Simple Stoic Advice
How to love
On Love
How to love
The beautiful thing about Stoic philosophy is the advice contained within it is just as applicable today as it was when it was first written all those many years ago. We can learn a great deal from interpreting the advice provided and using it to our advantage as we go throughout our own lives.
Today’s quote comes to us courtesy of Cicero from his essay on friendship under the recent translation title of How to be a Friend:
Quote
“To love someone simply means that you care for another person without putting your own needs or advantage first.”
Advice
Cicero’s essay on friendship is perhaps one of the most known on the subject. Dedicated to his friend Atticus, the essay discusses what makes a great friend as well as how one becomes a great friend.
Much of Cicero’s advice can be summed up in that of Hierocles, who left behind fragments of his writings. Of those fragments, however, remains what some now call the “Golden Rule” of Stoicism which is something akin to treat others as you yourself would wish to be treated.
Cicero believes that before making friends, one must ruthlessly judge the individual so as to not waste time on someone who will not provide the same type of friendship as you.
“…you should love after you have judged, not judge after you have loved. We pay the price for negligence in many things, but most of all for our carelessness in selecting and making friends.”
And his sentiments are true, we tend to give people the benefit of the doubt until we’re made to be a fool.
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