The Nexus Archive
Roman Republicanism · Essay
On Friendship
by Cicero · The Last Republican · Late Roman Republic, 106-43 BC
A Roman philosophical dialogue on friendship, loyalty, and virtue.
- Intermediate
- ~1 hr 15 min read
- 3 chapter guides
- Public domain
Start reading · Read the Grief, Memory, and the Nature of Friendship guide free
Before the text
Editor's Prelude
What Remains When a Friend Is Gone
A friend’s death can make every familiar activity feel altered. Cicero places Laelius in the first days after losing Scipio, with two sons-in-law asking how he bears it and what such a friendship means. The conversation reaches us through an explicit literary arrangement: Cicero recalls what Scaevola told him and brings the speakers onto a stage of his own making.
He dedicates the work to Atticus, giving a discussion of friendship the shape of a gift between friends. Its world is also the Roman republic, where office, reputation and political allegiance put affection under pressure. A private attachment may ask for more than public duty can allow.
The account is strongest where comfort becomes difficult: in the wish to help without humiliating, to speak honestly without wounding, or to remain loyal without losing judgment. Laelius’s confidence in Scipio and his own political world is not impartial. It is the conviction of someone trying to name what a beloved person has made possible.
The opening pages
Grief, Memory, and the Nature of Friendship
THE augur Quintus Mucius Scaevola used to recount a number of stories about his father-in-law Gaius Laelius, accurately remembered and charmingly told; and whenever he talked about him always gave him the title of "the wise" without any hesitation. I had been introduced by my father to Scaevola as soon as I had assumed the toga virilis, and I took advantage of the introduction never to quit the venerable man's side as long as I was able to stay and he was spared to us. The consequence was that I committed to memory many disquisitions of his, as well as many short pointed apophthegms, and, in short, took as much advantage of his wisdom as I could. When he died, I attached myself to Scaevola the Pontifex, whom I may venture to call quite the most distinguished of our countrymen for ability and uprightness. But of this latter I shall take other occasions to speak. To return to Scaevola the augur. Among many other occasions I particularly remember one. He was sitting on a semicircular garden-bench, as was his custom, when I and a very few intimate friends were there, and he chanced to turn the conversation upon a subject which about that time was in many people's mouths. You must remember, Atticus, for you were very intimate with Publius Sulpicius, what expressions of astonishment, or even indignation, were called forth by his mortal quarrel, as tribune, with the consul Quintus Pompeius, with whom he had formerly lived on terms of the closest intimacy and affection. Well, on this occasion, happening to mention this particular circumstance, Scaevola detailed to us a discourse of Laelius on friendship delivered to himself and Laelius's other son-in-law Gaius Fannius, son of Marcus Fannius, a few days after the death of Africanus. The points of that discussion I committed to memory, and have arranged them in this book at my own discretion. For I have brought the speakers, as it were, personally on to my stage to prevent the constant "said I" and "said he" of a narrative, and to give the discourse the air of being orally delivered in our hearing.
You have often urged me to write something on Friendship, and I quite acknowledged that the subject seemed one worth everybody's investigation, and specially suited to the close intimacy that has existed between you and me. Accordingly I was quite ready to benefit the public at your request.
Chapter guides · 3
Grief, Memory, and the Nature of Friendship
Grief Gives the Argument Its Weight
Cicero frames friendship through Atticus, Laelius, and the death of Scipio before asking where affection begins.
A remembered conversation, arranged by Cicero
Cicero dedicates the dialogue to Atticus and stages a conversation reported by Scaevola, with Laelius speaking days after Scipio’s death. Laelius admits his grief rather than claiming to feel nothing. He finds consolation in his friend’s life and argues that friendship begins in attraction to character, not a calculation of services to be gained.
Affection before advantage
The personal frame keeps the definition honest. Laelius is not praising companionship in the abstract; he is explaining why a dead friend still matters and why usefulness can follow friendship without being its cause.
A second life in remembrance
Laelius prefers belief in the soul’s survival but also considers the alternative of no sensation after death. On either account he thinks Scipio has suffered no evil. His own continuing pleasure in their shared life gives substance to the image of a friend as a second self, while his praise of Scipio remains the testimony of a devoted friend.
Virtue, Loyalty, and Friendship's Limits
Loyalty Meets Its Hard Cases
Laelius forbids wrongdoing for a friend, then tests how much concession loyalty permits.
A friend’s request under political pressure
Laelius names the forces that break friendship—money, office, rivalry and changing character—and confronts a request to assist wrongdoing. His account of Blossius’s loyalty to Tiberius Gracchus makes the danger concrete. It also speaks from Laelius’s partisan defense of the Senate: the accusations against reformers are his judgments, not an impartial definition of public justice.
A difficult concession
The prohibition on wrongdoing is strained when Laelius allows a limited departure from strict right to protect a friend’s life or reputation. He insists that virtue must not be abandoned, yet leaves the permitted concession difficult to measure. The tension belongs to the argument; friendship’s generosity does not emerge as a rule without hard cases.
Affection needs judgment
Laelius rejects both a balanced account of benefits and the assumption that a friend’s low estimate of himself must be accepted. He also admits the difficulty of testing character before affection takes hold. Money, office, prosperity and disaster reveal constancy that an early declaration of loyalty cannot establish.
Constancy, Candour, and the Second Self
A Friend Is Not an Echo
Constancy needs equality, honest speech, and the courage to correct rather than flatter.
Questions readers ask
- How long does it take to read On Friendship?
- About 1 hr 15 min in total.
- How difficult is On Friendship?
- Intermediate. A mid-length essay; about an hour of reading.
- Which translation is this?
- The Evelyn Shirley Shuckburgh translation from the Latin. The text follows Project Gutenberg #2808 transcription; Two Essays on Old Age & Friendship (1903 comparison control).
- Can I read On Friendship for free?
- On Friendship is part of Nexus Premium, so reading it needs an account and a Premium subscription. The opening above and two chapter guides on this page are free to read.
- How many chapter guides are there?
- 3 chapter guides, written by the Nexus editors. Two open in full here; the rest show their opening line.
About Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman statesman, lawyer, orator, and philosopher. He defended republican government, moral duty, natural law, friendship, rhetoric, and civic virtue during the violent collapse of the Roman Republic.
“What does a citizen owe to a republic that is falling apart?”
Cicero gives Nexus a bridge between philosophy and statesmanship. His life and writings show what happens when moral argument meets political collapse.
Source text: public domain. Chapter guides: original Nexus writing. On Friendship is part of The Nexus Archive, guided Quests through the great works.