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. And characters who unite
superiority of station and goodness are not common.
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.
VII
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.
(It must be remembered, however, that the equal is
not in the same case as regards Justice and Friendship:
for in strict Justice the exactly proportioned equal
ranks first, and the actual numerically equal ranks
second, while in Friendship this is exactly reversed.)
