When we meet with better fare than was expected, the disappointment is overlooked even by the unscrupulous. When we meet with worse than was expected, philosophers alone know how to make it better.
Every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud, adopts as a last resource pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and happy to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.