This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead." - F. Scott Fitzgerald, fully Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald
"We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we're not alone" - Orson Welles, fully George Orson Welles
"There is a seeking out of the best in others, of that which is most ultimate in them, and exposing oneself to it, to learn from it and be made over by it, which brings friendship very close to the mood of prayer." - Gregory Vlastos
"Don't flatter yourself that friendship authorizes you to say disagreeable things to your intimates. The nearer you come into relation with a person, the more necessary do tact and courtesy become." - Henry Ross Perot
"When friendship disappears then there is a space left open to that awful loneliness of the outside world which is like the cold space between the planets. It is an air in which men perish utterly. " - Hilaire Belloc, fully Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc
"We should remember that it is quite as much a part of friendship to be delicate in its demands as to be ample in its performances." - John Frederick Boyes
"Rare as is true love, true friendship is rarer. " - Jean de La Fontaine
"Love and friendship exclude each other. " - Jean de La Bruyère
"One who lacks a sense of justice lacks certain fundamental attitudes and capacities included under the notion of humanity. Now the moral feelings are admittedly unpleasant, in some extended sense of unpleasant; but there is no way for us to avoid a liability to them without disfiguring ourselves. This liability is the price of love and trust, of friendship and affection, and of devotion to institutions and traditions from which we have benefited and which serve the general interests of mankind…by understanding what it would be like not to have a sense of justice–that it would be to lack part of our humanity too–we are led to accept our having this sense." - John Rawls, fully John Bordley Rawls
"A friendship founded on business is better than a business founded on friendship." - John D. Rockefeller, fully John Davidson Rockefeller I
"True happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noise; it arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's self, and in the next from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions. " - Joseph Addison
"Great souls by instinct to each other turn, demand alliance, and in friendship burn." - Joseph Addison
"Renowned for conquest, and in council skilled, their courage dwells not in a troubled flood of mounting spirits, and fermenting blood: Lodged in the soul, with virtue overruled, inflamed by reason, and by reason cooled,in hours of peace content to be unknown. And only in the field of battle shown: To souls like these, in mutual friendship joined, Heaven dares intrust the cause of humankind." - Joseph Addison
"Love is a friendship set to music." - Joseph Campbell
"Life is so short, and friendship so precious!" - Julia Ward Howe
"If among thoughts they value those that are profound, if in friendship they value gentleness, in words, truth; in government, good order; timeliness – in each case it is because they prefer what does not lead to strife." - Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze
"Sooner mayest thou trust thy pocket to a pickpocket than give loyal friendship to the man who boasts of eyes to which the heart never mounts in dew! Only when man weeps he should be alone, not because tars are weak, but they should be secret. Tears are akin to prayer - Pharisees parade prayers, impostors parade tears." - Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, fully Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, Lord Lytton
"As for myself, I can only exhort you to look on Friendship as the most valuable of all human possessions, no other being equally suited to the moral nature of man, or so applicable to every state and circumstance, whether of prosperity or adversity, in which he can possibly be placed. But at the same time I lay it down as a fundamental axiom that "true Friendship can only subsist between those who are animated by the strictest principles of honour and virtue." When I say this, I would not be thought to adopt the sentiments of those speculative moralists who pretend that no man can justly be deemed virtuous who is not arrived at that state of absolute perfection which constitutes, according to their ideas, the character of genuine wisdom. This opinion may appear true, perhaps, in theory, but is altogether inapplicable to any useful purpose of society, as it supposes a degree of virtue to which no mortal was ever capable of rising." - Cicero, fully Marcus Tullius Cicero, anglicized as Tully NULL
"Though friendship is not quick to burn,It is explosive stuff" - May Sarton, pen name of Eleanore Marie Sarton
"I'm always there to tell people that their life is not that bad. I wish it was easy to follow that advice It is important to our friends to believe that we are unreservedly frank with them, and important to friendship that we are not." - Mignon McLaughlin
"It is important to our friends to believe that we are unreservedly frank with them, and important to friendship that we are not." - Miguel de Unamuno, fully Miguel de Unamuno y Jogo
"The test of friendship is assistance in adversity, and that too, unconditional assistance, Co-operation which needs consideration is as a commercial contract and not friendship. Conditional co-operation is like adulterated cement which does not bind. " - Mahatma Gandhi, fully Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, aka Bapu
"Friendship that insists on agreement on all matters is not worth the name. Friendship to be real must ever sustain the weight of honest differences, however sharp they be. " - Mahatma Gandhi, fully Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, aka Bapu
"The roots of such fears which choke love like weeds need repeated examination. Partly they spring from failures in loving within the family and within society; partly, also, from horror of the body and its desires which the Church has done much to encourage. The exaggerated emphasis on the sinfulness of sexual intercourse has led many sensitive people to a terror of any situation where they might lose control. This in turn leads in some cases to a fear of the opposite sex, or a dislike of even the briefest and most casual physical contact. Yet to be comforted, to be assured that we are valuable and important, we need to be touched. We need our hands to be shaken, our cheeks to be kissed, our shoulders to be embraced, with the quick sympathy and affection of friendship or of kinship." - Monica Furlong
"Let's give the world to the children just for one day like a balloon in bright and striking colours to play with let them play singing among the stars let's give the world to the children like a huge apple like a warm loaf of bread at least for one day let them have enough let's give the world to the children at least for one day let the world learn friendship children will get the world from our hands they'll plant immortal trees." - Nâzım Hikmet
