To whatever objects a person devotes his attention, these objects he
probably loves. Do men ever devote their attention, then, to [what
they think] evils? By no means. Or even to things indifferent? No, nor
this. It remains, then, that good must be the sole object of their
attention; and if of their attention, of their love too. Whoever,
therefore, understands good, is capable likewise of love; and he who
can not distinguish good from evil, and things indifferent from both,
how is it possible that he can love? The wise person alone, then, is
capable of loving.
"How so? I am not this wise person, yet I love my child."
I protest it surprizes me that you should, in the first place, confess
yourself unwise. For in what are you deficient? Have not you the use
of your senses? Do you not distinguish the semblances of things? Do
you not provide such food and clothing and habitation as are suitable
to you? Why then do you confess that you want wisdom? In truth,
because you are often struck and disconcerted by semblances, and their
speciousness gets the better of you; and hence you sometimes suppose
the very same things to be good, then evil, and lastly, neither; and,
in a word, you grieve, you fear, you envy, you are disconcerted, you
change. Is it from this that you confess yourself unwise? And are you
not changeable too in love? Riches, pleasure, in short, the very same
things, you sometimes esteem good, and at other times evil. And do you
not esteem the same persons too alternately as good and bad, at one
time treating them with kindness, at another with enmity; at one time
commending, and at another time censuring them?
"Yes. This too is the case with me."
Well, then; can he who is deceived in another be his friend, think
you?
"No, surely."
Or does he who loves him with a changeable affection bear him genuine
good-will?
"Nor he, neither."
Or he who now vilifies, then admires him?
"Nor he."
Do you not often see little dogs caressing and playing with each
other, so that you would say nothing could be more friendly? But to
learn what this friendship is, throw a bit of meat between them, and
you will see. Do you too throw a bit of an estate betwixt you and your
son, and you will see that he will quickly wish you under ground, and
you him; and then you, no doubt, on the other hand will exclaim, What
a son have I brought up! He would bury me alive! Throw in a pretty
girl, and the old fellow and the young one will both fall in love with
her; or let fame or danger intervene, the words of the father of
Admetus will be yours:
"You love to see the light. Doth not your father?
You fain would still behold it. Would not he?"
Do you suppose that he did not love his own child when it was little;
that he was not in agonies when it had a fever, and often wished to
undergo that fever in its stead? But, after all, when the trial comes
home, you see what expressions he uses. Were not Eteocles and
Polynices born of the same mother and of the same father? Were they
not brought up, and did they not live and eat and sleep, together? Did
not they kiss and fondle each other? So that any one, who saw them,
would have laughed at all the paradoxes which philosophers utter about
love. And yet when a kingdom, like a bit of meat, was thrown betwixt
them, see what they say--
_Polynices._ Where wilt thou stand before the towers?
_Eteocles._ Why askest thou this of me?
_Polynices._ I will oppose myself to thee, to slay thee.
_Eteocles._ Me too the desire of this seizes.
Such are the prayers they offer. Be not therefore deceived. No living
being is held by anything so strongly as by its own needs. Whatever
therefore appears a hindrance to these, be it brother or father or
child or mistress or friend, is hated, abhorred, execrated; for by
nature it loves nothing like its own needs. This motive is father and
brother and family and country and God. Whenever, therefore, the gods
seem to hinder this, we vilify even them, and throw down their
statues, and burn their temples; as Alexander ordered the temple of
Æsculapius to be burnt, because he had lost the man he loved.
When, therefore, any one identifies his interest with those of
sanctity, virtue, country, parents, and friends, all these are
secured; but whenever he places his interest in anything else than
friends, country, family and justice, then these all give way, borne
down by the weight of self-interest. For wherever I and mine are
placed, thither must every living being gravitate. If in body, that
will sway us; if in our own will, that; if in externals, these. If,
therefore, I rest my personality in the will, then only shall I be a
friend, a son, or a father, such as I ought. For in that case it will
be for my interest to preserve the faithful, the modest, the patient,
the abstinent, the beneficent character; to keep the relations of life
inviolate. But if I place my personality in one thing, and virtue in
another, the doctrine of Epicurus will stand its ground, that virtue
is nothing, or mere opinion.
From this ignorance it was that the Athenians and Lacedæmonians
quarreled with each other, and the Thebans with both; the Persian king
with Greece, and the Macedonians with both; and now the Romans with
the Getes.[112] And in still remoter times the Trojan war arose from
the same cause. Alexander [Paris] was the guest of Menelaus; and
whoever had seen the mutual proofs of good-will that passed between
them would never have believed that they were not friends. But a
tempting bait, a pretty woman, was thrown in between them; and thence
came war. At present, therefore, when you see that dear brothers have,
in appearance, but one soul, do not immediately pronounce upon their
love; not tho they should swear it, and affirm it was impossible to
live asunder. For the governing faculty of a bad man is faithless,
unsettled, undiscriminating, successively vanquished by different
semblances. But inquire, not as others do, whether they were born of
the same parents, and brought up together, and under the same
preceptor; but this thing only, in what they place their interest--in
externals or in their own wills. If in externals, you can no more
pronounce them friends, than you can call them faithful, or constant,
or brave, or free; nay, nor even truly men, if you are wise. For it is
no principle of humanity that makes them bite and vilify each other,
and take possession of public assemblies, as wild beasts do of
solitudes and mountains; and convert courts of justice into dens of
robbers; that prompts them to be intemperate, adulterers, seducers; or
leads them into other offenses that men commit against each other--all
from that one single error, by which they risk themselves and their
own concerns on things uncontrollable by will.
But if you hear that these men in reality suppose good to be placed
only in the will, and in a right use of things as they appear, no
longer take the trouble of inquiring if they are father and son, or
old companions and acquaintances; but boldly pronounce that they are
friends, and also that they are faithful and just. For where else can
friendship be met, but joined with fidelity and modesty, and the
intercommunication of virtue alone?
"Well; but such a one paid me the utmost regard for so long a time,
and did he not love me?"
How can you tell, foolish man, if that regard be any other than he
pays to his shoes, or his horse, when he cleans them? And how do you
know but that when you cease to be a necessary utensil, he may throw
you away, like a broken stool?
"Well; but it is my wife, and we have lived together many years."
And how many did Eriphyle live with Amphiaraus, and was the mother of
children not a few? But a bauble came between them. What was this
bauble? A false conviction concerning certain things. This turned her
into a savage animal; this cut asunder all love, and suffered neither
the wife nor the mother to continue such.
Whoever, therefore, among you studies either to be or to gain a
friend, let him cut up all false convictions by the root, hate them,
drive them utterly out of his soul. Thus, in the first place, he will
be secure from inward reproaches and contests, from vacillation and
self-torment. Then, with respect to others, to every like-minded
person he will be without disguise; to such as are unlike he will be
patient, mild, gentle, and ready to forgive them, as failing in points
of the greatest importance; but severe to none, being fully convinced
of Plato's doctrine, that the soul is never willingly deprived of
truth. Without all this, you may, in many respects, live as friends
do; and drink and lodge and travel together, and even be born of the
same parents; and so may serpents too; but neither they nor you can
ever be really friends, while your accustomed principles remain brutal
and execrable.