Prepared by David Reed haradda@aol.com or davidr@inconnect.com
Treatises on Friendship and Old Age
by Marcus Tullius Cicero
Translated by E S Shuckburgh
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO, the greatest of Roman orators and
the chief master of Latin prose style, was born at Arpinum, Jan.
3,106 B.C. His father, who was a man of property and belonged
to the class of the "Knights," moved to Rome when Cicero was a
child; and the future statesman received an elaborate education in
rhetoric, law, and philosophy, studying and practising under some
of the most noted teachers of the time. He began his career as an
advocate at the age of twenty-five, and almost immediately came
to be recognized not only as a man of brilliant talents but also as a
courageous upholder of justice in the face of grave political
danger. After two years of practice he left Rome to travel in
Greece and Asia, taking all the opportunities that offered to study
his art under distinguished masters. He returned to Rome greatly
improved in health and in professional skill, and in 76 B. C. was
elected to the office of quaestor. He was assigned to the province
of Lilybarum in Sicily, and the vigor and justice of his
administration earned him the gratitude of the inhabitants. It was
at their request that he undertook in 70 B. C. the Prosecution of
Verres, who as Praetor had subjected the Sicilians to incredible
extortion and oppression; and his successful conduct of this case,
which ended in the conviction and banishment of Verres, may be
said to have launched him on his political career. He became
aedile in the same year, in 67 B.C. praetor, and in 64 B. C. was
elected consul by a large majority. The most important event of the
year of his consulship was the conspiracy of Catiline. This
notorious criminal of patrician rank had conspired with a number
of others, many of them young men of high birth but dissipated
character, to seize the chief offices of the state, and to extricate
themselves from the pecuniary and other difficulties that had
resulted from their excesses, by the wholesale plunder of the city.
The plot was unmasked by the vigilance of Cicero, five of the
traitors were summarily executed, and in the overthrow of the
army that had been gathered in their support Catiline himself
perished. Cicero regarded himself as the savior of his country, and
his country for the moment seemed to give grateful assent.
But reverses were at hand. During the existence of the political
combination of Pompey, Caesar, and Crassus, known as the first
triumvirate, P. Clodius, an enemy of Cicero's, proposed a law
banishing "any one who had put Roman citizens to death without
trial." This was aimed at Cicero on account of his share in the
Catiline affair, and in March, 58 B. C., he left Rome. The same
day a law was passed by which he was banished by name, and his
property was plundered and destroyed, a temple to Liberty being
erected on the site of his house in the city. During his exile
Cicero's manliness to some extent deserted him. He drifted from
place to place, seeking the protection of officials against
assassination, writing letters urging his supporters to agitate for his
recall, sometimes accusing them of lukewarmness and even
treachery, bemoaning the ingratitude of his' country or regretting
the course of action that had led to his outlawry, and suffering
from extreme depression over his separation from his wife and
children and the wreck of his political ambitions. Finally in
August, 57 B. C., the decree for his restoration was passed, and he
returned to Rome the next month, being received with immense
popular enthusiasm. During the next few years the renewal of the
understanding among the triumvirs shut Cicero out from any
leading part in politics, and he resumed his activity in the
law-courts, his most important case being, perhaps, the defence of
Milo for the murder. of Clodius, Cicero's most troublesome
enemy. This oration, in the revised form in which it has come
down to us, is ranked as among the finest specimens of the art of
the orator, though in its original form it failed to secure Milo's
acquittal. Meantime, Cicero was also devoting much time to
literary composition, and his letters show great dejection over the
political situation, and a somewhat wavering attitude towards the
various parties in the state. In 55 B. C. he went to Cilicia in Asia
Minor as proconsul, an office which he administered with
efficiency and integrity in civil affairs and with success in military.
