Chapter 3

Love and keep him for thy friend, who, when all go away, will not forsake thee, nor suffer thee to perish at the last.

—Kempis.

Many there be who call themselves our friends;Yet, ah, if heaven sendsOne, only one, so mated to our soul,To make our half a whole,Rich beyond price we are.

Many there be who call themselves our friends;

Yet, ah, if heaven sends

One, only one, so mated to our soul,

To make our half a whole,

Rich beyond price we are.

Men only become friends by a community of pleasures. He who cannot be softened into gaiety, cannot be easily melted into kindness.

—Johnson.

My careful breast was free again,O friend, my bosom said;Through thee alone the sky is arched,Through thee the rose is red.Me, too, thy nobleness has taughtTo master my despair;The fountains of my hidden lifeAre through thy friendship fair.—Emerson.

My careful breast was free again,

O friend, my bosom said;

Through thee alone the sky is arched,

Through thee the rose is red.

Me, too, thy nobleness has taught

To master my despair;

The fountains of my hidden life

Are through thy friendship fair.

—Emerson.

New friends can never take the same place in our lives as the old. The former may be better liked for the time, their society may even have more attractions, but in a way they are strangers. If through change of circumstances they go out of our lives, they go out of it altogether. These latter-day friendships have no root, as it were. Their growth is as Jonah’s gourd—overshadowing, perhaps, and expansive, but all on the surface; whereas an old friend remains an old friend forever. Although separated for an indefinite period and not seen for years, if a chance happening brings old comrades together they resume the old relations in the most natural manner, and take up the former lines as easily as if there had been no break or interruption of the intermediate intercourse of auld lang syne.

—Unknown.

No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of each other’s worth.

—Southey.

After a certain age a new friend is a wonder. There is the age of blossoms and sweet budding green, the age of generous summer, the autumn when the leaves drop, and then winter shivering and bare.

—Thackeray.

Nothing is more common than the name of friend, nothing more rare than true friendship.

Truthfulness, frankness, disinterestedness, and faithfulness are the qualities absolutely essential to friendship, and these must be crowned by a sympathy that enters into all the joys, the sorrows and the interests of the friend; that delights in all his upward progress, and when he stumbles or falls, stretches out the helping hand, and is tender and patient even when it condemns.

—Ware.

Of all felicities, the most charming is that of a firm and gentle friendship. It sweetens all our cares, dispels our sorrows, and counsels us in all extremities. Nay, if there were no other comfort in it than the bare exercise of so generous a virtue, even for that single reason a man would not be without it; it is a sovereign antidote against all calamities—even against the fear of death itself.

—Seneca.

Of what shall a man be proud if he is not proud of his friends?

—Stevenson.

Old books, old wine, old nankin blue—All things, in short, to which belongThe charm, the grace that Time makes strong,All these I prize but (entre nous)Old friends are best.—Dobson.

Old books, old wine, old nankin blue—All things, in short, to which belongThe charm, the grace that Time makes strong,All these I prize but (entre nous)Old friends are best.

Old books, old wine, old nankin blue—

All things, in short, to which belong

The charm, the grace that Time makes strong,

All these I prize but (entre nous)

Old friends are best.

—Dobson.

The only reward of virtue is virtue. The only way to have a friend is to be one.

—Emerson.

The most powerful and the most lasting friendships are usually those of the early season of our lives, when we are most susceptible of warm and affectionate impressions. The connections into which we enter in any after-period decrease in strength as our passions abate in heat; and there is not, I believe, a single instance of vigorous friendship that ever struck root in a bosom chilled by years.

The tide of friendship does not rise high on the banks of perfection. Amiable weaknesses and shortcomings are the food of love. It is from the roughness and imperfect breaks in a man that you are able to lay hold of him. My friend is not perfect—no more am I—and so we suit each other admirably.

—Smith.

Old friends burn dim, like lamps in noisome air;Love them for what they are; nor love them less,Because to thee they are not what they were.—Coleridge.

Old friends burn dim, like lamps in noisome air;Love them for what they are; nor love them less,Because to thee they are not what they were.

Old friends burn dim, like lamps in noisome air;

Love them for what they are; nor love them less,

Because to thee they are not what they were.

—Coleridge.

Our intellectual and active powers increase with our affection. The scholar sits down to write, and all his years of meditation do not furnish him with one good thought or happy expression; but it is not necessary to write a letter to a friend, and, forthwith, troops of gentle thoughts invest themselves, on every hand, with chosen words.

