Friendships That Do Not Last

There are many kinds of friendship and companionship, and they join people together in the bonds of love in very different ways. For some, a recommendation from someone else leads them into a relationship, first of acquaintance and afterward even of friendship. For others, some bargain, or an agreement to give and receive something, has joined them in the bonds of love. Others have been bound in the chain of friendship by a likeness and partnership in business, or learning, or a craft, or study. By this even fierce souls come to be kindly disposed toward each other, so that those who delight in robbery in the forests and mountains, and revel in shedding human blood, embrace and cherish the partners of their crimes. [a]

But there is another kind of love, where the bond comes from the instincts of nature and the laws of blood relationship. By it those of the same tribe, wives and parents, brothers and children, are naturally preferred to others. We find that this is so not only with human beings but with all birds and beasts. For at the prompting of a natural instinct they protect and defend their offspring and their young, so that often they are not afraid to expose themselves to danger and death for their sake. Indeed, there are kinds of beasts and serpents and birds that are cut off and set apart from all others by their unbearable ferocity or their deadly poison, such as basilisks, unicorns and vultures. Though they are said to be dangerous to everyone by their very look, yet among themselves they remain peaceful and harmless, because they share a common origin and a fellow-feeling.

But we see that all these kinds of love we have spoken of, since they are common to the good and the bad, and to beasts and serpents, certainly cannot last forever. For often separation of place interrupts them and breaks them off, and so do forgetfulness as time passes, and dealings in affairs, in business and in words. For since they generally arise from different kinds of ties, whether of gain, or of desires, or of kinship, or of business, so whenever any occasion for separation comes between them, they are broken off.