Generosity In Cicero's 'On Obligations'

From Friendship, Grows Generosity In Cicero’s work, On Obligations, the core values of life, including generosity and justice, are referred to in terms of how one should live a life that has fully and righteously incorporated them. How one chooses to live their life overlaps with how they interact with the people around them. Relationships with friends and family provide a point of reference for who someone is and what they value. To Cicero, friendship is a natural connection based on common moral ground that provides for well-intentioned generosity. Generosity is based on both the offering and repayment of kindness, the value of the recipient, and the intentions behind one’s hospitable act, which are most genuine and fruitful in a friendship.

Friendship is founded on a common moral ground. Cicero claims that “[of] all bonds of fellowship, however, none is more pre-eminent or enduring than the friendship forged between good men of like character” (20). Friendship grows out of a mutual goodness. Mutual goodness thus results in mutual generosity because generosity “is apportioned to each recipient according to his worth” (17). If it is human nature to want to surround one’s self with those who are of good moral standing, it should be simple to share kindness with our friends faithfully. Cicero also claims that “we are to assess the character of the recipient of our kindness, his affection for us, our partnership and association in living, and the obligations which he has previously undertaken in our interest” (18). Friendship has components of each point of assessment. However, Cicero also states that, “in both granting a kindness and returning a favour, our greatest obligation, all else being equal, is to lend help above all to the person in greatest need” (19). Friends may not be the people in our environment in greatest need, and we most not neglect those in greater need, but the ongoing association that a friendship provides fosters ongoing generosity. One’s relationship with the neediest people will most likely not surpass the singular exchange of

Friendship and the intentions behind generosity go hand in hand because humans are more likely to act honorably towards people who we are familiar with and consider close confidantes. Generosity given to manipulate others or force a façade that one is indeed generous, is not so, because it is done in a way that involves dishonesty and lack of justice. Cicero makes it clear that “we must therefore ensure that our generosity is such as benefits friends and does harm to no one” (17). The fact that Cicero chose to use the word “friends” rather than “family” or “neighbor” shows an inclination that those who we show generosity to can become people that we share a bond with. Later on, Cicero says that “[another] important mode of fellowship is that which results from exchanging kindnesses. Provided these are reciprocal and welcomed, those who bestow and receive them are bound together in stable association” (21). This idea alone provides for the fact that generosity has the potential of creating