Browse 7 quotations connecting Cicero with Community, with meanings, source notes and related themes.
Each quotation is included because its central idea connects with this theme, not simply because one matching word appears in the sentence.
Sources represented here include De Amicitia, De Officiis, Laelius on Friendship. Keeping the work and source note beside each quotation makes differences in setting, speaker and emphasis easier to see.
Sources represented here include De Amicitia, De Officiis, Laelius on Friendship.
“Friendship has more advantages than I can easily name.”
The value of friendship is intentionally left larger than a checklist, because companionship affects many parts of life at once.
Source note: Cicero develops the many practical and moral benefits of friendship throughout De Amicitia.
“Such friendship at once enhances the lustre of prosperity, and by dividing and sharing adversity lessens its burden.”
A good friend does not matter only in crisis: companionship can enlarge good fortune while also making hardship easier to carry because difficulty is no longer borne alone.
Source note: De Amicitia, section 6–7 transition, Project Gutenberg #7491. Cicero contrasts true and perfect friendship with merely moderate association and emphasizes its usefulness in both prosperity and adversity.
“Friendship is nothing else than entire fellow feeling as to all things human and divine with mutual good-will and affection.”
Cicero defines the strongest friendship as a broad sharing of concern, judgment and goodwill rather than a narrow exchange of favors or useful contacts.
Source note: De Amicitia, section 6, Project Gutenberg #7491. Laelius is the dialogue speaker in Cicero’s philosophical treatment of friendship; the sentence defines friendship through mutual goodwill and affection.
“Good-will is won principally through kind services.”
Trust and affection are more likely to grow from useful conduct toward others than from reputation management alone.
Source note: De Officiis, Book II, section 32; Cicero lists kind services among the strongest ways of earning goodwill.
“No duty is more imperative than that of proving one's gratitude.”
Gratitude is framed as an obligation to recognize and answer benefits already received, not merely as a pleasant feeling toward a benefactor.
Source note: De Officiis, Book I, section 47; Cicero discusses how kindness already received creates a stronger duty of requital.
“The greatest privilege of wealth is, beyond all peradventure, the opportunity it affords for doing good, without sacrificing one’s fortune.”
Wealth is given ethical value when it creates capacity to help others sustainably rather than serving only accumulation, display, or personal appetite.
Source note: De Officiis, Book II, section 64; Cicero discusses generosity while also warning against careless management of one’s property.
“Is not prosperity robbed of half its value if you have no one to share your joy?”
Good fortune becomes more meaningful when it can be shared, making companionship part of the value of prosperity itself.
Source note: Laelius on Friendship; the surrounding passage pairs shared joy with support during misfortune.