Complete. From “Resolves, Divine, Moral, and Political.”

IN noble natures, I never found it fail that those, who suffered for them, they ever greatly loved. Nothing indeed attaches us more strongly to our friend than his having smarted for our sake, or having freely borne the burden which was ours. He has, in a manner, made a purchase of thy life by saving it; and though he forbears to call for it, yet I believe thou owest it him. There is a sympathy of souls, which makes men sensible of each other’s sufferances. I know not by what hidden way it is, but I find that love increases by adversity. Ovid confesses it:—

    To make two friends entire, we need but plot to make one suffer for the other’s sake. For this is always the case with a worthy mind; it grieves more at the misfortune of a friend than it can do for its own. Men often know how to manage a trouble in themselves, how to entertain it; but in another, they are uncertain how it may work. In courtesies rendered us, it is most noble to prize them after the author’s intention, if they be mean; but after their effect, if they be great: and when we render them to others, to value them only, as the result may prove them to be beneficial to the receiver.