right; for the benefactor has then his end, and his only end, when the receiver is grateful. The more glorious part, in appearance, is that of the giver; but the receiver has undoubtedly the harder game to play in many regards. There are some from whom I would not accept of a benefit; that is to say, from those upon whom I would not bestow one. For why should I not scorn to receive a benefit where I am ashamed to own it? and I would yet be more tender too, where I receive, than where I give; for it is no torment to be in debt where a man has no mind to pay; as it is the greatest delight imaginable to be engaged by a friend, whom I should yet have a kindness for; if I were never so much disobliged. It is a pain to an honest and a generous mind to lie under a duty of affection against inclination. I do not speak here of wise men, that love to do what they ought to do; that have their passions at command; that prescribe laws to themselves, and keep them when they have done; but of men in a state of imperfection, that may have a good will perhaps to be honest, and yet be overborne by the contumacy of their affections. We must therefore have a care to whom we become obliged; and I would be much stricter yet in the choice of a creditor for benefits than for money. In the one case, it is but paying what I had, and the debt is discharged; in the other, I do not only owe more, but when I have paid that, I am still in arrear: and this law is the very foundation of friendship. I will suppose myself a prisoner; and a notorious villain offers to lay down a good sum of money for my redemption. _First_, Shall I make use of this money or not? _Secondly_, If I do, what return shall I make him for it? To the first point, I will take it; but only as a debt; not as a benefit, that shall ever tie me to a friendship with him; and, secondly, my acknowledgment shall be only correspondent to such an obligation. It is a school question, whether or not Brutus, that thought Cæsar not fit to live, (and put himself at the head of a conspiracy against him,) could honestly have received his life from Cæsar, if he had fallen into Cæsar’s power, without examining what reason moved him to that action? How great a man soever he was in other cases, without dispute he was extremely out in this, and below the dignity of his profession. For a Stoic to fear the name of a king, when yet monarchy is the best state of government; or there to hope for liberty, where so great rewards are propounded, both for tyrants and their slaves; for him to imagine ever to bring the laws to their former state, where so many thousand lives had been lost in the contest, not so much whether they should serve or not, but who should be their master: he was strangely mistaken, in the nature and reason of things, to fancy, that when Julius was gone, somebody else would not start up in his place, when there was yet a Tarquin found, after so many kings