Your neighbor’s—to distinguish ignorance from
calculation. And recognize it as like yours.
- You participate in a society by your existence. Then
participate in its life through your actions—all your actions.
Any action not directed toward a social end (directly or
indirectly) is a disturbance to your life, an obstacle to
wholeness, a source of dissension. Like the man in the
Assembly—a faction to himself, always out of step with the
majority. - Childish tantrums, children’s games, “spirits carrying
corpses”; “Odysseus in the Underworld” saw more real life. - Identify its purpose—what makes it what it is—and
examine that. (Ignore its concrete form.) Then calculate the
length of time that such a thing was meant to last. - Endless suffering—all from not allowing the mind to do
its job. Enough. - When you face someone’s insults, hatred, whatever...
look at his soul. Get inside him. Look at what sort of person
he is. You’ll find you don’t need to strain to impress him.
But you do have to wish him well. He’s your closest
relative. The gods assist him just as they do you—by signs
and dreams and every other way—to get the things he wants.