“Friendship is like love at its best; not blind but sympathetically all-seeing; a support which does not wait for understanding; an act of faith which does not need, but always has, reason.”

Treating friendship as clear-sighted loyalty rather than uncritical affection · Autobiography, From Another World, 1939

• Faith
• Friendship
• Love

“To whose encouragement much of my success in literature is due”

A public acknowledgement that friendship and encouragement helped her writing life · Dedication of Star-Dust, 1888, to Ella Wheeler Wilcox

• Friendship
• Gratitude
• Writers

“We have been praying that this conspiracy of things might come to an end. A conspiracy that produces separation is an improper conspiracy.”

Original: ما دعا می‌کردیم که این اتفاق چیزها به پایان رسد. اتفاقی که جدایی آرد اتفاق نیکو نیست. — A wry greeting to a long-absent visitor, turning chance into a moral question about distance. · Fihi Ma Fihi, Discourse 7 (Persian)

• Chance
• Friendship
• Separation

“Gold, silver, gems, purple cloth, a marble house and a well-tended field give only a mute and surface pleasure; books delight us through and through, they speak with us, they counsel us, and they join us in a living intimacy.”

Original: Aurum, argentum, gemme, purpurea vestis, marmorea domus, cultus ager... mutum et superficiale gaudium afferunt; libri delectant penitus, loquuntur, consulunt, viva quadam et arguta familiaritate se nobis inserunt. — Sets the companionship of reading against the silence of luxury. · Letter to Giovanni Anchiseo, Familiares III, 18 (Latin)

• Books
• Friendship
• Pleasure

“In mature years I have always been gregarious, a lover of my kind, dependent upon the company of friends for the very pulse of moral life.”

Friendship framed as the heartbeat of ethical existence · Autobiographical prose

• Friendship
• Morality
• Society

“You have the great gift of understanding, beloved Mary. You are a life-giver. You are like the Great Spirit, who befriends man not only to share his life, but to add to it.”

Friendship that enlarges rather than merely accompanies · Letter to Mary Haskell

• Friendship
• Generosity
• Understanding

“When I am unhappy, dear Mary, I read your letters. When the mist overwhelms the I in me, I take two or three letters out of the little box and reread them.”

Letters as a lamp against the fog of the self · Letter to Mary Haskell, Paris

• Consolation
• Friendship
• Letters

“Friendship is always a sweet responsibility, never an opportunity.”

Friendship as duty rather than advantage · Sand and Foam, 1926

• Friendship
• Responsibility

“If you had delayed writing another 24 hours our letters would have crossed. It has never before happened to me to be admiring an author of a book while he at the same time was admiring me. My admiration for the staff work of the Omnipotence rises every day.”

Delight at a simultaneous exchange of praise as a sign of providence · Letter to C. S. Lewis, 1936

• Friendship
• Letters
• Providence

“To the authors, many of them my friends, whose methods I have here attempted to imitate.”

A parodist's courtesy to the writers he mimics · Dedication, Borrowed Plumes

• Authors
• Friendship
• Satire

“Love my memory, cherish my friends; their faith to me may assure you they were honest. But, above all, govern your will and affections by the will and word of your Creator.”

A dying charge of friendship, memory, and piety · Last words to his brother Robert, as recorded

• Death
• Faith
• Friendship

“If at the end of a long life you have to make your peace with the Recording Angel (a malicious fellow, he!) and other virtues are dismissed with contempt and other charities declared folly, if then you speak of these many wise and kind indulgences, that Angel will be convinced you are the kindest of friends—and the best of critics. O rare conjunction!”

A weary, grateful tribute to an editor’s long patience with a poet’s verse · Letter to J. C. Squire, 1928

• Friendship
• Gratitude
• Poets

“True happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noise; it arises from the enjoyment of one's self, and from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions.”

Happiness placed in inward ease and a small circle rather than display · The Spectator, No. 15, 17 March 1711

• Contentment
• Friendship
• Happiness

“I hold he loves me best that calls me Tom.”

A preference for unforced familiarity over formal address · The Hierarchie of the Blessed Angells, 1635

• Affection
• Friendship
• Simplicity

“I fancy, if I were with you, I could remove some of the uneasiness which you may have felt from the opposition of the world, and which you should be ashamed to feel, since it is but the testimony which one part of it gives you, that your merit is unquestionable.”

Envy is recast as unwilling proof of excellence · Letter to Alexander Pope, 27 June 1715

• Envy
• Friendship
• Merit

“I am writing to you a long letter, but all the tediousness I feel in it is, that it makes me during the time think more intently of my being far from you.”

Absence is felt most sharply while writing to a friend · Letter to Alexander Pope, 27 June 1715

• Absence
• Friendship
• Letters

“Give my love to your mother; love is better than admiration, but I give her both.”

Affection ranked above public homage even for a great actress · Letter to Miss Siddons

• Affection
• Friendship
• Praise

“May God support both you and me, and give us comfort and consolation when it is most wanted.”

A plain blessing exchanged between two ageing friends · Letter to Mary Berry, 1837

• Comfort
• Faith
• Friendship

“This book is lovingly dedicated to Zona Gale whose appreciation, encouragement and helpful criticism have so heartened me.”

Publicly credits a fellow writer’s support as courage for the book · Dedication, An Autumn Love Cycle (1928)

• Criticism
• Encouragement
• Friendship

“Somehow all that I have missed in the big ways of the world with its fanfare of trumpets, have more than been compensated for through the fragrant friendships I have known.”

Sets intimate fellowship above public acclaim · Letter to Langston Hughes, about 1930

• Contentment
• Fame
• Friendship

“I have been fortunate in having the friendship of all of you winged artists. It has been one of my blessings.”

Credits the Harlem Renaissance circle as a sustaining gift · Letter to Langston Hughes, about 1930

• Artists
• Friendship
• Gratitude

“I wear that ring in memory of a great friendship, and also because I love the diamond for its own sake — it symbols infinity, eternity.”

Makes a jewel stand for both a friend and the endless · Conversation, recorded by Elbert Hubbard

• Eternity
• Friendship
• Symbols

“Opposition is true Friendship.”

A friend who contends may serve better than one who only agrees · The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

• Conflict
• Friendship
• Truth

“Doubts are always pernicious, Especially when we Doubt our Friends.”

Suspicion, even when kindly meant, wounds the bond it claims to protect · Letter to Thomas Butts, 25 April 1803

• Doubt
• Friendship
• Trust