Pagina 507 de 734

There are then, as was stated at the commencement of this book,

three kinds of Friendship, and in each there may be friends on a

footing of equality and friends in the relation of superior and

inferior; we find, I mean, that people who are alike in goodness,

become friends, and better with worse, and so also pleasant

people; again, because of advantage people are friends, either

balancing exactly their mutual profitableness or differing from

one another herein. Well then, those who are equal should in

right of this equality be equalised also by the degree of their

Friendship and the other points, and those who are on a footing

of inequality by rendering Friendship in proportion to the

superiority of the other party.