Turn him, and see his threads:  look if he be
Friend to himself, that would be friend to thee: 
For that is first required, a man be his own;
But he that’s too much that is friend to none.
Underwood.  B. JONSON.

                      Lay this into your breast: 
  Old friends, like old swords, still are trusted best.
Duchess of Malfy.  J. WEBSTER.

Talk not of wasted affection, affection never was wasted;
If it enrich not the heart of another, its waters, returning
Back to their springs, like the rain, shall fill them full of
refreshment;
That which the fountain sends forth returns again to the fountain.
Evangeline.  H.W.  LONGFELLOW.

                        True happiness
  Consists not in the multitude of friends,
  But in the worth and choice.
Cynthia’s Revels.  B. JONSON.

  Thou dost conspire against thy friend, Iago,
  If thou but think’st him wronged, and mak’st his ear
  A stranger to thy thoughts.
Othello, Act iii.  Sc. 3.  SHAKESPEARE.

Friendship above all ties does bind the heart;
And faith in friendship is the noblest part.
King Henry V.  EARL OF ORRERY.

Be kind to my remains; and O, defend,
Against your judgment, your departed friend!
Epistle to Congreve.  J. DRYDEN.

                       O summer friendship,
  Whose flattering leaves, that shadowed us in
  Our prosperity, with the least gust drop off
  In the autumn of adversity.
The Maid of Honor.  P. MASSINGER.

Such is the use and noble end of friendship,
To bear a part in every storm of fate.
Generous Conqueror.  B. HIGGONS.

Friendship, like love, is but a name,
Unless to one you stint the flame.

* * * * *

’T is thus in friendships:  who depend
On many, rarely find a friend.
Fables:  The Hare and many Friends.  J. GAY.

Like summer friends,
Flies of estate and sunneshine.
The Answer.  G. HERBERT.

                            What the declined is
  He shall as soon read in the eyes of others
  As feel in his own fall; for men, like butterflies,
  Show not their mealy wings but to the summer.
Troilus and Cressida, Act iii.  Sc. 3.  SHAKESPEARE.

The man that hails you Tom or Jack,
And proves, by thumping on your back,
His sense of your great merit,
Is such a friend, that one had need
Be very much his friend indeed
To pardon, or to bear it.
On Friendship.  W. COWPER.

  Give me the avowed, the erect, the manly foe,
  Bold I can meet,—­perhaps may turn his blow;
  But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send,
  Save, save, oh! save me from the Candid Friend!
New Morality.  G. CANNING.

  Friendship is constant in all other things,
  Save in the office and affairs of love.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act ii.  Sc. 1.  SHAKESPEARE.