Has any man been preferred before you at a banquet,
or in being saluted, or in being invited to a consultation?
If these things are good, you ought to rejoice that he has
obtained them: but if bad, be not grieved because you
have not obtained them; and remember that you cannot,
if you do not the same things in order to obtain what is
not in our own power, be considered worthy of the same
(equal) things. For how can a man obtain an equal
share with another when he does not visit a man's doors
as that other man does, when he does not attend him
when he goes abroad, as the other man does; when he
does not praise (flatter) him as another does? You will
be unjust then and insatiable, if you do not part with
the price, in return for which those things are sold, and
if you wish to obtain them for nothing. Well, what is
the price of lettuces? An obolus1 perhaps. If then a
man gives up the obolus, and receives the lettuces, and if
you do not give up the obolus and do not obtain the
lettuces, do not suppose that you receive less than he who
has got the lettuces; for as he has the lettuces, so you
have the obolus which you did not give. In the same
way then in the other matter also you have not been
invited to a man's feast, for you did not give to the host
the price at which the supper is sold; but he sells it for
praise (flattery), he sells it for personal attention. Give
then the price,2 if it is for your interest, for which it is
sold. But if you wish both not to give the price and to
obtain the things, you are insatiable and silly. Have you
nothing then in place of the supper? You have indeed,
you have the not flattering of him, whom you did not
choose to flatter; you have the not enduring3 of the man
when he enters the room.
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