From this we see that to incline a young man to humanity you must
not make him admire the brilliant lot of others; you must show
him life in its sorrowful aspects and arouse his fears. Thus it
becomes clear that he must force his own way to happiness, without
interfering with the happiness of others.
SECOND MAXIM.--We never pity another's woes unless we know we may
suffer in like manner ourselves.
"Non ignara mali, miseris succurrere disco."--Virgil.
I know nothing go fine, so full of meaning, so touching, so true
as these words.
Why have kings no pity on their people? Because they never expect
to be ordinary men. Why are the rich so hard on the poor? Because
they have no fear of becoming poor. Why do the nobles look down
upon the people? Because a nobleman will never be one of the lower
classes. Why are the Turks generally kinder and more hospitable
than ourselves? Because, under their wholly arbitrary system of
government, the rank and wealth of individuals are always uncertain
and precarious, so that they do not regard poverty and degradation
as conditions with which they have no concern; to-morrow, any one
may himself be in the same position as those on whom he bestows
alms to-day. This thought, which occurs again and again in eastern
romances, lends them a certain tenderness which is not to be found
in our pretentious and harsh morality.
So do not train your pupil to look down from the height of his glory
upon the sufferings of the unfortunate, the labours of the wretched,
and do not hope to teach him to pity them while he considers them
as far removed from himself. Make him thoroughly aware of the fact
that the fate of these unhappy persons may one day be his own, that
his feet are standing on the edge of the abyss, into which he may
be plunged at any moment by a thousand unexpected irresistible
misfortunes. Teach him to put no trust in birth, health, or riches;
show him all the changes of fortune; find him examples--there are
only too many of them--in which men of higher rank than himself
have sunk below the condition of these wretched ones. Whether by
their own fault or another's is for the present no concern of ours;
does he indeed know the meaning of the word fault? Never interfere
with the order in which he acquires knowledge, and teach him only
through the means within his reach; it needs no great learning
to perceive that all the prudence of mankind cannot make certain
whether he will be alive or dead in an hour's time, whether
before nightfall he will not be grinding his teeth in the pangs of
nephritis, whether a month hence he will be rich or poor, whether
in a year's time he may not be rowing an Algerian galley under the
lash of the slave-driver. Above all do not teach him this, like
his catechism, in cold blood; let him see and feel the calamities
which overtake men; surprise and startle his imagination with the
perils which lurk continually about a man's path; let him see the
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