An Anthology
 
 LIBRARY OF THE 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 
 AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 
 
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 IOLAUS
 
 IOLAUS 
 
 AN ANTHOLOGY OF FRIENDSHIP 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 EDWARD CARPENTER 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 SWAN SONNENSCHEIN & Co. LIMITED 
 
 PATERNOSTER SQUARE, LONDON 
 
 ALSO BY THE AUTHOR AT 
 
 56, SACKVILLE STREET, MANCHESTER 
 
 AND BY CHARLES E. GOODSPEED 
 
 BOSTON, MASS., U.S.A. 
 
 MCMII.
 
 "And as to the loves of Hercules it is difficult 
 to record them because of their number. But some 
 who think that lolaus was one of them, do to this 
 day worship and honour him; and make their 
 loved ones swear fidelity at his tomb." 
 
 (Plutarch)
 
 HO 
 O^ 
 
 * 
 
 . 
 
 
 CM 
 
 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 THE degree to which Friendship, in the early 
 history of the world, has been recognised as 
 an institution, and the dignity ascribed to it, are 
 things hardly realised to-day. Yet a very slight ex- 
 amination of the subject shows the important part 
 it has played. In making the following collection 
 I have been much struck by the remarkable manner 
 in which the customs of various races and times 
 illustrate each other, and the way in which they 
 point to a solid and enduring body of human senti- 
 ment on the subject. By arranging the extracts in 
 a kind of rough chronological and evolutionary or- 
 der from those dealing with primitive races onwards, 
 the continuity of these customs comes out all the 
 more clearly, as well as their slow modification in 
 course of time. But it must be confessed that the 
 present collection is only incomplete, and a small 
 contribution, at best, towards a large subject. 
 
 In the matter of quotation and translation, my 
 best thanks are due to various authors and holders 
 of literary copyrights for their assistance and author- 
 ity ; and especially to the Master and Fellows of 
 Balliol College for permission to quote from the 
 late Professor Jowett's translation of Plato's dia-
 
 VI. 
 
 Preface 
 
 logues ; to Messrs. George Bell & Sons for leave 
 to make use of the Bohn series ; to Messrs. A. & C. 
 Black for leave of quotation from the late J. Ad- 
 dington Symonds' Studies of the Greek Poets; and 
 to Messrs. Longmans, Green & Co., for sanction 
 of extracts from the Rev. W. H. Hutchings' trans- 
 lation of the Confessions of St. Augustine. In cases 
 where no reference is given the translations are by 
 the Editor. 
 
 E.G. 
 March, 1902.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 page 
 
 Preface 
 
 v. 
 
 I. Friendship-customs in the Pagan and 
 
 Early World .... I 
 
 II. The place of Friendship in Greek Life 
 
 and Thought . . . . ^o 
 
 HI. Poetry of Friendship among the 
 
 Greeks and Romans . . 65 
 
 IV. Friendship in Early Christian and 
 
 Mediaeval Times . . .95 
 V. The Renaissance and Modern Times 121 
 
 Index ' , - . . 183
 
 I. 
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 in the Pagan & Early World 
 
 o / 
 
 it SHEET Two
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 in the Tagan & Early World 
 
 O XT 
 
 'RIENDSHIP-CUSTOMS, of a very 
 
 marked and definite character, have 
 apparently prevailed among a great 
 many primitive peoples ; but the 
 information that we have about them is seldom 
 thoroughly satisfactory. Travellers have been con- 
 tent to note external ceremonies, like the exchange 
 of names between comrades, or the mutual tasting 
 of each other's blood, but either from want of 
 perception or want of opportunity have not been 
 able to tell us anything about the inner meaning of 
 these formalities, or the sentiments which may have 
 inspired them. Still, we have material enough to 
 indicate that comrade-attachment has been recog- 
 nised as an important institution, and held in high 
 
