23 verified quotes from 17 writers, 1600 to 1918.
Francis Bacon’s essay Of Friendship makes the case that a friend doubles joys and halves griefs, and Emerson’s essay of the same name answers that the only way to have a friend is to be one. Those two essays anchor a list that also includes Thoreau’s three chairs, one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.
The novelists add friendship in action: Austen’s Marianne insisting that disposition, not time, decides intimacy, and Anne Shirley delighted to find kindred spirits are not so scarce. Henry V’s band of brothers and Kipling’s wolf pack take it into battle and the jungle. Each line was matched word for word in the edition we link.
What “verified” means, and what we leave out: How we verify.
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother
Our note: From the king's speech to his outnumbered army before Agincourt.
Verified in the full text of Henry V on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #100 · Collected in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare
Painted the same decade: The Golden Age, Joachim Wtewael, 1605
Neither a borrower nor a lender be: For loan oft loses both itself and friend
Our note: Polonius warns Laertes about money between friends.
Verified in the full text of Hamlet on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #100 · Collected in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare
Painted the same decade: The Golden Age, Joachim Wtewael, 1605
Tell me what company thou keepest, and I'll tell thee what thou art
Our note: Sancho quoting one of his many proverbs, from the second part.
Verified in the full text of Don Quixote on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #996
Painted the same decade: Samson Captured by the Philistines, Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri), 1619
For there is no man, that imparteth his joys to his friend, but he joyeth the more; and no man that imparteth his griefs to his friend, but he grieveth the less.
Our note: From Bacon's essay on what friends are for.
Verified in the full text of Of Friendship on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #575 · Collected in Essays
Painted the same decade: Young Man and Woman in an Inn, Frans Hals, 1623
A man, Sir, should keep his friendship in constant repair
Our note: Johnson on the need to keep making new friends as one grows older.
Verified in the full text of The Life of Samuel Johnson on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #1564 · Collected in Life of Johnson
Painted the same decade: The Sackville Children, John Hoppner, 1796
…every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle
Our note: Jefferson urging a bitterly split country to unite after the election of 1800.
Verified in the full text of First Inaugural Address on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #56313 · Collected in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 8 (of 9)
Painted the same decade: Ignacio Garcini y Queralt (1752–1825), Brigadier of Engineers, Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes), 1804
It is not time or opportunity that is to determine intimacy;—it is disposition alone.
Our note: Marianne defends her quick friendship with Willoughby.
Verified in the full text of Sense and Sensibility on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #161
Painted the same decade: Charles Maurice de Talleyrand Périgord (1754–1838), Prince de Talleyrand, Pierre Paul Prud'hon, 1817
My idea of good company, Mr Elliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.
Our note: Anne Elliot to her cousin, William Elliot.
Verified in the full text of Persuasion on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #105
Painted the same decade: General Étienne-Maurice Gérard (1773–1852), Jacques Louis David, 1816
A friend is a person with whom I may be sincere. Before him I may think aloud.
Our note: From Emerson's essay "Friendship."
Verified in the full text of Friendship on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #2944 · Collected in Essays, First Series
Painted the same decade: Study of a Female Nude, Henri Lehmann, 1840
…the only way to have a friend is to be one.
Our note: From Emerson's essay "Friendship."
Verified in the full text of Friendship on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #2944 · Collected in Essays, First Series
Painted the same decade: The Abduction of Rebecca, Eugène Delacroix, 1846
The plan which I adopted, and the one by which I was most successful, was that of making friends of all the little white boys whom I met in the street.
Our note: How Douglass taught himself to read in Baltimore, trading bread for lessons.
Verified in the full text of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #23
Painted the same decade: The Abduction of Rebecca, Eugène Delacroix, 1846
I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.
Our note: From the chapter "Visitors," describing the furniture of his one-room cabin.
Verified in the full text of Walden on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #205
Painted the same decade: Madame Frederic Breyer (Fanny Hélène Van Bruyssel, 1830–1894), Gustave Courbet, 1858
…life is made of ever so many partings welded together
Our note: The blacksmith Joe to Pip, after an awkward visit to London.
Verified in the full text of Great Expectations on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #1400
Painted the same decade: The Source of the Loue, Gustave Courbet, 1864
We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies
Our note: Lincoln's appeal to the seceding South at his first inauguration in March 1861.
Verified in the full text of First Inaugural Address on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #3253 · Collected in The Papers and Writings of Abraham Lincoln
Painted the same decade: The Collector of Prints, Edgar Degas, 1866
Though passion may have strained, it must not break, our bonds of affection.
Our note: Lincoln's plea to the seceding South, near the close of his first inaugural.
Verified in the full text of First Inaugural Address on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #3253 · Collected in The Papers and Writings of Abraham Lincoln
Painted the same decade: The Spanish Singer, Edouard Manet, 1860
Old and young, we are all on our last cruise
Our note: From Stevenson's essay on what the young and the old can learn from each other.
Verified in the full text of Crabbed Age and Youth on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #386 · Collected in Virginibus Puerisque, and Other Papers
Painted the same decade: Shoes, Vincent van Gogh, 1888
Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need—a homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends, worth the name, someone to love and someone to love you, …
Our note: The narrator, after the friends try to pack far too much for their boat trip on the Thames.
Verified in the full text of Three Men in a Boat on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #308
Painted the same decade: Study for "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte", Georges Seurat, 1884
We be of one blood, ye and I
Our note: The jungle greeting Mowgli uses to show he is a friend, not prey.
Verified in the full text of Kaa's Hunting on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #236 · Collected in The Jungle Book
Painted the same decade: Ia Orana Maria (Hail Mary), Paul Gauguin, 1891
The holy passion of Friendship is of so sweet and steady and loyal and enduring a nature that it will last through a whole lifetime, if not asked to lend money.
Our note: A maxim from "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar," with a joke in the last few words.
Verified in the full text of Pudd'nhead Wilson on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #102 · Collected in The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson
Painted the same decade: The Dream of the Shepherd (Der Traum des Hirten), Ferdinand Hodler, 1896
For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Our note: From the verses "The Law of the Jungle."
Verified in the full text of The Second Jungle Book on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #1937
Painted the same decade: Still Life with Teapot and Fruit, Paul Gauguin, 1896
Grief can take care of itself; but to get the full value of a joy you must have somebody to divide it with.
Our note: From "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar."
Verified in the full text of Following the Equator on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #2895
Painted the same decade: Serena Pulitzer Lederer (1867–1943), Gustav Klimt, 1899
Kindred spirits are not so scarce as I used to think. It's splendid to find out there are so many of them in the world.
Our note: Anne, after finding a new friend.
Verified in the full text of Anne of Green Gables on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #45
Whatever we had missed, we possessed together the precious, the incommunicable past.
Our note: Jim Burden's last words on his friendship with Ántonia.
Verified in the full text of My Ántonia on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #242
Painted the same decade: Tilla Durieux (Ottilie Godeffroy, 1880–1971), Auguste Renoir, 1914
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