5p6sc.md (860B)
1 The more this knowledge, that things are necessary, is 2 applied to particular things, which we conceive more distinctly 3 and vividly, the greater is the power of the mind over the 4 emotions, as experience also testifies. For we see, that the 5 pain arising from the loss of any good is mitigated, as soon as 6 the man who has lost it perceives, that it could not by any means 7 have been preserved. So also we see that no one pities an 8 infant, because it cannot speak, walk, or reason, or lastly, 9 because it passes so many years, as it were, in unconsciousness. 10 Whereas, if most people were born full–grown and only one here 11 and there as an infant, everyone would pity the infants; because 12 infancy would not then be looked on as a state natural and 13 necessary, but as a fault or delinquency in Nature; and we may 14 note several other instances of the same sort. 15 16