Aelredus Rievallensis: AELREDUS RIEVALLENSIS DE AMICITIA

Cum adhuc puer essem in scholis, et sociorum meorum me gratia plurimum delectaret, et inter mores et vitia quibus aetas illa periclitari solet, totam se mea mens dedit affectui, et devovit amori; ita ut nihil mihi dulcius, nihil iucundius, nihil utilius quam amari et amare videretur. Itaque inter diversos amores et amicitias fluctuans, rapiebatur animus huc atque illuc: et verae amicitiae legem ignorans, eius saepe similitudine fallebatur. Tandem aliquando mihi venit in manus, liber ille quem De amicitia Tullius scripsit; qui statim mihi et sententiarum gravitate utilis, et eloquentiae suavitate dulcis apparebat.

When I was still a boy in the schools, and the favor of my companions delighted me exceedingly, and amid the manners and vices with which that age is wont to be imperiled, my mind gave itself wholly to affection and devoted itself to love; so that nothing seemed to me sweeter, nothing more pleasant, nothing more useful than to be loved and to love. And so, wavering among diverse loves and friendships, my spirit was snatched hither and thither: and, ignorant of the law of true friendship, it was often deceived by its likeness. At length there came into my hands that book which Tullius wrote, On Friendship; which straightway appeared to me useful by the gravity of its sentiments, and sweet by the sweetness of its eloquence.

Et licet nec ad illud amicitiae genus me viderem idoneum, gratulabar tamen quamdam me amicitiae formulam reperisse, ad quam amorum meorum et affectionum valerem revocare discursus. Cum vero placuit bono Domino meo corrigere devium, elisum erigere, salubri contactu mundare leprosum, relicta spe saeculi, ingressus sum monasterium. Et statim legendis sacris litteris operam dedi; cum prius nec ad ipsam earum superficiem oculus lippiens, et carnalibus tenebris assuetus sufficeret.

And although I saw myself not suited to that genus of friendship, nevertheless I rejoiced that I had discovered a certain formula of friendship, to which I might be able to recall the discourses, the meanderings, of my loves and affections. But when it pleased my good Lord to correct the one gone astray, to raise the one cast down, to cleanse the leper by a health-giving contact, the hope of the world left behind, I entered a monastery. And at once I applied myself to the reading of the sacred letters; since previously my bleary eye, accustomed to carnal darkness, did not suffice even for their very surface.

Igitur cum sacra Scriptura dulcesceret, et parum illud scientiae quod mihi mundus tradiderat, earum comparatione vilesceret, occurrebant animo quae de amicitia in praefato libello legeram, et iam mirabar quod non mihi more solito sapiebant. Iam tunc enim nihil quod non dulcissimi nominis Iesu fuisset melle mellitum, nihil quod non sacrarum Scripturarum fuisset sale conditum, meum sibi ex toto rapiebat affectum. Et iterum atque iterum ea ipsa revolvens, quaerebam si forte possent Scripturarum auctoritate fulciri.

Therefore when sacred Scripture was growing sweet, and that little bit of knowledge which the world had handed down to me, by comparison with them, was growing cheap, there occurred to my mind the things which I had read about friendship in the aforementioned little book, and already I was wondering that they did not taste to me in the accustomed manner. For already by then nothing which had not been honeyed with the honey of the sweetest name of Jesus, nothing which had not been seasoned with the salt of the sacred Scriptures, was carrying off my affection for itself in its entirety. And again and again, revolving those very things, I was seeking whether perchance they could be buttressed by the authority of the Scriptures.

Cum autem in sanctorum patrum litteris de amicitia plura legissem, volens spiritaliter amare nec valens, institui de spiritali amicitia scribere, et regulas mihi castae sanctae que dilectionis praescribere. Opusculum igitur istud in tribus distinximus libellis. In primo quid sit amicitia, et quis eius fuerit ortus vel causa commendantes.

However, when in the writings of the holy fathers I had read many things about friendship, wishing to love spiritually yet not being able, I determined to write about spiritual friendship, and to prescribe for myself rules of chaste and holy dilection. Therefore we have distinguished this little work into three little books. In the first, we commend what friendship is, and what its origin or cause has been.

In secundo eius fructum excellentiam que proponentes. In tertio quomodo et inter quos possit usque in finem indirupta servari, prout potuimus enodantes. In huius igitur lectione si quis profecerit Deo gratias agat, et pro peccatis meis apud Christi misericordiam intercedat.

In the second, proposing its fruit and excellence. In the third, elucidating as we were able how, and among whom, it can be kept unbroken unto the end. In the reading of this, therefore, if anyone has profited, let him give thanks to God, and intercede for my sins before the mercy of Christ.

Si quis autem superfluum aut inutile putat esse quod scripsimus parcat infelicitati meae, quae fluxum cogitationum mearum huius meditationis me compulit occupatione restringere. Aelredus. Ecce ego et tu, et spero quod tertius inter nos Christus sit.

But if anyone thinks that what we have written is superfluous or useless, let him spare my ill-fortune, which has compelled me to restrain the flux of my thoughts by the occupation of this meditation. Aelred. Behold, I and you, and I hope that the third among us may be Christ.

Non est modo qui obstrepat, non est qui intercidat amica colloquia; gratae que huic solitudini nullius vox vel tumultus irrepit. Age nunc, carissime, aperi pectus tuum, et amicis auribus quidquid placet instilla; nec ingrate accipiamus locum, tempus et otium. Nam paulo ante in turba fratrum me residente, cum omnes undique circumstreperent, et alius quaereret, alius disputaret, et iste de Scripturis, ille de moribus, alter de vitiis, de virtutibus alter quaestiones ingererent, tu solus tacebas; et nunc caput erigens, parabas aliquid proferre in medium; sed quasi vox in ipsis interciperetur faucibus, iterum demisso capite tacebas;

There is now no one to raise a din, no one to cut off friendly colloquies; and to this welcome solitude no one’s voice or tumult slips in. Come now, dearest, open your breast, and instill into friendly ears whatever pleases you; nor let us receive ungratefully the place, the time, and the leisure. For a little before, as I sat in the crowd of the brethren, when all on every side were clamorously surrounding, and one was inquiring, another disputing, and this one was pressing questions about the Scriptures, that one about morals, another about vices, another about virtues, you alone were silent; and just now, lifting your head, you were preparing to bring something forth into the midst; but as if the voice were intercepted in your very throat, again, with head lowered, you were silent;

nunc parvo intervallo secedens a nobis, et iterum rediens, tristem vultum praeferebas; quibus omnibus mihi dumtaxat dabatur intellegi te ad proferendum tuae mentis conceptum, et horrere multitudinem, et optare secretum. Ivo. Profecto ita est, et gratulor plurimum, intellegens quod cura est tibi de puero tuo, cuius tibi mentem mentis que propositum, non alius quam spiritus caritatis aperuit.

now, seceding from us for a small interval and returning again, you were presenting a sad countenance; from all of which it was granted me at least to understand that, for putting forward the conception of your mind, you both dread the multitude and desire secrecy. Ivo. Surely it is so, and I rejoice very much, understanding that you have care for your boy, whose mind and the mind’s purpose no one other than the spirit of charity has disclosed to you.

Et utinam hoc mihi tua concedat dignatio, ut quotiescumque filios tuos qui hic sunt visitaveris, vel semel mihi liceat caeteris remotis tui habere copiam, et aestus pectoris mei sine perturbatione proferre. Aelredus. Faciam quidem et libens.

And would that your dignation grant me this, that whenever you visit your sons who are here, at least once it may be permitted me, the others removed, to have access to you, and to proffer the ardor of my breast without perturbation. Aelredus. I will indeed do it, and gladly.

Delector enim plurimum quod te pronum ad haec vana et otiosa non video, sed semper aliquid utile, et profectui tuo necessarium proloqui. Loquere ergo secure et cum amico omnes curas tuas cogitationes que commisce, ut vel discas aliquid vel doceas, des et accipias, profundas et haurias. Ivo.

For I take very great delight that I do not see you prone to these vain and otiose things, but always to utter something useful and necessary for your advancement. Therefore speak securely, and with a friend mingle all your cares and thoughts, so that you may either learn something or teach, give and receive, pour forth and draw in. Ivo.

Ego quidem discere paratus sum, non docere; non dare, sed accipere; haurire, non profundere; sicut mihi aetas praescribit, imperitia cogit, hortatur professio. Sed ne in his tempus ad alia necessarium insipienter insumam, volo me aliquid de spiritali amicitia doceas; videlicet quid sit, quid pariat utilitatis; quod eius principium, quis finis; utrum inter omnes esse possit; et si non inter omnes, inter quos; quomodo etiam possit indirupta servari, et sine aliqua dissensionis molestia sancto fine concludi. Aelredus.

I indeed am prepared to learn, not to teach; not to give, but to receive; to draw, not to pour forth; as my age prescribes for me, inexperience compels, profession exhorts. But lest I foolishly spend on these things the time necessary for other matters, I wish you to teach me something about spiritual friendship; namely, what it is, what usefulness it begets; what its beginning, what end; whether it can be among all; and if not among all, among whom; how also it can be kept unbroken, and be concluded with a holy end without any annoyance of dissension. Aelredus.

Miror cur a me haec aestimas esse quaerenda, cum satis super que ab antiquissimis excellentissimis que doctoribus de his omnibus constet esse tractatum; maxime cum pueritiam tuam in studiis huiusmodi triveris, et Tullii Ciceronis librum De amicitia legeris; ubi copiosissime de omnibus quae ad eam spectare videntur iucundo stilo disseruit; et quasdam, ut ita dicam, leges in ea ac praecepta descripsit. Ivo. Non usquequaque ipse mihi ignotus est liber, utpote qui in eo aliquando plurimum delectabar; sed ex quo mihi de sanctarum Scripturarum favis aliquid coepit emanare dulcedinis, et mellifluum Christi nomen sibi meum vendicavit affectum; quidquid sine caelestium litterarum sale, ac dulcissimi illius nominis condimento, quamvis subtiliter disputatum legero vel audiero, nec sapidum mihi potest esse nec lucidum.

I marvel why you judge these things should be asked of me, since it is established that more than enough has been treated by the most ancient and most excellent doctors concerning all these matters; especially since you spent your boyhood in studies of this kind, and have read Tullius Cicero’s book On Friendship, where he discoursed most copiously, in a pleasing style, about all that seems to pertain to it, and set down certain, so to speak, laws and precepts in it. Ivo. The book is not altogether unknown to me, inasmuch as I once took very great delight in it; but from the time when some sweetness began to flow forth for me from the honeycombs of the holy Scriptures, and the mellifluous name of Christ claimed my affection for itself, whatever, without the salt of the heavenly letters and the seasoning of that most sweet name, however subtly argued I have read or heard, can be neither savory for me nor lucid.

Eapropter vel ea ipsa quae dicta sunt, si tamen sunt consona rationi, vel certe alia quae disputationis istius poscit utilitas, velim mihi Scripturarum auctoritate probari; et quemadmodum ea ipsa quae inter nos oportet esse amicitia, et in Christo inchoetur, et secundum Christum servetur, et ad Christum finis eius et utilitas referatur plenius edoceri.

For that reason, either those very things which have been said—if, nonetheless, they are consonant with reason—or certainly other things which the utility of this disputation requires, I would like to be proved to me by the authority of the Scriptures; and to be more fully taught in what manner that very friendship which ought to be between us is initiated in Christ, is preserved according to Christ, and its end and utility are referred to Christ.

CAPUT II. Inter quos sit amicitia vera.

CHAPTER 2. Among whom there is true friendship.

Constat enim Tullium verae amicitiae ignorasse virtutem; cum eius principium finem que, Christum videlicet, penitus ignoraverit. Aelredus. Victus sum fateor ut quasi meipsum nesciens nec vires proprias metiens de his non quidem te doceam sed te cum potius conferam; cum tu ipse viam utrisque aperueris, lumen que illud splendidissimum, in ipsa inquisitionis nostrae ianua accenderis, quod nos non sinat errare per devia, sed certo tramite ad certum finem propositae quaestionis perducat.

For it is agreed that Tullius was ignorant of the virtue of true friendship; since he utterly ignored its beginning and its end, namely Christ. Aelredus. I am vanquished, I confess, so that, as if not knowing myself nor measuring my own powers, concerning these matters I should not indeed teach you, but rather confer with you; since you yourself have opened the way for us both, and have kindled that most splendid light at the very door of our inquiry, which may not allow us to stray through byways, but may lead us by a sure path to the sure end of the proposed question.

Quid enim sublimius de amicitia dici potest, quid verius, quid utilius, quam quod in Christo inchoari, et secundum Christum produci, et a Christo perfici debeat probetur. Age nunc, et quid primum de amicitia tibi videatur esse quaerendum edicito. Ivo.

For what, indeed, more sublime can be said about friendship, what more true, what more useful, than that it be proved that it ought to be begun in Christ, brought forward according to Christ, and perfected by Christ? Come now, and declare what first seems to you ought to be inquired concerning friendship. Ivo.

Primum quid sit amicitia arbitror disserendum; ne videamur, in inani pingere, si nesciamus quid sit illud, de quo debeat disputationis nostrae series tenor que procedere. Aelredus. Nonne satis tibi est hinc quod ait Tullius: amicitia est rerum humanarum et divinarum cum benevolentia et caritate consensio?

First, what friendship is, I judge must be discussed; lest we seem to paint upon a void, if we do not know what that is, about which the series and tenor of our disputation ought to proceed. Aelredus. Is this not sufficient for you, what Tullius says: “friendship is a consensus concerning human and divine things, with benevolence and charity”?

Ivo. Si tibi sufficit ista diffinitio, mihi iudico satisfactum esse.

Ivo. If that definition suffices for you, I judge myself to be satisfied.

Aelredus. Ergo quibuscumque fuerit de rebus humanis atque divinis sententia eadem, eadem que voluntas cum benevolentia et caritate, ad amicitiae perfectionem eos pervenisse fatebimur? Ivo.

Aelredus. Therefore, for whomever there is the same sentiment concerning human and divine things, and the same will with benevolence and charity, shall we acknowledge that they have arrived at the perfection of friendship? Ivo.

Quidni? Verumtamen caritatis vel benevolentiae nomine quid ethnicus ille significare voluerit, non video. Aelredus.

Why not? Nevertheless, I do not see what that pagan wished to signify by the name of charity or benevolence. Aelred.

Forte nomine caritatis mentis affectum, benevolentiae vero operum expressit effectum. Nam ipsa in rebus humanis atque divinis, mentibus utriusque cara, id est suavis et pretiosa debet esse consensio; benevola etiam et iucunda in rebus exterioribus operum exhibitio. Ivo.

Perhaps by the name of charity he expressed the mind’s affection, but by benevolence the effect of works. For in human and divine affairs, the consensus—dear to the minds of both, that is, sweet and precious—ought to be; and likewise, in exterior matters, the exhibition of works ought to be benevolent and agreeable. Ivo.

Fateor placet mihi satis ista diffinitio; nisi et ethnicis et iudaeis, iniquis insuper christianis eam convenire putarem. Quod autem vera amicitia inter eos qui sine Christo sunt esse non possit, mihi fateor esse persuasum. Aelredus.

I confess that definition pleases me well enough; except that I would think it to suit pagans and Jews, and, moreover, iniquitous Christians as well. But that true friendship cannot exist among those who are without Christ, I confess I am persuaded. Aelredus.

Satis nobis in consequentibus elucescet, utrum diffinitio minus aliquid habeat, vel superhabundet in aliquo; ut vel reprobetur a nobis, vel quasi sufficiens, et extra nihil recipiens admittatur. Ex ipsa tamen diffinitione, quamvis forte tibi minus videatur esse perfecta, intellegere utcumque poteris quid sit amicitia. Ivo.

It will shine forth enough for us in what follows, whether the definition lacks something, or superabounds in something; so that either it may be reproved by us, or, as sufficient and receiving nothing extraneous, it may be admitted. Yet from the definition itself, although perhaps it seems to you less than perfect, you will be able somehow to understand what friendship is. Ivo.

Non sim tibi oneri, rogo te, si non ista sufficiant; nisi ipsius vocabuli rationem mihi enucleaveris. Aelredus. Geram tibi morem, si tamen parcas inscientiae meae, ut me non cogas docere quod nescio.

Do not let me be a burden to you, I beg you, if these do not suffice; unless you have enucleated for me the rationale of the word itself. Aelredus. I will humor you, if, however, you spare my ignorance, so that you do not compel me to teach what I do not know.

Ab amore, ut mihi videtur, amicus dicitur; ab amico amicitia. Est autem amor quidam animae rationalis affectus per quem ipsa aliquid cum desiderio quaerit et appetit ad fruendum; per quem et fruitur eo cum quadam interiori suavitate, amplectitur et conservat adeptum. Cuius affectus et motus in speculo nostro, quod satis cognitum habes, quam lucide potuimus ac diligenter expressimus.

From love, as it seems to me, “friend” is said; from “friend,” “friendship.” Now love is a certain affection of the rational soul, through which it itself seeks something with desire and appetites it for enjoyment; through which also it enjoys it with a certain inward sweetness, embraces, and conserves what has been attained. The affections and motions of which, in our mirror, which you know quite well, we have expressed as lucidly and as diligently as we could.

Porro amicus quasi amoris, vel ut quibusdam placuit ipsius animi custos dicitur; quoniam amicum meum amoris mutui, vel ipsius animi mei oportet esse custodem, ut omnia eius secreta fideli silentio servet, quidquid in ea vitiosum viderit pro viribus curet et toleret; cui et gaudenti congaudeat, et dolenti condoleat, et omnia sua esse sentiat, quae amici sunt. Amicitia igitur ipsa virtus est qua talis dilectionis ac dulcedinis foedere ipsi animi copulantur, et efficiuntur unum de pluribus. Unde ipsam amicitiam non inter fortuita vel caduca, sed inter ipsas virtutes quae aeternae sunt, etiam mundi huius philosophi collocarunt.

Moreover, a friend is called, as it were, the custodian of love, or, as it has pleased certain people, of the very soul; since my friend ought to be the custodian of mutual love, or of my very soul, so that he may keep all its secrets in faithful silence, and whatever he shall have seen in it to be faulty he may, to the extent of his powers, care for and tolerate; with whom also he may rejoice-with when I rejoice, and condole when I grieve, and may feel that whatever things are the friend’s are his own. Friendship, therefore, is itself a virtue by which, by the bond of such dilection and sweetness, the souls themselves are coupled, and are made one out of many. Whence even the philosophers of this world have placed friendship itself not among things fortuitous or caducous, but among the very virtues which are eternal.

Quibus Salomon in proverbiis consentire videtur: "Omni, inquiens, tempore diligit qui amicus est" (Prov. XVII, 17); manifeste declarans amicitiam aeternam esse, si vera est; si autem esse desierit, nec veram fuisse cum videretur existere. Ivo.

To which Solomon in the Proverbs seems to agree: “A friend loves at all times,” he says (Prov. 17, 17); manifestly declaring that friendship is eternal, if it is true; but if it has ceased to be, that it was not true when it seemed to exist. Ivo.

Quid est igitur quod inter amicissimos graves ortas inimicitias legimus? Aelredus. De his suo loco uberius, si Deus voluerit, disputabimus.

What, then, is it that we read of grievous enmities having arisen between the most intimate friends? Aelred. About these matters, in their proper place, we shall dispute more copiously, if God will.

Haec volo interim credas numquam fuisse amicum, qui laedere potuit eum quem in amicitia semel recepit; sed nec eum verae amicitiae gustasse delicias qui vel laesus desiit diligere quem semel amavit. Omni enim tempore diligit qui amicus est. Etsi arguatur, etsi laedatur, etsi tradatur flammis, etsi cruci affigatur, omni tempore diligit qui amicus est; et ut ait noster Hieronymus: "Amicitia quae desinere potest, numquam vera fuit" (Epist.

These things I wish you meanwhile to believe: that he was never a friend who could injure him whom he once received into friendship; but neither has he tasted the delights of true friendship who, even when injured, ceased to love him whom he once loved. For at every time he loves who is a friend. Even if he be accused, even if he be harmed, even if he be handed over to the flames, even if he be affixed to the cross, at every time he loves who is a friend; and as our Jerome says: "Friendship which can cease was never true" (Epist.

41, ad Ruffin.). Ivo. Cum tanta sit in amicitia vera perfectio, non est mirum quod tam rari fuerunt hi quos veros amicos antiquitas commendavit. "Vix enim", ut ait Tullius, "tria vel quatuor amicorum paria in tot retro saeculis fama concelebrat" (Lib.

41, to Ruffinus.). Ivo. Since there is such perfection in true friendship, it is not a wonder that those whom antiquity has commended as true friends were so rare. "Scarcely indeed", as Tullius says, "does fame celebrate three or four pairs of friends in so many ages past" (Book.

de Amic. n. 15). Quod si nostris, id est christianis temporibus, tanta est raritas amicorum, frustra, ut mihi videtur, in huius virtutis acquisitione desudo, quam me adepturum, eius mirabili sublimitate territus, iam pene despero. Aelredus.

de Amic. n. 15). But if in our times, that is, Christian times, such is the rarity of friends, in vain, as it seems to me, I sweat in the acquisition of this virtue, which, frightened by its marvelous sublimity, I now almost despair that I shall obtain. Aelredus.

Magnarum rerum, ut ait quidam, etiam ipse conatus magnus est. Unde virtuosae mentis est sublimia semper et ardua meditari, ut vel adipiscatur optata, vel lucidius intellegat et cognoscat optanda; cum non parum credendus sit profecisse, qui virtutis cognitione didicit quam longe sit a virtute. Quamvis de nullius virtutis acquisitione desperandum sit christiano, cui quotidie ex Evangelio vox divina resultat: petite et accipietis, et caetera.

Of great things, as a certain one says, even the very endeavor is great. Whence it belongs to a virtuous mind always to meditate on sublime and arduous things, so that either it may attain the things desired, or more lucidly understand and come to know the things to be desired; since he is to be believed to have made no small progress, who by the cognition of virtue has learned how far he is from virtue. Although a Christian should not despair of the acquisition of any virtue, for whom daily from the Gospel the divine voice resounds: ask and you will receive, and so forth.

Nec mirum si inter ethnicos verae virtutis rari fuerunt sectatores, qui virtutum largitorem et Dominum nesciebant, de quo scriptum est: Dominus virtutum ipse est rex gloriae. In cuius profecto fide non dico tria vel quatuor, sed mille tibi proferam paria amicorum; qui quod illi de Pylade et Oreste pro magno miraculo dicunt vel fingunt, parati erant pro invicem mori. Nonne, secundum tullianam diffinitionem, verae amicitiae virtute pollebant, de quibus scriptum est: "Multitudinis credentium erat cor unum et anima una; nec quisquam aliquid suum esse dicebat, sed erant illis omnia communia" (Act.

Nor is it a wonder if among the pagans there were rare followers of true virtue, who did not know the Bestower and Lord of the virtues, of whom it is written: The Lord of the virtues, he himself is the King of glory. In whose faith, assuredly, I will not say three or four, but a thousand pairs of friends I could bring forward to you; who, what they say or fashion about Pylades and Orestes as a great marvel, were ready to die for one another. Did they not, according to the Tullian definition, excel by the virtue of true friendship, of whom it is written: "The heart and soul of the multitude of believers was one; nor did anyone say that anything was his own, but all things were common to them" (Acts

IV, 32). Quomodo non inter eos rerum divinarum et humanarum cum caritate et benevolentia fuit summa consensio, quibus erat cor unum et anima una? Quot martyres pro fratribus animas posuerunt. Quot non pepercerunt expensis, non laboribus, non ipsius corporis cruciatibus.

4, 32). How was there not among them the highest consensus in divine and human things with charity and benevolence, for whom there was one heart and one soul? How many martyrs laid down their souls for their brothers. How many spared not expenses, nor labors, nor the torments of the body itself.

Credo te multotiens, non sine lacrimis, legisse puellam illam antiochenam, pulcherrima cuiusdam militis fraude ereptam lupanaribus, ipsum postmodum habuisse socium martyrii, quem custodem pudicitiae invenerat in lupanari. Multa tibi huius rei proferrem exempla, nisi et prolixitas prohiberet, et silentium nobis ipsa copia indixisset. Annuntiavit enim Christus Iesus et locutus est, et multiplicati sunt super numerum.

I believe that you many times, not without tears, have read of that Antiochene maiden, snatched from the brothels by the most beautiful stratagem of a certain soldier, that she afterwards had this very man as a companion in martyrdom, whom she had found a guardian of chastity in the brothel. I would bring forward to you many examples of this matter, if both prolixity did not forbid, and the very abundance had not imposed silence upon us. For Christ Jesus has announced and has spoken, and they have been multiplied beyond number.

Maiorem, inquit, hac dilectionem nemo habet, quam ut animam suam ponat quis pro amicis suis. Ivo. Ergo ne inter amicitiam et caritatem nihil distare arbitramur?

Greater love than this no one has, he says, than that someone should lay down his life for his friends. Ivo. Therefore do we suppose that nothing differs between friendship and charity?

Aelredus. Immo plurimum. Multo enim plures gremio caritatis quam amicitiae amplexibus recipiendos, divina sanxit auctoritas.

Aelred. On the contrary, very much indeed. For divine authority has sanctioned that many more are to be received into the bosom of charity than into the embraces of friendship.

Non enim amicos solum, sed et inimicos sinu dilectionis excipere, caritatis lege compellimur (Matth. V, 44). Amicos autem eos solos dicimus, quibus cor nostrum, et quidquid in illo est, committere non formidamus; illis vicissim nobis, eadem fidei lege et securitate constrictis. Ivo.

For we are compelled by the law of charity not only to receive friends, but even enemies, into the bosom of love (Matt. 5, 44). But we call friends only those to whom we do not fear to commit our heart, and whatever is in it; they, in turn, being bound to us by the same law of fidelity and security. Ivo.

Quam multi saeculariter viventes, et sibi in quibuslibet vitiis consentientes, simili sibi foedere copulantur, et prae euntis mundi deliciis gratum et dulce etiam talis amicitiae vinculum experiuntur. Non sit tibi molestum inter tot amicitias illam quam spiritalem ad differentiam aliarum credimus nominandam, quae illis quodammodo involvitur et obscuratur, et illam quaerentibus et desiderantibus occurrunt et obstrepunt ab earum, ut ita dixerim, communione secernere; ut illarum comparatione clariorem eam nobis ac proinde optabiliorem faciens, ad eius nos acquisitionem vehementius excites et accendas. Aelredus.

How many, living secularly and consenting to themselves in whatever vices, are coupled by a similar pact among themselves, and, because of the delights of the passing world, even experience the bond of such friendship as pleasant and sweet. Let it not be troublesome to you, among so many friendships, to name that one which, for the difference from the others, we believe ought to be called spiritual, which is in some manner enfolded and obscured by them, and they run to meet and raise a din against those seeking and desiring to separate it from their, so to speak, communion; so that, making it clearer to us by comparison with those and therefore more desirable, you may more vehemently excite and inflame us to its acquisition. Aelredus.

Falso sibi praeclarum amicitiae nomen assumunt, inter quos est coniventia vitiorum; quoniam qui non amat, amicus non est; non autem amat hominem, qui amat iniquitatem; qui enim diligit iniquitatem non amat, sed odit animam suam; qui vero suam non diligit, animam utique alterius amare non poterit. Unde colligitur eos amicitiae solo nomine gloriari, falli que eius similitudine, non veritate fulciri. Verumtamen cum in hac tali amicitia, quam vel libido commaculat, vel avaritia foedat, vel incestat luxuria, tanta ac talis experiatur dulcedo; libet conicere, quantum habeat suavitatis illa quae quanto honestior est, tanto est et securior; quanto castior, tanto et iucundior; quanto liberior, tanto et felicior.

They falsely assume to themselves the illustrious name of friendship, among whom there is connivance in vices; for he who does not love is not a friend; nor does he love the human being who loves iniquity; for he who loves iniquity does not love, but hates his own soul; but he who does not love his own will by no means be able to love the soul of another. Whence it is gathered that they glory in the name of friendship alone, and are deceived by its similitude, not supported by truth. Nevertheless, since in such a friendship, which either libido besmirches, or avarice defiles, or luxury makes unchaste, so great and such sweetness is experienced; it is pleasant to conjecture how much suavity that one has which, the more honest it is, by so much the more secure it also is; the more chaste, the more pleasant; the freer, the more felicitous.

Patiamur tamen ut propter quamdam quae in affectibus sentitur similitudinem, etiam illae amicitiae quae verae non sunt, amicitiae nuncupentur; dum tamen ab illa quae spiritalis est, et ideo vera, certis indiciis distinguantur. Dicatur itaque amicitia alia carnalis, alia mundialis, alia spiritalis. Et carnalem quidem creat vitiorum consensus; mundialem spes quaestus accendit; spiritalem inter bonos vitae morum studiorum que similitudo conglutinat.

Let us nevertheless allow that, on account of a certain likeness which is felt in the affections, even those friendships which are not true be entitled “friendships”; provided, however, that they be distinguished from that which is spiritual, and therefore true, by sure indications. Let friendship, then, be said to be of one kind carnal, of another worldly, of another spiritual. And the carnal indeed is created by a consent of vices; the worldly is kindled by the hope of gain; the spiritual among the good is cemented by a likeness of life, of morals, and of studies.

Verum amicitiae carnalis exordium ab affectione procedit, quae instar meretricis divaricat pedes suos omni transeunti, sequens aures et oculos suos per varia fornicantes; per quorum aditus usque ad ipsam mentem pulchrorum corporum, vel rerum voluptuosarum infertur imago, quibus ad libitum frui putat esse beatum, sed sine socio frui minus aestimat esse iucundum.

