One who is bereft of energy
and who has been abandoned by friends can never work with perseverance.
Such a man, if employed, fails in almost every business. A minister
possessed of little learning, even if blessed with high birth and
attentive to virtue, profit, and pleasure, becomes incompetent in
choosing proper courses of action. Similarly, a person of low descent,
even if possessed of great learning, always errs, like a blind man
without a guide, in all acts requiring dexterity and foresight. A person,
again, who is of infirm purposes, even if possessed of intelligence and
learning, and even if conversant with means, cannot long act with
success. A man of wicked heart and possessed of no learning may set his
hand to work but he fails to ascertain what the results will be of his
work. A king should never repose trust on a minister that is not devoted
to him. He should, therefore, never disclose his counsels to a minister
that is not devoted to him. Such a wicked minister, combining with the
other ministers of the king, may ruin his master, like a fire consuming a
tree by entering its entrails through the holes in its body with the aid
of the wind. Giving way to wrath, a master may one day pull down a
servant from his office or reprove him, from rage, in harsh words, and
restore him to power again. None but a servant devoted to the master can
bear and forgive such treatment. Ministers also become sometime highly
offended with their royal masters.
Pages:
1334
1335
1336
1337
1338
1339
1340
1341
1342
1343
1344
1345
1346
1347
1348
1349
1350
1351
1352
1353
1354
1355
1356
1357
1358