Quaestiones Naturales

Plutarch

Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals, Vol. III. Goodwin, William W., editor; Brown, R., translator. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company; Cambridge: Press of John Wilson and Son, 1874.

Is it because he can comprehend nothing by imagination nor call a thing to mind, which are gifts and virtues proper

to man alone; and therefore, seeing he cannot discern the party that offered him injury, he supposeth that to be his enemy which seemeth in his eye to threaten him, and of it he goes about to be revenged? Or is it that he thinks the stone, while it runs along the ground, to be some wild beast, and according to his nature he intendeth to catch it first; but afterwards, when he seeth himself deceived and put besides his reckoning, he setteth upon the man? Or rather, doth he not hate the man and the stone both alike, but pursueth that only which is next unto him?