s and Quintus Mucius come to call on their father-in-law
after the death of Africanus. They start the subject; Laelius answers
them. And the whole essay on friendship is his. In reading it you will
recognise a picture of yourself.

2. _Fannius_. You are quite right, Laelius! there never was a better or
more illustrious character than Africanus. But you should consider that
at the present moment all eyes are on you. Everybody calls you "the
wise" _par excellence_, and thinks you so. The same mark of respect was
lately paid Cato, and we know that in the last generation Lucius Atilius
was called "the wise." But in both cases the word was applied with
a certain difference. Atilius was so called from his reputation as a
jurist; Cato got the name as a kind of honorary title and in extreme old
age because of his varied experience of affairs, and his reputation
for foresight and firmness, and the sagacity of the opinions which he
delivered in senate and forum. You, however, are regarded as wise in
a somewhat different sense not alone on account of natural ability and
character, but also from your industry and learning; and not in the
sense in which the vulgar, but that in which scholars, give that title.
In this sense we do not read of any one being called wise in Greece
except one man at Athens; and he, to be sure, had been declared by the
oracle of Apollo also to be "the supremely wise man." For those who
commonly go by the name of the Seven Sages are not admitted into the
category of the wise by fastidious critics. Your wisdom people believe
to consist in this, that you look upon yourself as self-sufficing and
regard the changes and chances of mortal life as powerless to affect
your virtue. Accordingly they are always asking me, and doubtless also
our Scaevola here, how you bear the death of Africanus. This curiosity
has been the more excited from the fact that on the Nones of this month,
when we augurs met as usual in the suburban villa of Decimus Brutus for
consultation, you were not present, though it had always been your
habit to keep that appointment and perform that duty with the utmost
punctuality.

_Scaevola_. Yes, indeed, Laelius, I am often asked the question
mentioned by Fannius. But I answer in accordance with what I have
observed: I say that you bear in a reasonable manner the grief which
you have sustained in the death of one who was at once a man of the most
illustrious character and a very dear friend. That