Kitap 1
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Suppose there were; if one of two opposites be natural, the other must necessarily be unnatural, must it not?
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It must.
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What we find, then, to accord at once with love and reason, that we may safely pronounce to be right and good.
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Agreed.
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Well, then; you will not dispute this, that to run away, and leave a sick child, is contrary to reason. It remains for us to consider whether it be consistent with affection.
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Let us consider it.
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Did you, then, from an affection to your child, do right in running away and leaving her? Has her mother no affection for the child?
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Yes, surely she has.
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Would it have been right, then, that her mother too should leave her, or would it not?
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It would not.
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And does not her nurse love her?
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She does.
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Then ought she likewise to leave her?
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By no means.
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And does not her preceptor love her?
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He does.
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Then ought he also to have run away and left her,—the child being thus left alone and unassisted, from the great affection of her parents and her friends, or left to die among people who neither loved her nor took care of her?
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Heaven forbid!
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But is it not unreasonable and unjust that what you think right in yourself, on account of your affection, should not be allowed to others, who have the very same affection with you
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It is absurd.