Yet the beginning of carnal friendship proceeds from affection, which, like a prostitute, spreads her feet to every passer-by, following her ears and her eyes as they fornicate through diverse things; through the entryways of which the image of beautiful bodies, or of voluptuous things, is carried even into the very mind—things to enjoy at will she deems to be blessedness, but to enjoy without a companion she judges to be less pleasant.

Tunc, motu, nutu, verbis, obsequiis, animus ab animo captivatur, et accenditur unus ab altero, et conflantur in unum; ut inito foedere miserabili, quidquid sceleris, quidquid sacrilegii est, alter agat et patiatur pro altero; nihil que hac amicitia dulcius arbitrantur, nihil iudicant iustius; idem velle et idem nolle, sibi existimantes amicitiae legibus imperari. Haec itaque amicitia nec deliberatione suscipitur, nec iudicio probatur, nec regitur ratione; sed secundum impetum affectionis per diversa raptatur; non modum servans, non honesta procurans, non commoda incommoda ve prospiciens; sed ad omnia inconsiderate, indiscrete, leviter, immoderate que progrediens. Idcirco vel quasi quibusdam furiis agitata a semetipsa consumitur vel eadem levitate resolvitur qua contrahitur.

Then, by motion, by nod, by words, by courtesies, the mind is taken captive by mind, and the one is kindled by the other, and they are fused into one; so that, a miserable pact having been entered, whatever of crime, whatever of sacrilege there is, the one does and suffers for the other; and they reckon nothing sweeter than this friendship, judge nothing more just; to will the same and to not will the same, thinking that they are commanded by the laws of friendship. This friendship, therefore, is neither undertaken by deliberation, nor approved by judgment, nor governed by reason; but, according to the impulse of affection, is snatched through diverse things; keeping no measure, procuring no honorable things, foreseeing neither advantages nor disadvantages; but advancing toward all things inconsiderately, indiscriminately, lightly, and immoderately. Therefore either, as if agitated by certain furies, it is consumed by itself, or it is dissolved by the same levity by which it is contracted.

At amicitia mundialis, quae rerum vel bonorum temporalium cupidine partitur, semper est plena fraudis atque fallaciae; nihil in ea certum, nihil constans, nihil securum; quippe quae semper cum fortuna mutatur, et sequitur marsupium. Unde scriptum est: "Est amicus secundum tempus, et non permanebit in die tribulationis" (Eccli. VI, 8). Tolle spem quaestus, et statim desinet esse amicus.

But worldly friendship, which is portioned out by cupidity for things or temporal goods, is always full of fraud and fallacy; nothing in it is certain, nothing constant, nothing secure; indeed it always changes with fortune, and follows the purse. Whence it is written: "There is a friend according to the time, and he will not remain in the day of tribulation" (Eccli. 6, 8). Remove the hope of gain, and at once he will cease to be a friend.

Quam amicitiam quidam eleganti versu ita derisit: non est personae, sed prosperitatis amicus, quem fortuna tenet dulcis, acerba fugat. Attamen huius amicitiae vitiosae principium quosdam plerumque ad quamdam verae amicitiae provehit portionem; eos scilicet qui primum spe lucri communis foedus ineuntes dum sibi in iniquo mammona fidem servant, in rebus dumtaxat humanis, ad maximum perveniunt gratum que consensum. Attamen vera amicitia nullo modo dicenda est, quae commodi temporalis causa suscipitur, et servatur.

Which friendship a certain man derided in an elegant verse thus: he is not a friend of the person, but of prosperity; whom sweet Fortune holds fast, bitter Fortune drives away. Yet the beginning of this vicious friendship for some often propels them to a certain portion of true friendship; namely those who at first, entering into a foedus by hope of common profit, while they keep faith in the unjust Mammon, in human affairs only, arrive at a very great and pleasing consensus. Nevertheless, it is in no way to be called true friendship, which is undertaken and preserved for the sake of temporal commodity.

Amicitia enim spiritalis quam veram dicimus, non utilitatis cuiusque mundialis intuitu, non qualibet extra nascente causa, sed ex propriae naturae dignitate, et humani pectoris sensu desideratur; ita ut fructus eius praemium que non sit aliud quam ipsa. Unde Dominus in Evangelio: "Posui vos, inquit, ut eatis et fructum afferatis" (Joan. XV, 16), id est ut invicem diligatis.

For spiritual friendship, which we call true, is desired not in view of any worldly utility, not from any cause arising outside, but from the dignity of its own nature and from the sentiment of the human breast; such that its fruit and its reward is nothing other than itself. Whence the Lord in the Gospel: "I have appointed you, he says, that you should go and bear fruit" (John 15, 16), that is, that you should love one another.

In ipsa namque vera amicitia itur proficiendo, et fructus capitur perfectionis illius dulcedinem sentiendo.

For in true friendship itself one advances by making progress, and the fruit is captured by feeling the sweetness of that perfection.

CAPUT III. Amicitia triplex: carnalis, mundialis, spiritualis et vera.

CHAPTER 3. Threefold friendship: carnal, mundane, spiritual and true.

Amicitia itaque spiritalis inter bonos, vitae, morum, studiorum que similitudine parturitur, quae est in rebus humanis atque divinis cum benevolentia et caritate consensio. Quae quidem diffinitio ad amicitiam exprimendam satis mihi videtur esse sufficiens, si tamen more nostro caritas nuncupetur, ut ab amicitia omne vitium excludatur, benevolentia autem ipse sensus amandi qui cum quadam dulcedine movetur interius exprimatur. Ubi talis est amicitia, ibi profecto est idem velle et idem nolle, tanto utique dulcius, quanto sincerius; tanto suavius, quanto sacratius; ubi sic amantes nihil possunt velle quod dedeceat, nihil quod expediat nolle.

Therefore spiritual friendship among the good is brought to birth by a likeness of life, morals, and studies, which is, in human and divine matters, a consensus with benevolence and charity. This definition indeed seems to me to be sufficient for expressing friendship, provided that, in our usage, “charity” be so called, so that from friendship every vice be excluded, and “benevolence” be expressed as the very sense of loving, which is stirred within with a certain sweetness. Where such friendship is, there indeed there is to will the same and to not will the same—so much the sweeter, the more sincere; so much the more suave, the more sacred—where lovers thus can will nothing that would be unseemly, and nothing that is expedient can they not will.

Hanc nempe amicitiam prudentia dirigit, iustitia regit, fortitudo custodit, temperantia moderatur. De quibus suo loco disputabimus. Nunc autem si de eo quod primum quaerendum putasti, videlicet quid sit amicitia, satis datum existimas, edicito.

This, to wit, friendship is directed by prudence, ruled by justice, guarded by fortitude, moderated by temperance. Of these we shall discourse in their proper place. Now, however, if you think that enough has been given concerning that which you judged should first be inquired—namely, what friendship is—declare it.

Ivo. Sufficiunt plane ea quae dicta sunt, nec aliquid mihi suggeritur ultra quod quaeram. Sed antequam ad alia transeamus, scire desidero unde primum amicitia inter mortales orta est.

Ivo. The things that have been said plainly suffice, nor does anything further occur to me to ask. But before we pass on to other matters, I desire to know whence friendship first arose among mortals.

Natura an casu, an necessitate aliqua; vel certe praecepto, aut lege humano generi imposita, in usum venerit; usus vero eam commendabilem fecerit.

By nature or by chance, or by some necessity; or certainly by a precept, or by a law imposed upon the human race, has it come into use; and use indeed has made it commendable.

CAPUT IV. Amicitiae origo et progressus.

CHAPTER 4. The origin and progress of friendship.

Aelredus. Amicitiae, ut mihi videtur, primum ipsa natura humanis mentibus impressit affectum, deinde experientia auxit, postremo legis auctoritas ordinavit. Deus enim summe potens et summe bonus, sibi ipsi sufficiens bonum est; quoniam bonum suum, gaudium suum, gloria sua, beatitudo sua, ipse est.

Aelredus. To friendship, as it seems to me, nature herself first impressed the affection upon human minds, then experience augmented it, and finally the authority of law ordained it. For God, supremely powerful and supremely good, is a good sufficient to himself; since his good, his joy, his glory, his beatitude, he himself is.

Nec est aliquid extra ipsum quo egeat, non homo, non angelus, non coelum, non terra, nec aliquid quod in ipsis est, cui omnis creatura proclamat: Deus meus es, quoniam bonorum meorum non eges. Nec tantum sibi sufficit ipse, sed et omnium rerum sufficientia ipse est, dans aliis esse, et aliis sentire, aliis insuper et sapere, ipse omnium existentium causa, omnium sentientium vita, omnium intellegentium sapientia. Ipse itaque summa natura omnes naturas instituit, omnia suis locis ordinavit, omnia suis temporibus discrete distribuit.

Nor is there anything outside himself that he needs—neither man, nor angel, nor heaven, nor earth, nor anything that is in them—to whom every creature proclaims: You are my God, since you have no need of my goods. Nor does he only suffice for himself, but he is also the sufficiency of all things, giving to some to be, to others to feel, and to others moreover to be wise; he himself the cause of all existents, the life of all sentient beings, the wisdom of all intelligent beings. He therefore, the highest nature, instituted all natures, ordered all things in their places, and distributed all things in their times discretely.

Voluit autem, nam et ita ratio eius aeterna prescripsit, ut omnes creaturas suas pax componeret, et uniret societas; et ita omnia ab ipso qui summe et pure unus est quoddam unitatis vestigium sortirentur. Hinc est quod nullum genus rerum solitarium reliquit, sed ex multis quadam societate connexuit. Nam ut ab insensibilibus ordiamur, quae humus, vel quod flumen unum unius generis gignit lapidem; aut quae silva unam unius generis arborem producit?

He willed moreover—and thus too his eternal reason prescribed—that peace should compose all his creatures, and that society should unite them; and thus all things from him who is supremely and purely One should obtain a certain vestige of unity. Hence it is that he left no kind of things solitary, but out of many connected them by a certain society. For, to begin from the insensibles: what soil, or what river, begets a single stone of a single kind? or what forest brings forth a single tree of a single kind?

Ita inter ipsa insensibilia quasi amor quidam societatis elucet, cum nihil eorum solum sit; sed cum quadam sui generis societate et creetur, et persistat. Verum inter ipsa sensibilia quanta amicitiae species et societatis amoris que fulgeat imago, quis facile dixerit? Certe cum in caeteris omnibus irrationabilia deprehendantur, in hac tantum parte ita humanum animum imitantur, ut pene ratione agi aestimentur.

Thus among the insensibles themselves, as it were, a certain love of society shines forth, since none of them is solitary; rather, with a certain society of its own kind it both is created and persists. But among the sensibles themselves, who could easily say how great a species of amity and an image of society and of love gleams? Surely, though in all other respects they are found to be irrational, in this one part they so imitate the human mind that they are judged to be almost actuated by reason.

Ita se sequuntur, ita colludunt sibi, ita motibus simul et vocibus suum exprimunt et produnt affectum; tam avide et iucunde mutua societate fruuntur, ut nihil magis quam ea quae amicitiae sunt curare videantur. Sic etiam in angelis divina sapientia providit, ut non unus videlicet crearetur, sed plures; inter quos grata societas, et amor suavissimus eamdem voluntatem, eumdem crearet affectum; ne cum alter superior, inferior alter videretur, locus pateret invidiae, si non obstitisset caritas amicitiae; et ita solitudinem excluderet multitudo, iucunditatem augeret in pluribus caritatis communio. Postremo cum hominem condidisset, ut bonum societatis altius commendaret: non est bonum, inquit, esse hominem solum; faciamus ei adiutorium simile sibi.

Thus they follow one another, thus they play together with one another, thus by their motions and their voices alike they express and betray their affect; they enjoy mutual society so avidly and so jocundly that they seem to care for nothing more than the things that belong to friendship. So also in the angels divine wisdom provided that not one, to wit, should be created, but many; among whom a welcome society and most sweet love would create the same will, the same affect; lest, when one might seem superior, another inferior, a place lie open for envy, if the charity of friendship had not opposed it; and thus the multitude would exclude solitude, the communion of charity would increase pleasantness among the many. Lastly, when he had fashioned man, that he might commend more highly the good of society: it is not good, he says, for man to be alone; let us make for him an aid like to himself.

Nec certe de simili, vel saltem de eadem materia hoc adiutorium divina virtus formavit; sed ad expressius caritatis et amicitiae incentivum, de ipsius substantia masculi feminam procreavit. Pulchre autem de latere primi hominis secundus assumitur, ut natura doceret omnes aequales, quasi collaterales; nec esset in rebus humanis superior vel inferior, quod est amicitiae proprium. Ita natura mentibus humanis, ab ipso exordio amicitiae et caritatis impressit affectum, quem interior mox sensus amandi quodam gustu suavitatis adauxit.

Nor indeed did the divine virtue form this aid from a similar, or at least from the same, matter; but, for a more express incentive of charity and friendship, from the very substance of the male himself it procreated the female. Beautifully, moreover, from the side of the first man the second is assumed, so that nature might teach all to be equals, as it were collaterals; and that in human affairs there might be neither a superior nor an inferior, which is proper to friendship. Thus nature impressed upon human minds, from the very beginning, the affection of friendship and charity, which the inner sense of loving soon augmented by a certain taste of suavity.

At post lapsum primi hominis, cum refrigescente caritate cupiditas subintrasset, fecisset que bono communi privata praeponi amicitiae caritatis que splendorem avaritia invidia que corrupit; contentiones, aemulationes, odia, suspiciones corruptis hominum moribus invehens. Tunc boni quique inter caritatem et amicitiam distinxerunt; animadvertentes quod etiam inimicis atque perversis impendenda sit dilectio; cum inter bonos et pessimos esse non possit voluntatum vel consiliorum ulla communio. Amicitia itaque quae sicut caritas inter omnes primum et ab omnibus servabatur, inter paucos bonos naturali lege resedit; qui, videntes a multis sacra fidei ac societatis iura violari, arctiori se dilectionis et amicitiae foedere constrinxerunt; inter mala quae videbant et sentiebant in mutuae caritatis gratia quiescentes.

But after the fall of the first man, when charity was growing cold and cupidity had crept in, and had caused private interests to be preferred to the common good, the splendor of friendship and charity avarice and envy corrupted; bringing in contentions, emulations, hatreds, suspicions upon the corrupted morals of men. Then all the good distinguished between charity and friendship; observing that even to enemies and the perverse dilection ought to be bestowed; since between the good and the worst there can be no communion of wills or counsels. Therefore friendship, which—like charity—was at first maintained among all and by all, settled by a natural law among a few good men; who, seeing the sacred rights of faith and society violated by many, bound themselves by a stricter covenant of dilection and friendship; resting, amid the evils which they saw and felt, in the grace of mutual charity.

Verum his in quibus omnem virtutis sensum oblitteravit impietas, ratio quae in eis exstingui non potuit, ipsum amicitiae et societatis affectum non reliquit; adeo ut sine sociis, nec avaro divitiae, nec ambitioso gloria, nec voluptas placere posset luxurioso. Compacta sunt etiam inter pessimos quaedam societatis foedera detestanda; quae amicitiae pulcherrimo nomine palliata, lege et praeceptis a vera amicitia fuerant distinguenda; ne cum ista appeteretur, in illa propter quamdam eius similitudinem incaute incideretur. Sic amicitiam quam natura instituit, quam roboravit usus, legis auctoritas ordinavit.

Yet in those in whom impiety has obliterated every sense of virtue, the reason which could not be extinguished in them did not abandon the very affection of friendship and of society; to such a degree that, without associates, neither do riches please the avaricious man, nor glory the ambitious, nor does pleasure please the voluptuary. Certain detestable compacts of society have also been struck even among the worst; which, cloaked with the most beautiful name of friendship, were to be distinguished from true friendship by law and by precepts; lest, when the one was sought, into the other one might incautiously fall on account of a certain likeness of it. Thus the friendship which nature instituted, which use corroborated, the authority of law ordained.

Manifestum proinde est amicitiam naturalem esse sicut virtutem, sicut sapientiam, et caetera quae propter se, quasi bona naturalia, et appetenda sunt et servanda; quibus omnis qui ea habet bene utitur, quibus nullus prorsus abutitur. Ivo. Nonne, quaeso te, sapientia multi abutuntur, qui ex ea hominibus placere cupiunt, vel in seipsis pro collata sibi sapientia superbiunt; vel certe hi qui eam venalem habent, et quaestum estimant pietatem?

It is manifest, therefore, that natural friendship is like virtue, like wisdom, and the rest of the things which for their own sake, as natural goods, are both to be sought and to be preserved; and as for these, everyone who has them uses them well, and none at all abuses them. Ivo. Do not, I ask you, many abuse wisdom, who from it desire to please men, or in themselves grow proud because wisdom has been conferred on them; or at least those who have it for sale, and esteem gain to be piety?

Aelredus. Hinc tibi satisfaciet noster Augustinus, cuius verba sunt haec: qui sibi placet, stulto homini placet; quia profecto stultus est, qui sibi placet. Qui vero stultus est, sapiens non est; et qui sapiens non est, non habendo utique sapientiam, sapiens non est.

Aelred. Here our Augustine will satisfy you, whose words are these: he who pleases himself pleases a foolish man; for surely he is foolish who pleases himself. But he who is foolish is not sapient; and he who is not sapient, by not having sapience, is not sapient.

Quomodo igitur sapientia male utitur, qui sapientiam non habet? Sic et superba castitas virtus non est; quia superbia ipsa quae vitium est, eam quae virtus putabatur, sibi conformem facit; et ideo iam non virtus sed vitium est. Ivo.

How, then, does he use wisdom badly, who does not have wisdom? Thus too proud chastity is not a virtue; because pride itself, which is a vice, makes that which was thought a virtue conformable to itself; and therefore it is now not virtue but vice. Ivo.

Sed pace tua dico, non congruum mihi videtur, quod amicitiae sapientiam adiunxisti, cum inter illas nulla sit comparatio. Aelredus. Saepe minora maioribus, bona melioribus, infirmiora fortioribus, etsi non coaequantur, coniunguntur tamen maxime in virtutibus; quae licet a se graduum diversitate discrepent, quadam sibi tamen similitudine vicinantur.

But, with your leave, I say, it does not seem congruous to me that you have adjoined wisdom to friendship, since there is no comparison between them. Aelredus. Often the lesser to the greater, good things to better, the weaker to the stronger—although they are not equalized—are nevertheless conjoined, most of all in virtues; which, although they differ from one another by a diversity of degrees, yet by a certain similitude are made near neighbors to one another.

Vicina enim est virginitati viduitas; viduitati coniugalis castitas; et quamvis inter has virtutes magna sit differentia, in eo tamen quod virtutes sunt, nonnulla est convenientia. Neque enim ideo pudicitia coniugalis virtus non est, quia praecellit continentia vidualis, quibus licet sancta praeferatur virginitas, earum tamen gratiam non oblitterat. Quamvis si ea quae de amicitia dicta sunt diligenter advertas, invenies eam sapientiae sic vicinam vel infertam, ut pene dixerim amicitiam nihil aliud esse, quam sapientiam.

For widowhood is neighboring to virginity; to widowhood, conjugal chastity; and although among these virtues there is a great difference, yet in that they are virtues there is some congruence. Nor, in fact, is conjugal modesty therefore not a virtue because widowly continence excels; and although holy virginity is preferred to these, nevertheless it does not obliterate their grace. Yet if you diligently attend to the things that have been said about friendship, you will find it so near to wisdom, or even ingrafted into it, that I would almost say friendship is nothing else than wisdom.

Ivo. Obstupesco fateor, nec facile id mihi persuaderi posse existimo. Aelredus.

Ivo. I am astonished, I confess, nor do I esteem that I can easily be persuaded of it. Aelredus.

Excidit ne tibi dixisse Scripturam: omni tempore diligit qui amicus est. Ait etiam, sicut meministi, noster Hieronymus: amicitia quae desinere potest, numquam vera fuit. Amicitiam etiam nec subsistere quidem sine caritate, satis super que monstratum est.

Has it escaped you that Scripture has said: “He loves at all times who is a friend”? Our Jerome also says, as you remember: “A friendship that can cease was never true.” And it has been shown enough and more than enough that friendship cannot even subsist without charity.

Cum igitur in amicitia et aeternitas vigeat, et veritas luceat, et caritas dulcescat, utrum nomen sapientiae tribus his debeas abrogare, tu videris. Ivo. O quid est hoc?

Since therefore in friendship eternity flourishes, verity shines, and charity grows sweet, whether you ought to abrogate the name of wisdom from these three, that is for you to decide. Ivo. O what is this?

Dicam ne de amicitia quod amicus Iesu Ioannes de caritate commemorat: Deus amicitia est? Aelredus. Inusitatum quidem hoc, nec ex Scripturis habet auctoritatem.

Shall I say about friendship what John, the friend of Jesus, commemorates about charity: God is friendship? Aelred. This indeed is unusual, nor does it have authority from the Scriptures.

Quod tamen sequitur de caritate, amicitiae profecto dare non dubito, quoniam: qui manet in amicitia, in Deo manet, et Deus in eo. Quod cum de ipsius fructu vel utilitate coeperimus disputare, manifestius pervidebis. Nunc si quid sit amicitia pro simplicitate ingenioli nostri satis diximus, caetera quae enucleanda proposuisti alio tempori reservemus. Ivo.

What nevertheless follows about charity, I do not doubt at all to give to amity, since: he who remains in amity remains in God, and God in him. You will see this more clearly when we begin to dispute about its fruit or utility. Now as to what amity is, we have said enough according to the simplicity of our little wit; let us reserve for another time the other things which you proposed to be enucleated. Ivo.

Licet aviditati meae nimis ista sit molesta dilatio, ad hoc tamen non solum tempus coenae, cui deesse non permittimur, sed etiam multorum, quibus debitor tui es, exspectatio satis onerosa compellit. Aelredus. Iam nunc, frater, accede; et quidnam causae fuerit quod paulo ante cum carnalibus illis carnalia compararem solus sedebas, modicum semotus a nobis; et nunc oculos huc illuc que vertebas, nunc frontem confricabas manu, nunc capillos digitis attrectabas, nunc iram ipsa facie praeferens, aliquid tibi praeter votum accessisse, crebra vultus mutatione querebaris, edicito.

Although this delay is overly vexatious to my avidity, yet to this not only the time of supper, which we are not permitted to be absent from, but also the quite burdensome expectation of many to whom you are a debtor, compels. Aelredus. Now then, brother, come near; and declare what was the cause that a little before, when I was comparing carnal things with those carnals, you were sitting alone, a little removed from us; and now you were turning your eyes here and there, now you were rubbing your brow with your hand, now you were fingering your hair with your fingers, now, displaying anger in your very face, by the frequent change of visage you were complaining that something had come to you contrary to your wish; speak out.

Galterus. Profecto ita est. Quis enim patienter sustineat tota die nescio quos exactores pharaonis tui habere copiam; nos autem quibus specialiter debitor es, nec rarum te cum habere posse colloquium?

Galterus. Indeed it is so. For who would patiently endure that, all day long, I-know-not-what exactors of your Pharaoh have free access; while we, to whom you are especially a debtor, cannot have even a rare colloquy with you?

Aelredus. Et illis quoque gerendus est mos, quorum vel optamus beneficia, vel maleficia formidamus. Quibus vel nunc tandem exclusis, tanto mihi gratior est solitudo, quanto molestior inquietudo praecessit.

Aelredus. And deference must also be shown to those whose benefits we desire, or whose malefactions we dread. With these now at last excluded, solitude is the more pleasing to me, in proportion as the preceding inquietude was more troublesome.

Nam optimum cibi condimentum fames est; nec mel aliave species vinum sic sapidum reddit, ut sitis vehemens aquam. Quocirca erit tibi forte haec nostra collatio quasi cibus vel potus quidam spiritalis, eo iucundior quo aestus praecessit ardentior. Age iam et quod anxio pectore paulo ante parabas evolvere, in medium proferre non differas.

For the best seasoning of food is hunger; nor do honey or any other sort render wine so savory as vehement thirst does water. Wherefore this our collation will perhaps be for you as a certain spiritual food or drink, the more pleasant the more ardent the heat that has preceded. Come now, and what a little before you were preparing with an anxious breast to unfold, do not defer to bring into the midst.

Galterus. Faciam quidem. Nam si velim de hora causari quam isti nobis reliquere brevissimam, videbor ipse eam mihi facere breviorem.

Walter. I will indeed do so. For if I should wish to complain about the hour which those men have left us—very brief—I shall seem myself to be making it briefer for myself.

Dic nunc, rogo te, utrum elapsum animo sit, an adhuc memoria teneas, quid inter te quondam et tuum Ivonem de amicitia spiritali convenerit; quas tibi ipse proposuerit quaestiones; quantum in earum enucleatione processeris; quid de his quoque stilo tradideris. Aelredus. Equidem carissimi mei recordatio, immo continuus amplexus et affectus, ita mihi semper recens est; ut, licet ex humanis exemptus, conditioni satis dederit, in meo tamen animo numquam videatur obiisse.

Say now, I beg you, whether it has slipped your mind, or you still hold in memory, what once was agreed between you and your Ivo concerning spiritual friendship; what questions he himself proposed to you; how far you have proceeded in the elucidation of them; what of these also you have consigned to the stylus. Aelredus. Indeed, the recollection of my dearest, nay rather his continuous embrace and affection, is to me always so fresh; so that, although removed from human things, having paid the due of our condition, yet in my mind he never seems to have died.

Ibi enim semper me cum est; ibi mihi religiosus vultus eius elucet; ibi dulces eius arrident oculi; ibi eius iucunda mihi verba sic sapiunt, ut vel ego videar cum eo ad meliora transisse; vel ipse me cum adhuc in his inferioribus conversari. Scis autem quia plures praeterierunt anni ex quo schedula ipsa cui de spiritali amicitia eius interrogationes meas que responsiones impresseram, nobis elapsa est. Galterus.

For there he is always with me; there his religious countenance shines out for me; there his sweet eyes smile; there his pleasant words so savor to me that either I seem to have passed over with him to better things, or he himself to be conversing with me while I am still in these lower things. You know, moreover, that several years have passed since the little slip itself, on which concerning spiritual friendship I had impressed my questions to him and the responses as well, slipped from us. Walter.

Non me latent ista. Sed, ut verum fatear, hinc tota ista aviditas et impatientia tota descendit, quod schedulam ipsam ante hoc triduum repertam et tibi traditam, a quibusdam accepi. Ostende, quaeso, eam puero tuo; non enim requiescit spiritus meus donec conspectis omnibus et quid illi disputationi desit advertens, ea quae mihi vel mens propria, vel inspiratio occulta suggesserit esse quaerenda, ad tuae paternitatis examen proferam, aut reprobanda, aut admittenda, aut exponenda.

These things are not hidden from me. But, to confess the truth, hence all that eagerness and the whole impatience descends, because I have learned from certain persons that the very little schedule, found three days ago and handed over to you, has been recovered. Show it, I beg, to your boy; for my spirit does not rest until, with all having been inspected and noticing what is lacking to that disputation, those things which either my own mind or a hidden inspiration shall have suggested are to be sought, I may bring forth to the examination of your paternity, either to be reprobated, or admitted, or expounded.

Aelredus. Geram tibi morem, sed solus volo legas quod scriptum est, nec efferatur in publicum; ne forte aliqua resecanda, addenda nonnulla, plurima vero corrigenda aestimaverim. Galterus.

Aelredus. I will comply with you, but I want you alone to read what has been written, nor let it be carried out into the public; lest perhaps I should judge that some things are to be cut out, some added, but very many indeed to be corrected. Galterus.

Ecce adsum, habens aures ad tua verba suspensas; tanto certe avidius, quanto id quod de amicitia legi dulcius sapuit. Quoniam igitur, quid sit amicitia, legi magnifice disputatum; quid cultoribus suis pariat utilitatis, velim mihi insinues. Cum enim res tanta sit, ut certis rationibus visus es comprobasse; tunc primum vehementius appetitur, cum finis eius fructus que cognoscitur.

Behold, I am here, with my ears suspended upon your words; surely the more eager, by how much that which I have read about friendship has tasted sweeter. Since, therefore, I have read magnificently disputed what friendship is; I would like you to intimate to me what usefulness it brings forth for its cultivators. For since the matter is so great, that you seem to have proved it by sure reasons; then for the first time it is more vehemently desired, when its end and fruit are known.

CAPUT V. De amicitiae fructibus.

CHAPTER 5. On the fruits of friendship.

Aelredus. Non id pro tantae rei dignitate a me explicari posse praesumo; cum in rebus humanis nihil sanctius appetatur, nihil quaeratur utilius, nihil difficilius inveniatur, nihil experiatur dulcius, nihil fructuosius teneatur. Habet enim fructum vitae praesentis quae nunc est et futurae.

Aelredus. I do not presume that this can be explained by me in proportion to the dignity of so great a matter; since in human affairs nothing more sacred is desired, nothing more useful is sought, nothing more difficult is found, nothing sweeter is experienced, nothing more fruitful is held. For it has the fruit of the present life which now is and of the future.

Ipsa enim omnes virtutes sua condit suavitate, vitia sua virtute confodit, adversa temperat, componit prospera; ita ut sine amico inter mortales nihil fere possit esse iucundum; homo bestiae comparetur, non habens qui sibi collaetetur in rebus secundis, in tristibus contristetur; cui evaporet si quid molestum mens conceperit; cui communicet si quid praeter solitum sublime vel luminosum accesserit. "Vae soli, quia cum ceciderit, non habet sublevantem se" (Eccle. IV, 10). Solus omnino est, qui sine amico est.

