existed between you and me. Accordingly I was quite ready to
benefit the public at your request.

As to the _dramatis personae_. In the treatise on Old Age, which I
dedicated to you, I introduced Cato as chief speaker. No one, I
thought, could with greater propriety speak on old age than one
who had been an old man longer than any one else, and had been
exceptionally vigorous in his old age. Similarly, having learnt from
tradition that of all friendships that between Gaius Laelius and
Publius Scipio was the most remarkable, I thought Laelius was just
the person to support the chief part in a discussion on friendship
which Scaevola remembered him to have actually taken.
Moreover, a discussion of this sort gains somehow in weight from
the authority of men of ancient days, especially if they happen to
have been distinguished. So it comes about that in reading over
what I have myself written I have a feeling at times that it is
actually Cato that is speaking, not I.

Finally, as I sent the former essay to you as a gift from one old
man to another, so I have dedicated this _On Friendship_ as a most
affectionate friend to his friend. In the former Cato spoke, who
was the oldest and wisest man of his day; in this Laelius speaks on
friendship-Laelius, who was at once a wise man (that was the title
given him) and eminent for his famous friendship. Please forget
me for a while; imagine Laelius to be speaking.

Gaius Fannius and Quintus Mucius come to call on their
father-in-law after the death of Africanus. They start the subject;
Laelius answers them. And the whole essay on friendship is his. In
reading it you will recognise a picture of yourself.