals of the same species;
therefore (cf. vii.) for man in the preservation of his being and
the enjoyment of the rational life there is nothing more useful
than his fellow--man who is led by reason. Further, as we know
not anything among individual things which is more excellent than
a man led by reason, no man can better display the power of his
skill and disposition, than in so training men, that they come at
last to live under the dominion of their own reason.

X. In so far as men are influenced by envy or any kind of
hatred, one towards another, they are at variance, and are
therefore to be feared in proportion, as they are more powerful
than their fellows.

XI. Yet minds are not conquered by force, but by love and
high--mindedness.

XII. It is before all things useful to men to associate
their ways of life, to bind themselves together with such bonds
as they think most fitted to gather them all into unity, and
generally to do whatsoever serves to strengthen friendship.

XIII. But for this there is need of skill and watchfulness.
For men are diverse (seeing that those who live under the
guidance of reason are few), yet are they generally envious and
more prone to revenge than to sympathy. No small force of
character is therefore required to take everyone as he is, and to
restrain one's self from imitating the emotions of others. But
those who carp at mankind, and are more skilled in railing at
vice than in instilling virtue, and who break rather than
strengthen men's dispositions, are hurtful both to themselves and
others. Thus many from too great impatience of spirit, or from
misguided religious zeal, have preferred to live among brutes
rather than among men; as boys or youths, who cannot peaceably
endure the chidings of their parents, will enlist as soldiers and
choose the hardships of war and the despotic discipline in
preference to the comforts of home and the admonitions of their
father: suffering any burden to be put upon them, so long as
they may spite their parents.

XIV. Therefore, although men are generally governed in
everything by their own lusts, yet their association in common
brings many more advantages than drawbac