It has been already stated that the good man unites the qualities of
pleasantness and usefulness: but then such a one will not be a friend
to a superior unless he be also his superior in goodness: for if this
be not the case, he cannot, being surpassed in one point, make things
equal by a proportionate degree of Friendship.[5] And characters who
unite superiority of station and goodness are not common.
Chapter VIII.
Now all the kinds of Friendship which have been already mentioned exist
in a state of equality, inasmuch as either the same results accrue to
both and they wish the same things to one another, or else they barter
one thing against another; pleasure, for instance, against profit: it
has been said already that Friendships of this latter kind are less
intense in degree and less permanent.
And it is their resemblance or dissimilarity to the same thing which
makes them to be thought to be and not to be Friendships: they show
like Friendships in right of their likeness to that which is based on
virtue (the one kind having the pleasurable, the other the profitable,
both of which belong also to the other); and again, they do not show
like Friendships by reason of their unlikeness to that true kind; which
unlikeness consists herein, that while that is above calumny and so
permanent these quickly change and differ in many other points.
But there is another form of Friendship, that, namely, in which the one
party is superior to the other; as between father and son, elder and
younger, husband and wife, ruler and ruled. These also differ one from
another: I mean, the Friendship between parents and children is not the
same as between ruler and the ruled, nor has the father the same
towards the son as the son towards the father, nor the husband towards
the wife as she towards him; because the work, and therefore the
excellence, of each of these is different, and different therefore are
the causes of their feeling Friendship; distinct and different
therefore are their feelings and states of Friendship.
And the same results do not accrue to each from the other, nor in fact
ought they to be looked for: but, when children render to their parents
what they ought to the authors of their being, and parents to their
sons what they ought to their offspring, the Friendship between such
parties will be permanent and equitable.
Further; the feeling of Friendship should be in a due proportion in all
Friendships which are between superior and inferior; I mean, the better
man, or the more profitable, and so forth, should be the object of a
stronger feeling than he himself entertains, because when the feeling
of Friendship comes to be after a certain rate then equality in a
certain sense is produced, which is thought to be a requisite in
Friendship.