oblest of men." Menedemus on the contrary,
having heard that Alexinus[674] frequently praised him, replied, "But I
always censure him, for that man is bad who either praises a bad man or
is blamed by a good." So inflexible and proof was he against such
flattery, and master of that advice which Hercules in Antisthenes[675]
gave, when he ordered his sons to be grateful to no one that praised
them; which meant nothing else than that they should not be
dumbfoundered at it, nor flatter again those who praised them. Very apt,
I take it, was the remark of Pindar to one who told him that he praised
him everywhere and to all persons, "I am greatly obliged to you, and
will make your account true by my actions."

Sec. XIX. A useful precept in reference to all passions is especially
valuable in the case of the bashful. When they have been overcome by
this infirmity, and against their judgement have erred and been
confounded, let them fix it in their memories, and, remembering the pain
and grief it gave them, let them recall it to their mind and be on their
guard for a very long time. For as travellers that have stumbled against
a stone, or pilots that have been wrecked off a headland, if they
remember these occurrences, not only dread and are on their guard
continually on those spots, but also on all similar ones; so those that
frequently remember the disgrace and injury that bashfulness brought
them, and its sorrow and anguish, will in similar cases be on their
guard against their weakness, and will not readily allow themselves to
be subjugated by it again.

[636] Or _bashfulness_, _shamefacedness_, what the
French call _mauvaise honte_.

[637] Shakespeare puts all this into one line: "Most
subject is the fattest soil to weeds."--_2 Henry IV._,
A. iv. Sc. iv.

[638] Or _girls_. [Greek: kore] means both a girl, and
the pupil of the eye.

[639] So Wyttenbach.

[640] These lines are quoted again "On Moral Virtue," Sec.
vi.

[641] "Iliad," xxiv. 44, 45.

[642] Euripides, "Bellerophon," Fragm., 313.

[643] Soph., Fragm., 736.

[644] Surely it is necessary to read [Greek:
prodiaphthareisa to akolasto].

[645] See Plato, "Charmides," 165 A.

[646] Euripides, "Medea," 290, 291.

[647] "Works and Days," 342.

[648] Reading with Wyttenbach, [Greek: med hypolabe
pisteuein, dokounta].

[649] See Horace's very amusing "Satire," i. ix., on