He returned to Italy in the end of the following year, and he was
publicly thanked by the senate for his services, but disappointed in
his hopes for a triumph. The war for supremacy between Caesar
and Pompey which had for some time been gradually growing
more certain, broke out in 49 B.C., when Caesar led his army
across the Rubicon, and Cicero after much irresolution threw in his
lot with Pompey, who was overthrown the next year in the battle
of Pharsalus and later murdered in Egypt. Cicero returned to Italy,
where Caesar treated him magnanimously, and for some time he
devoted himself to philosophical and rhetorical writing. In 46 B.C.
he divorced his wife Terentia, to whom he had been married for
thirty years and married the young and wealthy Publilia in order to
relieve himself from financial difficulties; but her also he shortly
divorced. Caesar, who had now become supreme in Rome, was
assassinated in 44 B.C., and though Cicero was not a sharer in the
conspiracy, he seems to have approved the deed. In the confusion
which followed he supported the cause of the conspirators against
Antony; and when finally the triumvirate of Antony, Octavius, and
Lepidus was established, Cicero was included among the
proscribed, and on December 7, 43 B.C., he was killed by agents
of Antony. His head and hand were cut off and exhibited at Rome.
The most important orations of the last months of his life were the
fourteen "Philippics" delivered against Antony, and the price of
this enmity he paid with his life.
To his contemporaries Cicero was primarily the great forensic and
political orator of his time, and the fifty-eight speeches which have
come down to us bear testimony to the skill, wit, eloquence, and
Passion which gave him his pre-eminence. But these speeches of
necessity deal with the minute details of the occasions which
called them forth, and so require for their appreciation a full
knowledge of the history, political and personal, of the time. The
letters, on the other hand, are less elaborate both in style and in the
handling of current events, while they serve to reveal his
personality, and to throw light upon Roman life in the last days of
the Republic in an extremely vivid fashion. Cicero as a man, in
spite of his self-importance, the vacillation of his political conduct
in desperate crises, and the whining despondency of his times of
adversity, stands out as at bottom a patriotic Roman of substantial
honesty, who gave his life to check the inevitable fall of the
commonwealth to which he was devoted. The evils which were
undermining the Republic bear so many striking resemblances to
those which threaten the civic and national life of America to-day
that the interest of the period is by no means merely historical.
As a philosopher, Cicero's most important function was to make
his countrymen familiar with the main schools of Greek thought.
Much of this writing is thus of secondary interest to us in
comparison with his originals, but in the fields of religious theory
and of the application of philosophy to life he made important
first-hand contributions. From these works have been selected the
two treatises, on Old Age and on Friendship, which have proved of
most permanent and widespread interest to posterity, and which
give a clear impression of the way in which a high-minded Roman
thought about some of the main problems' of human life.
On Friendship
by Marcus Tullius Cicero translated by E. S. Shuckburgh
THE augur Quintus Mucius Scaevola used to recount a number of
stories about his father-in-law Galus Laelius, accurately
remembered and charmingly told; and whenever he talked about
him always gave him the title of "the wise" without any hesitation.
I had been introduced by my father to Scaevola as soon as I had
assumed the _toga virilis_, and I took advantage of the
introduction never to quit the venerable man's side as long as I was
able to stay and he was spared to us. The consequence was that I
committed to memory many disquisitions of his, as well as many
short pointed apophthegms, and, in short, took as much advantage
of his wisdom as I could. When he died, I attached myself to
Scaevola the Pontifex, whom I may venture to call quite the most
distinguished of our countrymen for ability and uprightness. But
of this latter I shall take other occasions to speak. To return to
Scaevola the augur. Among many other occasions I particularly
remember one. He was sitting on a semicircular garden-bench, as
was his custom, when I and a very few intimate friends were there,
and he chanced to turn the conversation upon a subject which
about that time was in many people's mouths. You must
remember, Atticus, for you were very intimate with Publius
Sulpicius, what expressions of astonishment, or even indignation,
were called forth by his mortal quarrel, as tribune, with the consul
Quintus Pompeius, with whom he had formerly lived on terms of
the closest intimacy and affection. Well, on this occasion,
happening to mention this particular circumstance, Scaevola
detailed to us a discourse of Laelius on friendship delivered to
himself and Laelius's other son-in-law Galus Fannius, son of
Marcus Fannius, a few days after the death of Africanus. The
points of that discussion I committed to memory, and have
arranged them in this book at my own discretion. For I have
brought the speakers, as it were, personally on to my stage to
prevent the constant "said I" and "said he" of a narrative, and to
give the discourse the air of being orally delivered in our hearing.
