3: Seneca Was SO Judgmental

     Many of Seneca's letters to Lucilius discuss friendship. For instance, in Letter 3, Seneca expresses his concern to Lucilius that the latter has made friends with a person who he did not trust completely. However, according to Seneca:
          "Consider every question with a friend; but first, consider the friend. After you make a friend, you should trust him -- but before you make a friend, you should make a judgment. People who love someone and then judge that person are mixing up their responsibilities: they should judge first, then love, as Theophrastus advised. Take time to consider whether or not to receive a person into your friendship; but once you have decided to do so, receive him with all your heart, and speak with him as candidly as with yourself."
     Rightly or wrongly, judging another person -- the quality of being judgmental -- is no longer favored in the modern West. To cite but one example, consider the North American fitness chain that advertises itself as a "judgement-free zone" and informs potential members that "the world judges; we don't." However, I think there may be a mean between Seneca's "judge first" policy and the "never judge" motto of the fitness chain. 
     The Stoic thinker Epictetus was born about 10 years before Seneca's death in 65 AD/CE. Epictetus, who was a slave before he became a teacher of philosophy, expressed a more flexible view of the faculty of judgment in his Discourses:
          "The raw material of the good man is his mind -- his goal being to respond to impressions the way nature intended. As a general rule, nature designed the mind to assent to what is true, dissent from what is false[,] and suspend judgement in doubtful cases."
     Following Epictetus, I would argue that the better course is to give a potential friend the benefit of the doubt -- that is, to suspend judgment -- until all the evidence is in, before admitting him or her into your friendship, rather than making what might be a hasty decision about such an important matter.
     In closing, and before I forget, Happy New Year!
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References:  
     Epictetus, Discourses and Selected Writings, translated and edited by Robert Dobbin (Penguin Classics, London, 2008), Discourses, Book III, 1-2, page 146.
     Seneca, Letters on Ethics to Lucilius, Translated with an Introduction and Commentary by Margaret Graver and A.A. Long (University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 2015), Letter 3, 2, page 28.