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.
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