 3
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 esteem, among quite savage tribes ; and some of 
 the following quotations will show this. When we 
 come to the higher culture of the Greek age the 
 material fortunately is abundant not only for the 
 customs, but (in Greek philosophy and poetry) for 
 the inner sentiments which inspired these customs. 
 Consequently it will be found that the major part 
 of this and the following two chapters deals with 
 matter from Greek sources. The later chapters 
 carry on the subject in loosely historical sequence 
 through the Christian centuries down to modern 
 
 times. 
 
 t?=^ _ 
 
 HE Balonda are an African tribe 
 inhabiting Londa land, among the 
 Southern tributaries of the Congo 
 River. They were visited by Living- 
 stone, and the following account of their customs 
 is derived from him : 
 
 "HT^HE Balonda have a most remarkable custom 
 J. of cementing friendship. When two men 
 agree to be special friends they go through a sin- 
 gular ceremony. The men sit opposite each other 
 holding hands, and by the side of each is a vessel 
 
 4
 
 Pagan S? Early W^orld 
 
 o */ 
 
 of beer. Slight cuts are then made on the clasped PRIMITP 
 hands, on the pit of the stomach, on the right CJTRJT. 
 cheek, and on the forehead. The point of a grass- 
 blade is pressed against each of these cuts, so as 
 to take up a little of the blood, and each man 
 washes the grass-blade in his own beer vessel. 
 The vessels are then exchanged and the contents 
 drunk, so that each imbibes the blood of the other. 
 The two are thenceforth considered as blood- 
 relations, and are bound to assist each other in 
 every possible manner. While the beer is being 
 drunk, the friends of each of the men beat on the 
 ground with clubs, and bawl out certain sentences 
 as ratification of the treaty. It is thought correct 
 for all the friends of each party to the contract to 
 drink a little of the beer. The ceremony is called 
 'Kasendi.' After it has been completed, gifts are 
 exchanged, and both parties always give their 
 most precious possessions." Natural History of 
 Man. Rev. J. G. Wood. Vol: Africa^ p. 419. 
 Among the Manganjas and other tribes of the 
 
 Zambesi region, Livingstone found the custom of 
 
 changing names prevalent. 
 
 "OININYANE (a headman) had exchanged 
 O names with a Zulu at Shupanga, and on being 
 called the next morning made no answer; to a 
 
 5
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 EXCHANGE second and third summons he paid no attention; 
 OF but at length one of his men replied, { He is not 
 NAMES' Sininyane now, he is Moshoshoma ; ' and to this 
 name he answered promptly. The custom of ex- 
 changing names with men of other tribes is not 
 uncommon ; and the exchangers regard them- 
 selves as close comrades, owing special duties to 
 each other ever after. Should one by chance visit 
 his comrade's town, he expects to receive food, 
 lodging, and other friendly offices from him." 
 Narrative of an Expedition to the Zambesi. By 
 David and Charles Livingstone. Murray, 1865, 
 p. 148. 
 
 the story of David and Jonathan, 
 i which follows, we have an example, 
 , from much the same stage of primitive 
 ^tribal life, of a compact between two 
 friends one the son of the chief, the other a shep- 
 herd youth only in this case, in the song of 
 David ("I am distressed for thee, my brother Jona- 
 than, thy love to me was wonderful") we are for- 
 tunate in having the inner feeling preserved for us. 
 It should be noted that Jonathan gives to David 
 his "most precious possessions." 
 
 6
 
 Pagan & Early World 
 
 " A ND when Saul saw David go forth against DAVID 
 JL\. the Philistine (Goliath), he said unto Abner, AND 
 the captain of the host, 'Abner, whose son is this JONATHAN 
 youth?' And Abner said, 'As thy soul liveth, O 
 King, I cannot tell.' And the King said, 'Inquire 
 thou whose son the stripling is.' And as David 
 returned from the slaughter of the Philistine, 
 Abner took him and brought him before Saul, 
 with the head of the Philistine in his hand. And 
 Saul said to him, 'Whose son art thou, young 
 man?' And David answered, 'The son of thy 
 servant Jesse the Bethlehemite.' 
 
