There is the man who is called timid because he is a fool; and because of this he is classed with the bad men who are beset by all vices without distinction and without exception. But, strictly speaking, a timid man is one who because of a natural weakness grows alarmed even at unmeaning noises. The fool possesses all vices, but he is not inclined by nature to all; one man inclines to greed, another to luxury, another to insolence. Therefore it is a mistake for persons to put such questions as these to the Stoics: “Tell me, is Achilles timid? Tell me, is Aristides, whose name stood for justice, unjust? Tell me, is even Fabius, ‘who retrieved the situation by his delays,’22 rash? Tell me, is Decius afraid of death? Mucius a traitor? Camillus a deserter?” We do not say that all men possess all vices in the same way in which certain men display particular vices, but that the bad and foolish man is not exempt from any vice; we do not acquit even the bold man of fear, nor absolve even the spendthrift from avarice. Just as a man has all the five senses, and yet all men do not for that reason have as keen sight as Lynceus,23 so, if a man is a fool, he does not possess all the vices in the same active and vigorous form in which some persons possess some of them. All the vices exist in all men, yet not all are equally prominent in each individual. This man’s nature impels him to greed; this one is a victim of wine, this one of lust, or, if he is not yet a victim, he is so constituted that his natural impulses lead him in this direction.
And so, to return to my original proposition, everyone who is bad is ungrateful, for he has in him all the seeds of wrongdoing; yet, strictly speaking, the man who is termed ungrateful is one who has a bent toward this vice. To such a man, consequently, I shall not give a benefit. As a father who betroths his daughter to an overbearing man who has been often divorced will disregard her best interests, as he who entrusts the care of his patrimony to one who has been condemned for the bad management of his affairs will be considered a poor head of a household, as it will be the veriest madness for a man to make a will naming as the guardian of his son one who is known to be a robber of wards, so he will be counted the worst of benefactors who chooses ungrateful persons in order to bestow upon them gifts that are doomed to perish.