Practical Wisdom Plato on why friendship between bad people is not possible
“‘Have you come across the writings of our wisest men, which say that like must always be friend to like? These are, of course, the men who discuss and write about nature and the universe.’
‘That’s true,’ he said.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘are they right?’
‘Possibly,’ he replied. …
[But] ‘We think that the closer one wicked man gets to another wicked man and the more he associates with him, the more he becomes hated by him, because he wrongs him; and it is, of course, impossible for wronger and wronged to be friends, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ he replied. …
‘Well then, in my opinion, Lysis, this is what people mean when they say, in their cryptic way, that like is friend to like: friendship exists only between good men, whereas the bad man never achieves true friendship with either a good or a bad man. Do you agree?’
He nodded assent.”
(Lysis, 214b-214d)
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