For it itself conditions all the virtues with its own sweetness, with its own virtue it pierces the vices, it tempers adversities, it composes prosperities; so that without a friend among mortals almost nothing can be pleasant; a man is compared to a beast, not having one who would rejoice-with-him in favorable things, who would be saddened-with-him in sad things; to whom he may let off steam if the mind has conceived anything troublesome; with whom he may communicate if anything lofty or luminous beyond the usual has come. “Woe to the solitary, because when he shall have fallen, he has not one to lift him up” (Eccle. 4, 10). He is altogether alone, who is without a friend.

At quae felicitas, quae securitas, quae iucunditas habere cum quo aeque audeas loqui ut tibi; cui confiteri non timeas si quid deliqueris; cui non erubescas revelare in spiritalibus si quid profeceris; cui cordis tui omnia secreta committas, et commendes consilia?

But what felicity, what security, what delight to have one with whom you dare to speak as freely as to yourself; to whom you would not fear to confess if you have done anything amiss; before whom you would not blush to reveal, in spiritual matters, if you have made any progress; to whom you commit all the secrets of your heart, and commend your counsels?

Quid igitur iucundius, quam ita unire animum animo, et unum efficere e duobus, ut nulla iactantia timeatur, nulla formidetur suspicio; nec correptus alter ab altero doleat; nec laudantem alter alterum adulationis notet vel arguat? "Amicus", ait Sapiens, "medicamentum vitae est" (Eccli. VI, 16). Praeclare quidem id. Non enim validior vel efficacior vel praestantior est vulneribus nostris in omnibus temporalibus medicina, quam habere qui omni incommodo occurrat compatiens, omni commodo occurrat congratulans; ut, secundum Apostolum, iunctis humeris, onera invicem tolerent; nisi quod unusquisque propriam levius quam amici portat iniuriam.

What, then, is more pleasant than thus to unite mind to mind, and to make one out of two, so that no boasting be feared, no suspicion dreaded; nor, if one be corrected by the other, should he be pained; nor should the one praising the other be marked or accused of adulation? "A friend," says the Wise Man, "is a medicine of life" (Eccli. 6, 16). Excellently indeed is that said. For there is no medicine stronger, or more efficacious, or more excellent for our wounds in all things temporal, than to have one who meets every discomfort compassionating, who meets every comfort congratulating; so that, according to the Apostle, with shoulders joined, they bear one another’s burdens; except that each one bears his own injury more lightly than that of a friend.

Amicitia ergo secundas res splendidiores facit, adversas partiens, communicans que leviores. Optimum ergo vitae medicamentum amicus. Nam ut ethnicis etiam placuit, non aqua, non igni pluribus locis utimur quam amico.

Friendship therefore makes prosperous things more splendid, and, by dividing and sharing adverse ones, makes them lighter. Therefore the best medicament of life is a friend. For, as it pleased even the pagans, we make use neither of water nor of fire in more places than of a friend.

In omni actu, in omni studio, in certis, in dubiis, in quolibet eventu, in fortuna qualibet, in secreto et publico, in omni consultatione, domi foris que, ubique amicitia grata, amicus necessarius, utilis gratia reperitur. "Quo circa amici", ut ait Tullius, "et absentes adsunt sibi, et egentes abundant, et imbecilles valent; et, quod difficilius dictu est, mortui vivunt" (Cicero de Amicitia, n. 23). Igitur amicitia divitibus pro gloria, exsulibus pro patria, pauperibus pro censu, aegrotis pro medicina, mortuis pro vita, sanis pro gratia, imbecillibus pro virtute, robustis est pro praemio. Tantus enim amicos honos, memoria, laus desiderium que prosequitur, ut et eorum vita laudabilis, et mors pretiosa iudicetur.

In every act, in every study, in things certain and in doubtful, in any event, in any fortune, in secret and in public, in every consultation, at home and abroad, everywhere friendship is welcome, a friend necessary, and a useful favor is found. "Wherefore friends," as Tullius says, "even being absent are present to one another, and the needy abound, and the weak are strong; and, what is more difficult to say, the dead live" (Cicero, On Friendship, no. 23). Therefore friendship is to the rich in place of glory, to exiles in place of a fatherland, to the poor in place of a census (wealth), to the sick in place of medicine, to the dead in place of life, to the healthy in place of grace/favor, to the feeble in place of virtue, to the robust in place of a reward. For so great an honor, memory, praise, and longing follows friends, that both their life is judged laudable and their death precious.

Et quod his omnibus excellit, quidam gradus est amicitia vicinus perfectioni, quae in Dei dilectione et cognitione consistit; ut homo ex amico hominis Dei efficiatur amicus, secundum illud salvatoris in Evangelio: "Iam non dicam vos servos, sed amicos meos" (Joan. XV, 15). Galterus. Ita, fateor, tua me movit oratio; ita in amicitiae desiderium totum animi mei succendit appetitum; ut nec vivere me crediderim, quamdiu huius tanti boni tam multiplici fructu caruero.

And what excels all these, friendship is a certain degree neighboring perfection, which consists in the dilection and cognition of God; so that a man, from being the friend of a man, may be made the friend of God, according to that of the Savior in the Gospel: "I will no longer call you servants, but my friends" (John 15, 15). Walter. Thus, I confess, your speech has moved me; thus into the desire of friendship it has enkindled the whole appetite of my soul; so that I would not even think myself alive, so long as I shall have lacked the manifold fruit of so great a good.

Sed hoc quod ultimum posuisti, quod me totum rapuit, et pene abripuit a terrenis, plenius mihi enodari desidero: quod scilicet amicitia optimus ad perfectionem gradus existit. Et opportune nunc hic noster Gratianus intravit, quem ipsius amicitiae alumnum iure dixerim, cuius totum studium est amari et amare; ne forte amicitiae nimium avidus, eius que similitudine deceptus, falsam pro vera, fictam pro solida, pro spiritali carnalem recipiat. Gratianus.

But this which you set down last — which has seized me entirely and almost snatched me away from earthly things — I desire to have unraveled for me more fully: namely, that friendship exists as the best step toward perfection. And opportunely now our Gratian has entered here, whom I would rightly call a fosterling of friendship itself, whose whole zeal is to be loved and to love; lest perhaps, being too avid of friendship and deceived by its similitude, he receive the false for the true, the feigned for the solid, the carnal for the spiritual. Gratianus.

Ago gratias humanitati tuae, frater, quod non vocato, sed se impudentius ingerenti, nunc tandem ad spiritale convivium concedis accessum. Nam si me serio, non ludo, alumnum amicitiae appellandum putasti, debueram in sermonis principio accersiri; nec aviditatem meam posita verecundia prodidissem. At tu, pater, perge quo coeperas, et causa mei aliquid mensis appone; ut si non satiari ut iste, qui nescio quot ferculis devoratis, nunc me quasi ad reliquias suas fastidiosus ascivit, saltem modicum valeam refocillari.

I give thanks to your humanity, brother, that, though not invited, but thrusting myself in more impudently, you now at length grant access to the spiritual banquet. For if you thought that I should be called, in earnest, not in play, an alumnus of friendship, I ought to have been summoned at the beginning of the discourse; nor would I, modesty set aside, have betrayed my avidity. But you, father, proceed whither you had begun, and for my sake set something on the table; so that, if I cannot be sated like this fellow, who, with I know not how many courses devoured, has now, fastidious, admitted me as it were to his leftovers, at least I may be able to be refreshed a little.

Aelredus. Non verearis, fili, quoniam tanta restant adhuc de amicitiae bono dicenda, quae si quislibet sapiens prosequeretur, nos nihil dixisse putares. Verum quomodo ad Dei dilectionem et cognitionem gradus quidam sit amicitia, paucis adverte.

Aelredus. Do not fear, son, since so great things still remain to be said about the good of friendship, which, if any wise man whatsoever were to prosecute, you would think that we had said nothing. But consider in a few words how friendship is a certain step toward the love and knowledge of God.

In amicitia quippe nihil inhonestum est, nihil fictum, nihil simulatum, et quidquid est, id sanctum et voluntarium et verum est. Et hoc ipsum caritatis quoque proprium est. In hoc vero amicitia speciali praerogativa praelucet, quod inter eos qui sibi amicitiae glutino copulantur, omnia iucunda, omnia secura, omnia dulcia, omnia suavia sentiuntur.

Indeed, in friendship there is nothing dishonorable, nothing fictitious, nothing simulated; and whatever there is, that is sacred and voluntary and true. And this very thing is likewise proper to charity. In this, however, friendship shines forth with a special prerogative: that among those who are coupled to one another by the glue of friendship, all things jocund, all things secure, all things sweet, all things suave are felt.

Ex caritatis igitur perfectione plerosque diligimus, qui nobis oneri sunt et dolori; quibus licet honeste, non ficte, non simulate, sed vere voluntarie que consulimus; ad secreta tamen eos amicitiae nostrae non admittimus. Quocirca in amicitia coniunguntur honestas et suavitas, veritas et iucunditas, dulcedo et voluntas, affectus et actus. Quae omnia a Christo inchoantur, per Christum promoventur, in Christo perficiuntur.

Therefore, out of the perfection of charity we love very many who are a burden and a sorrow to us; for whom, although we provide honorably, not feigned, not simulated, but truly and voluntarily; yet we do not admit them to the secrets of our friendship. Wherefore in friendship are conjoined honesty and suavity, truth and jocundity, sweetness and will, affection and act. All these things are begun by Christ, advanced through Christ, perfected in Christ.

Non igitur videtur nimium gravis vel innaturalis ascensus, de Christo amorem inspirante quo amicum diligimus, ad Christum semetipsum amicum nobis praebentem, quem diligamus; ut suavitas suavitati, dulcedo dulcedini, affectus succedat affectui. Itaque amicus in spiritu Christi adhaerens amico, efficitur cum eo cor unum et anima una; et sic per amoris gradus ad Christi conscendens amicitiam, unus cum eo spiritus efficitur in osculo uno. Ad quod osculum anima quaedam sancta suspirans: "Osculetur me, inquit, osculo oris sui" (Cant.

Therefore it does not seem an excessively heavy or unnatural ascent, from Christ inspiring the love by which we love a friend, to Christ himself proffering himself as a friend to us, whom we may love; so that suavity may succeed to suavity, dulcitude to dulcitude, affection to affection. And so a friend, adhering to a friend in the Spirit of Christ, is made with him one heart and one soul; and thus, ascending by the grades of love to the friendship of Christ, he is made one spirit with him in one kiss. To which kiss a certain holy soul, sighing: "Let him kiss me," she says, "with the kiss of his mouth" (Cant.

I, 1). Consideremus istius osculi carnalis proprietatem, ut de carnalibus ad spiritalia, de humanis ad divina transeamus. Duobus alimentis vita hominis sustentatur, cibo et aere. Et sine cibo aliquamdiu potest subsistere; at sine aere, ne una quidem hora.

1, 1). Let us consider the property of this carnal kiss, so that from carnal things to spiritual, from human things to divine we may pass. The life of man is sustained by two aliments, food and air. And without food he can subsist for some time; but without air, not even a single hour.

Itaque ut vivamus, ore haurimus aerem et remittimus. Et ipsum quidem quod emittitur vel recipitur, spiritus nomen obtinuit. Quocirca in osculo duo sibi spiritus obviant, et miscentur sibi et uniuntur.

Therefore, that we may live, with the mouth we draw in air and send it back. And the very thing which is emitted or received has obtained the name spirit. Wherefore, in a kiss two spirits meet one another, and are mingled with one another and are united.

Ex quibus quaedam mentis suavitas innascens, osculantium movet et perstringit affectum. Est igitur osculum corporale, osculum spiritale, osculum intellectuale.

From which a certain nascent sweetness of mind springs up, and it moves and thrills the affection of the kissers. Therefore there is a corporeal kiss, a spiritual kiss, an intellectual kiss.

CAPUT VI. Osculum corporale quando adhibendum. Osculum spirituale.

CHAPTER 6. The corporeal kiss, when to be applied. The spiritual kiss.

Osculum corporale impressione fit labiorum, osculum spiritale coniunctione animorum, osculum intellectuale per Dei Spiritum infusione gratiarum. Osculum proinde corporale, non nisi certis et honestis causis, aut offerendum est, aut recipiendum. Verbi gratia, in signum reconciliationis, quando fiunt amici, qui prius inimici fuerant ad invicem; in signum pacis, sicut communicaturi in Ecclesia interiorem pacem exteriori osculo demonstrant; in signum dilectionis, sicut inter sponsum et sponsam fieri permittitur; vel sicut ab amicis, post diuturnam absentiam et porrigitur et suscipitur; in signum catholicae unitatis, sicut fit cum hospes suscipitur.

The bodily kiss is made by the impression of the lips, the spiritual kiss by the conjunction of souls, the intellectual kiss through the infusion of graces by the Spirit of God. Therefore the bodily kiss, only for certain and honest causes, is either to be offered or to be received. For example, as a sign of reconciliation, when they become friends who previously had been enemies toward one another; as a sign of peace, just as those about to communicate in the Church demonstrate interior peace by an exterior kiss; as a sign of dilection, as it is permitted to be done between bridegroom and bride; or as by friends, after a long absence, it is both proffered and received; as a sign of Catholic unity, as is done when a guest is received.

Sed sicut plerique aqua, igni, ferro, cibo et aere, quae naturaliter bona sunt, in suae crudelitatis vel voluptatis satellitium abutuntur; ita perversi et turpes, etiam hoc bono, quod ad ea significanda quae diximus, lex naturalis instituit, sua quodammodo flagitia condire nituntur; ipsum osculum turpitudine tanta foedantes, ut sic osculari nihil aliud sit quam adulterari. Quod quam sit detestandum, quam abominandum, quam fugiendum, quam adversandum, quilibet honestus intellegit. Porro osculum spiritale proprie amicorum est, qui sub una amicitiae lege tenentur.

But just as many people abuse water, fire, iron, food, and air—which are naturally good—into the retinue of their cruelty or voluptuousness, so the perverse and the base likewise strive to season their very disgraces, in a certain way, with this good too, which natural law instituted for signifying the things we have said; befouling the kiss itself with such turpitude that to kiss thus is nothing other than to commit adultery. How detestable that is, how abominable, how to be fled, how to be opposed, any honorable person understands. Moreover, the spiritual kiss is properly of friends, who are held under one law of friendship.

Non enim fit oris attactu, sed mentis affectu; non coniunctione labiorum, sed commixtione spirituum, castificante omnia Dei Spiritu, et ex sui participatione coelestem immittente saporem. Hoc osculum non inconvenienter osculum dixerim Christi, quod ipse tamen porrigit non ore proprio sed alieno; illum sacratissimum amantibus inspirans affectum, ut videatur illis quasi unam animam in diversis esse corporibus; dicant que cum propheta: "Ecce quam bonum et quam iucundum, habitare fratres in unum" (Psal. CXXXII, 1). Huic ergo osculo assuefacta mens et a Christo totam hanc dulcedinem adesse non ambigens, quasi se cum reputans et dicens: o si ipsemet accessisset, ad illud intellectuale suspirat, et cum maximo desiderio clamans: osculetur me, ait, osculo oris sui; ut iam terrenis affectibus mitigatis, et omnibus quae de mundo sunt cogitationibus desideriis que sopitis, in solius Christi delecter osculo, et quiescam amplexu, exultans et dicens: "Laeva eius sub capite meo, et dextera illius amplexabitur me" (Cant.

For it is not wrought by the touch of the mouth, but by the affection of the mind; not by the conjunction of lips, but by the commingling of spirits, the Spirit of God sanctifying all things and, from His own participation, sending in a heavenly savor. This kiss I would not inappropriately call the kiss of Christ, which He nevertheless extends not with His own mouth but with another’s; breathing into lovers that most sacrosanct affection, so that it seems to them as if there were one soul in diverse bodies; and let them say with the prophet: "Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity" (Psalm 132, 1). Therefore, a mind accustomed to this kiss and not doubting that all this sweetness is present from Christ, as if reckoning with itself and saying: oh if He Himself had approached, sighs for that intellectual one, and with the greatest desire cries out: let him kiss me, she says, with the kiss of his mouth; so that now, with earthly affections softened, and all thoughts and desires that are of the world lulled to rest, I may take delight in the kiss of Christ alone, and may rest in his embrace, exulting and saying: "His left hand under my head, and his right hand will embrace me" (Cant.

II, 6).

2, 6).

CAPUT VII. Amicitia quid.

CHAPTER 7. What is friendship.

Gratianus. Amicitia haec, ut video, non est popularis, nec qualem eam somniare consuevimus.

Gratianus. This friendship, as I see, is not popular, nor of the kind we are accustomed to dream it.

Nescio quid hic Galterus hactenus senserit; ego aliud nihil amicitiam esse credidi, quam inter duos voluntatum identitatem, ut nihil velit unus quod alter nolit; sed tanta sit inter utrosque in bonis malis que consensio, ut non spiritus, non census, non honor, nec quidquam quod alterius sit, alteri denegetur, ad fruendum pro voto et abutendum. Galterus. Longe aliud in priori dialogo memini me didicisse, ubi ipsa diffinitio amicitiae posita et exposita, merito ad eius fructum altius inspiciendum me vehementius animavit.

I do not know what Walter has hitherto thought; I for my part have believed friendship to be nothing other than an identity of wills between two, so that the one wills nothing which the other does not will; but that there be so great a consensus between them in good and in bad things, that neither spirit, nor census (estate), nor honor, nor anything that is the one’s be denied to the other, to be enjoyed according to one’s wish and used to the full. Walter. I remember that I learned something far different in the former dialogue, where the very definition of friendship, having been set forth and expounded, rightly stirred me more vehemently to look more deeply into its fruit.

De qua sufficienter instructi, certam nobis metam, quatenus debeat amicitia progredi, cum diversorum diversa sententia sit, petimus praefigi. Sunt namque quidam qui contra fidem, contra honestatem, contra commune bonum vel privatum, favendum putant amico. Quidam solam fidem detrahendam iudicant, caetera non cavenda.

On which, being sufficiently instructed, we seek to have a definite goal set for us, how far friendship ought to progress, since diverse men have diverse opinions. For there are some who think a friend should be favored even against good faith, against honesty, against the common good or the private. Some judge that only good faith is to be detracted, the rest not to be guarded against.

Alii pro amico contemnendam pecuniam, expuendos honores, maiorum inimicitias subeundas, exilium censent etiam non fugiendum; se ipsum, in quibus non obsit patriae, nec contra fas alium laedat, etiam in inhonestis et turpibus exponendum. Sunt et qui hanc metam in amicitia constituunt, ut unusquisque, sicut erga seipsum, sic et afficiatur erga amicum. Quidam amico in omni beneficio vel obsequio vicem rependere, satis dare amicitiae credunt.

Others judge that, for a friend, money is to be contemned, honors to be spat out, the enmities of the greater men to be undergone, exile even not to be fled; that oneself, in matters where it does not harm the fatherland, nor, against divine law, injure another, is to be exposed even to dishonorable and base things. There are also those who set this boundary in friendship: that each be affected toward a friend just as toward himself. Some believe that to repay a friend in kind, in every benefit or service, is to give enough—to satisfy—friendship.

Mihi sane nulli horum esse cedendum, hac nostra collatione satis persuasum est. Unde aliquam certam mihi in amicitia metam a te opto constitui; maxime propter hunc Gratianum, ne forte secundum nomen suum ita velit esse gratiosus, ut incaute fiat vitiosus. Gratianus.

For my part, I am sufficiently persuaded by this our conference that one must yield to none of these. Whence I desire you to set for me some definite limit in friendship; chiefly on account of this Gratianus, lest perhaps, according to his name, he should wish to be so gracious that, incautiously, he become vicious. Gratianus.

Haud ingrate hanc tuam pro me accipio sollicitudinem; nisi tamen sitis audiendi praepediret, forte iam nunc tibi redderem talionem. Sed quid potius ad tuas inquisitiones respondere velit, pariter audiamus. Aelredus.

Not ungratefully do I accept this your solicitude on my behalf; yet if the thirst for hearing did not impede, perhaps even now I would render talion to you. But rather let us together hear what he wishes to answer to your inquiries. Aelredus.

Certam in amicitia metam Christus ipse praefixit: maiorem hac, inquiens, dilectionem nemo habet, quam ut animam suam ponat quis pro amicis suis. Ecce quousque tendi debet amor inter amicos, ut scilicet velint pro invicem mori. Satis ne vobis istud?

Christ himself has fixed a certain goal in friendship: “Greater love than this,” he says, “no one has, than that someone lay down his life for his friends.” Behold how far love ought to be extended among friends, namely, that they should be willing to die for one another. Is that enough for you?

Gratianus. Cum maior esse non possit amicitia, cur non satis sit? Galterus.

Gratian. Since friendship cannot be greater, why is it not sufficient? Walter.

Quid si pessimi quique vel ethnici in consensu facinorum et flagitiorum sic se diligant, ut velint pro invicem mori, eos ne ad summam amicitiae conscendisse fatebimur? Aelredus. Absit; cum inter pessimos amicitia esse non possit.

What if the very worst people, even the ethnics (pagans), in a conspiracy of crimes and outrages, so love one another that they are willing to die for each other—shall we admit that they have ascended to the summit of friendship? Aelred. Far be it; since friendship cannot exist among the worst.

Gratianus. Describe nobis, quaeso, inter quos vel oriri potest, vel servari. Aelredus.

Gratianus. Describe to us, please, among whom it can either arise or be preserved. Aelredus.

Breviter dico. Inter bonos oriri potest, inter meliores proficere, consummari autem inter perfectos. Quamdiu enim quemquam ex studio malum delectat, quamdiu honestis inhonesta praeponit, quamdiu ei voluptas gratior est puritate, temeritas moderatione, adulatio correptione; quomodo ad amicitiam vel aspirare eum fas est, cum ortus eius ex virtutis opinione procedat?

Briefly I say. Among good men it can arise, among better it can make progress, but it is consummated among the perfect. For as long as anyone from inclination takes delight in evil, as long as he prefers the dishonorable to the honorable, as long as pleasure is more pleasing to him than purity, rashness than moderation, flattery than correction; how is it right that he even aspire to friendship, since its origin proceeds from an opinion of virtue?

Difficile igitur, immo impossibile tibi est, vel initia eius degustare, si fontem de quo oriri potest, nescieris. Foedus est enim amor, nec amicitiae nomine dignus, quo turpe aliquid exigitur ab amico, quod necesse est eum facere, qui necdum vitiis aut sopitis aut depressis, ad quaelibet illicita, vel illicitur vel impellitur. Unde illorum detestanda sententia est, qui contra fidem et honestatem pro amico aestimant faciendum.

Therefore it is difficult, nay impossible, for you even to taste its beginnings, if you do not know the fountain from which it can arise. For it is a foul love, nor worthy of the name of friendship, in which something shameful is exacted from a friend, which it is necessary for him to do, who, his vices not yet either lulled to sleep or pressed down, is either enticed or driven to whatever illicit things. Whence detestable is the judgment of those who reckon that, for a friend, something must be done against faith and honesty.

Nulla enim excusatio peccati est, si amici causa peccaveris. Protoplastus Adam salubrius praesumptionis arguisset uxorem; quam, gerendo ei morem, vetitum usurpasset. Multo etiam melius servi regis Saul fidem domino servaverunt, contra eius imperium manum sanguini subtrahentes, quam Doech idumaeus, qui regiae crudelitatis minister, Domini sacerdotes sacrilegis manibus interfecit.

For there is no excuse for sin, if you have sinned for a friend’s sake. The Protoplast Adam would more healthfully have reproved his wife for presumption, than, by complying with her, usurped the forbidden. Much better too did the servants of King Saul preserve faith to their lord, withdrawing their hand from blood against his command, than Doeg the Idumaean, who, minister of royal cruelty, slew the Lord’s priests with sacrilegious hands.

Ionadab quoque amicus Amon, laudabilius amici prohibuisset incestum, quam quo potiretur optato consilium praebuisset (II Reg. XIII, 5). Sed nec amicos Absalon amicitiae virtus excusat, qui perduellioni praebentes assensum, contra patriam arma tulerunt. Et ut ad haec nostra tempora veniamus, multo certe felicius, Otto Romanae cardinalis Ecclesiae, ab amicissimo suo recessit Guidone, quam Iohannes suo adhaesit in tali schismate octoviano.

Jonadab, too, the friend of Amnon, would more laudably have forbidden a friend’s incest, than have provided counsel by which he might obtain his desired end (2 Kings 13:5). But neither does the virtue of friendship excuse Absalom’s friends, who, giving assent to treason, took up arms against their fatherland. And, to come down to our own times, much more happily, surely, Otto, cardinal of the Roman Church, withdrew from his very dear friend Guido, than John adhered to his own in such an Octavian schism.

Cernitis igitur, nisi inter bonos amicitiam stare non posse. Galterus. Quid igitur nobis cum amicitia, qui boni non sumus?

You perceive, therefore, that friendship cannot stand except among the good. Walter. What then have we to do with friendship, we who are not good?

Aelredus. Ego bonum non ita ad vivum reseco, ut quidam qui neminem volunt esse bonum, nisi eum cui ad perfectionem nihil desit. Nos hominem bonum dicimus, qui secundum modum nostrae mortalitatis, sobrie et iuste et pie vivens in hoc saeculo, nihil a quolibet inhonestum petere, nec rogatus velit praestare.

Aelred. I do not pare “the good” down to the quick, as some do who are unwilling that anyone be good except him to whom nothing is lacking for perfection. We call a man good who, according to the measure of our mortality, living soberly and justly and piously in this age, asks nothing dishonorable from anyone, nor, when asked, is willing to furnish it.

Inter tales profecto amicitiam oriri, a talibus conservari, in talibus perfici posse non ambigimus. Nam qui vel fidem, vel patriae periculum, vel alterius contra ius et fas laesionem excipientes, semetipsos amicorum exponunt libidini, eos non tam stultos dixerim quam insanos; qui parcentes aliis, sibimet non aestimant esse parcendum; et aliorum providentes honestati, suam infeliciter produnt.

Among such men, assuredly, we do not doubt that friendship can arise, be conserved by such, and be perfected in such. For those who, accepting either a breach of faith, or peril to the fatherland, or an injury to another against right and divine law, expose themselves to the desires of friends—I would call them not so much foolish as insane; who, sparing others, do not judge that they ought to be spared themselves; and, providing for others’ honesty, unhappily betray their own.

CAPUT VIII. Amicitiae sunt et naevi. An ideo abnuenda.

CHAPTER 8. Friendships too have blemishes. Are they therefore to be refused?

Galterus. Fere in illorum cado sententiam qui amicitiam dicunt esse cavendam, rem videlicet plenam sollicitudinis atque curarum, nec timoris vacuam, multis etiam obnoxiam doloribus. Nam cum unicuique satis super que sit sui curam gerere, incautum dicunt se sic aliis obligare, ut necesse sit eum multis implicari curis et affligi molestiis.

Galterus. I almost fall into the opinion of those who say that friendship is to be shunned, a thing plainly full of solicitude and cares, not void of fear, and even liable to many dolors. For since it is enough and to spare for each person to bear care of himself, they say it is incautious to bind oneself thus to others, so that it becomes necessary for him to be entangled in many cares and afflicted with annoyances.

Nihil praeterea difficilius aestimant, quam amicitiam usque ad diem vitae extremum permanere; turpe que nimis sit post initam amicitiam rem in contrarium verti. Unde tutius iudicant sic quemquam amare, ut possit odire cum velit; sic amicitiae laxandas habenas, quas vel astringat cum velit, vel remittat. Gratianus.

They esteem nothing, moreover, more difficult than that friendship should remain up to the last day of life; and that it is too shameful that, after friendship has been initiated, the matter be turned to the contrary. Whence they judge it safer thus to love someone, so that he may be able to hate when he wishes; thus the reins of friendship are to be loosened, which he either tightens when he wishes, or remits. Gratianus.

Frustra igitur tu in loquendo, nos in audiendo laboravimus, si tam facile ab amicitiae tepuerimus appetitu; cuius nobis fructum tam utilem, tam sanctum, tam acceptum Deo, perfectioni tam vicinum, tam multipliciter commendasti. Sit illius ista sententia, cui placet sic amare hodie ut cras oderit; sic amicus omnibus esse, ut nulli sit fidus; hodie laudans, cras vituperans; hodie blandiens, cras mordens; hodie paratus ad oscula, cras ad opprobria promptus; cuius amor vili pretio comparatur, levissima recedit offensa. Galterus.

Therefore, in vain have you toiled in speaking, and we in hearing, if we have so easily grown tepid from the appetite for friendship; whose fruit for us—so useful, so holy, so acceptable to God, so near to perfection—you have in so many ways commended. Let this be the opinion of the man to whom it pleases thus to love today that tomorrow he may hate; thus to be a friend to all, that he may be faithful to none; today lauding, tomorrow vituperating; today blandishing, tomorrow biting; today ready for kisses, tomorrow prompt for reproaches; whose love is procured at a cheap price, and at the slightest offense withdraws. Galterus.

Felle putabam carere columbas. Verumtamen haec istorum sententia, quae sic displicet gratioso, qualiter refelli possit, edicito. Aelredus.

I used to think doves were without gall. Nevertheless, declare how this opinion of those men, which so displeases the gracious one, can be refuted. Aelredus.

