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.
Cicero elaborates on the distinctiveness of true friendship, highlighting its concentrated and exclusive nature compared to broader human ties.
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Further than this, who fails to see that those promises are not binding which are extorted by intimidation or which we make when misled by false pretences?
Besides, he will not expose anyone to hatred or disrepute by groundless charges, but he will surely cleave to justice and honour so closely that he will submit to any loss, however heavy, rather than be untrue to them, and will face death…
For if we bring a certain amount of propriety and order into the transactions of daily life, we shall be conserving moral rectitude and moral dignity.
For self-control is the foe of the passions, and the passions are the handmaids of pleasure.
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