be found in actual exercise and in common life, not at those which exist
only in fancy or in aspiration. Caius Fabricius, Manius Curius, Tiberius
Coruncanius, wise as they were in the judgment of our fathers, I will
consent not to call wise by the standard of these philosophers. Let them
keep for themselves the name of wisdom, which is invidious and of
doubtful meaning, if they will only admit that these may have been good
men. But they will not grant even this; they insist on denying the name
of good to any but the wise. I therefore adopt the standard of common
sense. [Footnote: Latin _agamus igitur piagui (ut aiunt) Minerva_, that
is with a less refined, a grosser wisdom more nearly conformed to the
sound, if somewhat crass, common-sensFe of the majority.] Those who
integrity, equity, and kindness win approval, who are entirely free from
avarice, lust and the infirmities of a hasty temper, and in whom there
is perfect consistency of character, in fine men like those whom I have
named while they are regarded as good, ought to be so called, because to
the utmost of human capacity they follow Nature who is the best guide in
living well. Indeed, it seems to me thoroughly evident that there should
be a certain measure of fellowship among all, but more intimate the
nearer we approach one another. Thus this feeling has more power between
fellow-citizens than toward foreigners, between kindred than between
those of different families. Toward our kindred, Nature herself produces
a certain kind of friendship. But this lacks strength, and indeed
friendship in its full sense, has precedence of kinship in this
particular, that good-will may be taken away from kinship, not from
friendship, for when good will is removed, friendship loses its name,
while that of kinship remains. How great is the force of friendship we
may best understand from this,--that out of the boundless society of the
human race which Nature has constituted, the sense of fellowship is so
contracted and narrowed that the whole power of loving is bestowed on
the union of two or a very few friends.