Aspersion is the babbler's trade,
To listen is to lend him aid,
And rush into dissension.
A friendship, that in frequent fits
Of controversial rage emits
The sparks of disputation,
Like hand-in-hand insurance plates,
Most unavoidably creates
The thought of conflagration.
Some fickle creatures boast a soul
True as the needle to the pole,
Their humour yet so varies
They manifest their whole life through
The needle's deviations too,
Their love is so precarious.
The great and small but rarely meet
On terms of amity complete ;
Plebeians must surrender
And yield so much to noble folk,
It is combining fire with smoke,
Obscurity with splendour.
Some are so palcid and serene
(As Irish bogs are always green)
They sleep secure from waking;
And are indeed a bog, that bears
Your unparticipated cares
Unmoved and without quaking.
Courtier and patriot cannot mix
Their heterogeneous politics
Without an effervescence,
Like that of salts with lemon-juice,
Which does not yet like that produce
A friendly coalescence.
Religion should extinguish strife,
And make a calm of human life;
But friends that chance to differ
On points which God has left at large,
How freely will they meet and charge
No combatants are stiffer.
To prove at last my main intent
Needs no expense of argument,
No cutting and contriving-
Seeking a real friend we seem
To adopt the chymist's golden dream,
With still less hope of thriving.
As similarity of mind,
Or something not to be defined,
First fixes our attention;
Sometimes occasion brings to light
Our friend's defect long hid from sight,
And even from suspicion.
Then judge yourself, and prove your man
As circumspectly as you can,
And, having made election,
Beware no negligence of yours,
Such as a friend but ill endures,
Enfeeble his affection.
That secrets are a sacred trust,
That friends should be sincere and just,
That constancy befits them,
And observations on the case,
That savour much of common-place,
And all the world admits them.
But 'tis not timber, lead, and stone,
An architect requires alone,
To finish a fine building-
The palace were but half complete,
If he would possibly forget
The carving and the gilding.
The man that hails you Tom or Jack,
And proves by thumps upon your back
How he esteems your merit,
Is such a friend, that one had need
Be very much his friend indeed,
To pardon or to bear it.
Sometimes the fault is all our own,
Some blemish in due time made know
By trespass or omission;
So manners decent and polite,
The same we practised at first sight,
Must save it from declension.
Some act upon this prudent plan,
"Say little, and hear all you can:"
Safe policy, but hateful-
So barren sands imbibe the shower,
But render neither fruit nor flower,-
Unpleasant and ungrateful.
The man I trust, if shy to me,
Shall find me as reserved as he;
No subterfuge or pleading
Shall win my confidence again;
I will by no means entertain
A spy on my proceeding.
These samples-for alas! at last
These are but samples, and a taste
Of evils yet unmentioned-
May prove the task a task indeed,
In which 'tis much if we succeed,
However well-intentioned.
Pursue the search and you will find
Good sense and knowledge of mankind
To be at least expedient;
And, after summing all the rest,
Religion ruling in the breast
A principle ingredient.
The noblest Friendship ever shown
The Saviour's history makes known,
Though some have turned and turned it;
And, whether being crazed or blind,
Or seeking with a biassed mind,
Have not, it seems, discerned it.
O! Friendship, if my soul forego
Thy dear delights while here below;
To mortify and grieve me,
May I myself at last appear
Unworthy, base, and insincere,
Or may my friend deceive me!
THE KIND OLD FRIENDLY FEELINGS.
THE kind old friendly feelings!
We have their spirit yet,
Though years and years have passed, old friend, Since thou and I last met!
And something of gray Time's advance
Seems in thy fading eye,
Yet 'tis the same good honest glance
I loved in times gone by
Ere the kind old friendly feelings
Had ever brought one sigh! The warm old friendly feelings! Ah, who need yet be told
No other links can bind the heart
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