 "And it came to pass, when he had made an 
 end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan 
 was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan 
 loved him as his own soul. And Saul took him 
 that day, and would let him go no more home to 
 his father's house. Then Jonathan and David 
 made a covenant, because he loved him as his own 
 soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe 
 that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his 
 garments, even to his sword, and to his bow, and 
 to his girdle." i Sam. ch. xvii. 55. 
 
 With regard to the exchange of names, a slightly FLOWER 
 different custom prevails among the Bengali coolies. ^ 
 Two youths, or two girls, will exchange two 
 
 7
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 flowers (of the same kind) with each other, in 
 token of perpetual alliance. After that, one speaks 
 of the other as "my flower," but never alludes to 
 the other by name again only by some round- 
 about phrase. 
 
 ERMAN MELVILLE, who voyaged 
 among the Pacific Islands in 1841- 
 1845, gi yes some interesting and re- 
 liable accounts of Polynesian customs 
 -iod. He says : 
 POLYNESIA " r I ^HE really curious way in which all the Poly- 
 TAHITI * nes i ans are m the habit of making bosom 
 friends at the shortest possible notice is deserving 
 of remark. Although, among a people like the 
 Tahitians, vitiated as they are by sophisticating 
 influences, this custom has in most cases degene- 
 rated into a mere mercenary relation, it neverthe- 
 less had its origin in a fine, and in some instances 
 heroic, sentiment formerly entertained by their 
 fathers. 
 
 "In the annals of the island (Tahiti) are exam- 
 ples of extravagant friendships, unsurpassed by 
 the story of Damon and Pythias, in truth, much 
 more wonderful ; for notwithstanding the devo- 
 tion even of life in some cases to which they 
 
 8
 
 Pagan ^f Early World 
 
 led, they were frequently entertained at first sight 
 for some stranger from another island." Omoo, 
 Herman Melville, ch. 39, p. 154. 
 
 "HpHOUGH little inclined to jealousy in (ordi- 
 A. nary) love-matters, the Tahitian will hear of 
 no rivals in his friendship." Ibid, ch. 40. 
 
 Melville spent some months on one of the Mar- 
 quesas Islands, in a valley occupied by a tribe called 
 Typees ; one day there turned up a stranger be- 
 longing to a hostile tribe who occupied another part 
 of the island: 
 '"THHE stranger could not have been more than ]yj ARQU E- 
 
 J. twenty -five years of age, and was a little 5 AS 
 above the ordinary height; had he been a single ISLANDS 
 hair's breadth taller, the matchless symmetry of 
 his form would have been destroyed. His unclad 
 limbs were beautifully formed ; whilst the elegant 
 outline of his figure, together with his beardless 
 cheeks, might have entitled him to the distinction 
 of standing for the statue of the Polynesian 
 Apollo ; and indeed the oval of his countenance 
 and the regularity of every feature reminded me 
 of an antique bust. But the marble repose of art 
 was supplied by a warmth and liveliness of expres- 
 sion only to be seen in the South Sea Isbnder 
 
 9
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 under the most favourable developments of 
 nature. . . . When I expressed my surprise (at his 
 venturing among the Typees) he looked at me for 
 a moment as if enjoying my perplexity, and then 
 with his strange vivacity exclaimed 'Ah! me 
 taboo me go Nukuheva me go Tior me go 
 Typee me go everywhere nobody harm me, 
 me taboo.' 
 
