ks. Wherefore it is
better to bear patiently the wrongs they may do us, and to strive
to promote whatsoever serves to bring about harmony and
friendship.

XV. Those things, which beget harmony, are such as are
attributable to justice, equity, and honourable living. For men
brook ill not only what is unjust or iniquitous, but also what is
reckoned disgraceful, or that a man should slight the received
customs of their society. For winning love those qualities are
especially necessary which have regard to religion and piety (cf.
IV. xxxvii. notes. i. ii.; xlvi. note; and lxxiii. note).

XVI. Further, harmony is often the result of fear: but such
harmony is insecure. Further, fear arises from infirmity of
spirit, and moreover belongs not to the exercise of reason: the
same is true of compassion, though this latter seems to bear a
certain resemblance to piety.

XVII. Men are also gained over by liberality, especially
such as have not the means to buy what is necessary to sustain
life. However, to give aid to every poor man is far beyond the
power and the advantage of any private person. For the riches of
any private person are wholly inadequate to meet such a call.
Again, an individual man's resources of character are too limited
for him to be able to make all men his friends. Hence providing
for the poor is a duty, which falls on the State as a whole, and
has regard only to the general advantage.

XVIII. In accepting favours, and in returning gratitude our
duty must be wholly different (cf. IV. lxx. note; lxxi. note).

XIX. Again, meretricious love, that is, the lust of
generation arising from bodily beauty, and generally every sort
of love, which owns anything save freedom of soul as its cause,
readily passes into hate; unless indeed, what is worse, it is a
species of madness; and then it promotes discord rather than
harmony (cf. III. xxxi. Coroll.).

XX. As concerning marriage, it is certain that this is in
harmony with reason, if the desire for physical union be not
engendered solely by bodily beauty, but also by the desire to
beget children and to train them up wisely; and moreover, if the
love of both, to wit, of the man and of the woman, is not caused
by bodily beauty only, but also by freedom of soul.

XXI. Furthermore, flattery begets harmony; but only by
means of the vile offence of slavishness or treachery. None are
more readily taken with flattery than the proud, who wish to be
first, b