And so far from its being true that lack of means is a motive for seeking friendship, it is usually those who being most richly endowed with wealth and means, and above all with virtue (which, after all, is a man's best support), are least in need of another, that are most openhanded and beneficent.
From a philosophical treatise on the nature of friendship, refuting the notion that friendship is primarily driven by material need.
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Again, is there not the fact that the wisest man ever dies with the greatest cheerfulness, the most unwise with the least?
I don't wish to depreciate life, as many men and good philosophers have often done; nor do I regret having lived, for I have done so in a way that lets me think that I was not born in vain.
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