Cicero

“Constant practice devoted to one subject often prevails over both ability and skill.”

“Learning is a kind of natural food for the mind.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“Friendship excels relationship in this, that whereas you may eliminate affection from relationship, you cannot do so from friendship.”

“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.”

“Now friendship may be thus defined: a complete accord on all subjects human and divine, joined with mutual goodwill and affection.”

“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.”

“Fire and water themselves, to use a common expression, are not of more universal use than friendship.”

“Such friendship enhances prosperity, and relieves adversity of its burden by halving and sharing it.”

“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.”

“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.”

“For if any marked instance of loyal friendship in confronting or sharing danger comes to light, every one applauds it to the echo.”

“The Latin word for friendship— amicitia —is derived from that for love— amor; and love is certainly the prime mover in contracting mutual affection.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“I conclude, then, that the plea of having acted in the interests of a friend is not a valid excuse for a wrong action.”

“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.”

“We may then lay down this rule of friendship—neither ask nor consent to do what is wrong.”

“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.”

“Seeing then that the wise are not exempt from the heart-ache (which must be the case unless we suppose all human nature rooted out of their hearts), why should we banish friendship from our lives, for fear of being involved by it in some amount of distress?”

“We conclude then that mental pain which we must often encounter on a friend's account is not of sufficient consequence to banish friendship from our life, any more than it is true that the cardinal virtues are to be dispensed with because they involve certain anxieties and distresses.”

“For what can be more irrational than to take delight in many objects incapable of response, such as office, fame, splendid buildings, and personal decoration, and yet to take little or none in a sentient being endowed with virtue, which has the faculty of loving or, if I may use the expression, loving back?”

“For nothing is really more delightful than a return of affection, and the mutual interchange of kind feeling and good offices.”

“And if we add, as we may fairly do, that nothing so powerfully attracts and draws one thing to itself as likeness does to friendship, it will at once be admitted to be true that the good love the good and attach them to themselves as though they were united by blood and nature.”

“So, my dear Fannius and Scaevola, we may look upon this as an established fact, that between good men there is, as it were of necessity, a kindly feeling, which is the source of friendship ordained by nature.”

“For it is not so much what one gets by a friend that gives one pleasure, as the warmth of his feeling; and we only care for a friend's service if it has been prompted by affection.”

“It is not friendship, then, that follows material advantage, but material advantage friendship.”

“For who, in heaven's name, would choose a life of the greatest wealth and abundance on condition of neither loving or being beloved by any creature?”

“Who can love one whom he fears, or by whom he knows that he is feared?”

“Now, can anything be more foolish than that men who have all the opportunities which prosperity, wealth, and great means can bestow, should secure all else which money can buy—horses, servants, splendid upholstering, and costly plate—but do not secure friends, who are, if I may use the expression, the most valuable and beautiful furniture of life?”

“And even if those possessions, which are, in a manner, the gifts of fortune, do prove permanent, life can never be anything but joyless which is without the consolations and companionship of friends.”

“The first, which holds that our regard for ourselves is to be the measure of our regard for our friend, is not true; for how many things there are which we would never have done for our own sakes, but do for the sake of a friend!”

“There are many advantages too which men of upright character voluntarily forego, or of which they are content to be deprived, that their friends may enjoy them rather than themselves.”

“True friendship appears to me to be something richer and more generous than that comes to; and not to be so narrowly on its guard against giving more than it receives.”

“In such a matter we must not be always afraid of something being wasted or running over in our measure, or of more than is justly due being devoted to our friendship.”

“How can a man be friends with another, if he thinks it possible that he may be his enemy?”

“The true rule is to take such care in the selection of our friends as never to enter upon a friendship with a man whom we could under any circumstances come to hate.”

“The real limit to be observed in friendship is this: the characters of two friends must be stainless.”

“Now the qualities we ought to look out for in making our selection are firmness, stability, constancy.”

“Now this testing can only be made during the actual existence of the friendship; for friendship so often precedes the formation of a judgment, and makes a previous test impossible.”

“This is why true friendship is very difficult to find among those who engage in politics and the contest for office.”

“Where can you find the man to prefer his friend's advancement to his own?”

“We should also in making our selection look out for simplicity, a social disposition, and a sympathetic nature, moved by what moves us.”

“Nor, indeed, is it possible for one to be trustworthy and firm who is unsympathetic by nature and unmoved by what affects ourselves.”

“Secondly, he will not only reject all accusations brought against his friend by another, but he will not be suspicious himself either, nor be always thinking that his friend has acted improperly.”

“Besides this, there should be a certain pleasantness in word and manner which adds no little flavour to friendship.”

“A gloomy temper and unvarying gravity may be very impressive; but friendship should be a little less unbending, more indulgent and gracious, and more inclined to all kinds of good-fellowship and good-nature.”

“For there should be no satiety in friendship, as there is in other things.”

“But here is another golden rule in friendship: put yourself on a level with your friend.”

“For the advantages of genius and virtue, and in short, of every kind of superiority, are never realized to their fullest extent until they are bestowed upon our nearest and dearest.”