—Emerson.

Only he who is unwilling to love without being loved is likely to feel that there is no such thing as friendship in the world.

Perhaps the most delightful friendships are those in which there is much agreement, much disputation, and yet more personal liking.

—Eliot.

Silence is the ambrosial night in the intercourse of friends, in which their sincerity is recruited and takes deeper root. The language of friends is not words, but meanings. It is an intelligence above language.

—Thoreau.

Friendship hath the skill and observation of the best physician; the diligence and vigilance of the best nurse; and the tenderness and patience of the best mother.

—Lord Clarendon.

So, if I live or die to serve my friend,’Tis for my love—’tis for my friend alone,And not for any rate that friendship bearsIn heaven or on earth.—Eliot.

So, if I live or die to serve my friend,’Tis for my love—’tis for my friend alone,And not for any rate that friendship bearsIn heaven or on earth.

So, if I live or die to serve my friend,

’Tis for my love—’tis for my friend alone,

And not for any rate that friendship bears

In heaven or on earth.

—Eliot.

So long as we love, we serve. So long as we are loved by others I would almost say we are indispensable; and no man is useless while he has a friend.

—Stevenson.

Two people who are friends make themselves responsible for each other. If I had a friend, and he went to the bad, and I met him in rags and poverty and disgrace, and if it ruined me to own him and help him, I should have to do it. If two men are really friends, nothing can come between them.

—Murray.

Some people keep a friend as children have a toy bank, into which they drop little coins now and again; and some day they draw out the whole of their savings at once.

—Unknown.

Some seem to make a man a friend, or try to do so, because he lives near, because he is in the same business, travels on the same line of railway, or for some other trivial reason. There cannot be a greater mistake.

—Avebury.

Take heed of thy friends. A faithful friend is a strong defence; and he that hath found such a one hath found a treasure. Nothing doth countervail a faithful friend, and his excellency is invaluable.

—Proverbs.

There is no surer bond of friendship than an identity and community of ideas and tastes. What sweetness is left in life if you take away friendship? Robbing life of friendship is like robbing the world of the sun.

—Cicero.

The only true and firm friendship is that between man and woman, because it is the only one free from all possible competition.

—Comte.

The place where two friends met is sacred to them all through their friendship, all the more sacred as their friendship deepens and grows old.

—Brooks.

The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel.—Shakespeare.

The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel.

The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,

Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel.

—Shakespeare.

The making of friends who are real friends is the best token we have of a man’s success in life.

—Hale.

The years have taught some sweet, some bitter lessons—none wiser than this: to spend in all things else, but of old friends to be most miserly.

—Lowell.

Of all the heavenly gifts that mortal men commend,What trusty treasure in the world can countervail a friend?Our health is soon decayed; goods, casual, light and vain;Broke have we seen the force of power, and honor suffer stain.In body’s lust man doth resemble but base brute;True virtue gets and keeps a friend, good guide of our pursuit.Whose hearty zeal with ours accords in every case;No term of mine, no space of place, no storm can it deface.—Nicholas Grimoald.

Of all the heavenly gifts that mortal men commend,

What trusty treasure in the world can countervail a friend?

Our health is soon decayed; goods, casual, light and vain;

Broke have we seen the force of power, and honor suffer stain.

In body’s lust man doth resemble but base brute;

True virtue gets and keeps a friend, good guide of our pursuit.

Whose hearty zeal with ours accords in every case;

No term of mine, no space of place, no storm can it deface.

—Nicholas Grimoald.

The most I can do for my friend is simply to be his friend. I have no wealth to bestow upon him. If he knows I am happy in loving him, he will want no other reward. Is not friendship divine in this?

—Lavater.

Take envy out of a character and it leaves great possibilities for friendship.

There is no friend like the old friend who has shared our morning days,No greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise.Fame is the scentless sunflower with gaudy crown of gold;But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold.—Holmes.

There is no friend like the old friend who has shared our morning days,

No greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise.

Fame is the scentless sunflower with gaudy crown of gold;

But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold.

—Holmes.

There is no man so friendless but what he can find a friend sincere enough to tell him disagreeable truths.

—Lytton.

There is, after all, something in those trifles that friends bestow upon each other which is an unfailing indication of the place the giver holds in the affections. I would believe that one who preserved a lock of hair, a simple flower or any trifle of my bestowing, loved me, though no show was made of it; while all the protestations in the world would not win my confidence in one who set no value on such little things.

