remains to be proved;
‘And certaine he is well begone
Among a thousand that findeth one.’
We shall not surrender ourselves heartily to any, while we are conscious that another is more deserving of our love. Yet Friendship does not stand for numbers; the Friend does not count his
We cannot have too many friends
Friends on his fingers; they are not numerable. The more there are included by this bond, if they are indeed included, the rarer and diviner the quality of the love that binds them. I am ready to believe that as private and intimate a relation may exist by which three are embraced as between two. Indeed, we cannot have too many friends; the virtue which we appreciate we to some extent appropriate, so that thus we are made at last more fit for every relation of life. A base Friendship is of a narrowing and exclusive tendency, but a noble one is not exclusive; its very superfluity and dispersed love is the humanity which sweetens society, and sympathises with foreign nations; for though its foundations are private, it is, in effect, a public affair and a public advantage, and the Friend more
Faults attract faults
than the father of a family deserves well of the state.
The only danger in Friendship is that it will end. It is a delicate plant, though a native. The least unworthiness, even if it be unknown to one’s self, vitiates it. Let the Friend know that those faults which he observes in his Friend his own faults attract. There is no rule more invariable than that we are paid for our suspicions by finding what we suspected. By our narrowness and prejudices we say, I will have so much and such of you, my Friend, no more. Perhaps there are none charitable, none disinterested, none wise, noble, and heroic enough for a true and lasting Friendship.
I sometimes hear my Friends complain finely that I do not appreciate their fineness. I shall not tell them whether I do
Silence is better than speech