De Amicitia, Scipio's Dream · Marcus Tullius Cicero
CICERO DE AMICITIA
12. As to friendship, then, let this law be enacted, that we neither ask of a friend what is wrong, nor do what is wrong at a friend's request. The plea that it was for a friend's sake is a base apology,--one that should never be admitted with regard to other forms of guilt, and certainly not as to crimes against the State. We, indeed, Fannius and Scaevola, are so situated that we ought to look far in advance for the perils that our country may incur. Already has our public policy deviated somewhat from the method and course of our ancestors. Tiberius Gracchus attempted to exercise supreme power; nay, he really reigned for a few months. What like this had the Roman people ever heard or seen before? What, after his death, the friends and kindred who followed him did in their revenge on Publius Scipio [Footnote: Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica, who took the lead of the Senate in the assassination of Tiberius Gracchus, and incurred such popular odium that he could not safely stay in Rome.
He was sent on a fictitious mission to Asia to get him out of the way of the people, and not daring to return, wandered with no settled habitation till his death at Pergamum not long before the assumed date of this dialogue.] I cannot say without tears. We put up with Carbo [Footnote: Carbo succeeded Tiberius Gracchus on the commission for carrying the agrarian law into execution, and was shortly afterward chosen Tribune. He then proposed a law, permitting a tribune to be re-elected for an indefinite number of years. This law was vehemently opposed by Scipio Africanus the Younger, and if he was really killed by Carbo, it was probably on account of his hostility to Carbo's ambitious schemes.] as well as we could in consideration of the recent punishment of Tiberius Gracchus; but I am in no mood to predict what is to be expected from the tribuneship of Caius Gracchus. Meanwhile the evil is creeping upon us, from its very beginning fraught with threats of ruin. Before recent events, [Footnote: The reference undoubtedly here is to the Papirian law which had just been passed before the assumed date of this dialogue, having been proposed and carried through by (Caius _Papirius_) Carbo.
By this law the use of the ballot was established in all matters of popular legislation.] you perceive how much degeneracy was indicated in the legalization of the ballot, first by Gabinian, [Footnote: By which magistrates were to be chosen by ballot.] then two years later by the Cassian law. [Footnote: By which the judges were to be chosen by ballot. With reference to the use of the ballot the parties in Rome were prototypes of like parties in England. The voice of the people was for the ballot, on the ground that it made suffrage free, as it could not be when employers or patrons could dictate to their dependents and make them suffer for failure to vote in favor of their own candidates or measures. The aristocratic party opposed the ballot as fatal to their controlling influence, which many sincere patriots, like Cicero, regarded as essential to the public safety, while patrician demagogues, intriguers, and office-seekers made it subservient to their own selfish or partisan interests.] I seem already to see the people utterly alienated from the Senate, and the most important affairs determined by the will of the multitude; for more persons will learn how these things are brought about than how they may be resisted. To what purpose am I saying this?
Because no one makes such attempts without associates. It is therefore to be enjoined on good men that they must not think themselves so bound that they cannot renounce their friends when they are guilty of crimes against the State. But punishment must be inflicted on all who are implicated in such guilt,--on those who follow, no less than on those who lead. Who in Greece was more renowned than Themistocles? Who had greater influence than he had? When as commander in the Persian war he had freed Greece from bondage, and for envy of his fame was driven into exile, he did not bear as he ought the ill treatment of his ungrateful country. He did what Coriolanus had done with us twenty years before. Neither of these men found any helper against his country; [Footnote: No one of his own fellow-countrymen.] they therefore both committed suicide. [Footnote: If the story of Coriolanus be not a myth, as Niebuhr supposes it to be, his suicide forms no part of the story as Livy tells it. The suicide of Themistocles is related as a supposition, not as an established fact. If he died of poison, as was said, it may have been administered by a rival in the favor of Artaxerxes.] Association with depraved men for such an end is not, then, to be shielded by the plea of friendship, but rather to be avenged by punishment of the utmost severity, so that no one may ever think himself authorized to follow a friend to the extent of making war upon his country,--an extremity which, indeed, considering the course that our public affairs have begun to take, may, for aught I know, be reached at some future time. I speak thus because I feel no less concern for the fortunes of the State after my death than as to its present condition.
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.
14. Since virtue attracts friendship, as I have said, if there shines forth any manifestation of virtue with which a mind similarly disposed can come into contact and union from such intercourse love must of necessity spring. For what is so absurd as to be charmed with many things that have no substantial worth, as with office, fame, architecture, dress, and genteel appearance, but not to be in any wise charmed by a mind endowed with virtue, and capable of either loving or--if I may use the word--re-loving? [Footnote: Latin, _redamare_, a word coined by Cicero, and used with the apology, _ut ita dicam_] Nothing indeed yields a richer revenue than kind affections, nothing gives more delight than the interchange of friendly cares and offices. Then if we add, as we rightly may, that there is nothing which so allures and attracts aught else to itself as the likeness of character does to friendship it will certainly be admitted that good men love good men and adopt them into fellowship as if united with them by kindred and by nature. By nature I say, for nothing is more craving or greedy of its like than nature. This, then as I think, is evident, Fannius and Scaevola that among the good toward the good there cannot but be mutual kind feeling and in this we have a fountain of friendship established by nature.
