On Old Age and On Friendship

Introduction

Both of these graceful dialogues were written in Cicero's last years. In On Old Age the eighty-four-year-old Cato the Elder explains to two young men that old age is not to be lamented: it frees us from the tyranny of the passions, leaves time for farming, reading and teaching the young, and death itself is nothing to fear. In On Friendship the Roman statesman Laelius recalls his bond with his late friend Scipio and argues that true friendship exists only between good people and rests on virtue, not advantage. For two thousand years they have been among the most loved books on growing old and on human affection.