Envy in other matters is the result of various coarse or low attitudes of mind; envy of a speaker is born of inordinate love of glory and unfair ambition. A person so disposed is prevented [Sidenote: F] from listening to reason. His mind is perturbed and distracted. At one and the same time it is looking at its own endowments, to see if they are inferior to those of the speaker, and at the rest of the company, to see if they are wondering and admiring. It is disgusted at their applause, and exasperated at their approval. The previous portions of the speech it forgets and ignores, because the recollection is irksome. The parts yet to come it awaits with trembling anxiety, for fear they may prove better still. When the speaker is at his best, it is most [Sidenote: 40] eager for him to stop. When the lecture is over, it thinks of nothing that was said, but takes count of the expressions and attitudes of the audience. From those who give praise it dances away in a frenzy; and to those who carp and distort it runs to form one of the herd. If there is nothing to distort, it makes comparisons with others who have spoken ‘better and more eloquently to the same purpose’. In the end our friend has so cruelly mishandled the lecture that he has made it of no use or profit to himself. [Sidenote: B] Let the love of glory, then, be brought to terms with the love of learning. Let us listen to a speaker with friendly courtesy, regarding ourselves as guests at a sacred banquet or sacrificial offering. Let us praise his ability when he makes a hit, or be satisfied with the mere goodwill of a man who is making the public a present of his views and endeavouring to convince others by means of the arguments which have convinced himself. When he goes right, let us consider that his rightness is due not to chance or accident, but to painstaking effort and learning. Let us take a pattern by it, and not only admire it, but emulate it. When he is at fault, let us stop and think for what reasons he is so, and at what point he began to go astray. [Sidenote: C] Xenophon observes that good managers derive profit from their enemies as well as from their friends. In the same way those who are attentive and alert derive benefit from a speaker not only when he is in the right, but also when he is in the wrong. Paltry thought, empty phrase, affected bearing, vulgar delight and excitement at applause, and the like, are more palpable to a listener in another’s case than to a speaker in his own. It is well, therefore, to take the criticism which we apply to him, and apply it to ourselves, asking whether we commit any mistake of the kind without being aware of it. It is the easiest thing in [Sidenote: D] the world to find fault with our neighbour, but it is a futile and meaningless proceeding, unless made to bear in some way upon the correction or prevention of similar faults. When lapses are committed, let us always be prompt to exclaim to ourselves in the phrase of Plato,