Human Nature

Are you the type of person who believes people are inherently 'evil', out to get the best deal they can even if it means cutting the other guy out of something? Or are you the type that believes that humans are basically good even though there are some bad eggs out there? I'm asking because I'd really like to know what the common conscensus is on this. I've had two dealings in the past 10 days. Both of which involved the sale of an animal, both required my believing in the other person involved to do what they said they would do. One went good, the other went sour... but at least on the one that went sour, it looks like that person is at least going to be 'good' and do the right thing and return the animal this weekend since she can not continue making agreed upon payments. I actually thought THAT deal was going to be the one that went well and finished out. The one last Sunday where a mother and father wanted to buy one of our colts that we had at the farm animal sale but had to go home and fix things up and would come to our farm later that day to pick up the colt--unfortunately at the sale they only had a check for that amount, and I told them if they were picking the horse up that day I'd prefer cash. They didn't have a problem with that but would have to go get it and bring it when they picked up the colt. They seemed genuinley earnest and we agreed to bring the colt back home and wait for them to come... all that afternoon as it got later and later I worried we'd been suckered, but low and behold, the truck pulled in somewhere around 6ish. Then I find out today that the other deal was the one that was going bad when I got an email that said she would not be able to continue, and well there was more, but let's suffice it to say I requested she return the animal before she missed her first payment due. She was fine and seems like things will go well. So that's sort of the background of my wanting to know. I'm not sure how I will handle things in the future. Part of me says 'cash only' at the time of sale and that's it. No more messing around with possible problems. At least the one last Sunday would have only meant we had to hold onto the colt a few more weeks until the next sale but not really be messy. Maybe something like that would still be okay in the future.