Trifles they may be; but it is by such that character and disposition are oftenest revealed.

—Irving.

The feeling of friendship is like that of being comfortably filled with roast beef; love, like being enlivened with champagne.

—Jonson.

There are two elements that go to the composition of friendship, each so sovereign that I can detect no superiority in either, no reason why either should be first named. One is Truth. A friend is a person with whom I may be sincere. Before him I may think aloud. I am arrived at last in the presence of a man so real and equal that I may drop even those undermost garments of dissimulation, courtesy, and second thought, which men never put off, and may deal with him with the simplicity and wholeness with which one chemical atom meets another. Sincerity is the luxury allowed, like diadems and authority, only to the highest rank, that being permitted to speak truth as having none above it to court or conform unto.

Every man alone is sincere. The other element of friendship is tenderness.

—Emerson.

Foolish he who for the world would change a faithful friend.

—Euripides.

He who wrongs his friendWrongs himself more and ever bears aboutA silent court of justice in his breast.—Tennyson.

He who wrongs his friendWrongs himself more and ever bears aboutA silent court of justice in his breast.

He who wrongs his friend

Wrongs himself more and ever bears about

A silent court of justice in his breast.

—Tennyson.

Think of the importance of friendship in the education of men. It will make a man honest; it will make him a hero; it will make him a saint. It is the state of the just dealing with the just, the magnanimous with the magnanimous, the sincere with the sincere, man with man.

—Thoreau.

Thou mayest be sure that he that will in private tell thee of thy faults is thy friend, for he adventures thy dislike, and doth hazard thy hatred; there are few men that can endure it, every man for the most part delighting in self-praise, which is one of the most universal follies that bewitcheth mankind.

—Raleigh.

Two friends, two bodies with one soul inspired.

—Pope.

Thy lips are bland,And bright the friendship of thine eye;And in my thoughts with scarce a sigh,I take the pressure of thine hand.—Tennyson.

Thy lips are bland,And bright the friendship of thine eye;And in my thoughts with scarce a sigh,I take the pressure of thine hand.

Thy lips are bland,

And bright the friendship of thine eye;

And in my thoughts with scarce a sigh,

I take the pressure of thine hand.

—Tennyson.

Thy friend will come to thee unsought,With nothing can his love be bought,His soul thine own will know at sight,With him thy heart can speak outright.Greet him nobly, love him well,Show him where your best thoughts dwell,Trust him greatly and for aye;A true friend comes but once your way.—Unknown.

Thy friend will come to thee unsought,

With nothing can his love be bought,

His soul thine own will know at sight,

With him thy heart can speak outright.

Greet him nobly, love him well,

Show him where your best thoughts dwell,

Trust him greatly and for aye;

A true friend comes but once your way.

—Unknown.

Treat your friends for what you know them to be. Regard no surfaces. Consider not what they did, but what they intended.

—Thoreau.

To contract ties of friendship with any one, is to contract friendship with his virtue; there ought not to be any other motive in friendship.

—Confucius.

Thy voice is near me in my dreams;In accents sweet and low,Telling of happiness and loveIn days long, long ago.Word after word I think I hear,Yet strange it seems to meThat, though I listen to thy voice,Thy face I never see.From night to night my weary heartLives on the treasured past,And ev’ry day I fondly say,He’ll come to me at last.Yet still I weep, and watch and prayAs time rolls slowly on;And yet I have no hope but thee,Thou first, thou dearest one.—Lindsay.

Thy voice is near me in my dreams;In accents sweet and low,Telling of happiness and loveIn days long, long ago.

Thy voice is near me in my dreams;

In accents sweet and low,

Telling of happiness and love

In days long, long ago.

Word after word I think I hear,Yet strange it seems to meThat, though I listen to thy voice,Thy face I never see.

Word after word I think I hear,

Yet strange it seems to me

That, though I listen to thy voice,

Thy face I never see.

From night to night my weary heartLives on the treasured past,And ev’ry day I fondly say,He’ll come to me at last.

From night to night my weary heart

Lives on the treasured past,

And ev’ry day I fondly say,

He’ll come to me at last.

Yet still I weep, and watch and prayAs time rolls slowly on;And yet I have no hope but thee,Thou first, thou dearest one.

