He says, for instance, "Begin the morning by saying to thyself, _I shall meet with the busybody, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial. All these things happen to them by reason of their ignorance of what is good and evil_. But I who have seen the nature of the good that it is beautiful, and of the bad that it is ugly, and the nature of him that does wrong that is akin to me,... and that it partakes of the same portion of the divinity, I can neither be injured by any of them, for no one can fix on me what is ugly, nor can I be angry with my kinsman, nor hate him. _For we are made for co-operation,_ like feet, like hands, like eyelids, like the rows of the upper and lower teeth. To act against one another then is contrary to nature; and _it_ is acting against one another to be vexed and turn away." (ii. 1.) Another of his rules, and an eminently wise one, was to fix his thoughts as much as possible on the virtues of others, rather than on their vices. "When thou wishest to delight thyself, think of the _virtues_ of those who live with thee--the activity of one, the modesty of another, the liberality of a third, and some other good quality of a fourth." What a rebuke to the contemptuous cynicism which we are daily tempted to display! "An infinite being comes before us," says Robertson, "with a whole eternity wrapt up in his mind and soul, and we _proceed to classify him, put a label upon him, as we would upon a jar, saying, This is rice, that is jelly, and this pomatum_; and then we think we have saved ourselves the necessity of taking off the cover, How differently our Lord treated the people who came to Him!... consequently, at His touch each one gave out his peculiar spark of light." Here, again, is a singularly pithy, comprehensive, and beautiful piece of advice:-- "Men exist for the sake of one another. _Teach them or bear with them_" (viii. 59.) And again: "The best way of revenging thyself is not to become like the wrong doer." And again, "If any man has done wrong, the harm is his own. But perhaps he has not done wrong." (ix. 38.) Most remarkable, however, are the nine rules which he drew up for himself, as subjects for reflection when any one had offended him, viz.-- 1. That men were made for each other: even the inferior for the sake of the superior, and these for the sake of one another. 2. The invincible influences that act upon men, and mould their opinions and their acts. 3. That sin is mainly error and ignorance,--an involuntary slavery. 4. That we are ourselves feeble, and by no means immaculate; and that often our very abstinence from faults is due more to cowardice and a care for our reputation than to any freedom from the disposition to commit them. 5. That our judgments are apt to be very rash and premature. "And in short a man must learn a great deal to enable him to pass a correct judgment on another man's acts."