"Principal Doctrines" - читать интересную книгу автора (Epicurus)

consequence, viz. the terror which is excited by
apprehension that those appointed to punish such offenses
will discover the injustice.

35. It is impossible for the person who secretly
violates any article of the social compact to feel confident
that he will remain undiscovered, even if he has already
escaped ten thousand times; for right on to the end of his
life he is never sure he will not be detected.

36. Taken generally, justice is the same for all, to
wit, something found useful in mutual association; but in
its application to particular cases of locality or
conditions of whatever kind, it varies under different
circumstances.

37. Among the things accounted just by conventional
law, whatever in the needs of mutual association is attested
to be useful, is thereby stamped as just, whether or not it
be the same for all; and in case any law is made and does
not prove suitable to the usefulness of mutual association,
then this is no longer just. And should the usefulness which
is expressed by the law vary and only for a time correspond
with the prior conception, nevertheless for the time being
it was just, so long as we do not trouble ourselves about
empty words, but look simply at the facts.

38. Where without any change in circumstances the
conventional laws, when judged by their consequences, were
seen not to correspond with the notion of justice, such laws
were not really just; but wherever the laws have ceased to
be useful in consequence of a change in circumstances, in
that case the laws were for the time being just when they
were useful for the mutual association of the citizens, and
subsequently ceased to be just when they ceased to be
useful.

39. He who best knew how to meet fear of external foes
made into one family all the creatures he could; and those
he could not, he at any rate did not treat as aliens; and
where he found even this impossible, he avoided all
association, and, so far as was useful, kept them at a
distance.

40. Those who were best able to provide themselves with
the means of security against their neighbors, being thus in
possession of the surest guarantee, passed the most
agreeable life in each other's society; and their enjoyment
of the fullest intimacy was such that, if one of them died
before his time, the survivors did not mourn his death as if