 "This explanation would have been altogether 
 unintelligible to me, had it not recalled to my mind 
 something I had previously heard concerning a 
 singular custom among these islanders. Though 
 the country is possessed by various tribes, whose 
 mutual hostilities almost wholly preclude any 
 intercourse between them ; yet there are instances 
 where a person having ratified friendly relations 
 with some individual belonging to the valley, 
 whose inmates are at war with his own, may under 
 particular restrictions venture with impunity into 
 the country of his friend, where under other cir- 
 cumstances he would have been treated as an 
 enemy. In this light are personal friendships re- 
 garded among them, and the individual so pro- 
 tected is said to be 'taboo,' and his person to a 
 certain extent is held as sacred. Thus the stranger 
 informed me he had access to all the valleys in 
 the island." Typee, Herman Melville, ch. xviii. 
 10
 
 Pagan & Early World 
 
 almost all primitive nations, warfare 
 has given rise to institutions of mili- 
 tary comradeship including, for in- 
 i stance, institutions of instruction for 
 young warriors, of personal devotion to their 
 leaders, or of personal attachment to each other. 
 In Greece these customs were specially defined, as 
 later quotations will show. 
 
 Tacitus, speaking of the arrangement among the 
 Germans by which each military chief was surroun- 
 ded by younger companions in arms, says : 
 
 ur T^HERE is great emulation among the com- TACITUS 
 JL panions, which shall possess the highest place ON MILI- 
 in the favour of their chief ; and among the chiefs, TARY COM- 
 which shall excel in the number and valour of his RADESH1P 
 companions. It is their dignity, their strength, 
 to be always surrounded with a large body of 
 select youth, an ornament in peace, a bulwark in 
 war ... In the field of battle, it is disgraceful for 
 the chief to be surpassed in valour ; it is disgrace- 
 ful for the companions not to equal their chief; 
 but it is reproach and infamy during a whole suc- 
 ceeding life to retreat from the field surviving 
 him. To aid, to protect him ; to place their own 
 ii
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 gallant actions to the account of his glory is their 
 first and most sacred engagement." 'Tacitus, Ger- 
 mania, 13, 14, Bohn Series. 
 
 MONG the Arab tribes very much 
 the same thing may be found, every 
 Sheikh having his bodyguard of 
 young men, whom he instructs and 
 educates, while they render to him their military and 
 personal devotion. In the late expedition of the 
 British to Khartoum (Nov., 1899), when Colonel 
 Wingate and his troops mowed down the Khalifa 
 and his followers with their Maxims, the death of 
 the Khalifa was thus described by a correspondent 
 of the daily papers : 
 
 THE "TN the centre of what was evidently the main 
 KHALIFA * attack n ur right we came across a very large 
 AT KHAR- number of bodies all huddled together in a very 
 TOUM sma ll place ; their horses lay dead behind them, the 
 Khalifa lay dead on his furma, or sheepskin, the 
 typical end of the Arab Sheikh who disdains sur- 
 render ; on his right was the Khalifa Aly Wad Hila, 
 and on his left Ahmed Fedil, his great fighting 
 leader, whilst all around him lay his faithful emirs, 
 all content to meet their death when he had chosen 
 
 12
 
 Pagan ^f Early World 
 
 ci / 
 
 to meet his. His black Mulamirin, or bodyguard, 
 all lay dead in a straight line about 40 yards in front 
 of their master's body, with their faces to the foe 
 and faithful to the last. It was truly a touching 
 sight, and one could not help but feel that. . .their 
 
 end was truly grand Amongst the dead were 
 
 found two men tied together by the arms, who had 
 charged towards the guns and had got nearer than 
 any others. On enquiring of the prisoners Colonel 
 Wingate was told these two were great friends, and 
 on seeing the Egyptian guns come up had tied 
 themselves by the arms with a cord, swearing to 
 reach the guns or die together." 
 
 Compare also the following quotation from Am- 
 mianus Marcellinus (xvi. 13), who says that when 
 Chonodomarus, "King of the Alamanni,"was taken 
 prisoner by the Romans, 
 
 "T TIS companions, two hundred in number, and PRIMITIVE 
 -Li three friends peculiarly attached to him, GERMANS 
 thinking it infamous to survive their prince, or not 
 to die for him, surrendered themselves to be put 
 in bonds." 
 
