“Hold!” some one cries, “have you no failings?” Yes;
Failings enough, but different, maybe less. 
One day when Maenius happened to attack
Novius the usurer behind his back,
“Do you not know yourself?” said one, “or think
That if you play the stranger, we shall wink?”
“Not know myself!” he answered, “you say true: 
I do not:  so I take a stranger’s due.” 
Self-love like this is knavish and absurd,
And well deserves a damnatory word. 
You glance at your own faults; your eyes are blear: 
You eye your neighbour’s; straightway you see clear,
Like hawk or basilisk:  your neighbours pry
Into your frailties with as keen an eye. 
A man is passionate, perhaps misplaced
In social circles of fastidious taste;
His ill-trimmed beard, his dress of uncouth style,
His shoes ill-fitting, may provoke a smile: 
But he’s the soul of virtue; but he’s kind;
But that coarse body hides a mighty mind. 
Now, having scanned his breast, inspect your own,
And see if there no failings have been sown
By Nature or by habit, as the fern
Springs in neglected fields, for men to burn.

True love, we know, is blind:  defects that blight
The loved one’s charms escape the lover’s sight,
Nay, pass for beauties, as Balbinus glows
With admiration of his Hagna’s nose. 
Ah, if in friendship we e’en did the same,
And virtue cloaked the error with her name! 
Come, let us learn how friends at friends should look
By a leaf taken from a father’s book. 
Has the dear child a squint? at home he’s classed
With Venus’ self; “her eyes have just that cast:” 
Is he a dwarf like Sisyphus? his sire
Calls him “sweet pet,” and would not have him higher,
Gives Varus’ name to knock-kneed boys, and dubs
His club-foot youngster Scaurus, king of clubs. 
E’en so let us our neighbours’ frailties scan: 
A friend is close; call him a careful man: 
Another’s vain and fond of boasting; say,
He talks in an engaging, friendly way: 
A third is a barbarian, rude and free;
Straightforward and courageous let him be: 
A fourth is apt to break into a flame;
An ardent spirit—­make we that his name. 
This is the sovereign recipe, be sure,
To win men’s hearts, and having won, secure.

But we put virtue down to vice’s score,
And foul the vessel that was clean before: 
See, here’s a modest man, who ranks too low
In his own judgment; him we nickname slow: 
Another, ever on his guard, takes care
No enemy shall catch him unaware,
(Small wonder, truly, in a world like this,
Beset with dogs that growl and snakes that hiss);
We turn his merit to a fault, and style
His prudence mere disguise, his caution guile. 
Or take some honest soul, who, full of glee,
Breaks on a patron’s solitude, like me,
Finds his Maecenas book in hand or dumb,
And pokes him with remarks, the first that come;