I. No man who is imprisoned or dispossessed will be surrounded by true friends, and the rich man who has lost his wealth is despised and unloved, and the man who is vanquished is always said to have been defeated through stupidity; but the rich man and the one who has achieved great success is hardly ever considered foolish. He would be wise and courtly who could give such good advice before a man has suffered loss as he does afterwards.
II. One may easily learn from other men’s follies how to become more perfect, more honoured and obeyed, more noble and cultivated; and no one can be very sensible who does not frequently notice how one man rises and another falls, and who does not win friends when the opportunity is there. And when he has won them, let him strive to keep them, for it seems to me that this requires a greater effort than winning them.
III. Any man is base and presumptuous who, because he knows he is rich, thinks that one should be his close friend and love him sincerely even though his words are vulgar and his deeds arrogant and foolish; and though fear makes one offer him a pretence (of friendship), it is no such thing, for when his fortune is found to be declining, all men show their delight and great joy by smiling, when he is in tears.
IV. I declare that it is the height of madness for a powerful, haughty and uncultured man to wish to keep his neighbours for ever dishonoured and weak. Such a man deserves to be hated and disliked by all, and it is but just if misfortune overtakes him because of this, for we have seen and learnt from the example of several men that they have busied themselves harrying each other, and we should all remember this.
V. And such is the way of the world that one man is foolish and another intelligent, one base and the other well-bred, one uncouth and well-stocked with all manner of unseemliness and the other cultivated, one truthful and the other mendacious; so that in the whole world there is no man so worthy that he is endowed with every good quality, save the King of Aragon, for in him are all the supreme virtues, however many you may ask for.