“For there are people who make their friendship disagreeable by imagining themselves undervalued.”

“Now the measure of your benefits should be in the first place your own power to bestow, and in the second place the capacity to bear them on the part of him on whom you are bestowing affection and help.”

“As a general rule, we must wait to make up our mind about friendships till men's characters and years have arrived at their full strength and development.”

“For difference of character leads to difference of aims, and the result of such diversity is to estrange friends.”

“Another good rule in friendship is this: do not let an excessive affection hinder the highest interests of your friends.”

“Again, if a change in character and aim takes place, as often happens, or if party politics produces an alienation of feeling (I am now speaking, as I said a short time ago, of ordinary friendships, not of those of the wise), we shall have to be on our guard against appearing to embark upon active enmity while we only mean to resign a friendship.”

“For there can be nothing more discreditable than to be at open war with a man with whom you have been intimate.”

“Our first object, then, should be to prevent a breach; our second, to secure that, if it does occur, our friendship should seem to have died a natural rather than a violent death.”

“Next, we should take care that friendship is not converted into active hostility, from which flow personal quarrels, abusive language, and angry recriminations.”

“Now, by "worthy of friendship" I mean those who have in themselves the qualities which attract affection.”

“For man not only loves himself, but seeks another whose spirit he may so blend with his own as almost to make one being of two.”

“But most people unreasonably, not to speak of modesty, want such a friend as they are unable to be themselves, and expect from their friends what they do not themselves give.”

“The fair course is first to be good yourself, and then to look out for another of like character.”

“It is between such that the stability in friendship of which we have been talking can be secured; when, that is to say, men who are united by affection learn, first of all, to rule those passions which enslave others, and in the next place to take delight in fair and equitable conduct, to bear each other's burdens, never to ask each other for anything inconsistent with virtue and rectitude, and not only to serve and love but also to respect each other.”

“I say "respect"; for if respect is gone, friendship has lost its brightest jewel.”

“This being our best and highest object, we must, if we desire to attain it, devote ourselves to virtue; for without virtue we can obtain neither friendship nor anything else desirable.”

“In fact, if virtue be neglected, those who imagine themselves to possess friends will find out their error as soon as some grave disaster forces them to make trial of them.”

“Wherefore, I must again and again repeat, you must satisfy your judgment before engaging your affections: not love first and judge afterwards.”

“We suffer from carelessness in many of our undertakings: in none more than in selecting and cultivating our friends.”

“For friendship, in one way or another, penetrates into the lives of us all, and suffers no career to be entirely free from its influence.”

“The intercourse between friends is varied and complex, and it must often happen that causes of suspicion and offence arise, which a wise man will sometimes avoid, at other times remove, at others treat with indulgence.”

“For instance, it often happens that friends need remonstrance and even reproof. When these are administered in a kindly spirit they ought to be taken in good part.”

“Plain speaking is a cause of trouble, if the result of it is resentment, which is poison of friendship; but compliance is really the cause of much more trouble, because by indulging his faults it lets a friend plunge into headlong ruin.”

“Well, then, if it is true that to give and receive advice—the former with freedom and yet without bitterness, the latter with patience and without irritation—is peculiarly appropriate to genuine friendship, it is no less true that there can be nothing more utterly subversive of friendship than flattery, adulation, and base compliance.”

“In everything false pretence is bad, for it suspends and vitiates our power of discerning the truth. But to nothing it is so hostile as to friendship; for it destroys that frankness without which friendship is an empty name.”

“For the essence of friendship being that two minds become as one, how can that ever take place if the mind of each of the separate parties to it is not single and uniform, but variable, changeable, and complex?”

“But if we only take reasonable care, it is as easy to separate and distinguish a genuine from a specious friend as anything else that is coloured and artificial from what is sincere and genuine.”

“Now, if on a stage, such as a public assembly essentially is, where there is the amplest room for fiction and half-truths, truth nevertheless prevails if it be but fairly laid open and brought into the light of day, what ought to happen in the case of friendship, which rests entirely on truthfulness?”

“It is not then properly friendship at all when the one will not listen to the truth, and the other is prepared to lie.”

“When Virtue has reared her head and shewn the light of her countenance, and seen and recognised the same light in another, she gravitates towards it, and in her turn welcomes that which the other has to shew; and from it springs up a flame which you may call love or friendship as you please.”

“But in view of the instability and perishableness of mortal things, we should be continually on the look-out for some to love and by whom to be loved; for if we lose affection and kindliness from our life, we lose all that gives it charm.”

“I declare that of all the blessings which either fortune or nature has bestowed upon me I know none to compare with Scipio's friendship. In it I found sympathy in public, counsel in private business; in it too a means of spending my leisure with unalloyed delight.”

“If the recollection and memory of these things had perished with the man, I could not possibly have endured the regret for one so closely united with me in life and affection. But these things have not perished; they are rather fed and strengthened by reflexion and memory.”

“Virtue (without which friendship is impossible) is first; but next to it, and to it alone, the greatest of all things is Friendship.”