Pulchre de his Tullius: "Solem, inquit, e mundo tollere videntur, qui amicitiam e vita tollunt, quia nihil a Deo melius habemus, nihil iucundius" (De Amicitia, n. 47). Qualis sapientia amicitiam detestari, ut sollicitudinem caveas, curis careas, exuaris timore; quasi virtus ulla sine sollicitudine, vel acquiri possit vel servari. Ita ne in te, sine tua magna sollicitudine, aut prudentia contra errores, aut temperantia contra libidines, aut iustitia contra malitiam, aut fortitudo contra ignaviam pugnat? Quis, rogo, hominum maxime adolescentium, sine dolore maximo vel timore tueri pudicitiam, vel lascivientem refrenare valet affectum?

Handsomely on these matters Tullius: “They seem to take the sun from the world, who take friendship from life, because we have nothing better from God, nothing more pleasant” (On Friendship, no. 47). What sort of wisdom is it to detest friendship, that you may beware solicitude, be without cares, be stripped of fear; as if any virtue either could be acquired or preserved without solicitude. So then, within you, without your great solicitude, does prudence fight against errors, temperance against libidinous desires, justice against malice, and fortitude against sloth? Who, I ask, of men—most of all of the young—without very great pain or fear is able to guard chastity, or to bridle a wantoning affect?

Stultus Paulus qui noluit sine aliorum cura et sollicitudine vivere; sed intuitu caritatis, quam virtutem maximam credidit, infirmabatur cum infirmis, urebatur cum scandalizatis (II Cor. XI, 28 et 29). Sed et tristitia illi magna erat, et continuus dolor cordi eius, pro fratribus suis secundum carnem (Rom. IX, 2). Deserenda igitur illi caritas erat, ne sub tot timoribus ac doloribus viveret; nunc quos genuerat, iterum parturiens; nunc fovens ut nutrix, nunc ut magister corripiens; nunc timens, ne sensus illorum a fide corrumperentur; nunc cum multo dolore, multis que lacrimis ad paenitentiam provocans; nunc eos qui non egerunt paenitentiam lugens.

Foolish Paul, who did not wish to live without care and solicitude for others; but in view of charity, which virtue he believed the greatest, he was made infirm with the infirm, he was burning with the scandalized (2 Cor. 11, 28 and 29). But also great sadness was to him, and a continuous pain to his heart, for his brothers according to the flesh (Rom. 9, 2). Therefore charity had to be deserted by him, lest he live under so many fears and pains; now again travailing with those whom he had begotten; now cherishing as a nurse, now correcting as a teacher; now fearing lest their understanding be corrupted from the faith; now with much pain, and with many tears, provoking to penitence; now mourning those who have not done penitence.

Videtis quomodo virtutes auferre nituntur e mundo, qui comitem illarum sollicitudinem e medio tollere non formidant. Stulte Chusi arachites amicitiam quae erat ei cum David tanta fide servavit, ut sollicitudinem securitati praeferret; mallet que amici participari doloribus, quam parricidae gaudiis honoribus que dissolvi?

You see how those strive to carry the virtues out of the world who do not fear to remove from the midst their companion, solicitude. “Foolishly,” Hushai the Archite kept with such faith the friendship that he had with David, that he preferred solicitude to security; and he would rather be made a sharer in his friend’s pains than be dissolved in the parricide’s joys and honors?

Ego eos non tam homines quam bestias dixerim, qui sic dicunt esse vivendum, ut nulli consolationi sint; nulli etiam oneri vel dolori; qui nihil delectationis ex alterius bono concipiant, nihil amaritudinis sua aliis perversitate inferant, amare nullum, amari a nullo curantes. Absit enim ut eorum quemquam amare concesserim, qui amicitiam quaestum putant; tunc se solis labiis profitentes amicos, cum spes alicuius commodi temporalis arriserit; vel cum amicum cuiuslibet turpitudinis ministrum facere temptaverit. Galterus.

I would call them not so much men as beasts, who say that one must so live as to be a consolation to no one; a burden or a grief to no one either; who conceive no delectation from another’s good, who inflict no bitterness on others by their own perversity, caring to love no one and to be loved by no one. Far be it that I should allow that any of them loves, who think friendship a profit; then, with lips alone, professing themselves friends when the hope of some temporal advantage has smiled; or when they have tried to make a friend the minister of any turpitude. Galterus.

Cum igitur certum sit multos amicitiae similitudine falli, expone, quaeso, cuiusmodi amicitias cavere, quas appetere, colere et conservare debeamus. Aelredus. Cum dictum sit eam nisi inter bonos non posse subsistere, facile tibi est pervidere nullam amicitiam quae bonos dedeceat recipiendam.

Since therefore it is certain that many are deceived by the semblance of friendship, set forth, I beg, of what sort friendships we ought to beware, which to seek, cultivate, and preserve. Aelredus. Since it has been said that it cannot subsist except among good men, it is easy for you to perceive that no friendship which is unbecoming to good men is to be received.

Gratianus. Sed nos fortasse in hac discretione, quid deceat vel non deceat, caligamus. Aelredus.

Gratian. But perhaps in this discretion, as to what befits or does not befit, we are in the dark. Aelred.

Geram vobis morem, et quae mihi occurrerint fugiendae, breviter annotabo.

I will humor you, and I will briefly annotate what occurs to me as to be avoided.

CAPUT IX. Amicitia puerilis.

CHAPTER 9. Boyish friendship.

Est amicitia puerilis, quam vagus et lasciviens creat affectus; divaricans pedes suos omni transeunti; sine ratione, sine pondere, sine mensura, sine alicuius commodi vel incommodi consideratione. Haec ad tempus vehementius afficit, arctius stringit, blandius allicit. Sed affectus sine ratione motus bestialis est, ad quaeque illicita pronus; immo inter licita et illicita discernere non valens.

There is a puerile friendship, which a roving and lascivient affect creates; spreading its feet to every passer-by; without reason, without weight, without measure, without consideration of any advantage or disadvantage. This for a time affects more vehemently, binds more closely, allures more blandishingly. But affect without reason is a bestial motion, prone to whatever illicit things; nay, not able to discern between licit and illicit.

Licet autem plerumque amicitiam affectus praeveniat, numquam tamen sequendus est, nisi eum et ratio ducat, et honestas temperet, et regat iustitia. Igitur haec amicitia quam diximus puerilem, eo quod in pueris magis regnat affectus, ut infida, et instabilis, et impuris semper mixta amoribus, ab his quos spiritalis amicitiae dulcedo delectat, omnimodis caveatur. Quam non tam amicitiam, quam amicitiae dicimus esse venenum, cum in ea amoris numquam modus possit servari legitimus, qui est ab animo ad animum; sed honestam eius venam, ex carnis concupiscentia fumus quidam emergens, obnubilet et corrumpat; et neglecto spiritu, ad carnis desideria trahat.

Although for the most part affection may precede friendship, yet it must never be followed, unless both reason lead it, honesty temper it, and justice rule it. Therefore this friendship which we have called puerile, because in boys affection more reigns, as being faithless and unstable and always mixed with impure loves, should be in every way avoided by those whom the sweetness of spiritual friendship delights. Which we say is not so much a friendship as the venom of friendship, since in it the legitimate measure of love—which is from mind to mind—can never be kept; but its honorable vein a certain smoke, emerging from the concupiscence of the flesh, clouds over and corrupts; and, the spirit being neglected, it draws toward the desires of the flesh.

CAPUT X. Amicitia spiritualis. Vera. Amicitiae fons.

CHAPTER 10. Spiritual friendship. True. The fount of friendship.

Amoris origo.

Origin of love.

Eapropter primordia amicitiae spiritalis, primum intentionis habeant puritatem, rationis magisterium, temperantiae frenum; et sic suavissimus accedens affectus, ita profecto sentietur dulcis, ut esse numquam desinat ordinatus. Est et amicitia quam pessimorum similitudo morum conciliat; de qua dicere supersedeo, cum nec amicitiae nomine digna, ut superius diximus, habeatur. Est praeterea amicitia quam consideratio alicuius utilitatis accendit, quam multi ob hanc causam, et appetendam, et colendam, et conservandam existimant.

Wherefore the primordia of spiritual friendship should first have purity of intention, the magistery of reason, the bridle of temperance; and thus the most sweet affection, as it approaches, will indeed be felt sweet, in such wise that it never ceases to be ordered. There is also a friendship which the similitude of the very worst morals brings together; about which I forbear to speak, since, as we said above, it is not held worthy of the name of friendship. There is, moreover, a friendship which the consideration of some utility kindles, which many for this cause judge to be desired, and to be cultivated, and to be conserved.

Quod si admittimus, quam multos omni amore dignissimos excludemus; qui cum nihil habeant, nihil possideant, profecto nihil commodi temporalis ab eis vel adipisci poterit quis vel sperare. Si vero inter commoda duxeris consilium in dubiis, consolationem in adversis et caetera huiusmodi, haec utique ab amico exspectanda sunt, sed sequi debent ista amicitiam, non praecedere. Necdum enim quid sit amicitia didicit, qui aliam eius vult esse mercedem quam ipsam.

But if we admit this, how many who are most worthy of all love shall we exclude; since they have nothing, possess nothing, surely no temporal benefit could anyone either obtain from them or even hope for. But if you reckon among benefits counsel in doubtful matters, consolation in adversities, and other things of this sort, these indeed are to be expected from a friend, but these ought to follow friendship, not precede it. For he has not yet learned what friendship is, who wishes its reward to be other than itself.

Quae tunc plena merces erit colentibus eam, cum tota translata in Deum, in eius contemplatione sepelit quos univit. Nam cum multas et magnas utilitates pariat amicitia fida bonorum, non illam tamen ab istis, sed ab illa istas procedere non ambigimus.

Which will then be a full reward for those who cultivate it: when, wholly translated into God, it buries in his contemplation those whom it has united. For although faithful friendship of the good begets many and great utilities, yet we do not doubt that it does not proceed from these, but that these proceed from it.

Neque enim a beneficiis, quibus Berzellai galaadites David parricidam filium fugientem, et suscepit, et fovit, et numeravit amicum, inter tantos viros partam credimus amicitiam, sed ab ipsa potius tantam gratiam profecisse non dubitamus. Nam quod rex viri illius prius eguerit nemo qui cogitet. Verum quod ipse vir magnarum opum nihil pro his mercedis a rege speraverit, hinc advertere perspicuum est, quod omnes delicias divitias que civitatis pronius offerenti, nihil suscipere acquievit, suis volens esse contentus.

For we do not believe that the friendship, secured among so many men, arose from the benefits by which Barzillai the Gileadite, when David was fleeing his parricidal son, both received him, and fostered him, and counted him a friend; rather, we do not doubt that so great a favor proceeded from friendship itself. For as to the notion that the king had previously been in need of that man, there is no one who would think it. But that the man himself, great in resources, hoped for nothing of meed from the king for these things, it is plain to observe from this: that, when he more readily offered all the delights and riches of the city, he consented to accept nothing, wishing to be content with his own.

Sic et foedus illud venerabile, quod inter David et Ionathan, non spes futurae utilitatis, sed virtutis contemplatio consecravit, multum utrisque novimus contulisse, cum illius industria vita sit alterius reservata, illius beneficio, huius non sit posteritas deleta. Cum igitur in bonis semper praecedat amicitia, sequatur utilitas; profecto non tam utilitas parta per amicum, quam amici amor ipse delectat. Utrum igitur de fructu amicitiae satis dixerimus, utrum etiam certas personas, inter quas et oriri possit et servari et perfici, lucide distinxerimus, utrum praeterea assentationes quae falso amicitiae nomine palliantur, manifeste prodiderimus, utrum quoque certas metas, quousque tendi debeat amor inter amicos, ostenderimus, vos iudicate.

Thus also that venerable covenant which was between David and Jonathan was consecrated not by the hope of future utility, but by the contemplation of virtue, we know to have contributed much to both, since by the industry of the one the life of the other was preserved, by the benefice of the one, the posterity of this man was not blotted out. Since therefore among the good friendship should always precede, utility follow; assuredly it is not so much the utility obtained through a friend as the love of the friend himself that delights. Whether therefore we have said enough about the fruit of friendship, whether also we have lucidly distinguished the certain persons among whom it can both arise and be preserved and be perfected, whether moreover we have manifestly unmasked the assentations which are cloaked under the false name of friendship, whether also we have shown certain bounds, how far love between friends ought to be extended, you be the judges.

Galterus. Hoc ultimum non satis recordor enodatum. Aelredus.

Walter. I do not recall this last point as sufficiently unraveled. Aelred.

Recolitis, ut credo, eorum me refellisse sententiam, qui metas amicitiae in flagitiorum et facinorum consensu constituunt; illorum quoque, qui usque ad exilium progrediendum putant, et sine alterius laesione, quamlibet turpitudinem. Nihilominus et illorum, qui secundum speratae utilitatis modum, quantitatem amicitiae metiuntur. Nam duas earum, quas proposuit Galterus, nec mentione dignas existimavi.

You recall, as I believe, that I have refuted the opinion of those who set the bounds of friendship in a consensus to flagitious acts and crimes; and of those also who think one must advance even as far as exile, and, provided there is no injury to another, to accept any turpitude whatsoever. Nonetheless, also of those who measure the quantity of friendship according to the measure of hoped-for utility. For two of those which Walter proposed I judged not even worthy of mention.

Quid enim ineptius esse potest quam amicitiam hactenus extendi, ut in officiis vel obsequiis vicem quis rependat amico, cum omnia illis debeant esse communia, quibus nimirum esse debet et cor unum et anima una? Quam turpe et illud, ut non aliter afficiatur quis erga amicum, quam erga se ipsum, cum unusquisque de se humilia, sublimia sentire debeat de amico. His igitur falsis amicitiae finibus explosis, finem amicitiae ex verbis Domini proferendum putavimus, qui mortem ipsam pro amicis sanxit non esse fugiendam.

For what can be more inept than that friendship be extended thus far, that in offices or compliances one should repay a turn to a friend, since all things ought to be common to those for whom, assuredly, there ought to be one heart and one soul? How shameful also is this, that one be affected toward a friend no otherwise than toward oneself, whereas each ought to think humble things of himself, sublime things of his friend. Therefore, these false boundaries of friendship having been exploded, we have judged that the end of friendship must be brought forth from the words of the Lord, who sanctioned that death itself for friends is not to be fled.

Verum ne forte, si quilibet turpes sic affecti vellent pro invicem mori, ad amicitiae summam crederentur evecti, diximus inter quas personas oriri possit et perfici amicitia. Deinde illos qui ob multas sollicitudines et curas quas generat, cavendam eam existimant, ineptiae credidimus arguendos. Postremo quae amicitiae bonis omnibus sunt cavendae, quam breviter potuimus, enodavimus.

But lest perhaps, if any base men, thus disposed, should be willing to die for one another, they be believed to have been elevated to the summit of friendship, we have said between what persons friendship can arise and be perfected. Next, those who, on account of the many solicitudes and cares which it generates, think it must be shunned, we have judged to be liable to accusation for ineptitude. Lastly, which friendships are to be avoided by all good men, as briefly as we could, we have elucidated.

Patet proinde ex his omnibus certa et vera spiritalis amicitiae meta: nihil scilicet negandum amico, nihil pro amico non sustinendum, quod minus sit quam ipsa pretiosa corporis vita, quam ponendam pro amico divina sanxit auctoritas (Joan. XV, 13). Quocirca cum vita animae corporis sit multo praestantior, hoc omnino negandum censemus amico, quod mortem inferat animae, quod nihil aliud est quam peccatum, quod Deum separat ab anima, animam a vita. Verum in his quae vel exhibenda sunt amico, vel pro amico toleranda, quis servandus sit modus, quae cautio adhibenda, non est temporis huius evolvere.

It is therefore evident from all these things, the certain and true goal of spiritual friendship: namely, that nothing is to be denied to a friend, nothing not to be sustained for a friend, which is less than the precious life of the body itself, which by divine authority has been sanctioned to be laid down for a friend (John 15, 13). Wherefore, since the life of the soul is much more preeminent than that of the body, we judge that this must altogether be denied to a friend, which brings death upon the soul, which is nothing other than sin, which separates God from the soul, the soul from life. But as to those things which either are to be exhibited to a friend, or to be tolerated for a friend—what mode is to be observed, what caution to be applied—it is not the business of this time to unfold.

Gratianus. Non parum mihi Galterum nostrum fateor contulisse, cuius interrogatione provocatus, summam omnium quae disputata sunt brevi comprehendens epilogo, quasi prae oculis in ipsa memoria depinxisti. Age iam precor, et in ipsis officiis amicorum quis servandus sit modus, vel prae cautio adhibenda, nobis expone.

Gratian. I confess that our Walter has contributed not a little to me; provoked by his question, by comprehending in a brief epilogue the sum of all that has been disputed, you have painted it, as it were, before the eyes upon memory itself. Come now, I pray, and set forth to us, in the very offices of friends, what measure is to be observed, or what precaution is to be applied.

Aelredus. Et haec, et alia quaedam de amicitia restant dicenda. Sed hora iam praeteriit, et ad aliud nos negotium isti qui modo venerunt, sua, ut cernitis, importunitate compellunt.

Aelred. And these things, and certain other matters about friendship, remain to be said. But the hour has already passed, and those who have just now come, by their own importunity, as you see, compel us to another business.

Galterus. Invitus certe recedo, cras profecto cum se tempus obtulerit rediturus. Videat autem Gratianus ut praesto sit mane, ne ipse nos incuriae, aut nos eum tarditatis arguamus.

Galterus. Unwillingly indeed I withdraw, assuredly to return tomorrow when the time has offered itself. But let Gratian see to it that he be at the ready in the morning, lest he charge us with negligence, or we him with tardity.

Aelredus. Unde et quo? Gratianus.

Aelredus. Whence and whither? Gratianus.

Non te latet adventus mei causa. Aelredus. Num adest Galterus?

You are not unaware of the cause of my coming. Aelredus. Is Galterus present?

Gratianus. Videat ipse. Certe tarditatis non potest arguere nos hodie.

Gratianus. Let him see for himself. Certainly he cannot accuse us of tardiness today.

Aelredus. Vis ea quae proposita sunt prosequamur? Gratianus.

Aelred. Do you wish that we prosecute the things which have been proposed? Gratian.

Habebo ei fidem.

I will have faith in him.

Nam et praesentiam eius mihi reor necessariam, cui et sensus est acutior ad intellegendum, et lingua eruditior ad interrogandum, et memoria tenacior ad retinendum. Aelredus. Audisti, Galtere?

For I consider his presence necessary for me as well, who has a more acute sense for understanding, a more erudite tongue for questioning, and a more tenacious memory for retaining. Aelredus. Did you hear, Walter?

Amicitior tibi est Gratianus quam putabas. Galterus. Quomodo mihi amicus non esset, qui nullius non est?

Gratian is more friendly to you than you thought. Galterus. How would he not be a friend to me, who is everyone’s?

Sed quia utrique adsumus, promissi tui non immemores, otio huic non simus ingrati. Aelredus. Fons et origo amicitiae amor est, nam amor sine amicitia esse potest, amicitia sine amore numquam.

But since we are both present, not unmindful of your promise, let us not be ungrateful to this leisure. Aelredus. The fount and origin of amity is love; for love can be without amity, but amity without love never.

Amor autem aut ex natura, aut ex officio, aut ex ratione sola, aut ex solo affectu, aut ex utroque simul procedit. Ex natura, sicut mater diligit filium. Ex officio, quando ex ratione dati et accepti, quodam speciali affectu coniungimur.

But love proceeds either from nature, or from office (duty), or from reason alone, or from affection alone, or from both together. From nature, just as a mother loves her son. From office (duty), when from the reason of the given and the accepted we are conjoined by a certain special affection.

Ex sola ratione, sicut inimicos, non ex spontanea mentis inclinatione, sed ex praecepti necessitate diligimus (Matth. V, 44). Ex solo affectu, quando aliquis ob ea sola, quae corporis sunt, verbi gratia pulchritudinem, fortitudinem, facundiam, sibi quorumdam inclinat affectum. Ex ratione simul et affectu, quando is quem ob virtutis meritum ratio suadet amandum, morum suavitate, et vitae lautioris dulcedine, in alterius influit animum; et sic ratio iungitur affectui, ut amor ex ratione castus sit, dulcis ex affectu.

From reason alone, as when we love enemies, not from a spontaneous inclination of mind, but from the necessity of the precept (Matt. 5, 44). From affection alone, when someone, on account of those things alone which belong to the body— for example, beauty, strength, eloquence— inclines the affection of certain persons toward himself. From reason and affection together, when he whom reason persuades to be loved on account of the merit of virtue, by the suavity of manners and the sweetness of a more refined life, flows into another’s mind; and thus reason is joined to affection, so that love is chaste from reason, sweet from affection.

Quis horum vobis amicitiae videtur commodatior? Galterus. Hic ultimus sane, quem et virtutis contemplatio format, et morum ornat suavitas.

Which of these seems to you more commodious for friendship? Walter. This last one indeed, whom both the contemplation of virtue forms, and the suavity of manners adorns.

Sed utrum omnes quos sic diligimus ad illud amicitiae admittendi sint dulce secretum, scire desidero. Aelredus. Primo ponendum est solidum quoddam ipsius spiritalis amoris fundamentum, in quo eius sunt collocanda principia; ut sic recta quis linea ad eius altiora conscendens, ne fundamentum neglegat vel excedat, maximam cautelam adhibeat.

But whether all those whom we thus love are to be admitted to that sweet secret of friendship, I desire to know. Aelredus. First, a certain solid foundation of spiritual love itself must be laid down, in which its principles are to be set; so that thus, as one ascends by a straight line to its higher things, he may employ the greatest caution, lest he neglect the foundation or exceed it.

CAPUT XI. Amicitiae fundamentum.

CHAPTER 11. The foundation of friendship.

Fundamentum illud Dei amor est; ad quem omnia, quae vel amor suggerit vel affectus; omnia, quae vel occulte aliquis spiritus, vel palam quilibet suadet amicus referenda sunt, diligenter que inspiciendum, ut quidquid astruitur fundamento conveniat, et quidquid illud excedere deprehenditur, ad eius formam revocandum, et secundum eius qualitatem omnimodis corrigendum non dubites.

That foundation is the love of God; to it all things that either love or affection suggests; all things that either some spirit secretly, or any friend openly, urges are to be referred, and it must be carefully examined, so that whatever is built up may agree with the foundation, and whatever is discovered to exceed that must be called back to its form, and, according to its quality, in every way corrected—do not hesitate.

CAPUT XII. Delectus amici.

CHAPTER 12. The selection of a friend.

Nec omnes tamen quos diligimus in amicitiam sunt recipiendi, quia nec omnes ad hoc reperiuntur idonei. Nam cum amicus tui consors sit animi, cuius spiritui tuum coniungas et applices, et ita misceas ut unum fieri velis ex duobus; cui te tamquam tibi alteri committas, cui nihil occultes; a quo nihil timeas; primum certe eligendus est qui ad haec aptus putetur, deinde probandus, et sic demum admittendus. Stabilis enim debet esse amicitia, et quamdam aeternitatis speciem praeferre, semper perseverans in affectu.

Yet not all whom we love are to be received into friendship, because not all are found suitable for this. For since a friend is a consort of your mind, to whose spirit you conjoin and apply your own, and so mingle it that you wish one to be made out of two; to whom you commit yourself as to another self, from whom you hide nothing; from whom you fear nothing; first indeed he is to be chosen who is thought apt for these things, then to be proved, and thus at last to be admitted. For friendship ought to be stable, and to present a certain semblance of eternity, always persevering in affection.

Et ideo non puerili modo amicos mutare, vaga quadam debemus sententia. Quoniam enim nemo detestabilior, quam qui amicitiam laeserit; nihil que magis animum torqueat, quam vel deseri ab amico vel impugnari; cum summo studio eligendus est, et cum maxima cautela probandus; admissus autem sic tolerandus, sic tractandus, sic sequendus, ut, quamdiu a praemisso fundamento irrevocabiliter non recesserit, ille ita tuus, et tu illius sis, tam in corporalibus quam in spiritalibus, ut nulla sit animorum, affectionum, voluntatum, sententiarum que divisio.

And therefore we ought not to change friends in a puerile manner, by some wandering opinion. For indeed no one is more detestable than one who has wounded friendship; and nothing more torments the mind than either to be deserted by a friend or to be assailed; therefore he must be chosen with the highest zeal, and tested with the greatest caution; but, once admitted, he must be thus borne with, thus treated, thus followed, so that, so long as he has not irrevocably departed from the premised foundation, he may be yours and you his, as much in corporeal as in spiritual matters, so that there be no division of minds, affections, wills, and opinions.

Cernitis ergo quatuor gradus, quibus ad amicitiae perfectionem conscenditur; quorum primus est electio, secundus probatio, tertius admissio, quartus rerum divinarum et humanarum cum quadam caritate et benevolentia summa consensio. Galterus. Recordor te in prima illa tua disputatione, quam cum tuo habuisti Ivone, diffinitionem hanc satis probasse; sed quia de multis amicitiarum generibus disputasti, utrum omnes comprehendat, scire desidero.

You see therefore four steps by which one ascends to the perfection of friendship; of which the first is selection, the second testing (probation), the third admission, the fourth the highest consensus concerning divine and human things with a certain charity and benevolence. Walter. I remember that in that first disputation of yours, which you held with your Ivo, you approved this definition sufficiently; but because you discoursed about many kinds of friendships, I desire to know whether it comprehends them all.

Aelredus. Cum vera amicitia nisi inter bonos esse non possit, qui nihil contra fidem vel bonos mores velle possint aut facere; profecto non quamlibet, sed ipsam quae vera est amicitiam diffinitio ista complectitur. Gratianus.

Aelredus. Since true friendship cannot be except among good men, who can will or do nothing against faith or good morals; assuredly this definition embraces not just any sort, but the friendship itself which is true. Gratianus.

Quare non et illa quae ante hesternam collationem me plurimum delectabat aeque probanda est, idem scilicet velle et idem nolle. Aelredus. Certe inter eos, quorum fuerint emendati mores, vita composita, ordinati affectus, nec istam arbitror repudiandam.

Why, then, should not also that dictum which before yesterday’s colloquy delighted me exceedingly be equally to be approved—namely, to will the same and to not will the same. Aelredus. Certainly among those whose morals have been emended, whose life is composed, whose affections are ordered, I do not judge even this to be repudiated.

Galterus. Videat Gratianus ut tam in seipso quam in eo quem diligit, ista praecedant; et sic idem velit et nolit cum ipso; nihil sibi volens concedi, nihil ipse praestare rogatus, quod iniustum vel inhonestum, vel indecens sit. Sed de quatuor his quae praemisisti, quid sentiendum sit, a te exspectamus doceri.

Walter. Let Gratian see to it that, both in himself and in the one whom he loves, these things take precedence; and thus let him will the same and not will the same with him; willing that nothing be conceded to himself, and that he himself, when asked, bestow nothing that is unjust or dishonorable or indecent. But concerning these four things which you have premised, we expect to be taught by you what should be thought.

Aelredus. Primum igitur de ipsa electione tractemus. Sunt vitia quaedam quibus si quilibet fuerit involutus, non diu amicitiae leges vel iura servabit.

Aelredus. First, therefore, let us treat of the very election. There are certain vices, with which if anyone should be involved, he will not for long observe the laws or rights of friendship.

Huiusmodi ad amicitiam non facile eligendi sunt; sed si alias vita eorum mores que placuerint, agendum cum eis summopere est, ut sanati ad amicitiam habeantur idonei; videlicet iracundi, instabiles, suspiciosi, verbosi. Difficile quippe est eum quem saepe iracundiae furor exagitat, non aliquando insurgere in amicum, sicut in Ecclesiastico scribitur: "Est amicus, qui odium, et rixam, et convicia denudabit" (Eccli. VI, 9). Unde ait Scriptura: "Noli esse amicus homini iracundo, neque ambules cum viro furioso, ne sumas scandalum animae tuae" (Prov.

Such men are not easily to be chosen for friendship; but if otherwise their life and morals too have pleased, one must deal with them most earnestly, that, once healed, they may be held fit for friendship; namely, the irascible, the unstable, the suspicious, the verbose. For it is difficult that one whom the frenzy of anger often harasses should not at some time rise up against a friend, as it is written in Ecclesiasticus: "There is a friend who will lay bare hatred, and strife, and reproaches" (Eccli. 6, 9). Whence Scripture says: "Do not be a friend to an irascible man, nor walk with a furious man, lest you take up a stumbling-block for your soul" (Prov.

XXII, 24, 25). Et Salomon: "Ira, inquit, in sinu stulti requiescit" (Eccle. VII, 9). At cum stulto diu servare amicitiam quis non credat impossibile? Galterus.

22, 24, 25). And Solomon: “Anger,” says he, “rests in the bosom of the fool” (Ecclesiastes 7, 9). But who would not believe it impossible to keep friendship for long with a fool? Walter.

Et nos te vidimus, si non fallimur, cum iracundissimo homine summa religione colere amicitiam; quem usque ad eius vitae finem numquam a te laesum, quamquam ipse te saepe laesisset, audivimus. Aelredus. Sunt quidam ex naturali conspersione iracundi, qui tamen ita hanc comprimere et temperare soliti sunt passionem, ut in quinque quibus, teste Scriptura, amicitia dissolvitur atque corrumpitur, numquam prosiliant; quamvis nonnumquam amicum inconsiderato sermone, vel actu, vel zelo minus discreto offendant.

And we too saw you, if we are not mistaken, cultivate friendship with a most irascible man with the utmost religious conscientiousness; whom we heard was never harmed by you even to the end of his life, although he himself had often harmed you. Aelredus. There are certain men irascible by natural constitution, who nevertheless are accustomed so to compress and temper this passion that, in the five things by which, Scripture bearing witness, friendship is dissolved and corrupted, they never leap forth; although sometimes they may offend a friend by an inconsiderate word, or by a deed, or by zeal that is less discreet.

