Treatises on Friendship and Old Age
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 he 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 refusal, though
perfectly right, is attacked by those to whom they refuse compliance
as a violation of the laws of friendship. Now the people who have no
scruples as to the requests they make to their friends, thereby allow
that they are ready to have no scruples as to what they will do for
their friends; and it is the recriminations of such people which
commonly not only quench friendships, but give rise to lasting enmities.
"In fact," he used to say, "these fatalities overhang friendship in such
numbers that it requires not only wisdom but good luck also to escape
them all."
11. With these premises, then, let us first, if you please, examine
the question--how far ought personal feeling to go in friendship? For
instance: suppose Coriolanus to have had friends, ought they to have
joined him in invading his country? Again, in the case of Vecellinus
or Spurius Maelius, ought their friends to have assisted them in their
attempt to establish a tyranny? Take two instances of either line of
conduct. When Tiberius Gracchus attempted his revolutionary measures he
was deserted, as we saw, by Quintus Tubero and the friends of his own
standing. On the other hand, a friend of your own family, Scaevola,
Gaius Blossius of Cumae, took a different course. I was acting as
assessor to the consuls Laenas and Rupilius to try the conspirators,
and Blossius pleaded for my pardon on the ground that his regard for
Tiberius Gracchus had been so high that he looked upon his wishes as
law. "Even if he had wished you to set fire to the Capitol?" said I.
"That is a thing," he replied, "that he never would have wished." "Ah,
but if he had wished it?" said I. "I would have obeyed." The wickedness
of such a speech needs no comment. And in point of fact he was as good
and better than his word for he did not wait for orders in the audacious
proceedings of Tiberius Gracchus, but was the head and front of them,
and was a leader rather than an abettor of his madness. The result
of his infatuation was that he fled to Asia, terrified by the special
commission appointed to try him, joined the enemies of his country, and
paid a penalty to the republic as heavy as it was deserved. I conclude,
then, that the plea of having acted in the interests of a friend is not
a valid excuse for a wrong action. For, seeing that a belief in a man's
virtue is the original cause of friendship, friendship can hardly remain
if virtue he abandoned. But if we decide it to be right to grant our
friends whatever they wish, and to ask them for whatever we wish,
perfect wisdom must be assumed on both sides if no mischief is to
happen. But we cannot assume this perfect wisdom; for we are speaking
only of such friends as are ordinarily to be met with, whether we have
actually seen them or have been told about them--men, that is to say, of
everyday life. I must quote some examples of such persons, taking care
to select such as approach nearest to our standard of wisdom. We read,
for instance, that Papus Aemilius was a close friend of Gaius Luscinus.
History tells us that they were twice consuls together, and colleagues
in the censorship. Again, it is on record that Manius Curius and
Tiberius Coruncanius were on the most intimate terms with them and with
each other. Now, we cannot even suspect that any one of these men ever
asked of his friend anything that militated against his honour or his
oath or the interests of the republic. In the case of such men as these
there is no point in saying that one of them would not have obtained
such a request if he had made it; for they were men of the most
scrupulous piety, and the making of such a request would involve a
breach of religious obligation no less than the granting it. However,
it is quite true that Gaius Carbo and Gaius Cato did follow Tiberius
Gracchus; and though his brother Caius Gracchus did not do so at the
time, he is now the most eager of them all.
12. We may then lay down this rule of friendship--neither ask nor
consent to do what is wrong. For the plea "for friendship's sake" is a
discreditable one, and not to be admitted for a moment. This rule
holds good for all wrong-doing, but more especially in such as involves
disloyalty to the republic. For things have come to such a point with
us, my dear Fannius and Scaevola, that we are bound to look somewhat far
ahead to what is likely to happen to the republic. The constitution, as
known to our ancestors, has already swerved somewhat from the regular
course and the lines marked out for it. Tiberius Gracchus made an
attempt to obtain the power of a king, or, I might rather say, enjoyed
that power for a few months. Had the Roman people ever heard or seen
the like before? What the friends and connexions that followed him, even
after his death, have succeeded in doing in the case of Publius Scipio
I cannot describe without tears. As for Carbo, thanks to the punishment
recently inflicted on Tiberius Gracchus, we have by hook or by crook
managed to hold out against his attacks. But what to expect of the
tribuneship of Caius Gracchus I do not like to forecast. One thing
leads to another; and once set going, the downward course proceeds with
ever-increasing velocity. There is the case of the ballot: what a blow
was inflicted first by the lex Gabinia, and two years afterwards by the
lex Cassia! I seem already to see the people estranged from the Senate,
and the most important affairs at the mercy of the multitude. For you
may be sure that more people will learn how to set such things in motion
than how to stop them. What is the point of these remarks? This: no one
ever makes any attempt of this sort without friends to help him. We
must therefore impress upon good men that, should they become inevitably
involved in friendships with men of this kind, they ought not to
consider themselves under any obligation to stand by friends who are
disloyal to the republic. Bad men must have the fear of punishment
before their eyes: a punishment not less severe for those who follow
than for those who lead others to crime. Who was more famous and
powerful in Greece than Themistocles? At the head of the army in the
Persian war he had freed Greece; he owed his exile to personal envy: but
he did not submit to the wrong done him by his ungrateful country as
he ought to have done. He acted as Coriolanus had acted among us twenty
years before. But no one was found to help them in their attacks upon
their fatherland. Both of them accordingly committed suicide.
We conclude, then, not only that no such confederation of evilly
disposed men must be allowed to shelter itself under the plea of
friendship, but that, on the contrary, it must be visited with the
severest punishment, lest the idea should prevail that fidelity to a
friend justifies even making war upon one's country. And this is a case
which I am inclined to think, considering how things are beginning to
go, will sooner or later arise. And I care quite as much what the state
of the constitution will be after my death as what it is now.
13. Let this, then, be laid down as the first law of friendship, that
_we should ask from friends, and do for friends', only what is good_.
But do not let us wait to be asked either: let there be ever an eager
readiness, and an absence of hesitation. Let us have the courage to give
advice with candour. In friendship, let the influence of friends who
give good advice be paramount; and let this influence be used to enforce
advice not only in plain-spoken terms, but sometimes, if the case
demands it, with sharpness; and when so used, let it be obeyed.
I give you these rules because I believe that some wonderful opinions
are entertained by certain persons who have, I am told, a reputation for
wisdom in Greece. There is nothing in the world, by the way, beyond the
reach of their sophistry. Well, some of them teach that we should avoid
very close friendships, for fear that one man should have to endure the