Pagina 670 de 734

[37] The meaning is this: personal fortunes, we have said, must

be in certain weight and number to affect our own happiness, this

will be true, of course, of those which are reflected on us from

our friends: and these are the only ones to which the dead are

supposed to be liable? add then the difference of sensibility

which it is fair to presume, and there is a very small residuum

of joy or sorrow.

[38] This is meant for an exhaustive division of goods, which are

either so in esse or in posse.

If in esse, they are either above praise, or subjects of praise.

Those in posse, here called faculties, are good only when rightly

used. Thus Rhetoric is a faculty which may be used to promote

justice or abused to support villainy. Money in like way.

[39] The doubt is, whether [Greek] or [Greek] is the subject of

the sentence. It is translated as above, not merely with

reference to the sense of this passage, but on a comparison with

a similar one in Book X. chap 8. [Greek].