Tales si forte in amicitiam receperimus, patienter tolerandi sunt, et cum nobis constet de affectu certitudo, si quis fuerit vel sermonis vel actionis excessus, amico id indulgendum; vel certe sine aliquo dolore iucunde insuper, in quo excesserit, commonendum. Gratianus. Ille tuus quem prae omnibus nobis, ut multis videtur, tibi probas amicum, aliquid quod tibi displicere nullatenus potuit ignorare, ante paucos dies, ut nos putabamus, ira praeventus et dixit, et fecit; cui tamen nihil prioris gratiae imminutum nec credimus, nec videmus.

If by chance we have received such men into friendship, they are to be patiently tolerated; and when certitude about the affection stands firm for us, if there shall have been any excess either of speech or of action, that is to be indulged to the friend; or certainly, without any pain, pleasantly moreover, he is to be reminded about that in which he has exceeded. Gratianus. That man of yours whom, before all of us, as it seems to many, you approve as a friend to yourself, a few days ago, as we supposed, being overtaken by anger, both said and did something which could in no way have been unknown to be displeasing to you; for whom, however, we neither believe nor do we see that anything of his prior grace has been diminished.

Unde non parum obstupuimus, quod cum tu, ut nos mutuo loquimur, nihil velis vel modicum praeterire, quod velit ipse; ipse modicum quid, tui causa, non potuerit sustinere. Galterus. Audacior me multum est iste.

Whence we were not a little astonished, that whereas you, as we mutually say, wish to let nothing, even a small thing, pass that he himself wishes; he himself could not endure a small thing for your sake. Walter. This man is much more audacious than I.

Nam et ego ista novi, sed tuum erga eum animum non ignorans, nihil tibi de his loqui praesumpsi. Aelredus. Homo certe ille mihi carissimus est, et semel a me receptus in amicitiam, a me poterit numquam non amari.

For I also know those things, but not being ignorant of your disposition toward him, I did not presume to speak to you about these matters. Aelredus. That man indeed is most dear to me, and once received by me into friendship, he will never be able not to be loved by me.

Unde si forte in hac parte fortior illo fui; et ubi utriusque voluntas non concurrebat in unum, meam mihi facilius fuit, quam illi suam frangere voluntatem; ubi nulla interveniebat inhonestas, nec fides laedebatur, nec minuebatur virtus, cedendum amico fuit, ut et tolerarem in quo videbatur excessisse, et ubi pax eius periclitabatur, voluntatem eius meae praeferrem. Galterus. Sed cum prior ille iam in fata concesserit; alter tibi, licet nos non viderimus, satisfecerit; illa nobis quinque, quibus amicitia sic laeditur ut dissolvatur, velim nobis enuclees, ut eos, qui nullo modo eligendi sunt in amicos, cavere possimus.

Whence, if by chance in this matter I was stronger than he; and where the will of each did not concur into one, it was easier for me to break my will than for him to break his; where no dishonor intervened, nor was good faith injured, nor was virtue diminished, one had to yield to a friend, so that I might both tolerate that in which he seemed to have exceeded, and, where his peace was imperiled, prefer his will to mine. Galterus. But since the former has already passed into the fates; and the latter, although we have not seen it, has given you satisfaction; those five things by which friendship is so wounded that it is dissolved, I would like you to elucidate for us, so that we may be able to beware of those who are in no way to be chosen as friends.

Aelredus. Audite non me, sed Scripturam loquentem: qui conviciatur amico, dissolvit amicitiam. Ad amicum, inquit, etiamsi produxerit gladium non desperes; est enim regressus ad amicum.

Aelredus. Hear not me, but Scripture speaking: he who rails at a friend dissolves friendship. Toward a friend, it says, even if he has drawn forth the sword, do not despair; for there is a return to a friend.

Si aperuerit os triste, non timeas. Vide quid dicat. Si forte ira praeventus amicus eduxerit gladium, vel si verbum protulerit triste; si quasi non amans ad tempus tibi sese subtraxerit; si tuo suum aliquando praetulerit consilium; si a te in aliqua sententia vel disputatione dissenserit, non his amicitiam aestimes dissolvendam.

If he opens his mouth grimly, do not fear. See what he says. If perchance, overtaken by anger, a friend should draw the sword, or if he should utter a harsh word; if, as though not loving, he withdraws himself from you for a time; if he should at some time prefer his counsel to yours; if he should dissent from you in some opinion or disputation, do not deem friendship to be dissolved on these accounts.

Est enim, ait, regressus ad amicum, excepto convicio, et improperio et superbia, et mysterii revelatione, et plaga dolosa. In his omnibus effugiet amicus. Diligentius proinde haec quinque consideremus, ne nos eis amicitiae vinculis constringamus; quos ad haec vitia vel iracundiae furor, vel alia quaelibet passio compellere consuevit.

For there is, he says, a return to a friend, excepting reviling, and reproach and pride, and the revelation of a mystery, and a deceitful blow. In all these the friend will flee. Therefore let us consider these five more diligently, lest we bind ourselves to them with the bonds of friendship; those whom to these vices either the frenzy of wrath, or any other passion whatsoever, is wont to compel.

CAPUT XIII. De causis dissolvendae amicitiae. - Qui conviciatur autem amico, dissolvit amicitiam.

CHAPTER 13. On the causes of dissolving friendship. - But he who rails at a friend dissolves friendship.

Ad amicum si produxerit gladium, non desperes; si protulerit os triste, non timeas. Est enim reversio ad amicum. Excepto convicio, et improperio, et superbia, et mysterii revelatione, et plaga dolosa; in his omnibus effugiet amicus (Eccli.

If he has drawn the sword against a friend, do not despair; if he has put forth a sad face, do not fear. For there is a return to a friend. Except for reviling, and reproach, and pride, and the revelation of a mystery, and a deceitful blow; in all these a friend will flee (Eccli.

XXII, 25-27).

22, 25-27).

Convicium quippe laedit famam, caritatem extinguit. Tanta enim est hominum malitia, ut quidquid ira instigante ab amico iaculatum fuerit in amicum, quasi a secretorum suorum prolatum conscio, si non credatur, verum tamen esse clametur. Multi enim sicut in propriis laudibus, ita in aliorum vituperationibus delectantur.

Reviling indeed wounds fame, extinguishes charity. For such is the malice of men, that whatever, anger instigating, has been hurled by a friend against a friend, as if brought forth by one privy to his secrets, even if it be not believed, yet is cried out to be true. For many, just as in their own praises, so in the vituperations of others, take delight.

Quid vero scelestius improperio, quod etiam falsa obiectione innocentis faciem miserando rubore perfundit? At superbia quid minus ferendum, quae solum id quo tactae amicitiae subveniendum foret, humilitatis et confessionis excludit remedium, reddens hominem audacem ad iniuriam, tumidum ad correctionem. Sequitur mysteriorum, id est secretorum revelatio, qua nihil est turpius, nihil execrabilius, nihil amoris, nihil gratiae, nihil suavitatis relinquens inter amicos, sed omnia replens amaritudine, et indignationis, et odii atque doloris, felle cuncta conspergens.

But what, indeed, is more wicked than reproach, which even with a false objection suffuses the face of the innocent with a pitiable blush? But pride—what is less bearable?—which excludes the remedy of humility and confession, the sole means by which friendships that have been touched could be succored, making a man bold for injury and swollen against correction. Next follows the revelation of mysteries, that is, of secrets, than which nothing is more base, nothing more execrable, leaving nothing of love, nothing of grace, nothing of sweetness among friends, but filling all things with bitterness, and with indignation, and with hatred and grief, sprinkling everything with gall.

Hinc scriptum est: qui denudat archana amici, perdet fidem. Et paulo post: "Denudare amici mysteria, desperatio est animae infelicis" (Eccli. XXVII, 17, 24). Quid enim infelicius illo, qui fidem perdit, et desperatione languescit?

Hence it is written: he who lays bare the arcana of a friend will lose faith. And a little after: "To lay bare a friend’s mysteries is the desperation of an unhappy soul" (Ecclesiasticus 27, 17, 24). For what is more unfortunate than the one who loses faith and languishes with desperation?

Ultimum illud quod dissolvitur amicitia, plaga dolosa est, quae non est aliud quam occulta detractio. Plaga certe dolosa, plaga serpentis et aspidis mortifera: "Si mordeat serpens in silentio", ait Salomon, "nihil eo minus habet, qui occulte detrahit" (Eccle. X, 11). Quemcumque igitur in his vitiis assiduum inveneris, cavendus tibi est ille; nec donec sanetur, ad amicitiam eligendus.

The last thing by which friendship is dissolved is that treacherous wound, which is nothing other than covert detraction. A truly deceitful wound, the mortal wound of the serpent and of the asp: "If the serpent bite in silence," says Solomon, "he who secretly detracts has nothing less" (Eccle. 10, 11). Whomever therefore you find assiduous in these vices, that man is to be shunned by you; nor, until he is healed, is he to be chosen for friendship.

Abiuremus convicia, quorum ultor Deus est. Semei fugientem a facie Absalon sanctum David conviciis impetens, inter haereditaria verba, quae pater filio moriens delegavit, auctoritate Spiritus Sancti decernitur occidendus (III Reg. I, 44-46). Improperium nihilominus caveamus.

Let us abjure revilings, of which God is the avenger. Shimei, assailing holy David with revilings while he was fleeing from the face of Absalom, is, among the hereditary words which the father, as he was dying, delegated to the son, by the authority of the Holy Spirit, decreed to be put to death (3 Reg. 1, 44-46). Nevertheless let us beware of reproach.

Infelix Nabal Carmelus, David servitutem et fugam improperans, a Domino percuti meruit, et occidi (I Reg. XXV, 38). Quod si forte contigerit in aliquo nos legem amicitiae praeterire, vitemus superbiam, et amici gratiam humilitatis beneficio repetamus. Rex David amicitiam quam Naas regi filiorum Amon exhibuerat, cum filio eius Hanon misericorditer obtulisset, ille superbus et ingratus amico contumeliam adiecit contemptui.

Ill-fated Nabal the Carmelite, casting reproach upon David for servitude and flight, deserved to be struck by the Lord, and to be killed (1 Kings 25, 38). But if by chance it should happen that we in any respect overstep the law of friendship, let us avoid pride, and let us seek again a friend’s favor by the benefit of humility. King David, the friendship which Nahash, king of the sons of Ammon, had exhibited to him, having mercifully offered to his son Hanun, that man, proud and ungrateful, added contumely to contempt against his friend.

Ob quam causam, tam ipsum quam populum eius et urbes, gladius simul et ignis absumpsit (II Reg. X). Super omnia autem amicorum revelare secreta sacrilegium arbitremur, quo fides amittitur, et animae captivatae desperatio importatur. Hinc est quod impiissimus Achitophel parricidae consentiens, cum ei patris consilium prodidisset (II Reg.

For which cause, both him and his people and his cities, the sword together with fire consumed (2 Kings 10). Above all, however, we deem the revealing of friends’ secrets to be a sacrilege, whereby faith is lost, and despair is imported into the captive soul. Hence it is that the most impious Ahithophel, consenting to the parricide, when he had betrayed to him his father’s counsel (2 Kings

XVI, 23), cernens suum quod contra illud dederat, non mancipatum effectui, dignum proditori finem, laqueo suspensus promeruit.

(16, 23), seeing that his [counsel], which he had given against him, had not been consigned to effect, he earned—suspended by a noose—an end worthy of a traitor.

Postremo detrahere amico venenum amicitiae reputemus, quod Mariae frontem lepra perfudit, et eiectam extra castra, sex diebus populi communione privavit (Num. XII).

Finally, let us reckon the tearing-down of a friend as the venom of friendship, which poured leprosy over Miriam’s brow and, once she had been cast outside the camp, deprived her of the communion of the people for six days (Numbers 12).

CAPUT XIV. Qui minus idonei ad amicitiam.

CHAPTER 14. Who are less suitable for friendship.

Nec solum nimium iracundi, sed etiam instabiles et suspiciosi in hac electione cavendi sunt. Cum enim magnus amicitiae fructus sit securitas qua te credis et committis amico; quomodo in eius amore aliqua potest esse securitas, qui omni circumfertur vento, omni acquiescit consilio? Cuius affectus molli luto comparatus, diversas et contrarias tota die, pro arbitrio imprimentis, suscipit et format imagines.

Not only the excessively irascible, but also the unstable and the suspicious are to be guarded against in this election. For since a great fruit of friendship is the security by which you trust yourself and commit yourself to a friend, how can there be any security in his love who is carried about by every wind, who acquiesces in every counsel? Whose affections, compared to soft clay, all day long, at the arbitrium of the one pressing, receive and shape diverse and contrary images.

Quid praeterea magis competit amicitiae, quam pax quaedam ad invicem et tranquillitas cordis, cuius semper expers est suspiciosus? Numquam enim requiescit. Suspiciosum quippe semper curiositas comitatur, quae continuos ei stimulos acuens, inquietudinis et perturbationis ei materias subministrat.

What, moreover, more befits friendship than a certain mutual peace and tranquility of heart, of which the suspicious man is always devoid? For he never finds rest. Indeed curiosity always accompanies the suspicious man, which, sharpening continual stimuli for him, furnishes him with materials for inquietude and perturbation.

Si enim viderit amicum secretius loquentem cum aliquo, proditionem putabit. Si se benevolum alteri praebuerit, vel iucundum, ille se minus diligi proclamabit. Si eum corripuerit, odium interpretabitur.

For if he sees a friend speaking more secretly with someone, he will suppose treachery. If he has presented himself benevolent to another, or agreeable, he will proclaim that he is loved less. If he has rebuked him, he will interpret it as hatred.

Si laudandum crediderit, irrisum se calumniabitur. Sed nec verbosum arbitror eligendum, quia vir linguosus non iustificabitur. "Vides", inquit Sapiens, "hominem promptulum ad loquendum; magis illo spem habet stultus" (Prov.

If he thinks it praiseworthy, he will complain that he is being mocked. But neither do I judge a verbose man to be chosen, because a loquacious man will not be justified. "Do you see", says the Wise Man, "a man somewhat prompt for speaking; a fool has more hope than he" (Prov.

XXIX, 20).

29, 20).

CAPUT XV. Qui idonei. Amicitia dissuenda, non rumpenda.

CHAPTER 15. Who are suitable. Friendship is to be dissuaded, not broken.

Is igitur tibi eligendus est in amicum, quem non iracundiae furor inquietet, non instabilitas dividat, non conterat suspicio, non verbositas a debita gravitate dissolvat. Praecipue utile est, ut eum eligas qui tuis conveniat moribus, tuae consonet qualitati. Inter dispares quippe mores, ut beatus ait Ambrosius, amicitia esse non potest; et ideo convenire debet sibi utriusque gratia.

Therefore you must choose for yourself as a friend one whom the fury of irascibility does not disquiet, whom instability does not divide, whom suspicion does not wear down, whom verbosity does not dissolve from due gravity. It is especially useful that you choose one who is congruent with your mores, who is consonant with your quality. Among disparate mores, as Blessed Ambrose says, friendship cannot exist; and therefore the favor/disposition of both ought to agree together.

Galterus. Ubi ergo talis invenietur, qui nec iracundus sit, nec instabilis, nec suspiciosus? Nam verbosus quisquis est profecto latere non potest.

Galterus. Where then will such a one be found, who is neither irascible, nor unstable, nor suspicious? For whoever is verbose surely cannot lie hidden.

Aelredus. Licet non facile queat reperiri qui non his passionibus saepius moveatur, multi certe sunt qui his omnibus superiores inveniuntur; qui iracundiam patientia comprimant, levitatem servata gravitate cohibeant, suspiciones dilectionis contemplatione propellant. Quos maxime in amicitiam quasi exercitatiores assumendos dixerim, qui vitia virtute vincentes, tanto securius possidentur, quanto fortius, etiam tentantibus vitiis, resistere consuerunt.

Aelredus. Although it may not easily be found that someone is not more often moved by these passions, there are certainly many who are discovered superior to all of them; who compress anger by patience, restrain levity with gravity maintained, drive back suspicions by the contemplation of love. These I would say are most of all to be taken into friendship as, so to speak, more exercised—who, conquering vices by virtue, are possessed so much the more securely, the more stoutly they have been accustomed to resist, even when vices make their assaults.

Galterus. Ne quaeso, irascaris, si loquar. Ille tuus, de quo Gratianus paulo ante fecit mentionem, quem a te receptum in amicitiam non dubitamus, utrum tibi iracundus videatur, scire desidero.

Galterus. Please, do not be angry, I beg, if I speak. That man of yours, of whom Gratian a little before made mention, whom we do not doubt has been received by you into friendship—I desire to know whether he seems irascible to you.

Aelredus. Est quidem, at in amicitia minime. Gratianus.

Aelredus. He is indeed, but least of all in friendship. Gratianus.

Quid est, rogo te, in amicitia non esse iracundum? Aelredus. Inter nos contractam amicitiam non dubitatis?

What is it, I ask you, to not be irascible in friendship? Aelredus. You do not doubt the friendship contracted between us?

Gratianus. Prorsus. Aelredus.

Gratianus. Absolutely. Aelredus.

Quando inter nos iras, rixas, dissensiones, aemulationes, vel contentiones ortas audisti? Gratianus. Nequaquam; sed hoc non illius, sed tuae patientiae imputamus.

When have you heard angers, quarrels, dissensions, emulations (rivalries), or contentions to have arisen between us? Gratianus. By no means; but we impute this not to his, but to your patience.

Aelredus. Fallimini. Nullo modo enim iram quam non refrenat affectus, cuiusquam patientia refrenabit, cum patientia iracundum magis excitet in furorem, in hoc aliquid sibi vel modicum solatium praestari cupiens, si in iurgiis se illi aliquis parem exhibeat.

Aelredus. You are mistaken. For in no way will anyone’s patience bridle the ire which one’s own passion does not bridle, since patience rouses the irascible man all the more into fury, as he desires that therein some solace, even a slight one, be afforded to himself, if in quarrels someone should show himself his equal.

Ille sane de quo nunc nobis sermo est, ita mihi amicitiae iura conservat, ut commotum aliquando et iamiam prorumpentem in verba, solo nutu cohibeam; et ea quae displicent numquam producat in publicum; sed ad evaporandum suae mentis conceptum, semper expectet secretum. Quod si non ei amicitia, sed natura praescriberet, nec ita virtuosum, nec ita laude dignum iudicarem.

That man indeed, about whom we are now speaking, so preserves for me the rights of friendship that, when I am at times stirred and on the very point of bursting into words, I am restrained by a nod alone; and he never produces into the public those things that displease; but, in order to let the conception of his mind evaporate, he always awaits secrecy. But if it were not friendship, but nature, that prescribed this to him, I would judge it neither so virtuous nor so worthy of praise.

Si vero, ut assolet, ab eius aliquando meus sensus dissentiat, ita alterutro nobis deferimus, ut aliquando ille meam suae, plerumque ego suam meae praeferam voluntatem. Galterus. Satis datum est Gratiano.

But if indeed, as is accustomed, at some time my sense dissents from his, we so defer to the one or the other, that sometimes he prefers my will to his own, more often I prefer his to mine. Walter. Enough has been given to Gratian.

Sed mihi velim enuclees, si forte quis incautius in eorum inciderit amicitias, quos cavendos paulo ante dixisti; vel si qui eorum quos eligendos dixisti, aut in ea ipsa vitia, aut in alia forte deteriora corruerint, qualis eis servanda sit fides, qualis exhibenda gratia. Aelredus. Haec, si fieri potest, in ipsa electione, vel etiam probatione cavenda sunt, ne videlicet nimis cito diligamus maxime indignos.

Sed I would wish you to make clear for me, if perchance someone has incautiously fallen into the friendships of those whom you said a little before were to be avoided; or if any of those whom you said were to be chosen have fallen either into those very vices, or perhaps into others worse, what sort of fidelity is to be kept to them, what sort of grace is to be shown. Aelredus. These things, if it can be done, are to be guarded against in the very election, or even in the probation, namely, lest we love too quickly those most unworthy.

Digni autem sunt amicitia, quibus in ipsis causa est, cur diligantur. Attamen in his, qui probati digni que putantur, erumpunt saepe vitia, tum in ipsos amicos, tum in alienos, quorum tamen ad amicos redundat infamia. Talibus amicis omnis diligentia adhibenda est, ut sanentur.

Worthy of friendship are those who have within themselves the cause why they should be cherished. Nevertheless, even among those who are approved and thought worthy, vices often erupt—both against the friends themselves and against outsiders—whose infamy, however, redounds upon the friends. To such friends every diligence must be applied, that they may be healed.

Quod si impossibile fuerit, non statim amicitiam rumpendam, vel discindendam arbitror, sed ut quidam eleganter ait: "Potius paulatim dissuendam; nisi forte quaedam intolerabilis iniuria exarserit, ut neque rectum, neque honestum sit, ut non statim alienatio vel disiunctio fiat" (Cicero de Amicitia, n. 76). Si enim aliquid molitur amicus, aut in patrem, aut in patriam, quod subita et festinata egeat correctione; non amicitia laedetur si perduellis et inimicus prodatur. Sunt alia vitia pro quibus amicitiam non rumpendam, ut diximus, sed paulatim dissolvendam iudicamus; ita tamen ut non usque ad inimicitias, ex quibus iurgia, maledicta, contumeliae que gignuntur, erumpant. Turpe enim nimis est cum eo huiusmodi gerere bellum, cum quo familiariter vixeris.

But if that should prove impossible, I do not think the friendship should be straightway broken or torn asunder, but, as someone elegantly says: "Rather it should be little by little disengaged; unless perhaps some intolerable injury has flared up, such that it would be neither right nor honorable that there not be an immediate alienation or disjunction" (Cicero, On Friendship, no. 76). For if a friend is plotting something either against a father or against his fatherland, which needs sudden and hasty correction, the friendship is not injured if he is denounced as a public enemy and foe. There are other vices for which we judge that a friendship is not to be broken, as we have said, but gradually dissolved; yet in such a way that it does not burst forth into enmities, from which quarrels, maledictions, and contumelies are begotten. For it is exceedingly shameful to wage a war of this kind with him with whom you have lived on familiar terms.

Nam etsi his omnibus ab eo quem in amicitiam receperas, impetaris, quibusdam quippe moris est, ut cum ipsi sic vixerint, ut non iam mereantur amari; si forte eis aliquid evenerit adversi, culpam retorqueant in amicum, laesam dicant amicitiam, et omne consilium quod amicus dederit suspectum habeant; et cum proditi eorum in palam culpa processerit, non habentes ultra quid faciant, in amicum odia et maledicta congeminent, detrahentes in angulis, in tenebris susurrantes, se mendaciter excusantes, et alios similiter accusantes. Si igitur his omnibus post dimissam amicitiam impetaris, quamdiu tolerabilia fuerint, ferenda sunt; et hic honos veteri amicitiae tribuendus, ut in culpa sit qui faciat, non is qui patiatur iniuriam. Amicitia quippe aeterna est, unde: "Omni tempore diligit qui amicus est" (Prov.

For even if by all these things you are assailed by him whom you had received into friendship, for it is the custom of some that, when they themselves have so lived that they no longer deserve to be loved; if by chance something adverse befalls them, they turn the culpa back upon the friend, say that the friendship has been wounded, and hold every counsel that the friend has given as suspect; and when the fault of their betrayal has come forth into the open, having no further what they might do, they heap up hatreds and maledictions against the friend, detracting in corners, whispering in the dark, falsely excusing themselves, and accusing others in like manner. If therefore by all these things, after the friendship has been dismissed, you are attacked, so long as they shall be tolerable, they are to be borne; and this honor is to be attributed to the old friendship, that he be in culpa who does the deed, not he who suffers the injury. For friendship is eternal, whence: "At all times the one who is a friend loves" (Prov.

XVII, 17). Si te laeserit ille quem diligis tu tamen dilige. Si talis fuerit, ut ei amicitia subtrahatur, numquam tamen subtrahatur dilectio. Consule quantum potes saluti eius; prospice famae, nec umquam amicitiae eius prodas secreta, quamvis tua ipse prodiderit.

17, 17). If he whom you love has wounded you, yet love nonetheless. If he should be such that friendship be withdrawn from him, yet let affection never be withdrawn. Consult as much as you can for his welfare; look out for his reputation, and never betray the secrets of his friendship, although he himself has betrayed your own.

Galterus. Quae sunt, rogo, illa vitia, pro quibus amicitiam paulatim dicis esse solvendam?

Galterus. What are, I ask, those vices, on account of which you say that friendship is to be gradually dissolved?

CAPUT XVI. De laesione eorum qui diligendi sunt.

CHAPTER 16. On the injury of those who are to be loved.

Aelredus. Quinque illa quae paulo ante descripsimus, maxime autem revelatio secretorum, et occulti morsus detractionum. His sextum addimus.

Aelred. Those five which a little before we have described—most of all, however, the revelation of secrets, and the hidden bites of detraction. To these we add a sixth.

Si eos qui tibi aeque diligendi sunt, laeserit, eis que quorum tua interest providere saluti, ruinae et scandali materiam etiam correptus praebere non desierit, maxime ubi vitiorum ipsorum te tangit infamia. Non enim amor praeponderare debet religioni, non fidei, non caritati civium, non plebis saluti. Rex Assuerus superbissimum Aman, quem prae caeteris amicum habuerat, suspendit in cruce, amicitiae quam ille fraudulentis consiliis laeserat, salutem multitudinis et caritatem praeponens uxoris.

If he has injured those who ought to be loved by you equally, and, even when corrected, has not ceased to offer, to those whose salvation it is your concern to provide, matter for downfall and scandal—especially where the infamy of the very vices touches you. For love ought not to outweigh religion, nor faith, nor the charity of citizens, nor the salvation of the populace. King Ahasuerus hanged upon the gallows the most proud Haman, whom he had held as a friend before the rest, preferring to that friendship—which he had injured by fraudulent counsels—the safety of the multitude and the love of his wife.

Iahel uxor Aber cinei, licet pax fuerit inter Sisaram et domum Aber, plebis tamen salutem huic amicitiae praeferens, ipsum Sisaram clavo sopivit et malleo.

Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, although there was peace between Sisera and the house of Heber, yet preferring the safety of the people to this friendship, struck down Sisera himself with a nail and a hammer.

Sanctus propheta David, cum de iure amicitiae cognationi Ionathae debuerat pepercisse, audiens tamen a Domino, propter Saul et domum eius et sanguinem, quia occiderat gabaonitas, populum fame tribus annis iugiter laborasse, septem viros de cognatione eius, gabaonitis tradidit puniendos. Hoc autem nolo vos ignorare, inter perfectos quos sapienter electos et caute probatos, vera et spiritalis amicitia copulavit, non posse intervenire discidium. Cum enim amicitia de duobus unum fecerit, sicut id quod unum est non potest dividi, sic et amicitia a se non poterit separari.

Saint Prophet David, although by the right of friendship he ought to have spared the kin of Jonathan, yet, hearing from the Lord that, on account of Saul and his house and blood—because he had slain the Gibeonites—the people had labored under famine for three years continually, handed over seven men of his kindred to the Gibeonites to be punished. But this I do not wish you to be unaware of: among the perfect—whom a true and spiritual friendship, wisely chosen and cautiously proved, has coupled together—a sundering cannot intervene. For when friendship has made from two one, just as that which is one cannot be divided, so too friendship will not be able to be separated from itself.

Patet igitur hanc amicitiam quae patitur sectionem, ex ea parte qua laeditur, numquam fuisse veram, quia amicitia quae desinere potest, numquam vera fuit. In hoc tamen amicitia probabilior et magis virtus probatur, quod nec in eo qui laeditur desinit esse quod fuit; diligens eum a quo non diligitur; honorans eum a quo spernitur; benedicens eum a quo maledicitur; benefaciens ei qui sibi quod perniciosum est machinatur. Gratianus.

It is clear, therefore, that this friendship which suffers severance, on that side where it is injured, was never true, because a friendship that can cease was never true. In this, however, friendship is the more probable, and virtue is the more proved: namely, that even in the one who is injured it does not cease to be what it was—loving him by whom he is not loved; honoring him by whom he is scorned; blessing him by whom he is cursed; doing good to him who contrives what is pernicious against him. Gratian.

Quomodo igitur amicitia solvitur, si excluso talia sunt exhibenda ab eo a quo solvitur?

How therefore is friendship dissolved, if to the excluded one such things are to be exhibited by the very person by whom it is dissolved?

CAPUT XVII. Ad amicitiam quatuor requiruntur.

CHAPTER 17. Four things are required for friendship.

Aelredus. Ad amicitiam quatuor specialiter pertinere videntur: dilectio et affectio, securitas et iucunditas. Ad dilectionem spectat, cum benevolentia beneficiorum exhibitio; ad affectionem, interior quaedam procedens delectatio; ad securitatem, sine timore vel suspicione omnium secretorum et consiliorum revelatio; ad iucunditatem, de omnibus quae contingunt, sive laeta sint, sive tristia; de omnibus quae cogitantur, sive nociva sint, sive utilia; de omnibus quae docentur vel discuntur, quaedam dulcis et amica collatio.

Aelred. Four things seem in a special way to pertain to friendship: love and affection, security and jocundity. To love pertains the exhibition of benefactions with benevolence; to affection, a certain interior delight proceeding forth; to security, the revelation of all secrets and counsels without fear or suspicion; to jocundity, concerning all things that befall, whether they be joyful or sad; concerning all things that are thought, whether harmful or useful; concerning all things that are taught or learned, a certain sweet and friendly conference.

