M. —— said to me, à propos of his constant offences against digestion, and of the pleasures in which he indulged—the only obstacles to his regaining his health: “I should be marvellously well if it were not for myself.”
Nature seems to make use of men for the accomplishment of her designs without concerning herself about her instruments, like tyrants who rid themselves of those who have been of service to them.
There is no need to regard Burrhus as an absolutely virtuous man; he is only so, contrasted with Narcissus. Seneca and Burrhus are the honest men of an age in which there are none.
In order to sum up in a single word the rarity of honest folk, a friend remarked to me that in society the honest man is a variety of the human species.
I used to know a misanthrope who in his good-humoured moments would say: “I should not be at all surprised if there were an honest man hidden away in some corner without any one knowing of him.”