—Henry D. Thoreau
Friendship is a vase, which, when it is flawed by heat or violence or accident, may as well be broken at once; it can never be trusted after. The more graceful and ornamental it was, the more clearly do we discern the hopelessness of restoring it to its former state. Coarse stones, if they are fractured, may be cemented again; precious stones never.
—Landor
Friendship’s the wine of life.
—Young
Give me the avow’d, the erect, the manly foe;
Bold I can meet—perhaps may turn his blow;
But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send,
Save, save, oh! save me from the candid friend.
—George Canning
How often we find ourselves turning our backs on our actual Friends, that we may go and meet their ideal cousins.
—Henry D. Thoreau
Common friendships will admit of division; one may love the beauty of this, the good humor of that person, the liberality of a third, the paternal affection of a fourth, the fraternal love of a fifth, and so on. But this friendship that possesses the whole soul, and there rules and sways with an absolute sovereignty, can admit of no rival.
—Montaigne