Apart from the case where it would be a real help to you if your friend were to make some great sacrifice to serve you, there is no better means of testing the genuineness of his feelings than the way in which he receives the news of a misfortune that has just happened to you.  At that moment the expression of his features will either show that his one thought is that of true and sincere sympathy for you; or else the absolute composure of his countenance, or the passing trace of something other than sympathy, will confirm the well-known maxim of La Rochefoucauld:  Dans l’adversite de nos meilleurs amis, nous trouvons toujours quelque chose qui ne nous deplait pas.  Indeed, at such a moment, the ordinary so-called friend will find it hard to suppress the signs of a slight smile of pleasure.  There are few ways by which you can make more certain of putting people into a good humor than by telling them of some trouble that has recently befallen you, or by unreservedly disclosing some personal weakness of yours.  How characteristic this is of humanity!

Distance and long absence are always prejudicial to friendship, however disinclined a man may be to admit.  Our regard for people whom we do not see—­even though they be our dearest friends—­gradually dries up in the course of years, and they become abstract notions; so that our interest in them grows to be more and more intellectual,—­nay, it is kept up only as a kind of tradition; whilst we retain a lively and deep interest in those who are constantly before our eyes, even if they be only pet animals.  This shows how much men are limited by their senses, and how true is the remark that Goethe makes in Tasso about the dominant influence of the present moment:—­

  Die Gegenwart ist eine maechtige Goettin[1]

[Footnote 1:  Act iv., se. 4.]

Friends of the house are very rightly so called; because they are friends of the house rather than of its master; in other words, they are more like cats than dogs.

Your friends will tell you that they are sincere; your enemies are really so.  Let your enemies’ censure be like a bitter medicine, to be used as a means of self-knowledge.

A friend in need, as the saying goes, is rare.  Nay, it is just the contrary; no sooner have you made a friend than he is in need, and asks for a loan.

SECTION 34.  A man must be still a greenhorn in the ways of the world, if he imagines that he can make himself popular in society by exhibiting intelligence and discernment.  With the immense majority of people, such qualities excite hatred and resentment, which are rendered all the harder to bear by the fact that people are obliged to suppress—­even from themselves—­the real reason of their anger.

What actually takes place is this.  A man feels and perceives that the person with whom he is conversing is intellectually very much his superior.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Cf. Welt als Wills und Vorstellung, Bk.  II. p. 256 (4th Edit.), where I quote from Dr. Johnson, and from Merck, the friend of Goethe’s youth.  The former says:  There is nothing by which a man exasperates most people more, than by displaying a superior ability of brilliancy in conversation.  They seem pleased at the time, but their envy makes them curse him at their hearts. (Boswells Life of Johnson aetat:  74).]