Page:Early Spring in Massachusetts (1881).djvu/201

Rh the man or his designs who would make the very highest use of me short of an all-adventuring friendship. The field where friends have met is consecrated forever. Man seeks friendship out of the desire to realize a home here. As the Indian thinks he receives into himself the courage and strength of his conquered enemy, so we add to ourselves all the character and heart of our friend. He is my creation. I can do what I will with him. There is no possibility of being thwarted. The friend is like wax in the rays that fall from our own hearts. My friend does not take my word for anything, but he takes me. He trusts me as I trust myself. We only need to be as true to others as we are to ourselves that there may be ground enough for friendship. In the beginnings of friendship, for it does not grow, we realize such love and justice as are attributed to God.

Very few are they from whom we derive any information. The most only announce and tell tales, but the friend in-forms. How simple is the natural connection of events. We complain greatly of the want of flow and sequence in books, but if the journalist only move himself from Boston to New York, and speak as before, there is link enough. And so there would be if he were as careless of connection and order when he stayed at home, and let the incessant