one another by the widest possible intervals; they can therefore
come under no regular rule, since it would be more just to leave
them all unrewarded than to give the same reward to all.

XII. Some benefits cost much to the givers, some are of much value
to the receivers but cost the givers nothing. Some are bestowed
upon friends, others on strangers: now although that which is given
be the same, yet it becomes more when it is given to one with whom
you are beginning to be acquainted through the benefits which you
have previously conferred upon him. One man may give us help,
another distinctions, a third consolation. You may find one who
thinks nothing pleasanter or more important than to have some one
to save him from distress; you may again find one who would rather
be helped to great place than to security; while some consider
themselves more indebted to those who save their lives than to
those who save their honour. Each of these services will be held
more or less important, according as the disposition of our judge
inclines to one or the other of them. Besides this, I choose my
creditors for myself, whereas I often receive benefits from those
from whom I would not, and sometimes I am laid under an obligation
without my knowledge. What will you do in such a case? When a man
has received a benefit unknown to himself, and which, had he known
of it, he would have refused to receive, will you call him
ungrateful if he does not repay it, however he may have received
it? Suppose that some one has bestowed a benefit upon me, and that
the same man has afterwards done me some wrong; am I to be bound by
his one bounty to endure with patience any wrong that he may do me,
or will it be the same as if I had repaid it, because he himself
has by the subsequent wrong cancelled his own benefit? How, in that
case, would you decide which was the greater; the present which the