But the same kind feeling extends to the community at large. For virtue is not unsympathetic, nor unserviceable, [Footnote: Latin, _immunis_, literally--without office.] nor proud. It is wont even to watch over the well-being of whole nations, and to give them the wisest counsel, which it would not do if it had no love for the people. Now those who maintain that friendships are formed from motives of utility annul, as it seems to me, the most endearing bond of friendship; for it is not so much benefit obtained through a friend as it is the very love of the friend that gives delight. What comes from a friend confers pleasure, only in case it bears tokens of his interest in us, and so far is it from the truth that friendships are cultivated from a sense of need, that those fully endowed with wealth and resources, especially with virtue, which is the surest safeguard, and thus in no need of friends, are the very persons who are the most generous and munificent. Indeed, I hardly know whether it may not be desirable that our friends should never have need of our services. Yet in the case of Scipio and myself, what room would there have been for the active exercise of my zeal in his behalf, had he never needed my counsel or help at home or in the field? In this instance, however, the service came after the friendship, not the friendship after the service.
15. If these things are so, men who are given up to pleasure are not to be listened to when they express their opinions about friendship, of which they can have no knowledge either by experience or by reflection. For, by the faith of gods and men, who is there that would be willing to have a superabundance of all objects of desire and to live in the utmost fulness of wealth and what wealth can bring, on condition of neither loving any one nor being loved by any one? This, indeed, is the life of tyrants, in which there is no good faith, no affection, no fixed confidence in kindly feeling, perpetual suspicion and anxiety, and no room for friendship; for who can love either him whom he fears, or him by whom he thinks that he is feared? Yet they receive the show of homage, but only while the occasion for it lasts. [Footnote: Latin, _dum taxat ad tempus_, that is, while the homage rendered is in close contact with the occasion,--with the immunity or profit to be purchased by it.]
If they chance to fall, as they commonly have fallen, they then ascertain how destitute of friends they have been, as Tarquin is reported to have said that he learned what faithful and what unfaithful friends he had, when he could no longer render back favors to those of either class,--although I wonder whether pride and insolence like his could have had any friends. Moreover, as his character could not have won real friends, so is the good fortune of many who occupy foremost places of influence so held as to preclude faithful friendships. Not only is Fortune blind, but she generally makes those blind whom she embraces. Thus they are almost always beside themselves under the influence of haughtiness and waywardness; nor can there be created anything more utterly insupportable than a fortune-favored fool. There are to be seen those who previously behaved with propriety who are changed by station, power, or prosperity, and who spurn their old friendships and lavish indulgence on the new. But what is more foolish than when men have resources, means, wealth at their fullest command, and can obtain horses, servants, splendid raiment, costly vases, whatever money can buy, for them not to procure friends, who are, if I may so speak, the best and the most beautiful furniture of human life? Other things which a man may procure know not him who procures them, nor do they labor for his sake,--indeed, they belong to him who can make them his by the right of superior strength. But every one has his own firm and sure possession of his friendships, while even if those things which seem the gifts of fortune remain, still life unadorned and deserted by friends cannot be happy. But enough has been said on this branch of our subject.
16. We must now determine the limits or bounds of friendship. On this subject I find three opinions proposed, neither of which has my approval,--the first, that we should do for our friends just what we would do for ourselves, the second, that our good offices to our friends should correspond in quantity and quality to those which they perform for us, the third, that one's friends should value him according to his own self-estimate. I cannot give unqualified assent to either of these opinions. The first--that one should be ready to do for his friends precisely what he would do for himself--is inadmissible. How many things there are that we do for our friends which we should never do on our own account!--such as making a request even an entreaty, of a man unworthy of respect or inveighing against some person with a degree of bitterness, nay, in terms of vehement reproach. In fine, we are perfectly right in doing in behalf of a friend things that in our own case would be decidedly unbecoming. There are also many ways in which good men detract largely from their own comfort or suffer it to be impaired, that a friend may have the enjoyment which they sacrifice.
The second opinion is that which limits kind offices and good will by the rule of equality. This is simply making friendship a matter of calculation with the view of keeping a debtor and creditor account evenly balanced. To me friendship seems more affluent and generous and not disposed to keep strict watch lest it may give more than it receives and to fear that a part of its due may be spilled over or suffered to leak out or that it may heap up its own measure over full in return. [Footnote: We have here, first, a figure drawn from pecuniary accounts, then one from liquid measure, then one from dry measure--all designed to affix the brand of the most petty meanness on the (so called) friendship which makes it a point neither to leave nor to brook a preponderance of obligation on either side.] But worst of all is the third limit which prescribes that friends shall take a man's opinion of himself as a measure for their estimate and treatment of him. There are some persons who are liable to fits of depression, or who have little hope of better fortune than the present.