Vides ne, in quibus ab his qui merentur solvenda est amicitia? Subtrahitur certe illa interior delectatio quam ex amici pectore iugiter hauriebat; perit securitas, qua sua illi archana revelabat; seponitur iucunditas, quam amica confabulatio pariebat. Familiaritas proinde illa in qua talia continentur, ei neganda est, non subtrahenda dilectio; et hoc cum quadam moderatione et reverentia, ut si non nimius fuerit horror, semper antiquae amicitiae quaedam videantur remansisse vestigia.

Do you see, then, in what cases friendship is to be dissolved from those who deserve it? That interior delectation which he used to draw continually from a friend’s breast is certainly withdrawn; security perishes, by which he revealed to him his own arcana; jocundity is set aside, which friendly confabulation was bringing forth. Accordingly, that familiarity in which such things are contained is to be denied to him, not is dilection to be withdrawn; and this with a certain moderation and reverence, so that, if the horror be not excessive, certain vestiges of the ancient friendship may always seem to have remained.

Gratianus. Mihi certe perplacent ista quae dicis. Aelredus.

Gratian. Certainly, those things which you say are very pleasing to me. Aelred.

Iam de electione si sufficiunt ista quae diximus, insinuate. Galterus. Vellem ut eorum quae dicta sunt, summa sub brevi nobis epilogo traderetur.

Now, concerning the election, if the things we have said suffice, set it forth. Galterus. I would wish that the summary of the things that have been said be delivered to us in a brief epilogue.

Aelredus. Geram vobis morem. Amorem amicitiae diximus esse principium.

Aelred. I will comply with your custom. We have said that the love of friendship is the beginning.

Nec qualemcumque, sed quae de ratione simul et affectu procedit. Qui quidem et castus est ex ratione, et ex affectu dulcis. Deinde amicitiae ponendum diximus fundamentum, Dei scilicet dilectionem; ad quam omnia quae suggeruntur referenda sunt; et utrum ei conveniant, vel ab ea dissideant explorandum.

Not of just any kind, but that which proceeds at once from reason and from affection. Which indeed is chaste from reason, and sweet from affection. Then we said the foundation of friendship must be laid, namely the love of God; to which all things that are suggested must be referred; and it must be examined whether they agree with it, or dissent from it.

Quatuor subinde gradus in amicitia, quibus ad eius summam pervenitur, constituendos putavimus; cum amicus primum sit eligendus, deinde probandus, tunc demum admittendus, et sic postea ut decet tractandus. Et de electione tractantes, iracundos, instabiles, suspiciosos atque verbosos exclusimus; non omnes tamen, sed eos dumtaxat qui has passiones nec ordinare, nec moderari possunt aut nolunt. Nam multi his perturbationibus sic tanguntur, ut non solum eorum in nullo laedatur perfectio, sed etiam virtus in earum moderatione laudabilius augeatur.

We have thought that four steps, taken successively, are to be established in friendship, by which one comes to its consummation: since a friend is first to be chosen, then to be proved, then at last to be admitted, and so afterwards to be handled as is fitting. And while treating of selection, we excluded the irascible, the unstable, the suspicious, and the verbose; not all, however, but only those who can neither order nor moderate these passions, or are unwilling to do so. For many are so touched by these perturbations that not only is their perfection in no way harmed, but even virtue is more laudably increased in their moderation.

Nam qui velut infrenes his passionibus acti semper feruntur in praeceps, in ea vitia inevitabiliter dilabuntur et corruunt, quibus amicitia, teste Scriptura, et laeditur et dissolvitur: convicia scilicet et improperium et secretorum revelatio, superbia, et plaga dolosa. Si tamen haec omnia patiaris ab illo quem semel in amicitiam suscepisti, non statim eam rumpendam dicimus, sed paulatim solvendam, talis que servetur antiquae amicitiae reverentia, ut licet ipsum a secretis tuis amoveas; numquam tamen ei dilectionem subtrahas, auxilium tollas, neges consilium.

For those who, like the unbridled, driven by these passions are always borne headlong, inevitably slip and fall into those vices by which friendship, with Scripture as witness, is both injured and dissolved: to wit, revilings and reproach and the revelation of secrets, pride, and a treacherous blow. If, however, you suffer all these things from him whom you have once received into friendship, we do not say that it must be broken at once, but gradually loosened; and such reverence of the ancient friendship should be kept, that, although you remove him from your secrets, nevertheless you never withdraw love from him, take away help, or deny counsel.

Quod si etiam ad blasphemias et maledicta eius prorumpat insania, tu tamen defer foederi, defer caritati, ut in culpa sit qui intulit, non ille qui pertulit iniuriam. Porro si patri, si patriae, si civibus, si subditis, si amicis inventus fuerit perniciosus, statim familiaritatis rumpendum est vinculum, nec unius amor perditioni multitudinis praeferatur. Haec ne proveniant, in ipsa electione cavendum, ut videlicet is eligatur, quem non ad ista furor impellat, aut levitas trahat, aut verbositas praecipitet, aut abducat suspicio; maxime qui non nimium a tuis dissentiat moribus, nec a qualitate discordet.

But if his insanity even bursts forth into blasphemies and maledictions, you, however, defer to the covenant, defer to charity, so that he be in the fault who inflicted it, not the one who endured the injury. Moreover, if he be found pernicious to his father, to his fatherland, to his fellow citizens, to his subjects, to his friends, the bond of familiarity must at once be broken, nor should the love of one be preferred to the perdition of the multitude. Lest these things come to pass, caution must be used in the very election, namely that he be chosen whom neither fury impels to these things, nor levity draws, nor verbosity precipitates, nor suspicion leads away; especially one who does not dissent too much from your manners, nor be at discord with your disposition.

Quia vero de vera amicitia loquimur quae non potest esse nisi inter bonos; de illis esse de quibus, quod non sint eligendi, nulla potest esse cunctatio, ut turpes, avari, ambitiosi, criminosi, nullam fecimus mentionem. Si vobis de electione satis datum est, ad probationem deinceps transeamus. Galterus.

Because indeed we speak of true friendship, which cannot be except among the good; as for those of whom there can be no hesitation that they are not to be chosen—such as the base, the avaricious, the ambitious, the criminal—we have made no mention. If enough has been given you concerning election, let us then pass on to probation. Walter.

Opportunum hoc, nam mihi semper ad ostium oculus est, ne forte quis irrumpat, qui vel nostris deliciis finem ponat, vel quid amaritudinis misceat, vel aliquid superducat inane. Gratianus. Cellerarius adest, cui si concedatur ingressus, non erit tibi facultas ulterius procedendi.

This is opportune, for my eye is always at the door, lest perchance someone burst in who either set an end to our delights, or mix in some bitterness, or superinduce something inane. Gratian. The Cellarer is here; if entry be granted him, you will not have the faculty of proceeding further.

Sed ecce ego observo ianuam; tu, pater, perge quo coeperas.

But behold, I keep watch at the door; you, father, proceed as you had begun.

CAPUT XVIII. In amico probanda quatuor.

CHAPTER 18. Four things to be proved in a friend.

Aelredus. Quatuor quaedam probanda sunt in amico: fides, intentio, discretio, patientia. Fides, ut ei te tua que omnia secure committas.

Aelred. Certain four things are to be proved in a friend: faith, intention, discretion, patience. Faith, so that you may securely commit to him yourself and all your things.

Intentio ut nihil ex amicitia nisi Deum, et naturale eius bonum expectet. Discretio, ut quid praestandum amico, quid ab amico petendum, in quibus contristandum pro amico, in quibus amico congratulandum, et quem amicum nonnumquam corripiendum credimus, pro quibus id causis fieri debeat, modum etiam ipsum, tempus quoque et locum non ignoret. Patientia vero, ne correptus doleat, ne corripientem contemnat vel odiat, ut eum pro amico quaelibet adversa sustinere non pigeat.

Intention, that he expect nothing from friendship except God and its natural good. Discretion, that he not be ignorant what is to be rendered to a friend, what is to be asked from a friend, in what matters one ought to be saddened on behalf of a friend, in what matters one ought to congratulate a friend; and, when we judge that a friend is sometimes to be corrected, for what causes that ought to be done, the very measure also, and likewise the time and the place. Patience, indeed, lest, when corrected, he feel pain, lest he contemn or hate the one correcting, so that it not irk him to sustain whatever adverse things for the sake of a friend.

CAPUT XIX. Fides amicitiae.

CHAPTER 19. The Faith of Friendship.

Nihil in amicitia fide praestantius, quae ipsius et nutrix videtur et custos. Ipsa se in omnibus, in adversis et prosperis, in laetis et tristibus, in iucundis et amaris, praebet aequalem; eodem intuens oculo humilem et sublimem, pauperem et divitem, fortem et debilem, sanum et aegrotum. Fidelis quippe amicus nihil in amico quod extra animum eius sit, intuetur; virtutem in propria sua sede complectens, caetera omnia quasi extra eum posita, nec multum probans si adsint, nec si absint requirens.

Nothing in friendship is more preeminent than fidelity, which seems both its nurse and its guardian. She offers herself equal in all things, in adverse and prosperous circumstances, in joyful and sad, in pleasant and bitter, looking with the same eye upon the humble and the sublime, the poor and the rich, the brave and the weak, the sound and the sick. For a faithful friend considers nothing in a friend that is outside his soul; embracing virtue in its own proper seat, he deems all the rest as if placed outside him, neither much approving if they are present, nor requiring them if they are absent.

Ipsa tamen fides in prosperis quidem latet, sed eminet in adversis. In necessitate enim, ut ait quidam, probatur amicus. "Amici divitis multi" (Prov.

Yet that very faith indeed lies hidden in prosperities, but is eminent in adversities. For in necessity, as someone says, a friend is proved. "Many are the friends of the rich man" (Prov.

XIV, 20). Sed utrum vere amici sint, interveniens paupertas explorat. "Omni tempore", ait Salomon, "diligit qui amicus est, et frater in angustiis comprobatur" (Prov. XVII, 17). Et alias, arguens infidelem: "Dens putridus, inquit, et pes lassus, qui sperat super infideli in die angustiae" (Prov.

14, 20). But whether they are truly friends, intervening poverty explores it. "At all times," says Solomon, "a friend loves, and a brother is proved in straits" (Prov. 17, 17). And elsewhere, accusing the unfaithful: "A putrid tooth," he says, "and a weary foot is he who trusts upon the faithless in the day of distress" (Prov.

XXV, 19). Gratianus. Si prospera nostra nulla umquam adversitas interpolet, quomodo amici probabitur fides? Aelredus.

25, 19). Gratian. If no adversity ever interposes amid our prosperities, how will the faith of a friend be proved? Aelred.

Multa sunt alia quibus probatur fides amici, quamuis in sinistris maxime. Nam ut superius diximus, nihil est quo amicitia magis laeditur quam consiliorum proditio. Evangelica vero sententia est: qui in modico fidelis est, et in multo fidelis erit.

There are many other things by which the fidelity of a friend is proved, although most of all in adverse circumstances. For, as we said above, there is nothing by which friendship is more injured than the betrayal of counsels. But the evangelical sentence is: "He who is faithful in a little will also be faithful in much."

Amicis itaque quibus adhuc probationem credimus esse necessariam, non omnia, nec profunda nostra sunt committenda secreta; sed primo exteriora vel modica, de quibus non magnopere curandum est, an celentur, an nudentur; cum tanta tamen cautione, ac si plurimum obessent prodita, prodessent autem celata. In quibus si fidelis fuerit inventus, in maioribus experiendum non dubites. Quod si forte sinistrum aliquid de te fama vulgaverit; si cuiusquam malitia famam tuam fuerit persecuta, et ille nullius ad credendum adducatur suggestione, nulla moveatur suspicione, nulla dubitatione turbetur; de eius fide ulterius nulla tibi debet esse cunctatio; sed quasi de certa et stabili, non parva exultatio.

Therefore, to friends for whom we believe a proving is still necessary, not all things, nor are our deep secrets to be entrusted; but first the external or moderate matters, about which there is no great need to care whether they be concealed or laid bare; yet with such great caution as if, being divulged, they would do very much harm, but, being hidden, would profit. In which, if he shall have been found faithful, do not hesitate to test him in greater things. But if perchance rumor has spread something adverse about you; if anyone’s malice has persecuted your fame, and he is led by no one’s suggestion to believe, is moved by no suspicion, is troubled by no hesitation; concerning his fidelity thereafter there ought to be for you no delay; but, as about one certain and stable, no small exultation.

Gratianus. Recordor nunc tui illius amici transmarini de quo nobis fecisti saepius mentionem, quem ob hoc verissimum tibi, ac fidelissimum probasti amicum, quod falsa de te referentibus, non solum non adhibuerit fidem, sed nec ulla sit haesitatione turbatus vel pulsatus; quod nec de tuo amicissimo, antiquo scilicet Claravallis sacrista, praesumendum putasti. Sed quoniam de probatione fidei satis actum est, ad caetera enucleanda procede.

Gratian. I recall now that overseas friend of yours, of whom you have made mention to us rather often, whom on this account you proved to be to you a most veracious and most faithful friend: that, when men were reporting false things about you, he not only did not lend credence, but was not at all disturbed or shaken by any hesitation; a thing which you did not think ought to be presumed even of your very dearest friend, namely the former sacristan of Clairvaux. But since enough has been said about the probation of faith, proceed to enucleate the rest.

CAPUT XX. Intentio.

CHAPTER 20. Intention.

Aelredus. Diximus et intentionem esse probandam. Pernecessarium hoc.

Aelredus. We have said also that the intention is to be proved. This is very necessary.

Sunt enim plerique qui in rebus humanis nihil bonum norunt, nisi quod temporaliter fructuosum sit. Hi sic amicos sicut boves suos diligunt, ex quibus aliquid commodi se sperant esse capturos; qui profecto germana et spiritali carent amicitia, propter se, et propter Deum et se expetenda, nec in se ipsis naturale amoris contuentur exemplar; ubi facile deprehenditur vis eius et qualis sit, et quanta sit. Ipse Dominus ac salvator noster verae nobis amicitiae formam praescripsit: "Diliges, inquiens, proximum tuum sicut te ipsum" (Matth.

For there are very many who, in human affairs, know nothing good except what is temporally fruitful. These love their friends as they do their oxen, from whom they hope to capture some advantage; and they truly lack a germane and spiritual friendship—one to be sought for itself, and for God and for oneself—nor do they behold within themselves the natural exemplar of love, wherein its force is easily apprehended, and of what sort it is, and how great it is. The Lord and our Savior himself has prescribed for us the form of true friendship: “You shall love, he says, your neighbor as yourself” (Matt.).

XXII, 39). En speculum: diligis te ipsum. Ita plane, si Deum diligis; si nempe talis es, qualem in amicitiam eligendum descripsimus. Aliquam, rogo, a te ipso, huius tuae dilectionis mercedem iudicas exigendam?

22, 39). Behold the mirror: you love yourself. So, plainly, if you love God; if indeed you are such as we have described as to be chosen into friendship. Do you, I ask, judge that any recompense of this your love is to be exacted from yourself?

Minime profecto; sed quod per se sibi quisque carus est. Nisi igitur et tu hunc ipsum in alium transferas affectum, gratis amicum diligens, eo quod per se carus tibi videatur amicus, quid vera sapiat amicitia non poteris. Tunc enim erit ipse quem diligis tamquam alter tu, si tuam tui in ipsum transfuderis caritatem.

By no means, assuredly; but because each is, through himself, dear to himself. Unless therefore you too transfer this very affection into another, loving a friend gratis, for the reason that the friend seems dear to you for his own sake, you will not be able to know what true friendship savors of. For then the one whom you love will be as another you, if you shall have poured your love of yourself into him.

"Non enim", ut ait sanctus Ambrosius, "vectigalis amicitia est, sed plena decoris, plena gratiae" (De Offic. lib. 3, cap.

"For," as Saint Ambrose says, "friendship is not tributary, but full of decorum, full of grace" (On Duties, book 3, chap.

21). Virtus est enim, non quaestus; quia pecunia non parturitur, sed gratia; nec licitatione pretiorum, sed concertatione benevolentiae. Eius igitur quem eligisti, subtiliter est probanda intentio, ne secundum spem commodi cuiuslibet tibi velit in amicitia copulari, mercenariam eam aestimans non gratuitam. Certiores autem plerumque sunt amicitiae pauperum vel inopum quam divitum; cum spem lucri sic tollat paupertas, ut amicitiae non minuat, sed potius augeat caritatem.

21). For it is virtue, not gain; for not money is brought forth, but grace; nor by the licitation of prices, but by the competition of benevolence. Therefore the intention of him whom you have chosen must be proved with subtlety, lest he wish to be joined to you in friendship according to the hope of some advantage, esteeming it mercenary, not gratuitous. Moreover, the friendships of the poor or of the needy are for the most part more certain than those of the rich; since poverty so removes the hope of lucre that it does not diminish friendship, but rather increases charity.

Divitibus itaque assentatorie gratificatur; erga pauperem nemo simulator est. Verum est quidquid defertur pauperi, cuius amicitia invidia vacat. Haec diximus ut in amicis mores probemus, non aestimemus censum.

Accordingly, people gratify the rich with flattery; toward the poor no one is a dissembler. True is whatever is bestowed upon the poor man, whose friendship is void of envy. We have said these things so that in friends we may approve character, not assess wealth.

Sic ergo probatur intentio. Si eum videris tuorum magis cupidum quam tui; aucupari semper aliquid quod tua sibi conferri possit industria, honorem, divitias, gloriam, libertatem; in quibus omnibus si dignior illo praeferatur, vel certe in tua non sit potestate quod appetitur, qua tibi intentione adhaeserit facile pervidebis. Iam nunc de discretione videamus.

Thus therefore the intention is proved. If you see him more desirous of your things than of you; always angling to catch something which by your industry could be conferred on him—honor, riches, glory, liberty—in all of which, if someone more worthy than he is preferred, or certainly if what is desired is not in your power, you will easily perceive with what intention he has adhered to you. Now then let us consider discretion.

CAPUT XXI. Discretio.

CHAPTER 21. Discernment.

Quidam perverse satis, ne dicam impudenter, talem amicum habere volunt, quales ipsi esse non possunt. Hi sunt, qui leves quoque amicorum transgressiones impatienter ferunt, austere corripiunt, et carentes discretione, magna neglegunt, contra minima quaeque se erigunt; confundunt omnia, non locum servantes ubi, non tempus quando, non personas, quibus quaelibet vel publicare conveniat, vel celare. Quocirca illius quem eligis est probanda discretio; ne si improvidum quemquam vel imprudentem tibi in amicitia sociaveris, lites quotidianas et iurgia tibi ipse perquiras.

Some, quite perversely, not to say impudently, want to have a friend such as they themselves cannot be. These are they who bear even light transgressions of friends impatiently, rebuke austerely, and, being devoid of discretion, neglect great things, while they set themselves up against each least thing; they confound everything, observing neither the place where, nor the time when, nor the persons before whom it is fitting either to make anything public or to conceal it. Wherefore the discretion of him whom you choose is to be approved; lest, if you associate to yourself in friendship anyone improvident or imprudent, you yourself be procuring for yourself daily litigations and wrangles.

Sane hanc in amicitia virtutem satis facile probatu est, qua si quis caruerit, instar navis absque gubernaculo pro impetu spiritus instabili et irrationabili semper motu feretur.

Surely this virtue in friendship is quite easy to prove; which if anyone should lack, he will, after the likeness of a ship without a rudder, be borne along at the impetus of a spirit unstable and irrational, in a continual motion.

CAPUT XXII. Patientia.

CHAPTER 22. Patience.

Sic et multae causae deesse non poterunt, quibus illius quem cupis esse amicum probetur patientia, cum necesse sit arguere eum quem diligis; quod aliquando quasi ex industria durius fieri oportet, ut sic eius vel probetur, vel exerceatur tolerantia. Id sane attendendum est, ut licet talia reperiantur in eo quem probas, quae offendant animum, vel alicuius secreti incauta revelatione, vel alicuius temporalis commodi cupiditate, vel minus discreta correptione, vel aliqua debitae lenitatis transgressione; non statim a proposita dilectione vel electione resilias, quamdiu correctionis eius spes ulla relucet. Nec quemquam in amicis eligendis vel probandis taedeat esse sollicitum; cum huius laboris fructus vitae sit medicamentum et immortalitatis solidissimum fundamentum.

Thus too many causes will not be lacking by which the patience of him whom you desire to be a friend may be proved, since it is necessary to reprove him whom you love; which sometimes ought to be done somewhat more harshly, as if by design, so that thus his tolerance may either be proved or exercised. This, to be sure, must be attended to: although such things may be found in him whom you are testing as offend the mind—either by the incautious revelation of some secret, or by a desire for some temporal convenience, or by a less discreet correction, or by some transgression of due lenity—you should not at once recoil from the proposed dilection or election, so long as any hope of his correction glimmers. Nor let anyone, in choosing or proving friends, be wearied of being solicitous; since the fruit of this labor is a medicine of life and the most solid foundation of immortality.

Cum enim plurimi in thesauris multiplicandis, in bobus et asinis, in ovibus et capris nutriendis, eligendis, comparandis, satis periti sint, certa que in his omnibus cognoscendis non desint indicia, dementiae res est, eamdem in amicis acquirendis, vel probandis non dare operam, et quasdam addiscere notas, quibus hi, quos elegimus in amicos, ad amicitiam probentur idonei. Cavendus sane est quidam impetus amoris qui praecurrit iudicium, et probandi adimit potestatem. Est proinde viri prudentis sustinere, hunc refrenare impetum, ponere modum benevolentiae, paulatim procedere in affectum, donec iam probato se totum dedat et committat amico.

Since indeed very many are quite skilled in multiplying treasures, in nourishing oxen and asses, sheep and goats, in selecting and purchasing them, and sure indicia are not lacking for recognizing all these, it is a matter of madness not to give the same effort in acquiring or testing friends, and to learn certain notes by which those whom we have chosen as friends may be proved suitable for friendship. One must certainly beware a certain impetus of love which outruns judgment and takes away the power of testing. It is therefore the part of a prudent man to sustain and to bridle this impulse, to set a measure to benevolence, to proceed little by little into affection, until, the friend now proved, he gives and commits himself wholly to the friend.

Galterus. Fateor, adhuc me movet illorum sententia, qui sine huiusmodi amicis vivere tutius arbitrantur. Aelredus.

Walter. I confess, the opinion of those who think it safer to live without friends of this kind still moves me. Aelred.

Mirum hoc; cum sine amicis nulla prorsus vita iucunda sit. Galterus. Cur, rogo te? Aelredus.

A wonder, this; since without friends no life whatsoever is pleasant. Walter. Why, I ask you? Aelred.

Ponamus totum genus humanum exemptum mundo, te solum superstitem reliquisse. Et ecce coram te omnes mundi deliciae et divitiae, aurum, argentum, lapides pretiosi, urbes muratae, castra turrita, ampla aedificia, sculpturae, picturae. Sed et reformatum te in antiquum cogita statum, omnia habere subiecta, oves et boves universas, insuper et pecora campi, volucres coeli et pisces maris, qui perambulant semitas maris.

Let us posit that the whole human race has been exempted from the world, leaving you alone as the survivor. And lo, before you are all the delights and riches of the world—gold, silver, precious stones, walled cities, turreted camps, ample buildings, sculptures, paintings. But also imagine yourself reformed to the ancient state, to have all things subject: sheep and oxen in their entirety, moreover the cattle of the field, the birds of heaven and the fishes of the sea, who perambulate the paths of the sea.

Dic, rogo nunc, utrum sine socio omnia tibi haec possent esse iucunda? Galterus. Minime.

Say, I ask now, whether without a companion all these things could be pleasant to you? Walter. By no means.

Aelredus. Quid si unum haberes cuius nescires linguam, ignorares mores, cuius te lateret et amor et animus? Galterus.

Aelred. What if you had one person whose language you did not know, whose mores you were ignorant of, and whose love and mind would be hidden from you? Walter.

Si non aliquibus signis efficere possem, ut esset amicus, mallem nullum quam talem habere. Aelredus. Si autem unus adesset quem aeque ut te ipsum diligeres, a quo te similiter diligi non dubitares, nonne omnia quae prius videbantur amara, dulcia redderentur et sapida?

If I could not by some signs bring it about that he was a friend, I would prefer to have none rather than to have such a one. Aelredus. But if there were one present whom you would love equally as yourself, by whom you would not doubt that you were loved likewise, would not all the things which previously seemed bitter be rendered sweet and sapid?

Galterus. Prorsus ita est. Aelredus.

Walter. Precisely so. Aelred.

Nonne quanto plures haberes de talibus, tanto feliciorem te iudicares?

Would you not judge yourself the happier, the more of such people you had?

Galterus. Verissime. Aelredus.

Walter. Most truly. Aelred.

Haec est illa mira et magna felicitas quam expectamus, Deo ipso operante, et diffundente inter se et creaturam suam quam sustulerit, inter ipsos gradus et ordines quos distinxerit, inter singulos quosque quos elegerit, tantam amicitiam et caritatem, ut sic quisque diligat alium sicut seipsum; ac per hoc sicut unusquisque de propria, sic et de alterius felicitate laetetur; et ita singulorum beatitudo omnium sit, et omnium beatitudinum universitas singulorum. Ibi nulla cogitationum occultatio, nulla affectionum dissimulatio. Haec est vera et aeterna amicitia quae hic inchoatur, ibi perficitur; quae paucorum hic est, ubi pauci boni; ibi omnium, ubi omnes boni.

This is that wondrous and great felicity which we await, with God Himself working, and pouring out between Himself and His creature whom He will have lifted up, between the very grades and orders which He will have distinguished, between each individual whom He will have chosen, such friendship and charity that thus each may love the other as himself; and through this, as each rejoices over his own felicity, so also over another’s; and so the beatitude of individuals will be that of all, and the universality of all beatitudes that of individuals. There, no concealment of thoughts, no dissimulation of affections. This is the true and eternal friendship which here is begun, there is perfected; which here belongs to the few, where few are good; there to all, where all are good.

Hic necessaria probatio, ubi est sapientium et stultorum permixtio; ibi probatione non egent, quos beatificat angelica illa et quodammodo divina perfectio. Ad hanc proinde similitudinem comparemus amicos quos non secus quam nos ipsos diligamus; quorum nobis nuda sint omnia, quibus omnia nostra pandamus secreta; qui firmi sint et stabiles, et constantes in omnibus. Putas ne quemquam mortalium esse qui non velit amari?

Here a necessary probation, where there is a commixture of the wise and of the foolish; there they have no need of probation, whom that angelic and, in a certain manner, divine perfection beatifies. To this similitude, then, let us compare friends whom we love no otherwise than ourselves; of whom let all things be naked to us, to whom let us lay open all our secrets; who may be firm and stable, and constant in all things. Do you think there is any of mortals who does not wish to be loved?

Galterus. Non aestimo. Aelredus.

Walter. I do not think so. Aelred.

Si quem videres inter multos vivere, et omnes habere suspectos, quasi insidiatores capitis sui timere omnes, nullum diligere, nec se diligi a quoquam putare, non eum miserrimum iudicares? Galterus. Miserrimum plane.

If you should see someone living among many, and holding everyone suspect, fearing all as plotters against his life, loving no one, and thinking himself loved by no one, would you not judge him most miserable? Galterus. Most miserable, plainly.

Aelredus. Ergo et ipsum felicissimum non negabis qui in eorum inter quos vivit visceribus requiescit, amans omnes et amatus ab omnibus, quem ab hac suavissima tranquillitate, nec suspicio dividat, nec timor excutiat. Galterus.

Aelredus. Therefore you will not deny that he too is most happy who rests in the very affections of those among whom he lives, loving all and loved by all, whom neither suspicion divides from this most sweet tranquility, nor does fear shake him out of it. Galterus.

Optime ac verissime. Aelredus. Quod si forte de omnibus difficile inventu sit in praesenti, cum id nobis in futurum servetur, quanto plures nobis abundant huiusmodi, tanto nobis feliciores aestimabimus?

Most excellently and most truly. Aelredus. But if perhaps, with regard to all, it is difficult to find at present, since that is reserved for us for the future, the more of this kind abound for us, by so much the more fortunate shall we esteem ourselves?

Nudiustertius cum claustra monasterii circuirem, consedente fratrum amantissima corona, et quasi inter paradisiacas amoenitates singularum arborum folia, flores fructus que mirarer; nullum inveniens in illa multitudine quem non diligerem, et a quo me diligi non confiderem, tanto gaudio perfusus sum ut omnes mundi huius delicias superaret. Sentiebam quippe meum spiritum transfusum in omnibus, et in me omnium transmigrasse affectum, ut dicerem cum propheta: "Ecce quam bonum et quam iucundum, habitare fratres in unum" (Psal. CXXXII, 1). Gratianus.

The day before yesterday, as I was going around the cloisters of the monastery, with a most loving crown of brothers sitting, and as if amid paradisiacal amenities I marveled at the leaves, flowers, and fruits of individual trees; finding no one in that multitude whom I did not love, and by whom I did not trust myself to be loved, I was so suffused with joy that it surpassed all the delights of this world. For I felt my spirit transfused into all, and the affection of all had transmigrated into me, so that I said with the prophet: "Behold how good and how pleasant it is, for brothers to dwell as one" (Psalm 132, 1). Gratianus.

Num omnes illos quos sic diligis et a quibus sic diligeris, te in amicitiam assumpsisse putabimus?

Are we to think that you have taken into friendship all those whom you so love and by whom you are so loved?

CAPUT XXIII. Non pariter admittendi omnes.

CHAPTER 23. Not all to be admitted equally.

