XI
That the fortunes of descendants and of all a man's friends should
not affect his happiness at all seems a very unfriendly doctrine,
and one opposed to the opinions men hold; but since the events that
happen are numerous and admit of all sorts of difference, and some
come more near to us and others less so, it seems a long- nay, an
infinite- task to discuss each in detail; a general outline will perhaps
suffice. If, then, as some of a man's own misadventures have a certain
weight and influence on life while others are, as it were, lighter,
so too there are differences among the misadventures of our friends
taken as a whole, and it makes a difference whether the various suffering
befall the living or the dead (much more even than whether lawless
and terrible deeds are presupposed in a tragedy or done on the stage),
this difference also must be taken into account; or rather, perhaps,
the fact that doubt is felt whether the dead share in any good or
evil. For it seems, from these considerations, that even if anything
whether good or evil penetrates to them, it must be something weak
and negligible, either in itself or for them, or if not, at least
it must be such in degree and kind as not to make happy those who
are not happy nor to take away their blessedness from those who are.
The good or bad fortunes of friends, then, seem to have some effects
on the dead, but effects of such a kind and degree as neither to make
the happy unhappy nor to produce any other change of the kind.
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