forbidding us to divulge our friend's secrets; there is no law
which bids us keep faith even with an enemy; pray what law is there
which binds us to stand by what we have promised? There is none.
Nevertheless I should remonstrate with one who did not keep a
secret, and I should be indignant with one who pledged his word and
broke it. "But," he argues, "you are turning a benefit into a
loan." By no means, for I do not insist upon repayment, but only
demand it; nay, I do not even demand it, but remind my friend of
it. Even the direst need will not bring me to apply for help to one
with whom I should have to undergo a long struggle.

If there be any one so ungrateful that it is not sufficient to
remind him of his debt, I should pass him over, and think that he
did not deserve to be made grateful by force. A money-lender does
not demand repayment from his debtors if he knows they have become
bankrupt, and, to their shame, have nothing but shame left to lose;
and I, like him, should pass over those who are openly and
obstinately ungrateful, and would demand repayment only from those
who were likely to give it me, not from those from whom I should
have to extort it by force.

XXII. There are many who cannot deny that they have received a
benefit, yet cannot return it--men who are not good enough to be
termed grateful, nor yet bad enough to be termed ungrateful; but
who are dull and sluggish, backward debtors, though not defaulters.
Such men as these I should not ask for repayment, but forcibly
remind them of it, and, from a state of indifference, bring them
back to their duty. They would at once reply, "Forgive me; I did
not know, by Hercules, that you missed this, or I would have
offered it of my own accord, I beg that you will not think me