(77.) This favourite has been wonderfully fortunate during his whole lifetime; he enjoyed an uninterrupted good fortune, was never in disgrace, occupied the highest posts, was in the kingʼs confidence, had vast treasures, perfect health, and died quietly. But what an extraordinary account he will have to render of a life spent as a favourite, of advice given, of advice which was not tendered or not listened to, of good deeds omitted, and, on the contrary, of evil ones committed, either by himself or his instruments; in a word, of all his prosperity.[645] (78.) When we are dead we are praised by those who survive us, though we frequently have no other merit than that of being no longer alive; the same commendations serve then for Cato and for Piso.[646] “There is a report that Piso is dead; it is a great loss; he was an honest man, who deserved to live longer; he was intelligent and agreeable, resolute and courageous, to be depended upon, generous and faithful;” add: “provided he be really dead.” (79.) The way in which we exclaim about certain persons being distinguished for their good faith, disinterestedness, and honesty is not so much to their praise as to the disrepute of all mankind. (80.) A certain person relieves the necessitous, but neglects his own family and leaves his son a beggar; another builds a new house though he has not paid for the lead of the one finished ten years before; a third makes presents and is very liberal, but ruins his creditors. I would fain know whether pity, liberality, and magnificence can be the virtues of a man without sense, or whether eccentricity and vanity are not rather the causes of this want of sense.[647] (81.) If we wish to be essentially just to others, we should be quick and not dilatory; to let people wait is to commit an injustice. Those persons do well, or do their duty, who do what they ought. A man who allows the world to speak always of him in the future tense, and to say he will do well, behaves really very badly. (82.) People say of a great man who has two meals a day, and spends the rest of his time in digesting what he has eaten, that he starves; all that they mean to express by this is that he is not rich, or that his affairs are not very prosperous; the remark about starving might be better applied to his creditors. (83.) The culture, good manners, and politeness of persons of either sex, advanced in years, give me a good opinion of what we call “former times.”[648] (84.) Parents are over-confident in expecting too much from the good education of their children, and commit a grievous error if they expect nothing from it and neglect it. (85.) Were it true, as several persons affirm, that education does not alter the heart and constitution of man, and that in reality the changes it produces transform nothing and are merely superficial, yet I would still maintain that it is beneficial to him.