Aelredus. Plerosque omni affectu complectimur, quos tamen ad amicitiae secreta non admittimus, quae maxime in omnium secretorum et consiliorum nostrorum revelatione consistit. Unde Dominus in Evangelio: "Iam non dicam vos servos, sed amicos" (Joan.

Aelred. We embrace very many with every affection, whom nevertheless we do not admit to the secrets of friendship, which chiefly consists in the revelation of all our secrets and our counsels. Whence the Lord in the Gospel: "Now I will no longer say you servants, but friends" (John.

XV, 15); causam que subiungens qua amici nomine digni haberentur: "Quia omnia, inquit, quae audivi a patre meo nota feci vobis" (Joan. XV, 15). Et alias: "Vos amici meis estis, si feceritis quae praecipio vobis" (Joan. XV, 14). De his verbis, ut sanctus ait Ambrosius: "Dedit formam amicitiae quam sequamur, ut faciamus amici voluntatem, ut aperiamus secreta nostra amico, quaecumque in pectore habemus, et illius archana non ignoremus" (De Offic.

15, 15); and subjoining the cause whereby they might be held worthy of the name “friends”: “Because,” he says, “all things which I have heard from my Father I have made known to you” (John 15, 15). And elsewhere: “You are my friends, if you do the things which I command you” (John 15, 14). Concerning these words, as Saint Ambrose says: “He gave the form of friendship which we should follow: that we do a friend’s will, that we open our secrets to a friend—whatever things we have in the breast—and that we not be ignorant of his arcana” (On Duties.

lib. 3, cap. 21). Ostendamus nos illi et ille nobis aperiat sinum.

book 3, chapter 21). Let us show ourselves to him, and let him open his bosom to us.

Nihil enim occultat amicus. Si verus est, effundit animum suum, sicut effundebat mysteria patris Dominus Iesus. Haec Ambrosius.

For a friend hides nothing. If he is true, he pours out his soul, just as the Lord Jesus poured out the mysteries of the Father. Thus Ambrose.

Quam multos ergo diligimus quibus minus cautum est, sic nostrum propalare animum, et effundere viscera, quorum vel aetas, vel sensus, sive discretio, ad talia sustinenda non sufficit. Galterus. Haec amicitia tam sublimis est et perfecta, ut ad eam aspirare non audeam.

How many, therefore, do we love, for whom it is less safe thus to make public our mind, and to pour out our inmost parts, whose either age, or sense, or discretion does not suffice to sustain such things. Galterus. This friendship is so sublime and perfect that I do not dare to aspire to it.

Mihi et huic Gratiano illa sufficit, quam tuus Augustinus describit, colloqui scilicet et conridere, et vicissim benevole obsequi; simul legere, simul conferre, simul nugari et simul honestari; dissentire interdum sine odio, tamquam homo sibi, atque ipsa rarissima dissensione, condire consensiones plurimas; docere aliquid invicem, aut discere ab invicem; desiderare absentes cum molestia; suscipere advenientes cum laetitia. His atque huiusmodi a corde amantium et redamantium procedentibus signis, per os, per linguam, per oculos, et mille motus gratissimos, quasi fomitibus conflare animos, et ex pluribus unum facere. Hoc est quod nos diligendum credimus in amicis; ita ut rea sibi nostra videatur conscientia, si non amaverimus redamantem, aut si amantem non redamaverimus.

For me and for this Gratian that suffices which your Augustine describes: namely, to converse and to laugh together, and in turn to oblige kindly; to read together, to confer together, to trifle together and to be made honorable together; to disagree sometimes without hatred, as a man with himself, and by that very rare dissension to season very many consensuses; to teach something in turn, or to learn from one another; to long for the absent with vexation; to receive those arriving with joy. By these signs and the like, proceeding from the heart of lovers and love-responders, through the mouth, through the tongue, through the eyes, and a thousand most pleasing gestures, to inflame souls as if by kindlings, and to make out of many one. This is what we believe ought to be loved in friends; such that our conscience seems guilty to itself if we have not loved one who loves back, or if we have not loved back one who loves.

CAPUT XXIV. De cultu amicitiae.

CHAPTER 24. On the cultivation of friendship.

Aelredus. Amicitia haec carnalium est, et maxime adolescentium; quales aliquando fuerant ipse et suus, de quo tunc loquebatur amicus; quae tamen, exceptis nugis et mendaciis, si nulla intercesserit inhonestas, spe uberioris gratiae toleranda est, quasi quaedam amicitiae sanctioris principia; quibus, crescente religione et spiritalium studiorum parilitate, accedente etiam maturioris aetatis gravitate et spiritalium sensuum illuminatione, purgatiori affectu ad altiora, quasi e vicino conscendant; sicut hesterna die ab hominis ad Dei ipsius amicitiam, ob quamdam similitudinem diximus facilius transeundum. Sed iam tempus est, ut quemadmodum amicitia sit colenda deinceps videamus.

Aelred. This is the friendship of the carnal, and especially of adolescents; such as at one time he himself and his own—of whom his friend was then speaking—had been; which nevertheless, excepting trifles and lies, if no dishonor has intervened, is to be tolerated in the hope of more abundant grace, as certain beginnings of a holier friendship; by which, with religion growing and with the parity of spiritual studies, the gravity of a more mature age and the illumination of spiritual senses also supervening, they ascend with a more purgated affection to higher things, as it were from nearby; just as yesterday we said that it is easier to pass from the friendship of a man to that of God himself, on account of a certain likeness. But now it is time that we see henceforth how friendship is to be cultivated.

Firmamentum igitur stabilitatis et constantiae in amicitia, fides est: nihil est enim stabile, quod infidum est. Simplices quippe, et communes, et consentientes, et qui iisdem rebus moveantur, esse debent amici ad invicem; quae omnia pertinent ad fidelitatem. Non enim fidum potest esse multiplex ingenium et tortuosum.

Therefore, the firm foundation of stability and constancy in friendship is fidelity: for nothing is stable that is unfaithful. Indeed, friends ought to be to one another simple, and communal, and consenting, and moved by the same things; all of which pertain to fidelity. For a multiplex and tortuous disposition cannot be faithful.

Neque vero hi qui non eisdem rebus moventur, nec eisdem consentiunt stabiles esse possunt, aut fidi. Prae omnibus autem cavenda suspicio est, amicitiae venenum, ut numquam male de amico sentiamus, nec mala dicenti credamus vel consentiamus. Accedat huc in sermone iucunditas, hilaritas in vultu, suavitas in moribus, in oculorum etiam nutu serenitas, in quibus haudquaquam mediocre in amicitia condimentum.

Nor indeed can those who are not moved by the same things, nor consent to the same, be stable or trusty. Above all, however, suspicion is to be guarded against, the venom of friendship, so that we may never think ill of a friend, nor believe or consent to one speaking ill. Let there be added here, in discourse, jocundity; hilarity in the countenance; suavity in manners; serenity even in the nod of the eyes: in which there is by no means a mediocre condiment for friendship.

Tristitia namque et severior facies habet quidem honestam plerumque gravitatem, sed amicitia quasi remissior aliquando debet esse, et liberior et dulcior, ad comitatem facilitatem que sine levitate et dissolutione proclivior. Est praeterea vis amicitiae, parem esse inferiori superiorem. Saepe enim quidam inferioris gradus, vel ordinis, vel dignitatis, vel scientiae, ab excellentioribus in amicitiam assumuntur; quos oportet omnia quae extra naturam sunt contemnere et aestimare quasi nihilum et inane; et in pulchritudinem amicitiae quae non sericis vel gemmis ornatur, non possessionibus dilatatur, non pinguescit deliciis, nec abundat divitiis, non honoribus extollitur, non dignitatibus inflatur, semper attendere; et sic ad originis recurrentes principium, aequalitatem quam natura dedit, non circumpendentia quae mortalibus cupiditas praestitit, subtili examinatione considerare.

For sadness and a more severe countenance do indeed possess for the most part an honorable gravity, but friendship, as it were more relaxed, ought sometimes to be freer and sweeter, more inclined toward comity and facility without levity and dissolution. Moreover, there is a force of friendship: to make the superior equal to the inferior. For often certain persons of an inferior grade, or order, or dignity, or knowledge, are taken up into friendship by those more excellent; whom it behooves to despise all things which are outside of nature and to value them as almost nothing and vanity; and always to attend to the beauty of friendship, which is not adorned with silks or gems, not enlarged by possessions, does not grow fat with delights, nor abound in riches, is not exalted by honors, is not puffed up by dignities; and thus, recurring to the beginning of origin, by a subtle examination to consider the equality which nature has given, not the external trappings which desire has furnished to mortals.

Itaque in amicitia quae naturae simul et gratiae optimum donum est, sublimis descendat, humilis ascendat; dives egeat, pauper ditescat; et ita unusquisque alteri suam conditionem communicet ut fiat aequalitas, sicut scriptum est: "Qui multum non abundavit, et qui modicum non minoravit" (II Cor. VIII, 15). Numquam ergo tuo te praeferas amico, sed si forte in his quae diximus superior inveneris, tunc te magis amico submittere non cuncteris, praestare confidentiam, extollere verecundum; et tanto plus ei conferre honoris, quanto minus conferendum conditio vel paupertas praescribit.

Therefore in friendship, which is the best gift of nature together with grace, let the lofty descend, let the humble ascend; let the rich be in want, let the poor grow rich; and thus let each one communicate his condition to the other, that equality may be made, as it is written: "He who had much did not abound, and he who had little did not diminish" (2 Cor. 8:15). Never, therefore, set yourself before your friend; but if perchance you find yourself superior in the things we have said, then do not hesitate to submit yourself the more to your friend, to afford confidence, to lift up the bashful; and to confer so much the more honor upon him, the less his condition or poverty prescribes to be conferred.

Praestantissimus iuvenum Ionathas, non regium stemma, nec regni expectationem attendens, foedus iniit cum David: et servulum in amicitiam adaequans Domino, sic fugatum a patre, sic latitantem in heremo, sic adiudicatum morti, neci destinatum sibi praetulit; et se humilans et illum exultans; "Tu", inquit, "eris rex, et ego ero secundus post te" (I Reg. XXIII, 17). O praeclarissimum verae amicitiae speculum. Mira res.

Jonathan, the most preeminent of youths, not attending to royal lineage nor to the expectation of the kingdom, entered into a covenant with David: and, equating the little servant in friendship to the lord, one so driven into flight by his father, so hiding in the desert, so adjudged to death, destined for slaughter, he preferred to himself; and humbling himself and exalting him; "You," he says, "will be king, and I shall be second after you" (1 Kings 23, 17). O most illustrious mirror of true friendship. A marvelous thing.

Rex furebat in servum, et quasi in aemulum regni totam patriam excitabat; sacerdotes arguens proditionis, pro sola suspicione trucidat; lustrat nemora, valles exquirit, montes et rupes armata obsidet manu; omnes se regiae indignationis spondent ultores; solus Ionathas qui solus iustius poterat invidere, patri resistendum putavit, deferendum amico, praebendum in tanta adversitate consilium, et amicitiam regno praeferens: tu eris, ait, rex et ego ero secundus post te. Et vide, quomodo pater adolescentis contra amicum excitabat invidiam, conviciis urgens, terrens minis, spoliandum regno, honore privandum commemorans. Cum enim in David mortis sententiam protulisset, Ionathas amico non defuit. Quare, inquit, morietur David?

The king was raging against his servant, and as if against a rival of the kingdom he was stirring up the whole fatherland; charging the priests with treason, he slaughters them for mere suspicion; he sweeps through the groves, searches out the valleys, and with an armed band besieges mountains and crags; all pledge themselves avengers of the royal indignation; Jonathan alone—who alone could more justly have envied—thought that the father must be resisted, that deference be shown to his friend, that in such adversity counsel be offered, and, preferring friendship to the kingdom: “you will be king,” he says, “and I will be second after you.” And see how the young man’s father was arousing envy against his friend, pressing with invectives, terrifying with menaces, declaring him to be despoiled of the kingdom and deprived of honor. For when he had pronounced a sentence of death upon David, Jonathan did not fail his friend. “Why,” he says, “shall David die?”

Quid peccavit? Quid fecit? Ipse posuit animam suam in manu sua, et percussit philistaeum, et laetatus es. Quare ergo morietur?

What sin has he committed? What has he done? He himself placed his life in his own hand, and struck down the Philistine, and you rejoiced. Why therefore will he die?

Ad hanc vocem versus in insaniam rex, lancea nisus est confodere Ionatham cum pariete, addens que convicia minis: fili, inquit, mulieris ultro virum rapientis; scio quia diligis David in confusionem tuam, et in confusionem ignominiosae matris tuae. Deinde totum virus quo pectus iuvenis aspergeretur, evomuit, adiciens verbum ambitionis incitamentum, fomentum invidiae, zeli et amaritudinis incentivum: quamdiu vixerit filius Ysai, non stabilietur regnum tuum. Quis non moveretur his verbis, quis non invideretur?

At this utterance the king, turned to insanity, with a spear strove to run Jonathan through along with the wall, adding revilings to threats: “Son,” he said, “of a woman who of her own accord snatches a man; I know that you love David to your own confusion, and to the confusion of your ignominious mother.” Then he vomited forth all the poison with which the breast of the youth might be bespattered, adding a word that was an incitement of ambition, a foment of envy, an incentive of zeal and bitterness: “So long as the son of Jesse lives, your kingdom will not be established.” Who would not be moved by these words, who would not be provoked to envy?

Cuius amorem, cuius gratiam, cuius amicitiam non corrumperent, non minuerent, non obliterarent? Ille amantissimus adolescens, amicitiae iura conservans, fortis ad minas, patiens ad convicia, propter amicitiam regni contemptor, immemor gloriae, sed memor gratiae. Tu eris, inquit, rex et ego ero secundus post te. Repertos quosdam dicit Tullius, qui pecuniam praeferre amicitiae sordidum aestimarent; illos autem impossibile reperiri, qui honores, magistratus, imperia, potestates, opes amicitiae non anteponunt; ut cum ex altera parte proposita haec sint, ex altera vis amicitiae, non multo illa malint.

Whose love, whose favor, whose friendship would they not corrupt, not lessen, not obliterate? That most-loving adolescent, conserving the rights of friendship, brave in the face of threats, patient under invectives, on account of friendship a despiser of the kingdom, forgetful of glory, but mindful of grace. “You will be,” he says, “king, and I shall be second after you.” Tullius says that certain persons have been found who would judge it sordid to prefer money to friendship; but that it is impossible to find those who do not put honors, magistracies, commands, powers, resources before friendship; such that, when on the one hand these are set forth, on the other the force of friendship, they would far rather prefer those.

Imbecillis est enim natura ad contemnendam potentiam. Ubi enim, ait, invenies, qui honorem amici anteponat suo? Ecce inventus est Ionathas victor naturae, gloriae ac potestatis contemptor, qui honorem amici suo praeferret.

For nature is feeble at contemning power. For where, he says, will you find one who would put a friend’s honor before his own? Behold, Jonathan has been found, victor over nature, a contemner of glory and of power, who would prefer the honor of a friend to his own.

Tu eris, inquiens, rex et ego secundus post te. Haec est vera, perfecta, stabilis et aeterna amicitia, quam invidia non corrumpit, non suspicio minuit, non dissolvit ambitio; quae sic tentata non cessit, sic arietata non corruit; quae tot conviciis pulsata cernitur inflexibilis, tot lacessita iniuriis permansit immobilis. Vade ergo et tu fac similiter. Verum, si tibi praeferre quem diligis durum vel etiam impossibile iudicas; vel parem eum tibi facere, si vis esse amicus non neglegas.

saying, “You shall be king, and I will be second after you.” This is true, perfect, stable, and eternal friendship, which envy does not corrupt, suspicion does not lessen, ambition does not dissolve; which, thus tested, did not yield; thus rammed, did not collapse; which, beaten by so many revilings, is seen to be inflexible, provoked by so many injuries, remained immovable. Go, therefore, and you also do likewise. But if you judge it hard or even impossible to prefer the one you love to yourself, do not neglect—if you wish to be a friend—to make him your equal.

Non enim amicitia recte colitur, a quibus aequalitas non servatur. Defer amico ut aequali, ait Ambrosius, nec te pudeat, ut praevenias amicum officio. Amicitia enim nescit superbiam.

For friendship is not rightly cultivated by those who do not keep equality. Defer to a friend as to an equal, says Ambrose, and do not be ashamed to anticipate your friend in doing a service. For friendship knows no arrogance.

Fidelis quippe amicus medicamentum est vitae, immortalitatis gratia. Iam in beneficiis, quomodo colenda sit, attendamus, et hinc aliquid de alienis manibus extorqueamus.

A faithful friend indeed is a medicament of life, a grace of immortality. Now, in benefits, let us attend to how it ought to be cultivated, and from here let us extort something from others’ hands.

CAPUT XXV. Amicitiae lex in petendis et dandis.

CHAPTER 25. The law of friendship in asking and giving.

Haec lex, ait quidam, in amicitia sanciatur, ut ab amicis honesta petamus, et pro amicis honesta faciamus, nec expectemus ut rogemur; cunctatio semper absit, studium semper assit.

Let this law, says a certain man, be sanctioned in friendship: that we ask from friends what is honorable, and do what is honorable for friends, nor wait to be entreated; let hesitation always be absent, let zeal always be present.

Si perdenda est pecunia propter amicum, multo magis amici utilitatibus vel necessitatibus conferenda. Sed non omnes omnia possunt. Abundat iste pecunia, ille agris et possessionibus; alter in consiliis plus potest, alter magis excellit in honoribus.

If money must be lost on account of a friend, much more ought it to be contributed to a friend’s utilities or necessities. But not all can do all things. This man abounds in money, that one in fields and possessions; one has more power in counsels, another excels more in honors.

In his qualem te debeas exhibere amico, prudenter adverte. Et de pecunia satis dedit Scriptura: "Perde, inquit, pecuniam propter amicum" (Eccli. XXIX, 13). Sed quia oculi sapientis in capite eius, si nos sumus membra et Christus caput, faciamus quod ait propheta: oculi mei semper ad Dominum, ut ab eo accipiamus vivendi formam, de quo scriptum est: si quis indiget sapientia, postulet a Domino, qui dat omnibus affluenter, et non improperat.

In these matters, prudently take notice how you ought to present yourself to a friend. And concerning money Scripture has given enough: “Lose,” he says, “money for the sake of a friend” (Ecclesiasticus 29, 13). But since the eyes of the wise man are in his head, if we are the members and Christ the head, let us do what the prophet says: “My eyes are always toward the Lord,” that from him we may receive the form of living, of whom it is written: “If anyone is in need of wisdom, let him ask from the Lord, who gives to all abundantly and does not reproach.”

Sic igitur des amico, ut non improperes, non mercedem expectes, non frontem obducas, non vultum avertas, non deponas oculos; sed serena facie, hilari vultu, sermone iucundo intercide verba petentis; occurre benevolentia, ut non rogatus videaris praestare quod petitur. Ingenuus animus nihil magis erubescendum aestimat quam rogare. Cum igitur tibi esse debeat cum amico cor unum et anima una, iniuriosum nimis est, si non sit et pecunia una.

Thus therefore give to a friend, that you do not upbraid, do not expect a reward, do not draw a cloud over your brow, do not turn your face away, do not lower your eyes; but with a serene face, a cheerful countenance, and pleasant speech, intercept the words of the one asking; run to meet him with benevolence, so that you may seem to grant unasked what is sought. An ingenuous spirit deems nothing more to be blushed at than to beg. Since therefore there ought to be for you with a friend one heart and one soul, it is excessively injurious if there is not also one money.

Haec igitur lex in hac parte inter amicos teneatur; ut sic se sibi sua que impendant; ut qui dat, servet hilaritatem; qui accipit, non perdat securitatem. Booz cum Ruth moabitidis advertisset inopiam, post messores suos legentem spicas alloquitur, consolatur, invitat ad convivium puerorum, et verecundiae eius ingenue parcens, iubet messoribus etiam de industria spicas relinquere, quas illa colligeret absque pudore. Sic et nos debemus amicorum necessitates subtilius explorare, petiturum beneficiis praevenire, talem in dando modum servare, ut ille gratiam videatur praestare qui accepit, magis quam ille qui dedit.

Therefore let this law be held in this matter among friends: that thus they spend themselves and their goods for one another; that he who gives preserve cheerfulness, and he who receives not lose assurance. When Booz had noticed the poverty of Ruth the Moabitess, gleaning ears after his reapers, he addresses her, consoles her, invites her to the banquet of the servants; and, generously sparing her modesty, he orders the reapers even deliberately to leave ears, which she might gather without shame. Thus also we ought to investigate more subtly the necessities of friends, to forestall with benefits the one who is about to ask, to keep such a manner in giving that he who received may seem to render the favor rather than he who gave.

Galterus. Nobis igitur quibus nihil accipere, nihil dare permittitur, qualis erit in hac parte spiritalis amicitiae gratia? Aelredus.

Walter. Therefore for us, to whom it is permitted to receive nothing, to give nothing, what will the grace of spiritual friendship be in this part? Aelred.

Felicissimam vitam, ait Sapiens, ducerent homines, si duo haec verba de medio tollerentur, meum et tuum. Magnam certe praestat spiritali amicitiae firmitatem sancta paupertas, quae ideo sancta est, quia voluntaria. Cum enim peremptorium sit amicitiae cupiditas, tanto certe facilius amicitia parta servatur, quanto animus ab illa peste purgatior invenitur.

“Men would lead the most happy life,” says the Sage, “if these two words were removed from the midst: mine and thine.” Holy poverty surely affords great firmness to spiritual friendship—holy for this reason, because it is voluntary. For since cupidity is peremptory to friendship, by so much the more easily is friendship, once won, preserved, the more the mind is found purged from that pest.

CAPUT XXVI. Quid sibi impendere debeant amici.

CHAPTER 26. What friends ought to devote to one another.

Sunt tamen alia in spiritali amore beneficia, quibus et adesse sibi, et prodesse possunt amici. Primum ut solliciti sint pro invicem, orent pro invicem, erubescant alter pro altero, gaudeat alter pro altero; alterius lapsum ut suum lugeat; alterius profectum, suum existimet. Quibus modis potest erigat pusillanimem, suscipiat infirmum, consoletur tristem, iratum sustineat.

Nevertheless, there are other benefits in spiritual love, by which friends can both be present to one another and be of use. First, that they be solicitous for one another, pray for one another, let the one blush for the other, let the one rejoice for the other; let him mourn another’s lapse as his own; let him reckon another’s progress as his own. By whatever means he can, let him raise up the pusillanimous, take up the infirm, console the sad, sustain the angry.

Sic praeterea oculos revereatur amici, ut nihil quod inhonestum sit agere; nihil quod dedeceat loqui praesumat. Cum enim quidquid ipse deliquerit, ita redundet in amicum, ut non solum intra se erubescat et doleat, sed etiam his qui videt vel audit, sibi ac si ipse peccasset, improperet; profecto licet non sibi, amico tamen credit esse parcendum. Optimus itaque comes amicitiae verecundia est; et ideo maximum ornamentum tollit amicitiae, qui ab ea tollit verecundiam.

Thus, furthermore, let him revere his friend’s eyes, so that he presume to do nothing that is dishonorable; presume to speak nothing that is unbecoming. For since whatever he himself has done amiss so redounds upon the friend that he not only blushes and grieves within himself, but also, before those who see or hear, reproaches himself as if he himself had sinned; assuredly, though not to himself, yet he believes the friend is to be spared. Therefore the best companion of friendship is modesty (shamefacedness); and hence he takes away the greatest ornament of friendship who takes away modesty from it.

Quam saepe conceptam ab intus iracundiae flammam, et iam in publicum erumpentem, amici mei nutus compescuit vel extinxit; quotiens verbum indecens usque ad fauces progressum, austerior illius aspectus repressit. Quam saepe incautius resolutus in risum, vel in otiosa lapsus, in eius adventum debitam gravitatem recepi.

How often has the flame of irascibility, conceived from within and already bursting forth into the public, been restrained or extinguished by my friend’s nod; how often has an indecent word, advanced up to the very throat, been repressed by his more austere look. How often, incautiously relaxed into laughter, or slipped into otiose things, upon his advent I recovered the due gravity.

CAPUT XXVII. Correptio amici.

CHAPTER 27. Correction of a friend.

Praeterea quidquid suadendum est, ab amico facilius recipitur, et securius retinetur, cuius in suadendo magna debet esse auctoritas; cum nec fides eius dubia, nec adulatio sit suspecta. Amicus igitur amico quod honestum sit suadeat, secure, manifeste, libere. Nec solum monendi sunt amici, sed si opus fuerit obiurgandi.

Moreover, whatever is to be advised is more easily received from a friend, and more securely retained, one whose authority in advising ought to be great; since neither is his faith doubtful, nor is adulation suspected. Let a friend, therefore, advise a friend as to what is honorable, securely, manifestly, freely. Nor are friends only to be admonished, but, if need be, to be objurgated.

Nam cum quibusdam molesta sit veritas, siquidem ex ea nascitur odium secundum illud: obsequium amicos, veritas odium parit; obsequium tamen illud multo molestius est, quod peccatis indulgens, praecipitem amicum fieri sinit. Maxime autem culpandus est amicus, et hinc praecipue obiurgandus, si veritatem aspernatur, et obsequiis atque blanditiis in crimen impellitur. Non quod non debeamus amicis dulciter obsequi, et plerumque blandiri; sed in omnibus servanda moderatio est, ut monitio acerbitate, obiurgatio contumelia careat.

For since to some persons truth is burdensome, seeing that from it there is born odium, according to that saying: “obsequiousness begets friends, truth begets odium”; yet that obsequiousness is far more burdensome which, indulging sins, allows a friend to be hurled headlong. But most of all is the friend to be blamed, and for this especially to be objurgated, if he spurns the truth, and by obsequiousness and blandishments is driven into crime. Not that we ought not sweetly to comply with friends, and often to use blandishment; but in all things moderation is to be kept, so that monition be free from bitterness, and objurgation from contumely.

In obsequiis vero vel blanditiis, suavis quaedam et honesta affabilitas assit; assentatio vero vitiorum nutrix procul amoveatur; quae non solum amico, sed nec libero quidem digna est. Cuius autem aures veritati clausae sunt, ut ab amico verum audire nequeant, huius salus desperanda est. Quocirca, sicut ait Ambrosius, si quid vitii in amico deprehenderis, corripe occulte; si te non audierit, corripe palam (De Off.

In compliances or blandishments, let there be present a certain sweet and honorable affability; but assentation, the nurse of vices, let it be removed far away; which is worthy neither of a friend nor indeed of a free man. But he whose ears are closed to truth, so that they cannot hear the truth from a friend, his salvation is to be despaired of. Wherefore, as Ambrose says, if you have detected any fault in a friend, rebuke in secret; if he does not hear you, rebuke openly (De Off.

lib. 3, cap. 21). Sunt enim bonae correptiones, et plerumque meliores quam tacita amicitia.

book 3, chapter 21). For there are good corrections, and often better than silent friendship.

Etsi laedi se putet amicus, tu tamen corripe. Etsi amaritudo correptionis animum eius vulneret, tu tamen corripe. "Tolerabiliora enim sunt amici vulnera, quam adulantium oscula" (Prov.

Even if the friend thinks himself to be harmed, nevertheless correct him. Even if the bitterness of correction wounds his mind, nevertheless correct him. "For the wounds of a friend are more tolerable than the kisses of adulators" (Prov.

XXVII, 6). Errantem igitur amicum corripe. Super omnia tamen cavenda est in correptione ira et amaritudo mentis; ne non tam videatur amicum velle corrigere, quam suo stomacho satisfacere. Vidi enim aliquos in amicis corrigendis, conceptam amaritudinem, ebullientem que furorem, nunc zeli, nunc libertatis nomine palliare; et secutos impetum, non rationem, sua tali correptione numquam prodesse, immo et obesse plurimum.

27, 6). Therefore, rebuke the erring friend. Above all, however, in correction ire and bitterness of mind are to be guarded against; lest one seem not so much to want to correct a friend as to satisfy his own spleen. For I have seen some, in correcting friends, cloak a conceived bitterness and a boiling-over fury, now under the name of zeal, now of liberty; and, having followed impulse, not reason, by such a correction never to profit, nay rather to harm very greatly.

At inter amicos nulla vitii huius excusatio est. Debet enim amicus amico compati, condescendere, vitium eius suum putare; corripere humiliter, compatienter. Corripiat eum vultus tristior, sermo deiectior; intercipiant verba lacrimae; ut non solum videat, sed etiam sentiat correptionem ex amore et non ex rancore procedere.

But among friends there is no excuse for this vice. For a friend ought to sympathize with a friend, to condescend, to reckon his vice as his own; to reprove humbly, compassionately. Let a sadder countenance, a more dejected speech reprove him; let tears intercept the words; so that he may not only see but also feel that the correction proceeds from love and not from rancor.

Si forte primam correptionem respuerit, recipiet vel secundam. Tu interim ora, tu plora; tristem praeferens vultum, pium servans affectum. Exploranda est etiam animi illius qualitas; nam sunt quibus blanditiae prosunt, et his libentius acquiescunt; sunt qui pro nihilo eas ducunt, et facilius verbere vel verbo corriguntur.

If by chance he spurns the first correction, he will receive even the second. You meanwhile pray, you weep; presenting a sad countenance, preserving a pious affection. The quality of his mind is also to be explored; for there are those for whom blandishments are beneficial, and they more willingly acquiesce to these; there are those who reckon them as nothing, and are more easily corrected by a beating or by a word.

