no person is your friend (or kin) who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow and be perceived as fully blossomed as you were intended. Or who belittles in any fashion the gifts you labor so to bring into the world.
Not chance of birth or place has made us friends, Being oftentimes of different tongues and nations, But the endeavor for the selfsame ends, With the same hopes, and fears, and aspirations.
We poets would die of loneliness but for women, and we choose our men friends that we may have somebody to talk about women with. Letter to Olivia Shakespeare, 1936
It is the acid test of nonviolence that in a nonviolent conflict there is no rancor left behind, and in the end the enemies are converted into friends.
Friendship is but a name, faith is an empty name. Alas,
it is not safe to praise to a friend the object of your love;
as soon as he believes your praises, he slips into your place.
Sometimes in our relationship to another human being the proper balance of friendship is restored when we put a few grains of impropriety onto our own side of the scale.
Oh, what is the matter with poor Puggy-Wug? Pet him and kiss him and give him a hug. Run and fetch him a suitable drug. Wrap him up tenderly all in a rug. That is the way to cure Puggy-Wug.
In poverty and other misfortunes of life, true friends are a sure refuge. The young they keep out of mischief; to the old they are a comfort and aid in their weakness, and those in the prime of life they incite to noble deeds.