es,
and only got reconciled with him after he repented and made his peace
with Cleanthes. For we ought to give our friend pain if it will benefit
him, but not to the extent of breaking off our friendship; but just as
we make use of some biting medicine, that will save and preserve the
life of the patient. And so the friend, like a musician, in bringing
about an improvement to what is good and expedient, sometimes slackens
the chords, sometimes tightens them, and is often pleasant, but always
useful. But the flatterer, always harping on one note, and accustomed to
play his accompaniment only with a view to please and to ingratiate
himself, knows not how either to oppose in deed, or give pain in word,
but complies only with every wish, ever chiming in with and echoing the
sentiments of his patron. As then Xenophon says Agesilaus took pleasure
in being praised by those who would also censure him,[392] so ought we
to think that to please and gratify us is friendly in the person who can
also give us pain and oppose us, but to feel suspicion at an intercourse
which is merely for pleasure and gratification, and never pungent, aye
and by Zeus to have ready that saying of the Lacedaemonian, who, on
hearing king Charillus praised, said, "How can he be a good man, who is
not severe even to the bad?"

Sec. XII. They say the gadfly attacks bulls, and the tick dogs, in the ear:
so the flatterer besieges with praise the ears of those who are fond of
praise, and sticks there and is hard to dislodge. We ought therefore
here to make a wide-awake and careful discrimination, whether the praise
is bestowed on the action or the man. It is bestowed on the action, if
people praise the absent rather than the present, if also those that
have the same aims and aspirations praise not only us but all that are
similarly disposed, and do not evidently say and do one thing at one
time, and the direct contrary at another; and the greatest test is if we
are conscious, in the matters for which we get the praise, that we have
not regretted them, and are not ashamed at them, and would not rather
have said and done differently. For our own inward judgement,
testifying the contrary and not admitting the praise, is above passion,
and impregnable and proof against the flatterer. But I know not how it
is that most people in misfortune cannot bear exhortation, but are
captivated more by condolence and sympathy, and when they have done
something wrong and acted a