"The first general rule for friendship is to be a friend, to be open, natural, interested; the second rule is to take time for friendship. Friendship, after all, is what life is finally about. Everything material and professional exists in the end for persons." - Nels F. S. Ferré, fully Nels Fredrick Solomon Ferré
"There are many moments in friendship, as in love, when silence is beyond words. The faults of our friend may be clear to us, but it is well to seem to shut our eyes to them. Friendship is usually treated by the majority of mankind as a tough and everlasting thing which will survive all manner of bad treatment. But this is an exceedingly great and foolish error; it may die in an hour of a single unwise word; its conditions of existence are that it should be dealt with delicately and tenderly, being as it is a sensitive plant and not a roadside thistle. We must not expect our friend to be above humanity." - Ouida, pseudonym of Maria Louise Ramé, preferred to be called Marie Louise de la Ramée NULL
"The relationship that exists between friends is the grandest of human loves. Friendly love is pure, because it is without compulsion. One freely chooses to love his friends; he is not bound by instinct. The love that manifests in friendship can exist between man and woman, woman and woman, man and man. But in the love of friendship, there is no sexual attraction. One must practice celibacy and absolutely forget sex if one wants to know divine love through friendship; then friendship nurtures the cultivation of divine love." - Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh
"The treasure of friendship is your richest possession, because it goes with you beyond this life. All the true friends you have made you will meet again in the home of the Father, for real love is never lost." - Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh
"Making others happy, through kindness of speech and sincerity of right advice, is a sign of true greatness. To hurt another soul by sarcastic words, looks, or suggestions, is despicable. Sarcasm draws out the rebellious spirit and anger in the wrongdoer. Loving suggestions bring out the repentence in him. Repentence consists in thoroughly understanding one's own error and in abandoning it. Friendship is pure by nature. When you have a lilly in your hands, how can you crush it? When you love a person dearly, how can you hurt him, even though he may be wrong? Divine love is unlimited and infinite. When two or more persons are friends always, no matter what happens, that is an expression of divine love, of divine friendship." - Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh
"Sarcasm draws out the rebellious spirit and anger in the wrongdoer. Loving suggestions bring out the repentence in him. Repentence consists in thoroughly understanding one’s own error and in abandoning it. Friendship is pure by nature. When you have a lilly in your hands, how can you crush it? When you love a person dearly, how can you hurt him, even though he may be wrong? Divine love is unlimited and infinite. When two or more persons are friends always, no matter what happens, that is an expression of divine love, of divine friendship." - Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh
"A bear's friendship is to scratch and tear." - Pashto Proverbs
"We are so perverted by an education which from infancy seeks to kill in us the spirit of revolt, and to develop that of submission to authority; we are so perverted by this existence under the ferrule of a law, which regulates every event in life — our birth, our education, our development, our love, our friendship — that, if this state of things continues, we shall lose all initiative, all habit of thinking for ourselves. Our society seems no longer able to understand that it is possible to exist otherwise than under the reign of law, elaborated by a representative government and administered by a handful of rulers. And even when it has gone so far as to emancipate itself from the thralldom, its first care has been to reconstitute it immediately. "The Year I of Liberty" has never lasted more than a day, for after proclaiming it men put themselves the very next morning under the yoke of law and authority." - Peter Kropotkin, fully Prince Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin
"Ties of blood are not always ties of friendship; but friendship founded on merit, on esteem, and on mutual trust, becomes more vital and more tender when strengthened by the ties of blood." - Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
"There is almost a sensual longing for communion with others who have a large vision. The immense fulfillment of the friendship between those engaged in furthering the evolution of consciousness has a quality impossible to describe." - Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
"The world is round so that friendship may encircle it." - Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
"The use of friendship for a selfish motive is like mixing bitter poison with the sweet rose-syrup." - Inayat Khan, aka Hazrat Inayat Khan, fully Pir-O-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan
"The most difficult types of friendship is the friendship of all, one for himself " - Plato NULL
"To love is to liberate. Love and friendship must empower those we love to become their best selves according to their own lights and visions. This means that wanting what is best for you and trying to be what you need me to be can be done only in a way that preserves your freedom to have your own feelings, think your own thoughts and make your own decisions. If your personhood is as dear to me as my own, which is the implication of love, I must respect it carefully and sensitively. When I affirm you, my affirmation is based on your unconditional value as a unique, unrepeatable and even sacred mystery of humanity." - John Powell
"For too long, our close ties with the Arab world have been compromised by negative stereotyping on both sides. It is my hope that this trip will help strengthen the bonds of friendship among our nations." - Hillary Rodham Clinton
"True and perfect friendship is, to make one heart and mind of many hearts and bodies." - Pythagoras, aka Pythagoras of Samos or Pythagoras the Samian NULL
"Without friendship life is nothing." - Ennius, fully Quintus Ennius NULL
"A friendship that can end never really began." - Publius Syrus
"It is only the great hearted who can be true friends. The mean and cowardly, Can never know what true friendship means." - Charles Kingsley
"If our friendship depends on things like space and time, then when we finally overcome space and time, we've destroyed our own brotherhood! But overcome space, and all we have left is Here. Overcome time, and all we have left is Now. And in the middle of Here and Now, don't you think that we might see each other once or twice?" - Richard Bach, fully Richard David Bach
"Next to God, love is the word most mangled in every language. The highest form of regard between two people is friendship, and when love enters, friendship dies." - Richard Bach, fully Richard David Bach
"Always set high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord will love you more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to you." - Robertson Davies