FRIENDSHIP'S ESSENTIALS 333 A friend, says that court of last appeal, the dictionary, is "One joined to another in mutual benevolence and intimacy." It is noteworthy that the sentiment is so fine a one that even the prose of the dictionary itself takes on an aspect of poetry. The word has been in English from the beginning of the language, and has been written for more than a thousand years-the Venerable Bede and the singer of Beowulf both use it. Its origin goes back, it is believed, to a word which means dear, and the root of friend itself is the old Teutonic participle which means loving; it would not have been quite true to its own traditions if it had meant loved. From the same root come words signifying to woo and to caress -all that is implied in love may be found in one or another of the meanings of triend. From it, too, come many pleasant words, some of which deserve more frequent use than they receive. To friend a man is an old phase that might be revived to advantage. Friendlihead or friendlihood, signifying both friendship and friendliness, ought never to have been lost sight of. Nor are friendsome and friendsomeness words that we can afford to be without, any more than we can afford to be without the ideas they represent. The Meaning of Friend 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. The other element of friendship is Tenderness. We are holden to men by every sort of tie, by blood, by pride, by fear, by hope, by lucre, by lust, by hate, by admiration, by every circumstance and badge and trifle, but we can scarce believe that so much character can subsist in another as to draw us by love. Can another be so blessed, and we so pure, that we can offer him tenderness? When a man becomes dear to me, I have touched the goal of fortune. Friendship with none but equals should be made. A man that hath friends must show himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. 35 Friendship is one mind in two bodies. To God be humble, and to thy friend be kind. A very simple intellectual mechanism answers the necessities of friendship, and even of the most intimate relations of life. If a watch tell us the hour and minute, we can be content to carry it about with us for a lifetime, though it has no second hand and is not a repeater, nor a musical watch, though it is not enameled nor jeweled,-in short though it has little beyond the wheels required for a trustworthy instrument, added to a good face and a pair of useful hands. Only a wise man knows how to love; only a wise man is a friend. Aristotle Dunbar Oliver Wendell Holmes Seneca Let us, then, be what we are and speak what we think, and in all Henry Wads worth Keep ourselves loyal to truth, and the sacred professions of friendship. Long fellow I will deal with you with all the frankness which is due to friendship. Friendship is nothing else than entire fellow-feeling as to all things, human and divine, with mutual good-will and affection. Pure friendship is something which men of an inferior intellect can never taste. George Washington Cicero "On Friendship" Jean de la Bru yére Benjamin Henry David Thoreau Earl of Emerson Henry William Thomas Carlyle "Sartor Resar tus" A benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself, to keep his friends in countenance. A man's social and spiritual discipline must answer to his corporeal. He must lean on a friend who has a hard breast, as he would lie on a hard bed. He must drink cold water for his only beverage. So he must not hear sweetened and colored words, but pure and refreshing truths. He must daily bathe in truth, cold as spring water, not warmed by the sympathy of friends. Friendship above all ties does bind the heart; We talk of choosing friends, but friends are self-elected. If you would know how rare a thing a true friend is, let me tell you that to be a true friend, a man must be perfectly honest. I would not enter on my list of friends Yet wanting sensibility) the man How were friendship possible? In mutual devotedness to the Good and True: otherwise impossible except as armed neutrality or hollow commercial league. |