From the above instances it appears that Cicero has too loosely worded his proposition, "that such promises, as are prejudicial to the person, to whom they are given, are not to be kept, nor, if they are more prejudicial to the party giving, than beneficial to the person receiving them." For it should not be left to the promiser to judge, whether the fulfilment of his engagement will be serviceable to the party receiving it, except in the case of the madman cited above: nor is any TRIVIAL or IMAGINARY prejudice that might result from it, sufficient to release the obligation. But it ought to be such, as, according to the nature of the act, would necessarily be supposed to form an exception. Thus any one, having promised his assistance to a neighbour at a certain period, would not be bound to his engagement, if he were detained at home by the sickness of a father or a child. A case, which Cicero, in his first book of offices, has put in the following terms, "If any one has undertaken to manage a cause, and, in the mean time, his son is taken ill, it will be no breach of duty in him not to perform what he has promised." There is a passage in the fourth book of Seneca, ON BENEFITS, to the same effect. "I am liable, _says he_, to be charged with levity, and a breach of faith, if, things continuing as they were, when I made a promise, I do not perform my engagement. But if any change has taken place, it leaves me at liberty to reconsider the matter, and releases the obligation. I promised my support in court, and it afterwards appeared that the cause would be prejudicial to my own father. I promised to take a journey, but afterwards heard that the road was infested with robbers. I promised my presence on some particular occasion, but was prevented from attending by the sickness of a son. In all these cases, to bind me to my engagement, the circumstances ought to remain exactly the same as they were when I made the promise." XXVIII. It has been said that there are other indications of intention, which require an equitable exception in favour of the present case. And among such proofs there can be nothing stronger than the same words used in another place, not where they directly oppose the present meaning, for that would amount to a contradiction, but where they clash with it, owing to some unexpected emergency, which the Greek Rhetoricians call a circumstantial disagreement.[50] XXIX. When there is any accidental collision between one part of a written document and another, Cicero, in the second book of his treatise ON INVENTION, has given rules for deciding which of them ought to have the preference. Though his arrangement is not very accurate, yet it is by no means to be neglected. To supply therefore this defect of accuracy, the rules may be digested in the following order.