[107] The word mercenary has always had an unfavorable meaning attached to it, a relic of ancient prejudice. In the proper sense, mercenary means remunerative, and should have no condemnatory signification. Yet already in antiquity the word _mercenary_ had a higher sense than the word _servile_; for Cicero, wishing to say that one should treat one's slaves well, said that they should be treated as mercenaries--that is to say, as men remunerated but free. [108] Plato, Republic, i., ii. [109] See his _De Officiis_, i., iv. [110] It might be called _sensibility_, in the sense this word had in the XVIII. century. It is not enough to be human toward others, one owes some feeling to one's self also. [111] Nicomachean Ethics, VI., ii. [112] Ibid., VI., xii. [113] Nicomachean Ethics, VI., ii. [114] We do not mean by this that science cannot be a means of livelihood: nothing more legitimate, on the contrary. We only mean that it is not that alone. [115] See also the admirable passage of Augustin Thierry in the preface to _Dix ans d'étude_. [116] "Answer me, ye illustrious philosophers, ye through whom we know what are the causes which attract bodies to a vacuum; what are in the revolutions of the planets, the relations of the spaces they travel over at equal periods ... how man sees everything in God; how the soul and the body correspond to each other without inter-communication, like two clocks.... Even though you had not taught us any of these things, should we be less numerous, less flourishing, more depraved?" This passage recalls vividly that of Malebranche quoted above. What, however, is most curious about it is that Rousseau in his criticism appropriates Malebranche's hypothesis. [117] "Good sense is the best distributed thing in the world," says Descartes at the beginning of his _Discours de la Méthode_. [118] Unless, of course, passion itself implies a duty superior to self-interest: which is not the case here. [119] See Burlamaqui, _Droit naturel_, part I., ch. vi. [120] See the celebrated lines in the _Misanthrope_, act ii., sc. v. [121] _Virtus_ in Latin has both meanings. [122] Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics. Translated by R. W. Browne, III., vi. [123] This idea of Aristotle may be questioned; for, in a sudden peril, one may be sustained by a natural impulse, and the feeling of self-defense, whilst anticipated peril allows all the impressions of fear to grow: it requires, therefore, a greater effort to overcome them. [124] _De Officiis_, I., xxiii. [125] See Xenophon's _Memorabilia of Socrates_, I., i. [126] _Discours de la Méthode_, part III. [127] The Works of Epictetus. T. W. Higginson's translation, ch. vi., p. 21. [128] The Works of Epictetus. T. W. Higginson's translation, ch. xv., page 139. [129] Latin, _gyrus_, the ring in which colts are driven round by horse-breakers. [130] Cicero, _De Officiis_, I., xxvi.