You have often urged me to write something on Friendship, and I
quite acknowledged that the subject seemed one worth everybody's
investigation, and specially suited to the close intimacy that has
existed between you and me. Accordingly I was quite ready to
benefit the public at your request.
As to the _dramatis personae_. In the treatise on Old Age, which I
dedicated to you, I introduced Cato as chief speaker. No one, I
thought, could with greater propriety speak on old age than one
who had been an old man longer than any one else, and had been
exceptionally vigorous in his old age. Similarly, having learnt from
tradition that of all friendships that between Gaius Laelius and
Publius Scipio was the most remarkable, I thought Laelius was just
the person to support the chief part in a discussion on friendship
which Scaevola remembered him to have actually taken.
Moreover, a discussion of this sort gains somehow in weight from
the authority of men of ancient days, especially if they happen to
have been distinguished. So it comes about that in reading over
what I have myself written I have a feeling at times that it is
actually Cato that is speaking, not I.
Finally, as I sent the former essay to you as a gift from one old
man to another, so I have dedicated this _On Friendship_ as a most
affectionate friend to his friend. In the former Cato spoke, who
was the oldest and wisest man of his day; in this Laelius speaks on
friendship-Laelius, who was at once a wise man (that was the title
given him) and eminent for his famous friendship. Please forget
me for a while; imagine Laelius to be speaking.
Gaius Fannius and Quintus Mucius come to call on their
father-in-law after the death of Africanus. They start the subject;
Laelius answers them. And the whole essay on friendship is his. In
reading it you will recognise a picture of yourself.
2. _Fannius_. You are quite right, Laelius! there never was a better
or more illustrious character than Africanus. But you should
consider that at the present moment all eyes are on you. Everybody
calls you "the wise" _par excellence_, and thinks you so. The same
mark of respect was lately paid Cato, and we know that in the last
generation Lucius Atilius was called "the wise." But in both cases
the word was applied with a certain difference. Atilius was so
called from his reputation as a jurist; Cato got the name as a kind
of honorary title and in extreme old age because of his varied
experience of affairs, and his reputation for foresight and firmness,
and the sagacity of the opinions which he delivered in senate and
forum. You, however, are regarded as wise in a somewhat
different sense not alone on account of natural ability and
character, but also from your industry and learning; and not in the
sense in which the vulgar, but that in which scholars, give that
title. In this sense we do not read of any one being called wise in
Greece except one man at Athens; and he, to be sure, had been
declared by the oracle of Apollo also to be "the supremely wise
man." For those who commonly go by the name of the Seven
Sages are not admitted into the category of the wise by fastidious
critics. Your wisdom people believe to consist in this, that you
look upon yourself as self-sufficing and regard the changes and
chances of mortal life as powerless to affect your virtue.
Accordingly they are always asking me, and doubtless also our
Scaevola here, how you bear the death of Africanus. This curiosity
has been the more excited from the fact that on the Nones of this
month, when we augurs met as usual in the suburban villa of
Decimus Brutus for consultation, you were not present, though it
had always been your habit to keep that appointment and perform
that duty with the utmost punctuality.
_Scaevola_. Yes, indeed, Laelius, I am often asked the question
mentioned by Fannius. But I answer in accordance with what I
have observed: I say that you bear in a reasonable manner the grief
which you have sustained in the death of one who was at once a
man of the most illustrious character and a very dear friend. That
of course you could not but be affected-anything else would have
been wholly unnatural in a man of your gentle nature-but that the
cause of your non-attendance at our college meeting was illness,
not melancholy.
