My friends may have well found it much more difficult to forgive me another defect, which consists in being rather slow not to show them affection but to render them assistance.  One of the injunctions most impressed upon us at the seminary was to avoid “special friendships.”  Friendships of this kind were described as being a fraud upon the rest of the community.  This rule has always remained indelibly impressed upon my mind.  I have never given much encouragement to friendship; I have done little for my friends, and they have done little for me.  One of the ideas which I have so often to cope with is that friendship, as it is generally understood, is an injustice and a blunder, which only allows you to distinguish the good qualities of a single person, and blinds you to those of others who are perhaps more deserving of your sympathy.  I fancy to myself at times, like my ancient masters, that friendship is a larceny committed at the expense of society at large, and that, in a more elevated world, friendship would disappear.  In some cases, it has seemed to me that the special attachment which unites two individuals is a slight upon good-fellowship generally; and I am always tempted to hold aloof from them as being warped in their judgment and devoid of impartiality and liberty.  A close association of this kind between two persons must, in my view, narrow the mind, detract from anything like breadth of view, and fetter the independence.  Beule often used to banter me upon this score.  He was somewhat attached to me, and was anxious to render me a service, though I had not done the equivalent for him.  Upon a certain occasion I voted against him in favour of some one who had been very ill-natured towards me, and he said to me afterwards:  “Renan, I shall play some mean trick upon you; out of impartiality you will vote for me.”

While I have been very fond of my friends, I have done very little for them.  I have been as much at the disposal of the public as of them.  This is why I receive so many letters from unknown and anonymous correspondents; and this is also why I am such a bad correspondent.  It has often happened to me while writing a letter to break off suddenly and convert into general terms the ideas which have occurred to me.  The best of my life has been lived for the public, which has had all I have to give.  There is no surprise in store for it after my death, as I have kept nothing back for anybody.

Having thus given my preference instinctively to the many rather than to the few, I have enjoyed the sympathy even of my adversaries, but I have had few friends.  No sooner has there been any sign of warmth in my feelings, than the St. Sulpice dictum, “No special friendships,” has acted as a refrigerator, and stood in the way of any close affinity.  My craving to be just has prevented me from being obliging.  I am too much impressed by the idea that in doing one person a service you as a rule disoblige another person;