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[18]
This; however, I do feel first of all—that friendship
cannot exist except among good men; nor do I
go into that too deeply,1 as is done by those2 who,
in discussing this point with more than usual accuracy,
and it may be correctly, but with too little view to
practical results, say that no one is good unless he
is wise. We may grant that; but they understand
wisdom to be a thing such as no mortal man has
yet attained.3 I, however, am bound to look at
things as they are in the experience of everyday
life and not as they are in fancy or in hope. Never
could I say that Gaius Fabricius, Manius Curius, and
Tiberius Coruncanius, whom our ancestors adjudged
to be wise, were wise by such a standard as that.
[p. 129]
Therefore, let the Sophists keep their unpopular4
and unintelligible word to themselves, granting only
that the men just named were good men. They
will not do it though; they will say that goodness
can be predicated only of the “wise” man.
1 Id ad vivum reseco, lit. “cut back to the quick.”
2 i.e. those who profess the art of disputation; of. 17.
3 The perfect “wise man” of the Stoics represents an ideal, though they allowed that a few men, such as Socrates, almost realized it.
4 Lit. “at which everyone looks askance,” as indicating conceit or arrogance.
Cicero: De Senectute De Amicitia De Divinatione. With An English Translation. William Armistead Falconer. Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass., London, England. 1923.
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