Aristotle And Montaigne On Friendship

This dissertation is an attempt to deepen our understanding of friendship,which is impoverished today but used to be understood by classical authors as life's most important and cherished experience.I begin with Aristotle's most comprehensive and subtle treatment of this subject in Book 8 and Book 9 of his Nicomachean Ethics.Then I turn to Montaigne's essay Of Friendship,which,in my view,echoes the classical teaching set forth in Aristotle's Ethics but develops in a fuller and more revealing way.I wish to show that according to both Aristotle and Montaigne,the highest friendship is based on a sharing of thought,which means that the highest friendship is possible only among philosophers.The philosopher's shared love of truth surpasses their concerns of other human goods and saves them ultimately from the inevitable conflicts that always occurred between ordinary people.