Yet still I weep, and watch and pray

As time rolls slowly on;

And yet I have no hope but thee,

Thou first, thou dearest one.

—Lindsay.

We ought to acquaint ourselves with the beautiful; we ought to contemplate it with rapture, and attempt to raise ourselves to its height. And in order to gain strength for that, we must keep ourselves thoroughly unselfish—we must not make it our own, but rather seek to communicate it; indeed, to make a sacrifice of it to those who are dear and precious to us.

—Goethe.

Tell me, gentle traveler, who hast wandered through the world, and seen the sweetest roses blow, and brightest gliding rivers, of all thine eyes have seen, which is the fairest land? “Child, shall I tell thee where nature is more blest and fair? It is where those we love abide. Though that space be small, ample is it above kingdoms; though it be a desert, through it runs the river of Paradise, and there are the enchanted bowers.”

—Unknown.

To friends and e’en to foes true kindness show;No kindly heart unkindly deeds will do;Harshness will alienate a bosom friend,And kindness reconcile a deadly foe.—Unknown.

To friends and e’en to foes true kindness show;No kindly heart unkindly deeds will do;Harshness will alienate a bosom friend,And kindness reconcile a deadly foe.

To friends and e’en to foes true kindness show;

No kindly heart unkindly deeds will do;

Harshness will alienate a bosom friend,

And kindness reconcile a deadly foe.

—Unknown.

We let our friends pass idly, like our time,Till they are lost, and then we see our crime!We think what worth in them might have been known,What duties done, what kind affections shown.Untimely knowledge! bought at heavy cost,When what we might have better used, is lost.

We let our friends pass idly, like our time,

Till they are lost, and then we see our crime!

We think what worth in them might have been known,

What duties done, what kind affections shown.

Untimely knowledge! bought at heavy cost,

When what we might have better used, is lost.

Wanting to have a friend is altogether different from wanting to be a friend. The former is a mere natural human craving, the other is the life of Christ in the soul.

My friend peers in on me with merryWise face, and though the sky stay dim,The very light of day, the verySun’s self comes in with him.—A. C. Swinburne.

My friend peers in on me with merryWise face, and though the sky stay dim,The very light of day, the verySun’s self comes in with him.

My friend peers in on me with merry

Wise face, and though the sky stay dim,

The very light of day, the very

Sun’s self comes in with him.

—A. C. Swinburne.

Walking here, in twilight, O my friends,I hear your voices, softened by the distance,And pause, and turn to listen, as each sendsHis words of friendship, comfort, and assistance.—Longfellow.

Walking here, in twilight, O my friends,I hear your voices, softened by the distance,And pause, and turn to listen, as each sendsHis words of friendship, comfort, and assistance.

Walking here, in twilight, O my friends,

I hear your voices, softened by the distance,

And pause, and turn to listen, as each sends

His words of friendship, comfort, and assistance.

—Longfellow.

We can never replace a friend. When a man is fortunate enough to have several, he finds they are all different. No one has a double in friendship.

—Schiller.

“What is the secret of your life?” asked Mrs. Browning of Charles Kingsley; “tell me, that I may make mine beautiful too.” He replied, “I had a friend.”

What we usually call friends are only acquaintances and familiarities brought together through some particular occasion or use, by which some little intercourse exists between our souls; but in the friendship of which I speak they are so tightly joined together one to the other, in so universal a mixture, that it effaces all signs of the seam by which they were first joined.

—Montaigne.

We just shake hands at meetingWith many that come nigh;We nod the head in greetingTo many that go by.But welcome through the gatewayOur few old friends and true;The hearts leap up and straightwayThere’s open house for you,Old friends,There’s open house for you.—Massey.

We just shake hands at meeting

With many that come nigh;

We nod the head in greeting

To many that go by.

But welcome through the gateway

Our few old friends and true;

The hearts leap up and straightway

There’s open house for you,

Old friends,

There’s open house for you.

—Massey.

Whatever the number of a man’s friends, there will be times in his life when he has one too few; but if he has only one enemy, he is lucky indeed if he has not one too many.

—Lytton.

He who forsakes a friend is himself forsaken of the Gods.

—Klopstock.

There are many moments in friendship, as in love, when silence is beyond words. The faults of our friend may be clear to us, but it is well to seem to shut our eyes to them. Friendship is usually treated by the majority of mankind as a tough and everlasting thing which will survive all manner of bad treatment. But this is an exceedingly great and foolish error; it may die in an hour of a single unwise word; its condition of existence is that it should be dealt with delicately and tenderly, being as it is a sensitive plant and not a roadside thistle. We must not expect our friend to be above humanity.

