"One is not vexed with the fig-tree for yielding figs, with the cucumber for being bitter! One must expect barbarians to behave barbariously." Marcus Aurelius would proceed to slaughter the barbarians, and then forgive them.

We can most of us forgive our brother his transgressions, having once got even with him.

In a tiny Swiss village, behind the angle of the school-house wall, I came across a maiden crying bitterly, her head resting on her arm.

I asked her what had happened.

Between her sobs she explained that a school companion, a little lad about her own age, having snatched her hat from her head, was at that moment playing football with it the other side of the wall.