Kitap 2
21
Very true; but if my child or my brother should die; or if I must die or be tortured myself, what good will these things do me? Why, did you come for this? Did you attend upon me for this? Was it upon any such account that you ever lighted your lamp, or sat up at night? Or did you, when you went into the walk, propose any delusive semblance to your own mind to be discussed, instead of a syllogism? Did any of you ever go through such a subject jointly? And after all, you say, theorems are useless. To whom? To such as apply them ill. For medicines for the eyes are not useless to those who apply them when and as they ought. Fomentations are not useless, dumb-bells are not useless: but they are useless to some, and on the contrary, useful to others. If you should ask me, now, are syllogisms useful? I should answer that they are useful; and, if you please, I will show you how. Will they be of service to me, then? Why, did you ask, man, whether they would be useful to you, or in general? If any one in a dysentery should ask me whether acids be useful, I should answer, they are. Are they useful for me, then? I say, no. First try to get the flux stopped, and the ulceration healed. Do you too first get your ulcers healed, your fluxes stopped. Quiet your mind, and bring it free from distraction to the school; and then you will know what force there is in reasoning.
Of friendship.
22
To whatever objects a person devotes his attention, these objects he probably loves. Do men ever devote their attention, then, to [what they think] evils? By no means. Or even to things indifferent? No, nor this. It remains, then, that good must be the sole object of their attention; and if of their attention, of their love too. Whoever, therefore, understands good, is capable likewise of love; and he who cannot distinguish good from evil, and things indifferent from both, how is it possible that he can love? The wise person alone, then, is capable of loving.