In such a case, it is the part of a friend, not to hold the position toward his friend which he holds toward himself, but to make the efficient endeavor to rouse him from his despondency, and to lead him to better hope and a more cheerful train of thought. It remains for me then, to establish another limit of friendship. But first let me tell you what Scipio was wont to speak of with the severest censure. He maintained that no utterance could have been invented more inimical to friendship [Footnote: Latin, _inimciorem_ (that is, _in amiciorem_) _amicitiae_.] than that of him who said that one ought to love as if he were going at some future time to hate, nor could he be brought to believe that this maxim came, as was reported from Bias, who was one of the seven wise men, but he regarded it as having proceeded from some sordid person, who was either inordinately ambitious or desirous of bringing everything under his own control. For how can one be a friend to him to whom he thinks that he may possibly become an enemy?
He will yield so far to friendship as to wish his friend's case to be worthy of succeeding, and to accommodate him as to the time of trial, within legal limits. But inasmuch as he must give sentence upon his oath, he will bear it in mind that he has "God for a witness." In another passage of the _De Officiis,_ Cicero asserts, somewhat hesitatingly, yet on the authority of Panaetius as the strictest of Stoics, the moral rightfulness of "defending on some occasions a guilty man, if he be not utterly depraved and false to all human relations." As in the passage on which I am commenting special reference is made to the peril of life or reputation, what Cicero contends for, as it seems to me, is the right of defending a guilty friend as advocate, or of favoring him as to time and mode of trial as a judge. Aulius Gellius, in connection with this passage in _De Amicitia,_ tells the following story of Chilo, who was on some of the lists of the seven wise men. Chilo, on the last day of his life, said that the only thing that gave him uneasy thought, and was burdensome to his conscience, was that once when he and two other men were judges in a case in which a friend of his was tried for a capital crime, he, in accordance with his own conviction, voted his friendy guilty, but so influenced the minds of his two associates that they gave their voice for his acquittal.]
"In unsure fortune a sure friend is seen," yet one of these two things convicts most persons of fickleness and weakness,--either their despising their friends when they themselves are prosperous, or deserting their friends in adversity. 18 Him, then, who alike in either event shall have shown himself unwavering, constant, firm in friendship we ought to regard as of an exceedingly rare and almost divine order of men. Still further good faith is essential to the maintenance of the stability and constancy which we demand in friendship, for nothing that is unfaithful is stable. It is, moreover, fitting to choose for a friend one who is frank, affable, accommodating, interested in the same things with ourselves,--all which qualities come under the head of fidelity, for a changeful and wily disposition cannot be faithful, nor can he who has not like interests and a kindred nature with his friend be either faithful or stable. I ought to add that a friend should neither take pleasure in finding fault with his friend, nor give credit to the charges which others may bring against him,--all which is implied in the constancy of which I have been speaking. Thus we come back to the truth which I announced at the beginning of our conversation, that friendship can exist only between the good. It is, indeed, the part of a good or--what is the same thing--a wise man [Footnote: Wisdom and goodness were identical with the Stoics.] to adhere to these two principles in friendship,--first, that he tolerate no feigning or dissembling (for an ingenuous man will rather show even open hatred than hide his feeling by his face), and, secondly, that he not only repel charges made against his friend by others, but that he be not himself suspicious, and always thinking that his friend has done something unfriendly.
To these requisites there may well be added suavity of speech and manners, which is of no little worth as giving a relish to the intercourse of friendship. Rigidness and austerity of demeanor on every occasion indeed carry weight with them, but friendship ought to be more gentle and mild, and more inclined to all that is genial and affable. 19 There occurs here a question by no means difficult,[Footnote: Latin, _subdifficilis_ which I should render _somewhat difficult_ had not Cicero treat that question as one that presents no difficulty. In the ancient tongues, as in our own or even more than in our own, a word is often better defined by its use than in the dictionary.] whether at any time new friends worthy of our love are to be preferred to the old, as we are wont to prefer young horses to those that have passed their prime. Shame that there should be hesitation as to the answer! There ought to be no satiety of friendships, as there is rightly of many other things. The older a friendship is, the more precious should it be as is the case with wines that will bear keeping, [Footnote: Some of the best Italian wines will not "bear keeping," and it was probably true of more of them in Cicero's time than now that wines are so often vitiated by strong alcoholic mixtures in order to preserve them. Cato, in his _De Re Rustica_, prescribes a method of determining whether the wine of any given vintage will "keep".] and there is truth in the proverb that many pecks of salt must be eaten together to bring friendship to perfection.
Ideas discussed in this chapter
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.