No. LIX.
Last Sabbath morning, I read Cicero’s Dialogus de Amicitia—simple Latinity, and very short—27 sections only. It seemed like enjoying the company of an old friend. It is now just forty-seven years, since I first read it, at Exeter. I marvel at Montaigne, for not thinking highly of it—but find some little motive, in the fact, that he had written a tract upon the subject, himself, which may be found, in his first volume, page 215, London, 1811, and which can no more be compared to the Dialogus, than—to use George Colman’s expression—a mummy to Hyperion.
The Dialogus de Amicitia, of a Sabbath morning! Aye, my reverend, orthodox brother. Not having, in my system, one pulse of sympathy for disorganization, and liberty parties, I reverence the holy Sabbath, as much as you do yourself; and, to prevent the Dialogus from hurting me, I read one sermon before, and another immediately after—Jeremy Taylor’s Apples of Sodom; and Fléchier’s Sur La Correction Fraternelle—such sermons, as, in the concoction, would, perhaps, be very likely to burst your mental boiler, and which would not suit the appetites of many, modern congregations, who have ruined their powers of inwardly digesting such strong meat, by dieting upon theological fricandises faites avec du sucre.
And you was not at meeting then! Right again, my dear brother. I am deaf as a haddock; though Sir Thomas Browne has annihilated this favorite standard of comparison, by assuring us, that a haddock has as good ears, as any other fish in the sea. Mine, however, are quite unscriptural—ears not to hear. My ear is all in my eye.
Roscius boasted of his power to convey his meaning, by mute gesticulation. Our modern clergy have so little of this gift, that, with my impracticable ears, it is all dumb show for me. Now and then, when the wind is fair, I catch a word or two; and no cross-readings were ever more grotesque and comical, than my cross-hearings. I am convinced, that I do not always have the worst of it. When, in reply to an old lady, who once asked me how I liked the preacher, I told her I heard not a syllable—what a mercy! she exclaimed. But consider the example! True, there is something in that. Try the experiment—stop the meatus auditorius with beeswax, and try it, for half a dozen Sabbaths, even with the knowledge, that you can remove the impediment at will, which I cannot!
After I had finished the Dialogus, I found myself successfully engaged, in the process of mental exhumation:—up they came, one after another, the playmates of my childhood, with their tee-totums and merry-andrews—the companions of my boyhood, with their tops, kites, and marbles—the friends and associates of my youth, with their skates, bats, and fowling pieces. It is really quite pleasant to gather a party, upon such short notice, and with so little effort; and without the trouble of providing wine and sweetmeats. Upon the very threshold of manhood, how they scatter and disperse! There is a passage of the Dialogus—the tenth section—which is so true to life, at the present hour, that one can scarcely realize it was written, before the birth of Christ:—“Ille (Scipio) quidem nihil dificilius esse dicebat, quam amicitiam usque ad extremum vitæ permanere. Nam vel ut non idem expediret utrique, incidere sæpe; vel ut de republica non idem sentirent; mutari etiam mores hominum sæpe dicebat, alias adversis rebus, alias ætate ingravescente. Atque earum rerum exemplum ex similitudine capiebat incuentis ætatis, quod summi puerorum amores sæpe una cum prætexta ponerentur; sin autem ad adolescentiam perduxissent, dirimi tamen interdum contentione, vel uxoriæ conditionis, vel commodi allicujus, quod idem adipisci uterque non posset. Quod si qui longius in amicitia provecti essent, tamen sæpe labefactari, si in honoris contentionem incidissent: pestem esse nullam amicitiis, quam in plerisque pecuniæ cupiditatem, in optimis quibusque honoris certamen et gloriæ: ex quo inimicitias maximas sæpe inter amicissimos extitisse.” Lord Rochester said, that nothing was ever benefited, by translation, but a bishop. This, nevertheless, I believe, is a fair translation of the passage—
He (Scipio) said, that nothing was more difficult, than for friendship to continue to the very end of life: either because its continuance was found to be inexpedient for one of the parties, or on account of political differences.
He remarked, that men’s humors were apt to be affected, sometimes, by adverse fortune, and at others, by the heavy listlessness of age. He drew an example of these things, from a similar condition in youth—the most vehement attachments, among boys, were commonly laid aside with the prætexta, or at the age of maturity; or, if continued beyond that period, they were occasionally interrupted, by some contention about the state or condition of the wife, or the possessions or advantages of somebody, which the other party was unable to equal. Indeed, if some there were, whose friendship was drawn along to a later period, it was very apt to be weakened, if they became rivals, in the path of fame. The greatest bane of friendship, among the mass, was the love of money, and among some, of the better sort, the thirst for glory; by which the bitterest hatred had been generated, between those, who had been the greatest friends.
Unless it be orthodoxy, nothing has been so variously defined, as friendship. A man who stands by, and sees another murdered, in a duel, is his friend. Mutual endorsers are friends. Partisans are the friends of the candidate. Those gentlemen, who give their time and talents to eat and drink up some wealthy fool, who would pass for an Amphytrion, and laugh at the fellow’s simplicity, behind his back, are his friends. The patrons of players and buffoons, signors and signorinas, are their friends. The venders of Havana cigars and Bologna sausages inform their friends and patrons, that they have recently received a fresh supply. Marat was the friend of the people. Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar were the friends of Job; and he told them rather uncivilly, I think, that they were miserable comforters. Matthew speaks of a friend of publicans and sinners.
Monsieur Megret, who, as Voltaire relates, the instant Charles XII. was killed, exclaimed—Voila la piece finie, allons souper—see, the play is over, let us go to supper, was the king’s friend. William the First, like other kings, had many friends, who, the moment he died, ran away, and literally left the dead to bury the dead; of which a curious account may be found, in the Harleian Miscellany, vol. iii. page 160, London, 1809. Friendship flourishes, at Christmas and New Year, for every one, we are told, in the book of Proverbs, is a friend to him that giveth gifts. There seems to be no end to this enumeration of friends. The name is legion, to say nothing of the whole society of Friends. What then could Aristotle have meant, when he exclaimed, as Diogenes Laertius says he did, lib. v. sec. 21, My friends, there is no such thing as a friend? Menander is stated by Plutarch, in his tract, on Brotherly Love, cap. 3, to have proclaimed that man happy, who had found even the shadow of a friend?