the malicious, the avaricious,
the headstrong, and the cruel? Do you imagine that those things which
are loathed are not punished, or do you suppose that any punishment is
greater than the hate of all men? It is a punishment not to dare receive
a benefit from anyone, not to dare to bestow one, to be, or to fancy
that you are a mark for all men's eyes, and to lose all appreciation of
so excellent and pleasant a matter. Do you call a man unhappy who has
lost his sight, or whose hearing has been impaired by disease, and do
you not call him wretched who has lost the power of feeling benefits? He
fears the gods, the witnesses of all ingratitude; he is tortured by
the thought of the benefit which he has misapplied, and, in fine, he is
sufficiently punished by this great penalty, that, as I said before, he
cannot enjoy the fruits of this most delightful act. On the other hand,
he who takes pleasure in receiving a benefit, enjoys an unvarying and
continuous happiness, which he derives from consideration, not of
the thing given, but of the intention of the giver. A benefit gives
perpetual joy to a grateful man, but pleases an ungrateful one only for
a moment. Can the lives of such men be compared, seeing that the one
is sad and gloomy--as it is natural that a denier of his debts and a
defrauder should be, a man who does not give his parents, his nurses, or
his teachers the honour which is their due--while the other is joyous,
cheerful, on the watch for an opportunity of proving his gratitude, and
gaining much pleasure from this frame of mind itself? Such a man has no
wish to become bankrupt, but only to make the fullest and most copious
return for benefits, and that not only to parents and friends, but also
to more humble persons; for even if he receives a benefit from his
own slave, he does not consider from whom he receives it, but what he
receives.

XVIII. It has, however, been doubted by Hecaton and some other writers,
whether a slave can bestow a benefit upon his master. Some distinguish
between benefits, duties, and services, calling those things benefits
which are bestowed by a stranger--that is, by one who could discontinue
them without blame--while duties are performed by our children, our
wives, and those whom relationship prompts and orders to afford us help;
and, thirdly, services are performed by slaves, whose position is such
that nothing which they do for their master can give them any claim upon
him....

Beside