company of my poor self who has
become thy friend. Like disciples worshipping their preceptor, all the
friends I have, all my relatives and kinsmen, will honour and worship
thee. I myself too shall worship thee with all thy friends and kinsmen.
What grateful person is there that will not worship the giver of his
life? Be thou the lord of both my body and home. Be thou the disposer of
all my wealth and possessions. Be thou my honoured counsellor and do thou
rule me like a father. I swear by my life that thou hast no fear from us.
In intelligence thou art Usanas himself. By the power of thy
understanding thou hast conquered us. Possessed of the strength of
policy, thou hast given us our life.' Addressed in such soothing words by
the cat, the mouse, conversant with all that is productive of the highest
good, replied in these sweet words that were beneficial to himself: 'I
have heard, O Lomasa, all that thou hast said. Listen now as I say what
appears to me. Friends should be well examined. Foes also should be well
studied. In this world, a task like this is regarded by even the learned
as a difficult one depending upon acute intelligence. Friends assume the
guise of foes, and foes assume the guise of friends. When compacts of
friendship are formed, it is difficult for the parties to understand
whether the other parties are really moved by lust and wrath. There is no
such thing as a foe. There is no such thing in existence as a friend. It
is force of circumstances that creates friends and foes. He who regards
his own interests ensured as long as another person lives and thinks them
endangered when that other person will cease to live, takes that other
person for a friend and considers him so as long as those interests of
his are not clashed against. There is no condition that deserves
permanently the name either of friendship or hostility. Both friends and
foes arise from considerations of interest and gain. Friendship becomes
changed into enmity in the course of time. A foe also becomes a friend.
Self-interest is very powerful. He who reposes blind trust on friends and
always behaves with mistrust towards foes without paying any regard to
considerations of policy, finds his life to be unsafe. He who,
disregarding all considerations of policy, sets his heart upon an
affectionate union with either friends or foes, comes to be regarded as a
person whose understanding has been unhinged. One should not repose trust
upon a person