Nicomachean Ethics

Should we then make as many friends as possible, or, just as it seems to have been appropriately said in the case of hospitality, “neither of many guests, nor of none,” will it also be fitting in the case of friendship to be neither without friends, nor again to have excessively many friends? To those based on utility, what has been said would indeed seem to fit perfectly; for to return services to many is troublesome, and life is not sufficient to do this. Thus, those who are more than enough for one’s own life are superfluous and obstacles to living well; there is, therefore, no need of them. And those for pleasure also are sufficient in small numbers, just like seasoning in food. But as for excellent friends, should we have them as many as possible in number, or is there some measure also for the size of a group of friends, just as for a city? For a city could not come into being from ten people, nor is it still a city when it reaches ten thousand. But the proper quantity is perhaps not some single number, but any number between certain defined limits. And of friends indeed there is a defined number, and it is perhaps the greatest number with whom one could live together (for this seemed to be the most friendly thing). But that it is not possible to live together with many and distribute oneself is not unclear. Furthermore, those friends must also be friends with one another, if they are all to spend their days together; and this is a laborious thing to exist among many. It also becomes difficult to share in joy and share in pain intimately with many; for it is likely that it will happen that one is pleased together with one person and at the same time grieved together with another. Perhaps, then, it is well not to seek to have as many friends as possible, but only as many as are sufficient for living together; for indeed it would seem impossible to be a close friend to many. For this reason, one cannot love many passionately either; for love wishes to be a certain excess of friendship, and this is toward one person; and so close friendship is toward a few. This indeed seems to be the case in actual facts too; for many friends do not come into being in the friendship of comrades, and those celebrated in song are said to be between two. But those with many friends, who encounter everyone intimately, seem to be friends to no one, except in a civic way, whom people also call obsequious. In a civic way, then, it is possible to be a friend to many without being obsequious, but being truly decent; but because of virtue and for their own sake, it is not possible to be a friend toward many, and it is welcome to find even a few such people.