_Laelius_. Thanks, Scaevola! You are quite right; you spoke the
exact truth. For in fact I had no right to allow myself to be
withdrawn from a duty which I had regularly performed, as long as
I was well, by any personal misfortune; nor do I think that anything
that can happen will cause a man of principle to intermit a duty.
As for your telling me, Fannius, of the honourable appellation
given me (an appellation to which I do not recognise my title, and
to which I make no claim), you doubtless act from feelings of
affection; but I must say that you seem to me to do less than justice
to Cato. If any one was ever "wise,"-of which I have my doubts,-he
was. Putting aside everything else, consider how he bore his son's
death! I had not forgotten Paulus; I had seen with my own eyes
Gallus. But they lost their sons when mere children; Cato his
when he was a full-grown man with an assured reputation. Do not
therefore be in a hurry to reckon as Cato's superior even that same
famous personage whom Apollo, as you say, declared to be "the
wisest." Remember the former's reputation rests on deeds, the
latter's on words.
3. Now, as far as I am concerned (I speak to both of you now),
believe me the case stands thus. If I were to say that I am not
affected by regret for Scipio, I must leave the philosophers to
justify my conduct, but in point of fact I should be telling a lie.
Affected of course I am by the loss of a friend as I think there will
never be again, such as I can fearlessly say there never was before.
But I stand in no need of medicine. I can find my own consolation,
and it consists chiefly in my being free from the mistaken notion
which generally causes pain at the departure of friends. To Scipio I
am convinced no evil has befallen mine is the disaster, if disaster
there be; and to be severely distressed at one's own misfortunes
does not show that you love your friend, but that you love yourself.
As for him, who can say that all is not more than well? For, unless
he had taken the fancy to wish for immortality, the last thing of
which he ever thought, what is there for which mortal man may
wish that he did not attain? In his early manhood he more than
justified by extraordinary personal courage the hopes which his
fellow-citizens had conceived of him as a child. He never was a
candidate for the consulship, yet was elected consul twice: the first
time before the legal age; the second at a time which, as far as he
was concerned, was soon enough, but was near being too late for
the interests of the State. By the overthrow of two cities which
were the most bitter enemies of our Empire, he put an end not only
to the wars then raging, but also to the possibility of others in the
future. What need to mention the exquisite grace of his manners,
his dutiful devotion to his mother, his generosity to his sisters, his
liberality to his relations, the integrity of his conduct to every one?
You know all this already. Finally, the estimation in which his
fellow-citizens held him has been shown by the signs of mourning
which accompanied his obsequies. What could such a man have
gained by the addition of a few years? Though age need not be a
burden,-as I remember Cato arguing in the presence of myself and
Scipio two years before he died,-yet it cannot but take away the
vigour and freshness which Scipio was still enjoying. We may
conclude therefore that his life, from the good fortune which had
attended him and the glory he had obtained, was so circumstanced
that it could not be bettered, while the suddenness of his death
saved him the sensation of dying. As to the manner of his death it
is difficult to speak; you see what people suspect. Thus much,
however, I may say: Scipio in his lifetime saw many days of
supreme triumph and exultation, but none more magnificent than
his last, on which, upon the rising of the Senate, he was escorted
by the senators and the people of Rome, by the allies, and by the
Latins, to his own door. From such an elevation of popular esteem
the next step seems naturally to be an ascent to the gods above,
rather than a descent to Hades.
