Salesian Literature

Chapter 36:  We must have a just and reasonable mind

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We are men only through reason.  Yet it is a rare thing to find men truly reasonable.  All the more so, since self-love generally confuses reason, it leads us unnoticeably into a thousand kinds of small but dangerous injustices and unfair dealings.  These, like the little foxes spoken of in the Song of Songs destroy the vines (215).  As they are small we do not pay attention to them.  Because there are many, they do not cease to do much harm.

 

I shall now point out to you certain unfair and unreasonable attitudes.  We accuse our neighbour for a little and we excuse ourselves much.  We wish to sell very dear and buy quite cheap.  We desire that justice by done in the house of another and at home we show mercy and indulgence to our own.  We want our words to be taken in a good sense by others and we are touchy and sensitive to what others say.  We would like our neighbour to leave us his property when we pay him.  Is it not more just that he keeps it and leave us our money?  We are displeased with him because he does not want to adjust to us.  Has he not greater reason to be angry with us because we wish to inconvenience him?  If we are attached to a particular practice, we despise all the rest and criticize all that is not according to our taste.  If one of our subordinates is not good-looking or we dislike him, whatever he may do we take it ill.  We do not cease to make him sad, and we are always ready to blame him.  On the contrary, if someone is pleasing to us as he is good-looking, there is nothing he does that we will not excuse.  There are virtuous children whom their father and mother can hardly tolerate on account of some physical defect.  There are vicious children who are favourites because of their graceful appearance.

 

On the whole we prefer the rich to the poor even though they are not better either in character or in virtue.  We prefer the best dressed.  We maintain our rights strictly and want others to be polite in demanding theirs.  We keep our rank with great formality but desire that others be humble and submissive.  We easily complain about our neighbour but we do not wish anyone to complain about us.  What we do for others always appears much, while what others do for us seems nothing.  In short, we are like the partridges of Paphlagonia which have two hearts[1].  For we have a gentle, kind and gracious heart towards ourselves and a hard, stern and strict heart towards our neighbour.  We have two weights: one to weigh our interests with the greatest possible advantage for ourselves and the other to weigh those of our neighbours with the greatest possible disadvantage to him.  Now, as the Scripture says: The deceitful lips have spoken with a double heart (Ps. 12:2), in other words, they have two hearts.  Also they have two weights, one heavy for receiving and the other light for giving which is an abominable thing before God (Prov. 20:23)

 

Philothea, be impartial and just in your actions.  Put yourself always in the place of your neighbour, and your neighbour in your own place, and thus you will judge him well.  Make yourself a seller while buying and a buyer while selling; you will sell and buy with justice.  All these acts of justice are small, and do not oblige us to restitution, since we remain strictly within the limits of what is advantageous to us.  But they continue to oblige us to correct our attitudes because these are great defects of reason and charity.  After all these are simply deceits.  We lose nothing by living generously, nobly, courteously and with a magnanimous, impartial and reasonable heart.  Remember, then, dear Philothea, to examine your heart often regarding its attitude towards your neighbour.  Is it as you would wish that his should be towards you if you were in his place.  For this is the mark of true reason.  Trajan when he was criticized by his intimates for rendering the imperial majesty, in their opinion, too accessible, answered: “Yes, Indeed.  Should I not be such an emperor towards private citizens as I would want an emperor to be if I were a private citizen?”

 

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[1]  Pliny

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