The Good we use,
The Wise we cannot choose.
These there are none above;
The Good they know and love,
But are not known again
By those of lesser ken.
They do not charm us with their eyes,
But they transfix with their advice;
No partial sympathy they feel,
With private woe or private weal,
But with the universe joy and sigh,
Whose knowledge is their sympathy.
Confucius said: "To contract ties of Friendship with any one, is
to contract Friendship with his virtue. There ought not to be
any other motive in Friendship." But men wish us to contract
Friendship with their vice also. I have a Friend who wishes me
to see that to be right which I know to be wrong. But if
Friendship is to rob me of my eyes, if it is to darken the day, I
will have none of it. It should be expansive and inconceivably
liberalizing in its effects. True Friendship can afford true
knowledge. It does not depend on darkness and ignorance. A want
of discernment cannot be an ingredient in it.
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