4. For I am not one of these modern philosophers who maintain
that our souls perish with our bodies, and that death ends all. With
me ancient opinion has more weight: whether it be that of our own
ancestors, who attributed such solemn observances to the dead, as
they plainly would not have done if they had believed them to be
wholly annihilated; or that of the philosophers who once visited
this country, and who by their maxims and doctrines educated
Magna Graecia, which at that time was in a flourishing condition,
though it has now been ruined; or that of the man who was
declared by Apollo's oracle to be "most wise," and who used to
teach without the variation which is to be found in most
philosophers that "the souls of men are divine, and that when they
have quitted the body a return to heaven is open to them, least
difficult to those who have been most virtuous and just." This
opinion was shared by Scipio. Only a few days before his death-as
though he had a presentiment of what was coming-he discoursed
for three days on the state of the republic. The company consisted
of Philus and Manlius and several others, and I had brought you,
Scaevola, along with me. The last part of his discourse referred
principally to the immortality of the soul; for he told us what he
had heard from the elder Africanus in a dream. Now if it be true
that in proportion to a man's goodness the escape from what may
be called the prison and bonds of the flesh is easiest, whom can we
imagine to have had an easier voyage to the gods than Scipio? I am
disposed to think, therefore, that in his case mourning would be a
sign of envy rather than of friendship. If, however, the truth rather
is that the body and soul perish together, and that no sensation
remains, then though there is nothing good in death, at least there
is nothing bad. Remove sensation, and a man is exactly as though
he had never been born; and yet that this man was born is a joy to
me, and will be a subject of rejoicing to this State to its last hour.
Wherefore, as I said before, all is as well as possible with him. Not
so with me; for as I entered life before him, it would have been
fairer for me to leave it also before him. Yet such is the pleasure I
take in recalling our friendship, that I look upon my life as having
been a happy one because I have spent it with Scipio. With him I
was associated in public and private business; with him I lived in
Rome and served abroad; and between us there was the most
complete harmony in our tastes, our pursuits, and our sentiments,
which is the true secret of friendship. It is not therefore in that
reputation for wisdom mentioned just now by Fannius-especially
as it happens to be groundless-that I find my happiness so much, as
in the hope that the memory of our friendship will be lasting. What
makes me care the more about this is the fact that in all history
there are scarcely three or four pairs of friends on record; and it is
classed with them that I cherish a hope of the friendship of Scipio
and Laelius being known to posterity.
_Fannius_. Of course that must be so, Laelius. But since you have
mentioned the word friendship, and we are at leisure, you would
be doing me a great kindness, and I expect Scaevola also, if you
would do as it is your habit to do when asked questions on other
subjects, and tell us your sentiments about friendship, its nature,
and the rules to be observed in regard to it.
_Scaevola_. I shall of course be delighted. Fannius has anticipated
the very request I was about to make. So you will be doing us both
a great favour.
5. _Laelius_. I should ccrtainly have no objection if I felt
confidence in myself. For the theme is a noble one, and we are (as
Fannius has said) at leisure. But who am I? and what ability have
I? What you propose is all very well for professional philosophers,
who are used, particularly if Greeks, to have the subject for
discussion proposed to them on the spur of the moment. It is a
task of considerable difficulty, and requires no little practice.
Therefore for a set discourse on friendship you must go, I think, to
professional lecturers. All I can do is to urge on you to regard
friendship as the greatest thing in the world; for there is nothing
which so fits in with our nature, or is so exactly what we want in
prosperity or adversity.
But I must at the very beginning lay down this principle-
_friendship can only exist between good men_. I do not, however,
press this too closely, like the philosophers who push their
definitions to a superfluous accuracy. They have truth on their
side, perhaps, but it is of no practical advantage. Those, I mean,
who say that no one but the "wise" is "good." Granted, by all
means. But the "wisdom" they mean is one to which no mortal
ever yet attained. We must concern ourselves with the facts of
everyday life as we find it-not imaginary and ideal perfections.
Even Gaius Fannius, Manius Curius, and Tiberius Coruncanius,
whom our ancestors decided to be "wise," I could never declare to
be so according to their standard. Let them, then, keep this word
"wisdom" to themselves. Everybody is irritated by it; no one
understands what it means. Let them but grant that the men I
mentioned were "good." No, they won't do that either. No one but
the "wise" can be allowed that title, say they. Well, then, let us
dismiss them and manage as best we may with our own poor
mother wit, as the phrase is.
We mean then by the "good" _those whose actions and lives leave
no question as to their honour, purity, equity, and liberality; who
are free from greed, lust, and violence; and who have the courage
of their convictions_. The men I have just named may serve as
examples. Such men as these being generally accounted "good,"
let us agree to call them so, on the ground that to the best of
human ability they follow nature as the most perfect guide to a
good life.