Amicus proinde ita se conformet et aptet amico, ut eius congruit qualitati; et cui in exteriori adversitate debet adesse, his quae sunt adversa spiritui, multo magis festinet occurrere. Igitur sicut monere et moneri proprie amicitiae est; et alterum libere facere, non aspere; alterum patienter accipere, non repugnanter; sic habendum est, nullam in amicitiis pestem esse maiorem quam adulationem et assentationem; quae sunt levium hominum, atque fallacium, ad voluntatem loquentium omnia, nihil ad veritatem. Nulla proinde sit inter amicos cunctatio, simulatio nulla, quae maxime repugnat amicitiae.

Accordingly let a friend so conform and adapt himself to a friend as is congruent to his quality; and for the one to whom he ought to be present in exterior adversity, let him much more hasten to meet those things which are adverse to the spirit. Therefore, just as to admonish and to be admonished is properly of friendship—on the one side to do it freely, not harshly; on the other to receive it patiently, not in a resistant way—so it must be held that there is no pest in friendships greater than adulation and assentation; which are of frivolous and fallacious men, speaking everything to the will, nothing to the truth. Let there, accordingly, be no hesitation among friends, no dissimulation, which most especially is repugnant to friendship.

Debet quippe amico veritatem; sine qua nomen amicitiae valere non potest. Corripiet me, ait sanctus David, iustus in misericordia, et increpabit me; oleum autem peccatoris non impinguet caput meum. Simulator et callidus provocat iram Dei.

He indeed owes his friend truth; without which the name of friendship cannot avail. “He will correct me,” says Saint David, “the just man in mercy, and he will reprove me; but the oil of the sinner shall not make my head fat.” The dissimulator and the crafty man provokes the wrath of God.

Inde Dominus per prophetam: popule meus, qui beatum te dicunt, ipsi te decipiunt, et viam gressuum tuorum dissipant. "Simulator enim ore", ut ait Salomon, "decipit amicum suum" (Prov. II, 9).

Then the Lord through the prophet: My people, those who call you blessed, they themselves are deceiving you, and they dissipate the way of your steps. "For the dissimulator with his mouth," as Solomon says, "deceives his friend" (Prov. 2, 9).

Quocirca sic colenda est amicitia, ut si forte certis ex causis admittenda videatur dissimulatio, sed simulatio numquam. Galterus. Quomodo, quaeso, dissimulatio necessaria est, quae ut mihi videtur, semper vitium est.

Wherefore friendship is to be cultivated thus, that if perchance for certain causes dissimulation may seem to be admitted, yet simulation never. Galterus. How, I ask, is dissimulation necessary, which, as it seems to me, is always a vice?

Aelredus. Falleris, fili. Nam et Deus dissimulare dicitur peccata delinquentium, nolens mortem peccatoris, sed ut convertatur et vivat.

Aelred. You are mistaken, son. For even God is said to dissimulate the sins of delinquents, not willing the death of the sinner, but that he be converted and live.

Galterus. Distingue, rogo, inter simulationem et dissimulationem. Aelredus.

Galterus. Distinguish, I beg, between simulation and dissimulation. Aelredus.

Simulatio, ut mihi videtur, deceptorius quidam consensus est, contra iudicium rationis, quam Terentius in persona Gnatonis satis eleganter expressit: negat quis? Nego. Ait?

Simulation, as it seems to me, is a certain deceptive consent, against the judgment of reason, which Terence expressed quite elegantly in the person of Gnatho: 'Does someone deny? I deny. Does he assert?'

Aio. Postremo imperavi egomet omnia mihi assentari. Et forte haec ethnicus ille de nostris mutuavit thesauris, sensum prophetae nostri suis exprimens verbis.

I say. Finally I myself commanded that everyone assent to me. And perhaps that pagan borrowed these things from our treasures, expressing the sense of our prophet in his own words.

Nam et hoc ipsum ex persona plebis perversae dixisse prophetam, manifestum est: videte nobis vana, loquimini nobis placentia. Et alias: prophetae prophetabant mendacium, et sacerdotes applaudebant manu, et populus meus dilexit talia. Hoc vitium ubique detestandum est, semper et ubique cavendum.

For it is manifest that the prophet said even this very thing in the persona of a perverse plebs: see for us vanities, speak to us pleasing things. And elsewhere: the prophets were prophesying falsehood, and the priests were applauding with the hand, and my people loved such things. This vice is everywhere to be detested, and always and everywhere to be avoided.

Porro dissimulatio dispensatoria quaedam est, vel poenae, vel correptionis dilatio, sine consensu interiori, pro loco, pro tempore, pro persona. Neque enim si quis amicus constitutus in plebe deliquerit, subito et palam obiurgandus est; sed dissimulandum pro loco, immo et quantum salva veritate fieri potest, excusandum quod fecit, et ad debitam correptionem inferendam expectandum familiare secretum. Sic eo tempore quo animus intentus pluribus, minus est ad ea quae dicenda sunt idoneus, vel, aliis supervenientibus causis, paululum commotior sensus ei fuerit aliquantulum perturbatus, dissimulatione opus est, donec interiori tumultu sedato, corripientem aure pacatiore sustineat.

Furthermore, dissimulation is a certain dispensatory delay, either of penalty or of correction, without inward consent, for the place, for the time, for the person. For it is not the case that if some friend, set among the plebs, has transgressed, he must be rebuked suddenly and openly; but one must dissimulate according to the place, indeed, and, so far as it can be done with truth safeguarded, excuse what he has done, and await a familiar privacy in which to bring in the due correction. Thus, at the time when the mind, intent upon many things, is less fit for the things that must be said, or, other causes supervening, his feeling has been a little more stirred and somewhat disturbed, there is need of dissimulation, until, the inner tumult having been calmed, he may endure the one correcting with a calmer ear.

David rex, cum praeventus concupiscentia homicidium adulterio copulasset, correpturus eum propheta nathan, regiae deferens maiestati, non subito, nec mente turbata tantae personae crimen impegit, sed congrua dissimulatione praemissa, prudenter ipsius regis contra se ipsum sententiam extorsit. Galterus. Perplacet mihi ista distinctio.

King David, when, overtaken by concupiscence, he had coupled murder with adultery, the prophet Nathan, about to rebuke him, showing deference to royal majesty, did not suddenly, nor with a troubled mind, hurl the charge against a person of such stature, but, with fitting dissimulation set beforehand, prudently wrung from the king himself a sentence against himself. Walter. That distinction is most pleasing to me.

Sed scire velim si amicus potentior fuerit, possit que ad honores vel quaslibet dignitates, quos voluerit promovere, utrum debeat eos quos diligit et a quibus diligitur, caeteris in tali promotione praeferre, et inter ipsos quem amplius diligit eis quos minus diligit anteferre? Aelredus. Et in hac parte quomodo colenda sit amicitia, operae pretium est indagare.

But I would like to know whether, if a friend is more powerful and can promote to honors or to whatever dignities whom he wishes, he ought to prefer in such promotion those whom he loves and by whom he is loved to the others, and among them to put before the rest the one whom he loves more over those whom he loves less? Aelred. And on this point, it is worth the effort to investigate how friendship ought to be cultivated.

Sunt enim nonnulli qui se putent non amari, quia non possunt promoveri; se que contemni causentur, si non curis et officiis implicentur. Unde non parvas discordias inter eos, qui putabantur amici, ortas novimus; ita ut indignationem divortium sequeretur, divortium maledicta. Itaque in dignitatibus vel officiis, maxime ecclesiasticis, magna cautio adhibenda est; nec attendendum quid tu possis praestare, sed quid ille cui praestas poterit sustinere.

For there are some who think themselves not to be loved, because they cannot be promoted; and they allege that they are despised, if they are not implicated in cares and offices. Whence we have known no small discords to have arisen between those who were thought friends; so that indignation was followed by a separation, and the separation by maledictions. Therefore in dignities or offices, especially ecclesiastical, great caution must be employed; nor is it to be regarded what you can bestow, but what he, to whom you bestow, will be able to sustain.

Plures quippe sunt diligendi, qui tamen non sunt promovendi; et multos laudabiliter et dulciter amplectimur, quos non sine gravi nostro peccato et illorum summo periculo, curis et negotiis implicaremus. Quocirca semper in his ratio sequenda est, non affectus; nec his imponendus est honos vel onus istud quos habemus amicitiores, sed quos ad ea sustinenda credimus aptiores. Ubi tamen virtutis invenitur aequalitas, non multum improbo, si aliquantisper affectus suas inserit partes.

More indeed are to be loved, who nevertheless are not to be promoted; and many we laudably and sweetly embrace, whom we would not implicate in cares and affairs without our grave sin and their utmost peril. Wherefore in these matters reason is always to be followed, not affection; nor is that honor or that burden to be imposed upon those whom we have as closer friends, but upon those whom we believe more apt to sustain them. Where, however, an equality of virtue is found, I do not much disapprove if affection, for a little, inserts its own part.

Nec quisquam se idcirco dicat contemptum, quia non promotum; cum Dominus Iesus Petrum Iohanni in hac parte praetulerit, nec ideo subtraxerit Iohanni affectum, quia Petro dederat principatum. Petro commendavit Ecclesiam suam, Iohanni commisit dulcissimam matrem suam. Petro dedit claves regni sui, Iohanni reservavit archana pectoris sui.

Nor let anyone say that he is therefore contemned, because he is not promoted; since the Lord Jesus preferred Peter to John in this respect, nor for that reason did he withdraw affection from John, because he had given the principate to Peter. To Peter he commended his Church, to John he committed his most sweet mother. To Peter he gave the keys of his kingdom, to John he reserved the arcana of his breast.

Petrus ergo sublimior, sed Iohannes securior. Petrus licet in potestate constitutus, dicente Iesu: unus ex vobis tradet me, cum caeteris timet et trepidat, Iohannes ex sinus sui participatione factus audacior, innuente Petro quisnam ille esset, interrogat. Petrus ergo exponitur actioni, Iohannes reservatur affectui, quia: sic, inquit, eum volo manere, donec veniam.

Peter, therefore, is more exalted, but John more secure. Peter, although constituted in power, when Jesus says, “one of you will betray me,” fears and trembles with the others; John, made more audacious from the participation of his bosom, Peter signaling who that one was, asks. Peter, therefore, is exposed to action, John is reserved for affection, because: “Thus,” he says, “I will that he remain until I come.”

Exemplum enim dedit nobis, ut et nos ita faciamus.

For he gave us an example, that we also may do thus.

CAPUT XXVIII. Epilogus.

CHAPTER 28. Epilogue.

Praestemus amico quidquid amoris est, quidquid gratiae, quidquid dulcedinis, quidquid caritatis; futiles hos honores et onera, illis quos praescripserit ratio imponamus; scientes quia numquam vere diligit amicum, cui amicus ipse non sufficit, nisi haec vilia et contemptibilia adiecerit. Cavendum autem magnopere est, ne tenerior affectus maiores utilitates impediat; dum eos quorum ampliori caritate complectimur, ubi magna spes fructus uberioris elucet, nec absentare volumus, nec onerare. Haec est enim amicitia ordinata, ut ratio regat affectum, nec tam quid illorum suavitas, quam quid multorum petat utilitas attendamus.

Let us render to a friend whatever of love there is, whatever of grace, whatever of sweetness, whatever of charity; these futile honors and burdens let us impose upon those whom reason shall have prescribed; knowing that he never truly loves a friend to whom the friend himself does not suffice, unless he has added these cheap and contemptible things. Yet we must greatly beware lest a more tender affection hinder greater advantages; since those whom we embrace with more ample charity, where a great hope of more abundant fruit shines forth, we are unwilling either to keep at a distance or to burden. For this is ordered friendship: that reason should rule affection, and that we attend not so much to what their sweetness desires as to what the utility of the many demands.

Recordor nunc duorum amicorum meorum, qui licet exempti praesentibus, mihi tamen vivunt, semper que vivent. Quorum primum in initiis meae conversionis, quadam mihi morum similitudine et studiorum parilitate comparaveram, cum adhuc essem adolescens; alterum ab ipso fere pueritiae suae tempore a me electum, et multifarie multis que modis probatum, cum iam aetas mihi variaret capillos, in summam amicitiam assumpsi. Et illum quidem nullo adhuc curae pastoralis onere pressus, nulla rerum temporalium sollicitudine distentus, claustralium deliciarum et spiritalium dulcedinum, quibus tunc initiabar, socium consortem que delegeram; nihil exigens, nihil praestans praeter affectum, et ipsius affectus suave quoddam prout caritas dictabat indicium.

I recall now two friends of mine, who, though exempted from present things, yet live to me, and will live forever. The first of whom, at the beginnings of my conversion, by a certain similarity of morals and a parity of studies I had obtained for myself, while I was still an adolescent; the other, chosen by me from almost the very time of his boyhood, and in many ways and by many modes proved, when already age was variegating my hairs, I took into the highest friendship. And him indeed, pressed as yet by no burden of pastoral care, and distracted by no solicitude of temporal things, I had chosen as a companion and partner of cloistral delights and spiritual sweetnesses, in which I was then being initiated; demanding nothing, furnishing nothing beyond affection, and of that very affection a certain sweet token as charity dictated.

Istum iam iuvenem in meae sollicitudinis partem ascitum, in his sudoribus meis habui coadiutorem. Inter utramque hanc amicitiam, memoria praeeunte discernens, video priorem inniti magis affectui, alterum rationi; quamvis nec illi affectus defuerit, nec illum ratio deseruerit. Denique prior in ipsis amicitiae nostrae principiis ereptus mihi eligi potuit, sicut praescripsimus, non probari; alter a puero ad mediam aetatem dimissus mihi, et a me dilectus, per omnes amicitiae gradus, quousque talium potuit imperfectio, me cum ascendit.

This one, now a youth, admitted into a share of my solicitude, I had as a coadjutor in these my toils. Discerning between these two friendships, memory going before, I see the former lean more upon affection, the latter upon reason; although neither was affection lacking to that one, nor did reason desert this one. Finally, the former, snatched from me in the very beginnings of our friendship, could be chosen, as we have prescript, not proved; the other, consigned to me from boyhood to mid-age, and loved by me, through all the grades of friendship, so far as the imperfection of such could, ascended with me.

Et primum quidem virtutum eius contemplatio illi meum inclinavit affectum; quem ego olim ab australibus partibus in aquilonalem hanc solitudinem duxi; ego regularibus disciplinis primus institui. Ex tunc ipse victor corporis, laboris etiam et inediae patiens, plurimis exemplo fuit, admirationi multis, mihi gloriae et delectationi. Onerosum nulli, sed omnibus gratum intuebar.

And first indeed the contemplation of his virtues inclined my affection toward him; whom I once led from the southern parts into this northern solitude; I myself was the first to initiate him in the regular disciplines. From then on he, a victor over the body, patient also of toil and of fasting, was for very many an example, for many a matter of admiration, for me a glory and a delight. I beheld him burdensome to no one, but welcome to all.

Ingrediebatur et egrediebatur pergens ad imperium seniorum, humilis, mansuetus, gravis moribus, sermone rarus, indignationis nescius, murmuris et ranconis et detractionis ignarus; incedebat quasi surdus non audiens, et sicut mutus non aperiens os suum. Ut iumentum factus est, sequens obedientiae frenum, et iugum disciplinae regularis mente et corpore infatigabiliter portans. Ingressus aliquando adhuc puer cellam infirmorum, correptus est a sancto patre et praedecessore meo, quod tam cito puer se quieti inertiae que dedisset; sic erubuit, ut mox egressus, tam ferventer corporalibus se subderet exercitiis, ut multis annis nec cum gravi aegritudine urgeretur aliquid sibi de consueto rigore laxaverit.

He would go in and go out, proceeding under the command of the elders, humble, meek, grave in manners, sparing in speech, unacquainted with indignation, ignorant of murmuring and rancor and detraction; he went as though deaf, not hearing, and as if mute, not opening his mouth. Like a beast of burden he was made, following the bridle of obedience, and bearing the yoke of regular discipline in mind and body indefatigably. Having once, while still a boy, entered the infirmary cell, he was rebuked by the holy father and my predecessor, because so quickly, being a boy, he had given himself to rest and inertia; he blushed so that, having at once gone out, he so fervently subjected himself to bodily exercises that for many years, not even when pressed by grave sickness, did he allow himself to relax anything of his accustomed rigor.

Haec eum mihi invisceraverant miris modis, et ita in animum induxerant meum, ut mihi eum de inferiori socium, de socio amicum, de amico amicissimum facerem. Videns enim eum in quosdam canos virtutis et gratiae profecisse, fratrum usus consilio, onus ei subprioratus imposui. Quod quidem invitus, sed quia totum obedientiae sese devoverat, modeste suscepit.

These things had knit him into my very vitals for me in wondrous ways, and had so brought him into my mind that I made him for myself from a subordinate a companion, from a companion a friend, from a friend a most dear friend. For seeing that he had advanced to a certain gray-haired maturity of virtue and grace, using the counsel of the brethren, I laid upon him the burden of the sub-priorship. This he indeed accepted unwillingly, but, because he had wholly devoted himself to obedience, he received it modestly.

Egit tamen me cum multis secreto, ut dimitteretur, praetendens aetatem, praetendens inscitiam, praetendens amicitiam qua iam initiabamur; ne forte hac occasione vel minus diligeret, vel diligeretur minus. Sed his nihil proficiens, coepit libera voce quidquid timebat utrisque, quidquid sibi in me minus placebat, humiliter et modeste proferre in medium; sperans, ut postea confessus est, hac me praesumptione offensum, ad id posse quod petebat, facilius inclinari.

He nevertheless pressed me privately, with many others, that he might be dismissed, alleging age, alleging ignorance, alleging the amity into which we were now being initiated; lest perhaps on this occasion he either love less, or be loved less. But, profiting nothing by these, he began with a free voice to bring into the midst, humbly and modestly, whatever he feared for us both, whatever in me pleased him less; hoping, as he afterwards confessed, that, offended by this presumption, I could more easily be inclined to that which he was seeking.

Sed haec eius mentis vocis que libertas, amicitiae nostrae cumulum addidit; quia volebam eum amicum habere non minus. Cernens tunc ille me gratum habere quod dixerat, humiliter respondisse ad singula, satis dedisse de omnibus, se non modo nihil offensionis, sed insuper copiosiorem fructum percepisse; coepit me et ipse arctius solito diligere, habenas laxare affectui, et meo se pectori totum infundere. Ita et mihi eius libertas, et mea sibi probata patientia est.

But this freedom of his mind and voice added an accumulation to our friendship; because I wished to have him a friend no less. Seeing then that I held as pleasing what he had said, that I had humbly responded to each particular, that I had given satisfaction about everything, that he had received not only nothing of offense, but moreover a more copious fruit; he too began to love me more closely than was usual, to loosen the reins to affection, and to pour himself wholly into my breast. Thus both his liberty to me, and my patience to him, was proved.

Ego quoque vicem rependens amico, accepta occasione durius obiurgandum putavi, nec quibusdam quasi conviciis parcens, eum libertati meae nec impatientem reperi, nec ingratum. Coepi deinde consiliorum meorum ei revelare secreta, et fidelis inventus est. Ita inter nos amor crevit, concaluit affectus, caritas roborabatur, donec ad id ventum est, ut esset nobis cor unum et anima una, idem velle et idem nolle, esset que hic amor timoris vacuus, offensionis nescius, suspicione carens, adulationem exhorrens.

I too, repaying in turn to my friend, seizing the occasion, thought he should be more harshly rebuked, and, not sparing certain, as it were, reproaches, I found him neither impatient of my liberty nor ungrateful. I then began to reveal to him the secrets of my counsels, and he was found faithful. Thus between us love grew, affection grew warm, charity was being strengthened, until it came to this: that for us there was one heart and one soul, to will the same and to not will the same; and this love was void of fear, unacquainted with offense, free from suspicion, abhorring adulation.

Nihil inter nos simulatum, fucatum nihil, nihil inhoneste blandum, nihil indecenter durum, circuitus nullus, nullus angulus, sed omnia nuda et aperta; qui meum pectus quodammodo suum putarem, et eius meum, ipse que similiter. Ita in amicitia recta linea gradientibus, nullius correptio indignationem, nullius consensio culpam pariebat. Unde se amicum in omnibus probans, meae paci, meae quantum poterat prospiciebat quieti.

Nothing between us was simulated, nothing painted-over, nothing dishonorably coaxing, nothing indecently hard; no circuit, no angle, but all things naked and open; so that I would reckon my breast in some way as his, and his as mine, and he likewise. Thus, proceeding in friendship by a straight line, no one’s correction brought forth indignation, no one’s consent brought forth blame. Whence, proving himself a friend in all things, he looked out for my peace, for my quiet so far as he was able.

Ipse se periculis obiiciebat, scandalis emergentibus obviabat. Volebam ei aliquando aliquid de his temporalibus, quia iam infirmabatur, praebere solatium; sed ille prohibebat cavendum dicens: ne amor noster secundum hanc carnis consolationem metiretur; ne id magis carnali affectui meo quam eius necessitati ascriberetur, et sic mea auctoritas minueretur. Erat igitur quasi manus mea, quasi oculus meus, baculus senectutis meae.

He himself would expose himself to dangers, he would meet emerging scandals head-on. I wished at times to offer him some solace of these temporal things, because he was already growing infirm; but he forbade it, saying caution was to be used: lest our love be measured according to this consolation of the flesh; lest it be ascribed more to my carnal affection than to his necessity, and thus my authority be diminished. He was therefore as it were my hand, as it were my eye, the staff of my old age.

Ipse spiritus mei reclinatorium, dolorum meorum dulce solatium; cuius amoris sinus excipiebat laboribus fatigatum, cuius consilium recreabat tristitia vel moerore demersum. Ipse commotum pacificabat; ipse leniebat iratum. Quidquid minus laetum emergebat, referebam ad eum; ut quod solus non poteram, iunctis humeris facilius sustinerem.

He himself was the reclining-place of my spirit, the sweet solace of my sorrows; whose bosom of love received me wearied by labors, whose counsel re-created me when submerged in sadness or mourning. He himself pacified me when agitated; he himself soothed me when angered. Whatever less joyful arose, I referred to him; so that what I could not alone, with shoulders joined I might more easily sustain.

Quid ergo? Nonne quaedam beatitudinis portio fuit, sic amare et sic amari; sic iuvare et sic iuvari; et sic ex fraternae caritatis dulcedine in illum sublimiorem locum dilectionis divinae splendorem altius evolare; et in scala caritatis nunc ad Christi ipsius amplexum conscendere, nunc ad amorem proximi ibi suaviter repausaturum descendere? In hac igitur amicitia nostra quam exempli gratia inservimus, si quid cernitis imitandum, ad vestrum id retorquete profectum.

What then? Was there not some portion of beatitude, thus to love and thus to be loved; thus to help and thus to be helped; and thus from the sweetness of fraternal charity to soar higher into that more sublime place of the splendor of divine dilection; and on the ladder of charity now to climb up to the embrace of Christ himself, now to descend to the love of the neighbor, there to repose sweetly? In this, therefore, our friendship which we serve for the sake of example, if you discern anything to be imitated, turn it to your own profit.

Sed ut tandem collationem hanc nostram, vel sole ruente claudamus, ab amore profectam amicitiam non dubitatis. Qui vero semetipsum non amat, alium amare qui potest, cum ex similitudine amoris quo ipse sibi carus est, amorem proximi debeat ordinare? Se autem non diligit, qui turpe aliquid et inhonestum, vel a se exigit, vel sibi impertit.

But so that at last we may close this our conference, even with the sun sinking, you do not doubt that this friendship has proceeded from love. But he who does not love himself—how can he love another, since by the likeness of the love by which he is dear to himself he ought to order the love of his neighbor? Now he does not love himself who either exacts of himself or imparts to himself anything base and dishonorable.

Primum igitur est ut semetipsum quisque castificet, nihil sibimet indulgens, quod indecens sit; nihil sibi subtrahens, quod utile sit. Sic vero se ipsum diligens, diligat et proximum, eamdem regulam sequens. Sed quia hic amor multos colligit, ex ipsis eligat quos ad amicitiae secreta lege familiari admittat, in quem suum copiose infundat affectum; denudans pectus suum usque ad inspectionem viscerum et medullarum, cogitationum et intentionum cordis.

Therefore, first it is that each one should chastify himself, indulging himself in nothing that is indecent; withholding from himself nothing that is useful. Thus truly loving himself, let him also love his neighbor, following the same rule. But since this love gathers many, from them let him choose those whom he admits to the secrets of friendship by a familiar law, into whom he may copiously pour his affection; laying bare his breast even unto the inspection of the inwards and marrow, the cogitations and intentions of the heart.

Eligatur autem non secundum affectionis lasciviam, sed secundum rationis perspicaciam; similitudine morum et contemplatione virtutum. Deinde sic se impendat amico, ut levitas omnis absit, iucunditas assit; nec ordinata desint benevolentiae et caritatis officia vel obsequia. Iam exinde probetur fides eius, probetur honestas, probetur patientia.

Let him, however, be chosen not according to the lasciviousness of affection, but according to the perspicacity of reason; by similarity of mores and by contemplation of virtues. Then let him thus expend himself upon a friend, that all levity be absent, jocundity be present; nor let the ordered offices or services of benevolence and charity be lacking. Now thereafter let his faith be proved, his honesty be proved, his patience be proved.

Accedat paulatim consiliorum communio, assiduitas parilium studiorum, et quaedam conformatio vultuum. Sic enim conformari sibi debent amici, ut statim cum alter alterum viderit, etiam similitudo vultus unius in alterum transfundatur; sive fuerit deiectus tristitia, sive iucunditate serenus.

Let there gradually come a communion of counsels, an assiduity of peer studies, and a certain conformation of countenances. For thus friends ought to be conformed to one another, that immediately when the one sees the other, even the similitude of the countenance of the one is transfused into the other; whether he has been dejected by sadness, or serene with jocundity.

Ita electus atque probatus, cum certum tibi fuerit, quod nihil velit, quod dedeceat, vel petere ab amico, vel praestare rogatus; constiterit que tibi amicitiam eum virtutem putare, non quaestum; adulationem fugere, detestari assentationem; inventus que fuerit liber cum discretione, patiens in correptione, firmus et stabilis in dilectione; tunc illa spiritalis sentitur dulcedo, quam bonum scilicet et quam iucundum, habitare fratres in unum. Quam utile tunc dolere pro invicem, laborare pro invicem, onera sua portare invicem, cum unusquisque pro altero semetipsum neglegere dulce habet; alterius voluntatem suae praeferre, illius necessitati magis quam suae ipsius occurrere; adversis semet opponere et exponere. Interea quam dulce habent conferre invicem, sua studia mutuo patefacere, simul examinare omnia, et de omnibus in unam convenire sententiam.

Thus chosen and approved, when it has been certain to you that he desires nothing that would be unbecoming either to ask from a friend or to render when asked; and it has been established for you that he considers friendship a virtue, not a quest for gain; that he flees adulation, detests assentation; and that he has been found free with discretion, patient under correction, firm and stable in love; then that spiritual sweetness is felt: how good indeed and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together as one. How useful then to grieve for one another, to labor for one another, to carry one another’s burdens, when each finds it sweet to neglect himself for the other; to prefer the other’s will to his own, to meet his need rather than his own; to set himself against adversities and to expose himself. Meanwhile how sweet they find it to confer with one another, to lay open their pursuits mutually, to examine all things together, and about all things to come together into one judgment.

Accedit et pro invicem oratio, quae in amici memoria tanto efficacius, quanto affectuosius ad Deum emittitur, profluentibus lacrimis, quas vel timor excutit, vel affectus elicit, vel dolor educit. Ita pro amico orans Christum, et pro amico volens exaudiri a Christo, ipsum diligenter et desideranter intendit; cum subito et insensibiliter aliquando affectus in affectum transiens, et quasi e vicino ipsius Christi dulcedinem tangens, incipit gustare quam dulcis est, et sentire quam suavis est. Ita a sancto illo amore quo amplectitur amicum, ad illum conscendens, quo amplectitur Christum; spiritalem amicitiae fructum pleno laetus ore carpebit; plenitudinem omnium expectans in futurum; quando timore sublato quo nunc pro invicem metuimus, et solliciti sumus, omni adversitate depulsa, quam oportet nunc ut pro invicem sustineamus, mortis insuper aculeo cum ipsa morte destructo, cuius nunc punctionibus plerumque fatigati, necesse est ut pro invicem doleamus, securitate concepta, de summi illius boni aeternitate gaudebimus; cum haec amicitia ad quam hic paucos admittimus, transfundetur in omnes, et ab omnibus refundetur in Deum, cum Deus fuerit omnia in omnibus.

There is added also prayer for one another, which, in the remembrance of a friend, is so much the more efficacious the more affectionately it is sent forth to God, with tears pouring forth, which either fear shakes out, or affection elicits, or pain draws out. Thus, praying to Christ for a friend, and wishing to be heard by Christ for a friend, he intently and desirously directs himself to Him; when suddenly and imperceptibly at times feeling passes into feeling, and, as if from nearby touching the very sweetness of Christ, he begins to taste how sweet He is, and to sense how pleasant He is. Thus, from that holy love with which he embraces a friend, ascending to that with which he embraces Christ, he will pluck with a glad full mouth the spiritual fruit of friendship; expecting the fullness of all things in the future; when, fear being removed by which now we fear for one another and are anxious, with every adversity driven away which now it is necessary that we sustain for one another, the sting of death moreover destroyed together with death itself—by whose pricks now, oft wearied, it is necessary that we grieve for one another—assurance being conceived, we shall rejoice over the eternity of that highest good; when this friendship, to which here we admit few, will be poured across into all, and from all will be poured back into God, when God shall be all in all.