Real friendship is a slow grower and never thrives unless engrafted upon a stock of known and reciprocal merit.
Friendship builds itself up: it is a sentiment which walks circumspectly.
The essence of friendship is entireness, a total magnanimity and trust.
I do not wish to see my friends as I run; I want to enjoy them in long draughts.
For affection, or the faintest imitation of it, a man should be obliged to his very dog. But for the gross assistance of patronage or purse, let him pause before accepting them from anyone.
Thine own friend, and thy father’s friend, forsake not.
The only good friends are old friends.
Whosoever formeth an intimacy with the enemies of his friends, does so to injure the latter. O wise man! wash your hands of that friend who associates with your enemies.
To thrust aside a virtuous friend, I consider as bad as to thrust away one’s own life, which one loves best.
Friendship is one soul in two bodies.
He removes the greatest ornament of friendship who takes away from it respect.
Friendship is no respecter of sex; and perhaps it is more rare between the sexes, than between two of the same sex.
The loss of a friend is like that of a limb; time may heal the anguish of the wound, but the loss cannot be repaired.
I always avoid contention, but if it shall happen, I had rather lose my money than my friend.
There are three faithful friends—an old wife, an old dog and ready money.
No discovery of defect in a character essentially good can so dampen friendship as the suspicion that something is kept back.
Thou learnest no secret until thou knowest friendship, since to the unsound no heavenly knowledge enters.
The dearest thing in nature is not comparable to the dearest thing of friendship.
There can never be deep peace between two spirits, never mutual respect, until, in their dialogue, each stands for the whole world.
The Friend asks no return but that his Friend will religiously accept and wear and not disgrace his apotheosis of him.
Friendship new is neither strong or pure.
A friendship that makes the least noise is often the most useful; for which reason I should prefer a prudent friend to a zealous one.
A faithful friend is a true image of the Deity.
The place where two friends first met is sacred to them all through their friendship, all the more sacred as their friendship deepens and grows old.
Stay is a charming word in a friend’s vocabulary.
We have a great deal more kindness than is ever spoken. Maugre all the selfishness that chills like east-winds the world, the whole human family is bathed with an element of love like a fine ether.
A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly.
Friendship is the marriage of the soul.
Some friendships are made by nature, some by contract, some by interest and some by souls.
Friendship consists properly in mutual offices, and a generous strife in alternate acts of kindness.
Old friends are best. King James used to call for his old shoes; they were easiest to his feet.
True friends are the whole world to one another; and he that is a friend to himself is also a friend to mankind.
There is no man so friendless but what he can find a friend sincere enough to tell him disagreeable truths.
Friendship is too pure a pleasure for a mind cankered with ambition, or the lust of power and grandeur.
The firmest friendships have been formed in mutual adversity as iron is most strongly united by the fiercest flame.
Between friends, frequent reproofs make the friendship distant.
We must accept or refuse one another as we are. I could tame a hyena more easily than my Friend. He is a material which no tool of mine will work.
A true and noble friendship shrinks not at the greatest of trials.
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.
Friendship is the only thing in the world concerning the usefulness of which all the world is agreed.
Friendship is a disinterested commerce between equals.
The man who has no enemies deserves to have no friends.
He that will lose his friend for a jest, deserves to die a beggar by the bargain.
No friendship is so cordial or so delicious as that of girl for girl; no hatred so intense and immovable as that of woman for woman.
Faith and friendship are seldom truly tried, but in extremes.
To hear complaints with patience, even when complaints are vain, is one of the duties of friendship.
I can never think of promoting my convenience at the expense of a friend’s interest and inclination.
We lose some friends for whose loss we regret more than we grieve; and others whose departure causes us grief, but not regret.
Friendship is a word the very sight of which in print makes the heart warm.
You, who forget your own friends, meanly to follow after those of a higher degree, are a snob.
Friendship is a plant that loves the sun, thrives ill under clouds.
To have the same desires and the same aversions is assuredly a firm bond of friendship.
Nothing makes the earth seem so spacious as to have friends at a distance; they make the latitudes and longitudes.
Friendship heightens all our affections. We receive all the ardor of our friends in addition to our own. The communication of minds gives to each the fervor of each.
Friendship! Sir, there can be no such thing without an equality!
Friendship admits of difference of character, as love does that of sex.
Something like home, that is not home, is to be desired; it is to be found in the house of a friend.
The feeling of friendship is like that of being comfortably filled with roast beef; love, like being enlivened with champagne.
Take the advice of a faithful friend, and submit thy inventions to his censure.
When men are friends, there is no need of justice; but when they are just, they still need friendship.
There are no rules for friendship. It must be left to itself; we cannot force it any more than love.
In friendship, your heart is like a bell struck every time your friend is in trouble.
Ceremony and great professing renders friendship as much suspected as it does religion.
The most familiar and intimate habitudes, connections, friendships, require a degree of good-breeding both to preserve and cement them.
Sincerity, truth, faithfulness, come into the very essence of friendship.
The services which cement friendship are reciprocal services. A feeling of dependence is scarcely compatible with friendship.
It is better to break off a thousand friendships than to endure the sight of a single enemy.
Nature and religion are the bands of friendship, excellency and usefulness are its great endearments.
Obvious printer errors corrected silently.
Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation are as in the original.