Now this truth seems clear to me, that nature has so formed us that
a certain tie unites us all, but that this tie becomes stronger from
proximity. So it is that fellow-citizens are preferred in our
affections to foreigners, relations to strangers; for in their case
Nature herself has caused a kind of friendship to exist, though it is
one which lacks some of the elements of permanence. Friendship
excels relationship in this, that whereas you may eliminate
affection from relationship, you cannot do so from friendship.
Without it relationship still exists in name, friendship does not.
You may best understand this friendship by considering that,
whereas the merely natural ties uniting the human race are
indefinite, this one is so concentrated, and confined to so narrow a
sphere, that affection is ever shared by two persons only or at most
by a few.
6. Now friendship may be thus defined: a complete accord on all
subjects human and divine, joined with mutual goodwill and
affection. And with the exception of wisdom, I am inclined to
think nothing better than this has been given to man by the
immortal gods. There are people who give the palm to riches or to
good health, or to power and office, many even to sensual
pleasures. This last is the ideal of brute beasts; and of the others
we may say that they are frail and uncertain, and depend less on
our own prudence than on the caprice of fortune. Then there are
those who find the "chief good" in virtue. Well, that is a noble
doctrine. But the very virtue they talk of is the parent and
preserver of friendship, and without it friendship cannot possibly
exist.
Let us, I repeat, use the word virtue in the ordinary acceptation and
meaning of the term, and do not let us define it in high-flown
language. Let us account as good the persons usually considered
so, such as Paulus, Cato, Gallus, Scipio, and Philus. Such men as
these are good enough for everyday life; and we need not trouble
ourselves about those ideal characters which are nowhere to be
met with.
Well, between men like these the advantages of friendship are
almost more than I can say. To begin with, how can life he worth
living, to use the words of Ennius, which lacks that repose which
is to be found in the mutual good-will of a friend? What can be
more delightful than to have some one to whom you can say
everything with the same absolute confidence as to yourself? Is
not prosperity robbed of half its value if you have no one to share
your joy? On the other hand, misfortunes would be hard to bear if
there were not some one to feel them even more acutely than
yourself. In a word, other objects of ambition serve for particular
ends-riches for use, power for securing homage, office for
reputation, pleasure for enjoyment, health for' freedom from pain
and the full use of the functions of the body. But friendship
embraces innumerable advantages. Turn which way you please,
you will find it at hand. It is everywhere; and yet never out of
place, never unwelcome. Fire and water themselves, to use a
common expression, are not of more universal use than friendship.
I am not now speaking of the common or modified form of it,
though even that is a source of pleasure and profit, but of that true
and complete friendship which existed between the select few who
are known to fame. Such friendship enhances prosperity, and
relieves adversity of its burden by halving and sharing it.
7. And great and numerous as are the blessings of friendship, this
certainly is the sovereign one, that it gives us bright hopes for the
future and forbids weakness and despair. In the face of a true
friend a man sees as it were a second self. So that where his friend
is he is; if his friend be rich, he is not poor; though he be weak, his
friend's strength is his; and in his friend's life he enjoys a second
life after his own is finished. This last is perhaps the most difficult
to conceive. But such is the effect of the respect, the loving
remembrance, and the regret of friends which follow us to the
grave. While they take the sting out of death, they add a glory to
the life of the survivors. Nay, if you eliminate from nature the tie
of affection, there will be an end of house and city, nor will so
much as the cultivation of the soil be left. If you don't see the
virtue of friendship and harmony, you may learn it by observing
the effects of quarrels and feuds. Was any family ever so well
established, any State so firmly settled, as to be beyond the reach
of utter destruction from animosities and factions? This may teach
you the immense advantage of friendship.
They say that a certain philosopher of Agrigentum, in a Greek
poem, pronounced with the authority of an oracle the doctrine that
whatever in nature and the universe was unchangeable was so in
virtue of the binding force of friendship; whatever was changeable
was so by the solvent power of discord. And indeed this is a truth
which everybody understands and practically attests by experience.