—Ouida.

Come friend, my fire is burning bright,A fire’s no longer out of place,How clear it glows (there’s frost to-night)It looks white winter in the face.Be mine the tree that feeds the fire!Be mine, the sun knows when to set!Be mine, the months when friends desireTo turn in here from cold and wet!—Constable.

Come friend, my fire is burning bright,A fire’s no longer out of place,How clear it glows (there’s frost to-night)It looks white winter in the face.

Come friend, my fire is burning bright,

A fire’s no longer out of place,

How clear it glows (there’s frost to-night)

It looks white winter in the face.

Be mine the tree that feeds the fire!Be mine, the sun knows when to set!Be mine, the months when friends desireTo turn in here from cold and wet!

Be mine the tree that feeds the fire!

Be mine, the sun knows when to set!

Be mine, the months when friends desire

To turn in here from cold and wet!

—Constable.

’Tis as hard to be a good fellow, a good friend, and a lover of women, as ’tis to be a good fellow, and a good friend, and a lover of money.

—Wycherley.

Two people cannot strike hands together, unless with a feeling of disagreeable resolve, and not gain something; perhaps the most treasured influence of their lives.

—Unknown.

One friend of tried value is better than many of no account.

—Anacharsis.

And friendship’s rainbow-promise fair,Of hope and faith-crowned ties,Doth find too soon that everywhereA touch of discord lies.—Freiberger.

And friendship’s rainbow-promise fair,Of hope and faith-crowned ties,Doth find too soon that everywhereA touch of discord lies.

And friendship’s rainbow-promise fair,

Of hope and faith-crowned ties,

Doth find too soon that everywhere

A touch of discord lies.

—Freiberger.

How often, when life’s summer dayIs waning, and its sun descends;Wisdom drives laughing wit away,And lovers shrivel into friends.—Landor.

How often, when life’s summer dayIs waning, and its sun descends;Wisdom drives laughing wit away,And lovers shrivel into friends.

How often, when life’s summer day

Is waning, and its sun descends;

Wisdom drives laughing wit away,

And lovers shrivel into friends.

—Landor.

The comfort of having a friend may be taken away, but not that of having had one.

—Seneca.

I have heard you say,That we shall see and know our friends in heaven.—Shakespeare.

I have heard you say,That we shall see and know our friends in heaven.

I have heard you say,

That we shall see and know our friends in heaven.

—Shakespeare.

The youth of friendship is better than its old age.

—Hazlitt.

If the friendships of the good be interrupted, their minds admit of no long change; as when the stalks of a lotus are broken the filaments within them are more visibly cemented.

—Hitopadesa.

In life it is difficult to say who do you the most mischief—enemies with the worst intentions or friends with the best.

—Lytton.

He who would enjoy many friends, and live happy in this world, should be deaf, dumb, and blind to the follies and vices of it.

—Edward Moore.

Some of the firmest friendships have been contracted between persons of different dispositions, the mind being often pleased with those perfections which are new to it, and which it does not find among its own accomplishments.

—Budgell.

Old friends are the great blessing of one’s later years. Half a word conveys one’s meaning. They have a memory of the same events, and have the same mode of thinking. I have young relations that may grow upon me, for my nature is affectionate, but can they grow old friends?

—Walpole.

True, it is most painful not to meet the kindness and affection you feel you have deserved, and have a right to expect from others; but it is a mistake to complain of it; for it is of no use; you cannot extort friendship with a cocked pistol.

—Smith.

The ruins of old friendships are a more melancholy spectacle to me than those of desolated palaces. They exhibit the heart that was once lighted up with joy all damp and deserted, and haunted by those birds of ill-omen that only nestle in ruins.

—Campbell.

Still, Love a summer sunrise shines,So rich its clouds are hung,So sweet its songs are sung.And Friendship’s but broad, common day,With light enough to showWhere fruit with brambles grow;With warmth enough to feedThe grain of daily need.—Unknown.

Still, Love a summer sunrise shines,

So rich its clouds are hung,

So sweet its songs are sung.

And Friendship’s but broad, common day,

With light enough to show

Where fruit with brambles grow;

With warmth enough to feed

The grain of daily need.

—Unknown.

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