one of _Sylla's_ chief favourites, and always near that general.

30. During the war between _Caesar_ and _Pompey_, he still maintained the
same conduct. After the death of Caesar, he sent money to _Brutus_, in
his troubles, and did a thousand good offices to _Anthony's_ wife and
friends, when the party seemed ruined. Lastly, even in that bloody war
between _Anthony_ and _Augustus_, _Atticus_ still kept his place in both
their friendships; insomuch, that the first, says _Cornelius Nepos_,
whenever he was absent from _Rome_, in any part of the empire, writ
punctually to him what he was doing, what he read, and whither he
intended to go; and the latter gave him constantly an exact account of
all his affairs.

31. A likeness of inclinations in every particular is so far from being
requisite to form a benevolence in two minds towards each other, as it
is generally imagined, that I believe we shall find some of the firmest
friendships to have been contracted between persons of different
humours; the mind being often pleased with those perfections which are
new to it, and which it does not find among its own accomplishments.

32. Besides that a man in some measure supplies his own defects, and
fancies himself at second-hand possessed of those good qualities and
endowments, which are in the possession of him who in the eye of the
world is looked on as his other self.

33. The most difficult province in friendship is the letting a man see
his faults and errors, which should, if possible, be so contrived, that
he may perceive our advice is given him not so much to please ourselves,
as for his own advantage. The reproaches, therefore, of a friend, should
always be strictly just, and not too frequent.

34. The violent desire of pleasing in the person reproved may otherwise
change into a despair of doing it, while he finds himself censured for
faults he is not conscious of. A mind that is softened and humanized by
friendship, cannot bear frequent reproaches: either it must quite sink
under the oppression, or abate considerably of the value and esteem it
had for him who bestows them.

35. The proper business of friendship is to inspire life and courage;
and a soul, thus supported, out-does itself; whereas if it be
unexpectedly deprived of those succours, it droops and languishes.

36. We are in some measure more inexcusable if we violate our duties to
a friend, than to a relation; since the former arise from a voluntary
choi