For if any marked instance of loyal friendship in confronting or
sharing danger comes to light, every one applauds it to the echo.
What cheers there were, for instance, all over the theatre at a
passage in the new play of my friend and guest Pacuvius; where
the king, not knowing which of the two was Orestes, Pylades
declared himself to be Orestes, that he might die in his stead, while
the real Orestes kept on asserting that it was he. The audience rose
_en masse_ and clapped their hands. And this was at an incident in
fiction: what would they have done, must we suppose, if it had
been in real life? You can easily see what a natural feeling it is,
when men who would not have had the resolution to act thus
themselves, shewed how right they thought it in another.
I don't think I have any more to say about friendship. If there is any
more, and I have no doubt there is much, you must, if you care to
do so, consult those who profess to discuss such matters.
_Fannius_. We would rather apply to you. Yet I have often
consulted such persons, and have heard what they had to say with a
certain satisfaction. But in your discourse one somehow feels that
there is a different strain.
_Scaevola_. You would have said that still more, Fannius, if you
had been present the other day in Scipio's pleasure-grounds when
we had the discussion about the State. How splendidly he stood up
for justice against Philus's elaborate speech.
_Fannius_. Ah! it was naturally easy for the justest of men to
stand up for justice.
_Scaevola_. Well, then, what about friendship? Who could
discourse on it more easily than the man whose chief glory is a
friendship maintained with the most absolute fidelity, constancy,
and integrity?
8. _Laclius_. Now you are really using force. It makes no
difference what kind of force you use: force it is. For it is neither
easy nor right to refuse a wish of my sons-in-law, particularly
when
the wish is a creditable one in itself.
Well, then, it has very often occurred to me when thinking about
friendship, that the chief point to be considered was this: is it
weakness and want of means that make friendship desired? I
mean, is its object an interchange of good offices, so that each may
give that in which he is strong, and receive that in which he is
weak? Or is it not rather true that, although this is an advantage
naturally belonging to friendship, yet its original cause is quite
other, prior in time, more noble in character, and springing more
directly from our nature itself? The Latin word for friendship-
_amicitia_-is derived from that for love-_amor_; and love is
certainly the prime mover in contracting mutual affection.
For as to material advantages, it often happens that those are
obtained even by men who are courted by a mere show of
friendship and treated with respect from interested motives. But
friendship by its nature admits of no feigning, no pretence: as far
as it goes it is both genuine and spontaneous. Therefore I gather
that friendship springs from a natural impulse rather than a wish
for help: from an inclination of the heart, combined with a certain
instinctive feeling of love, rather than from a deliberate calculation
of the material advantage it was likely to confer. The strength of
this feeling you may notice in certain animals. They show such
love to their offspring for a certain period, and are so beloved by
them, that they clearly have a share in this natural, instinctive
affection. But of course it is more evident in the case of man: first,
in the natural affection between children and their parents, an
affection which only shocking wickedness can sunder; and next,
when the passion of love has attained to a like strength-on our
finding, that is, some one person with whose character and nature
we are in full sympathy, because we think that we perceive in him
what I may call the beacon-light of virtue. For nothing inspires
love, nothing conciliates affection, like virtue. Why, in a certain
sense we may be said to feel affection even for men we have never
seen, owing to their honesty and virtue. Who, for instance, fails to
dwell on the memory of Gaius Fabricius and Manius Curius with
some affection and warmth of feeling, though he has never seen
them? Or who but loathes Tarquinius Superbus, Spurius Cassius,
Spurius Maelius? We have fought for empire in Italy with two
great generals, Pyrrhus and Hannibal. For the former, owing to his
probity, we entertain no great feelings of enmity: the latter, owing
to his cruelty, our country has detested and always will detest.
