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55He was not even content with this, but actually reconciled the men themselves, not because he was desirous that they should agree, but because he saw that they were most powerful. He understood well that without the aid of both, or at least of one, he could never come to any great power; and if he made a friend of either one of them alone, he would by that very fact have the other as his opponent and would meet with more failures through him than successes through the support of the other. 2For, on the one hand, it seemed to him that all men work more zealously against their enemies than they coöperate with their friends, not merely on the principle that anger and hatred impel more earnest endeavours than any friendship, but also because, when one man is working for himself, and a second for another, success does not involve the same degree of pleasure, or failure of pain, in the two cases. 3On the other hand, he reflected that it was easier to stand in people’s way and prevent their reaching any prominence than to be willing to lead them to great power, owing to the circumstance that he who keeps another from becoming great pleases others as well as himself, whereas he who exalts another renders him burdensome to both sides.
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