Treatises on Friendship and Old Age | Page 7

the disaster, if disaster there be; and to be severely distressed at
one's own misfortunes does not show that you love your friend, but that
you love yourself.
As for him, who can say that all is not more than well? For, unless he
had taken the fancy to wish for immortality, the last thing of which he
ever thought, what is there for which mortal man may wish that he did
not attain? In his early manhood he more than justified by
extraordinary personal courage the hopes which his fellow-citizens had
conceived of him as a child. He never was a candidate for the
consulship, yet was elected consul twice: the first time before the legal
age; the second at a time which, as far as he was concerned, was soon
enough, but was near being too late for the interests of the State. By the
overthrow of two cities which were the most bitter enemies of our
Empire, he put an end not only to the wars then raging, but also to the
possibility of others in the future. What need to mention the exquisite
grace of his manners, his dutiful devotion to his mother, his generosity
to his sisters, his liberality to his relations, the integrity of his conduct
to every one? You know all this already. Finally, the estimation in
which his fellow-citizens held him has been shown by the signs of
mourning which accompanied his obsequies. What could such a man
have gained by the addition of a few years? Though age need not be a
burden,-as I remember Cato arguing in the presence of myself and
Scipio two years before he died,-yet it cannot but take away the vigour
and freshness which Scipio was still enjoying. We may conclude
therefore that his life, from the good fortune which had attended him
and the glory he had obtained, was so circumstanced that it could not
be bettered, while the suddenness of his death saved him the sensation
of dying. As to the manner of his death it is difficult to speak; you see
what people suspect. Thus much, however, I may say: Scipio in his
lifetime saw many days of supreme triumph and exultation, but none
more magnificent than his last, on which, upon the rising of the Senate,
he was escorted by the senators and the people of Rome, by the allies,
and by the Latins, to his own door. From such an elevation of popular
esteem the next step seems naturally to be an ascent to the gods above,
rather than a descent to Hades.

4. For I am not one of these modern philosophers who maintain that our
souls perish with our bodies, and that death ends all. With me ancient
opinion has more weight: whether it be that of our own ancestors, who
attributed such solemn observances to the dead, as they plainly would
not have done if they had believed them to be wholly annihilated; or
that of the philosophers who once visited this country, and who by their
maxims and doctrines educated Magna Graecia, which at that time was
in a flourishing condition, though it has now been ruined; or that of the
man who was declared by Apollo's oracle to be "most wise," and who
used to teach without the variation which is to be found in most
philosophers that "the souls of men are divine, and that when they have
quitted the body a return to heaven is open to them, least difficult to
those who have been most virtuous and just." This opinion was shared
by Scipio. Only a few days before his death-as though he had a
presentiment of what was coming-he discoursed for three days on the
state of the republic. The company consisted of Philus and Manlius and
several others, and I had brought you, Scaevola, along with me. The
last part of his discourse referred principally to the immortality of the
soul; for he told us what he had heard from the elder Africanus in a
dream. Now if it be true that in proportion to a man's goodness the
escape from what may be called the prison and bonds of the flesh is
easiest, whom can we imagine to have had an easier voyage to the gods
than Scipio? I am disposed to think, therefore, that in his case mourning
would be a sign of envy rather than of friendship. If, however, the truth
rather is that the body and soul perish together, and that no sensation
remains, then though there is nothing good in death, at least there is
nothing bad. Remove sensation, and a man is exactly as though he had
never been born; and yet that this man was born is a joy to me, and will
be a