9. Now, if the attraction of probity is so great that we can love it
not only in those whom we have never seen, but, what is more,
actually in an enemy, we need not be surprised if men's affections
are roused when they fancy that they have seen virtue and
goodness in those with whom a close intimacy is possible. I do not
deny that affection is strengthened by the actual receipt of benefits,
as well as by the perception of a wish to render service, combined
with a closer intercourse. When these are added to the original
impulse of the heart, to which I have alluded, a quite surprising
warmth of feeling springs up. And if any one thinks that this
comes from a sense of weakness, that each may have some one to
help him to his particular need, all I can say is that, when he
maintains it to be born of want and poverty, he allows to friendship
an origin very base, and a pedigree, if I may be allowed the
expression, far from noble. If this had been the case, a man's
inclination to friendship would be exactly in proportion to his low
opinion of his own resources. Whereas the truth is quite the other
way. For when a man's confidence in himself is greatest, when he
is so fortified by virtue and wisdom as to want nothing and to feel
absolutely self-dependent, it is then that he is most conspicuous for
seeking out and keeping up friendships. Did Africanus, for
example, want anything of me? Not the least in the world!
Neither did I of him. In my case it was an admiration of his virtue,
in his an opinion, may be, which he entertained of my character,
that caused our affection. Closer intimacy added to the warmth of
our feelings. But though many great material advantages did
ensue, they were not the source from which our affection
proceeded. For as we are not beneficent and liberal with any view
of extorting gratitude, and do not regard an act of kindness as an
investment, but follow a natural inclination to liberality; so we
look on friendship as worth trying for, not because we are attracted
to it by the expectation of ulterior gain, but in the conviction that
what it has to give us is from first to last included in the feeling
itself.
Far different is the view of those who, like brute beasts, refer
everything to sensual pleasure. And no wonder. Men who have
degraded all their powers of thought to an object so mean and
contemptible can of course raise their eyes to nothing lofty, to
nothing grand and divine. Such persons indeed let us leave out of
the present question. And let us accept the doctrine that the
sensation of love and the warmth of inclination have their origin in
a spontaneous feeling which arises directly the presence of probity
is indicated. When once men have conceived the inclination, they
of course try to attach themselves to the object of it, and move
themselves nearer and nearer to him. Their aim is that they may be
on the same footing and the same level in regard to affection, and
be more inclined to do a good service than to ask a return, and that
there should be this noble rivalry between them. Thus both truths
will be established. We shall get the most important material
advantages from friendship; and its origin from a natural impulse
rather than from a sense of need will be at once more dignified and
more in accordance with fact. For if it were true that its material
advantages cemented friendship, it would be equally true that any
change in them would dissolve it. But nature being incapable of
change, it follows that genuine friendships are eternal.
So much for the origin of friendship. But perhaps you would not
care to hear any more.
_Fannius_. Nay, pray go on; let us have the rest, Laelius. I take on
myself to speak for my friend here as his senior.
_Scaevola_. Quite right! Therefore, pray let us hear.
10. _Loelius_. Well, then, my good friends, listen to some
conversations about friendship which very frequently passed
between Scipio and myself. I must begin by telling you, however,
that be used to say that the most difficult thing in the world was for
a friendship to remain unimpaired to the end of life. So many
things might intervene: conflicting interests; differences of opinion
in politics; frequent changes in character, owing sometimes to
misfortunes, sometimes to advancing years. He used to illustrate
these facts from the analogy of boyhood, since the warmest
affections between boys are often laid aside with the boyish toga;
and even if they did manage to keep them up to adolescence, they
were sometimes broken by a rivalry in courtship, or for some other
advantage to which their mutual claims were not compatible.
Even if the friendship was prolonged beyond that time, yet it
frequently received a rude shock should the two happen to be
competitors for office. For while the most fatal blow to friendship
in the majority of cases was the lust of gold, in the case of the best
men it was a rivalry for office and reputation, by which it had
often happened that the most violent enmity had arisen between
the closest friends.
Again, wide breaches and, for the most part, justifiable ones were
caused by an immoral request being made of friends, to pander to
a man's unholy desires or to assist him in inflicting a wrong. A