[p. 271]
|271| acquaintance and friendship. The original unity of human beings must have been made voluntarily into such closer bonds, through which more determinate duties arise.
(Friendship rests on equality of characters, especially of the interest in doing a common work with one another, not on pleasure in the person of the other as such. One must be as little burdensome to one’s friends as possible. Not to demand services from friends is the most delicate. One must not spare oneself the matter in order to lay it upon others.)
§ 68
The duty of prudence appears first as a duty towards oneself in relations to others, insofar as self-interest is the purpose. – The true benefit of one’s own is, however, essentially attained through ethical conduct, which is thus true prudence. It is at the same time contained therein that, in relation to moral conduct, one’s own benefit may indeed be a consequence, but is not to be regarded as purpose.
§ 69
Insofar as one’s own benefit does not lie immediately in moral conduct and depends on the particular, on the whole contingent benevolence of others, one finds oneself here in the sphere of mere affections towards one another, and prudence consists in not injuring the inclinations of others and in preserving them for oneself. But even in this respect what brings benefit is actually also that which in and for itself is proper, namely to leave others free in those matters where we have neither duty nor right to disturb them, and to win their affection through our conduct.
§ 70
Politeness is the attestation of benevolent dispositions, also of services, chiefly towards
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