The Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius - College of Stoic Philosophers

AN ESSAY ON FRIENDSHIP 283
either to make, or to grant, a request which honour and
virtue will not justify. To allege, in any instance of
deviation from moral rectitude, that one was actuated
by a warmth of zeal for his friend, is in every species of
criminal conduct a plea altogether scandalous and inad
missible, but particularly in transactions that strike at
the peace and welfare of the state. I would the more
earnestly inculcate this important maxim, as, from the
present complexion of the times, it seems peculiarly
necessary to guard against introducing principles which
may hereafter be productive of fatal disturbances in the
republic and, indeed, we have already somewhat
;
deviated from that political line by which our wiser
ancestors were wont to regulate their public conduct.
Thus Tiberius Gracchus, who aimed at sovereign
power or rather, indeed, who actually possessed it
during the space of a few months opened a scene so
totally new to the Roman people that not even tradition
had delivered down to them any circumstance in former
times which resembled it. Some of the friends and
relations of this man, who had concurred with him in his
lifetime, continued to support the same factious measures
after his death ;
and I cannot reflect on the cruel part
they acted towards Scipio Nasica without melting into
tears. I will confess, at the same time, that, in considera
tion of the punishment which Tiberius Gracchus has
lately suffered, I have protected his friend Carbo as far
as it was in my power. As to the consequences we have
reason to expect from the tribunate of Caius Gracchus,
I am unwilling to indulge conjecture ;
but this I do not
scruple to say, that when once a distemper of this kind
has broken out in a commonwealth, the infection is
apt
to spread, and it generally gathers strength the wider it
extends. In conformity to this observation, the change
which was made by the Gabinian law in the manner of
voting was, two years afterwards, you know, carried still