De Amicitia, Scipio's Dream · 14 of 30

De Amicitia, Chapter 13

13. Let this, then, be enacted as the first law of friendship, that we demand of friends only what is right, and that we do for the sake of friends only what is right. [Footnote: This is a virtual repetition of the law of friendship announced at the beginning of the previous section, and Cicero probably so intended it. He states the rule, then demonstrates its validity, then repeats it in an almost identical form, implying what the mathematician expresses when he puts at the end of a demonstration Quod èrat demonstrandum. ] This understood, let us not wait to be asked. Let there be constant assiduity and no loitering in a friend's service. Let us also dare to give advice freely; for in friendship the authority of friends who give good counsel may be of the greatest value. Let admonition be administered, too, not only in plain terms, but even with severity, if need be, and let heed be given to such admonition. On this subject some things that appear to me strange have, as I am told, been maintained by certain Greeks who are accounted as philosophers, and are so skilled in sophistry that there is nothing which they cannot seem to prove. Some of them hold that very intimate friendships are to be avoided; that there is no need that one feel solicitude for others; that it is enough and more than enough to take care of your own concerns, and annoying to be involved to any considerable extent in affairs not belonging to you; that the best way is to have the reins of friendship as loose as possible, so that you can tighten them or let them go at pleasure; for, according to them, ease is the chief essential to happy living, and this the mind cannot enjoy, if it bears, as it were, the pains of travail in behalf of a larger or smaller circle of friends. [Footnote: This passage seems to be a paraphrase of a passage in the Hippolytus of Euripides, in which the Nurse says: "It behooves mortals to form moderate friendships with one another, and not to the very marrow of the soul, and the affections of the mind should be held loosely, so that we may slacken or tighten them. That one soul should be in travail for two is a heavy burden." Euripides was regarded, and rightly, as no less a philosopher than a tragedian, and was not infrequently styled [Greek: sophos]. Cicero here veils his thorough conversance with Greek literature and philosophy, and assumes the part of Laelius, in whose time, though Greek was not omitted in the education of cultivated men, the study was comparatively new, and was not carried to any great extent.]

Others, [Footnote: The Epicureans.] I am told, with even much less of true human feeling, teach what I touched upon briefly a little while ago, that friendships are to be sought for defence and help, not on account of good-will and affection. The less of self-confidence and the less of strength one has, the more is he inclined to make friends. Thus it is that women [Footnote: Latin, mulierculae, a diminutive, meaning, however, not little women, but denoting the feebleness and dependence of women in comparison with men. It must be confessed, too, that the term is sometimes used, and perhaps here, semi-contemptuously; for the Roman man felt an overweening pride in mere manhood.] seek the support of friendship more than men do, the poor more than the rich, the unfortunate more than those who seem happy. Oh, pre-eminent wisdom! It is like taking the sun out of the world, to bereave human life of friendship, than which the immortal gods have given man nothing better, nothing more gladdening. What is the ease of which they speak? It is indeed pleasing in aspect, but on many occasions it is to be renounced; for it is not fitting, in order to avoid solicitude, either to refuse to undertake any right cause or act, or to drop it after it is undertaken. If we flee from care, we must flee from virtue, which of necessity with no little care spurns and abhors its opposites, as goodness spurns and abhors wickedness; temperance, excess; courage, cowardice. Thus you may see that honest men are excessively grieved by the dishonest, the brave by the pusillanimous, those who lead sober lives by the dissolute. It is indeed characteristic of a well-ordered mind to rejoice in what is good and to be grieved by the opposite. If then, pain of mind fall to the lot of a wise man as it must of necessity unless we imagine his mind divested of its humanity, why should we take friendship wholly out of life, lest we experience some little trouble on account of it? Yet more, if emotion be eliminated, what difference is there, I say not between a man and a brute, but between a man and a rock, or the trunk of a tree, or any inanimate object? Nor are those to be listened to, who regard virtue as something hard and iron-like. [Footnote: Here, undoubtedly, Cicero refers to the sterner type of Stoicism, which in his time was already obsolescent, and was yielding place to the milder, while no less rigid, ethics of which the De Officiis may be regarded as the manual.] As in many other matters, so in friendship, it is tender and flexible so that it expands, as it were, with a friend's well being, and shrinks when his peace is disturbed. Therefore the pain which must often be incurred on a friend's account is not of sufficient moment to banish friendship from human life, any more than the occasional care and trouble which the virtues bring should be a reason for renouncing them.