139: ‘You have cheered others.’ This is indeed the reality. People are never short of platitudes for others in dire circumstance, but they generally find that they too are unable to cope with adversity when it happens to them. Statius proclaimed himself a victim to the same predicament: "Yet I am he who was able - how many a time! - to soothe by appeasing words the pain of mother and of sire; I, the gentle consoler of the afflicted, whose voice was heard in the hour of untimely death by spirits departing, I now am at a loss, and seek healing hands and remedies." Silvae V.v.38-44.