 The following passage from Livingstone shows 
 the existence among the African tribes of his time 
 of a system, which Wood rightly says "has a singu- 
 
 13
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 lar resemblance to the instruction of pages in the 
 days of chivalry" : 
 
 SOUTH AF- " "\/T ONINA (one of the confederate chiefs of the 
 RICAN -LVJL Banyai) had a great number of young men 
 TRIBES about him, from twelve to fifteen years of age. 
 These were all sons of free men, and bands of 
 young lads like them in the different districts leave 
 their parents about the age of puberty and live with 
 such men as Monina for the sake of instruction. 
 When I asked the nature of the instruction I was 
 told 'Bonycii,' which I suppose may be understood 
 as indicating manhood, for it sounds as if we should 
 say, 'to teach an American Americanism,' or, 'an 
 Englishman to be English.' While here they are 
 kept in subjection to rather stringent regulations. 
 .... They remain unmarried until a fresh set of 
 youths is ready to occupy their place under the 
 same instruction." Missionary Travels and Re- 
 searches in South Africa. By David Livingstone, 
 1857, p. 618. 
 
 M. Foley (Bulln. Soc. d'Anthr. de Paris, 1879) 
 speaks of fraternity in arms among the natives of 
 New Caledonia as forming a close tie closer even 
 than consanguinity. 
 
 4
 
 Pagan & Early World 
 
 c* / 
 
 ITH regard to Greece, J. Addington 
 Symonds has some interesting re- 
 marks, which are well worthy of 
 consideration ; he says : 
 
 EARLY all the historians of Greece have GREEK 
 failed to insist upon the fact that fraternity in FRIEND- 
 arms played for the Greek race the same part as the SHIP AND 
 idealisation of women for the knighthood of feudal MEDIAEVAL 
 Europe. Greek mythology and history are full of CHIVALRY 
 tales of friendship, which can only be paralleled by 
 the story of David and Jonathan in the Bible. The 
 legends of Herakles and Hylas, of Theseus and 
 Peirithous, of Apollo and Hyacinth, of Orestes and 
 Pylades, occur immediately to the mind. Among 
 the noblest patriots, tyrannicides, lawgivers, and 
 self-devoted heroes in the early times of Greece, 
 we always find the names of friends and comrades 
 received with peculiar honour. Harmodius and 
 Aristogeiton, who slew the despot Hipparchus at 
 Athens ; Diocles and Philolaus, who gave laws to 
 Thebes ; Chariton and Melanippus, who resisted 
 the sway of Phalaris in Sicily ; Cratinus and Aristo- 
 demus, who devoted their lives to propitiate offen- 
 ded deities when a plague had fallen on Athens; 
 these comrades, staunch to each other in their love, 
 
 15
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 and elevated by friendship to the pitch of noblest 
 enthusiasm, were among the favourite saints of 
 Greek legend and history. In a word, the chivalry 
 of Hellas found its motive force in friendship rather 
 than in the love of women ; and the motive force of 
 all chivalry is a generous, soul-exalting, unselfish 
 passion. The fruit which friendship bore among 
 the Greeks was courage in the face of danger, in- 
 difference to life when honour was at stake, patri- 
 otic ardour, the love of liberty, and lion-hearted 
 rivalry in battle. * Tyrants,' said Plato, 'stand in 
 awe of friends.' " Studies of the Greek Poets. By J. A. 
 Symonds, vol.. i, p. 97. 
 
 [E customs connected with this fra- 
 ternity in arms, in Sparta and in 
 'rete, are described with care and at 
 ^considerable length in the following 
 extract from Miiller's History and Antiquities of the 
 Doric Race, book iv., ch. 4, par. 6 : 
 
 "AT Sparta the party loving was called a<T7rvrjAae, 
 -iV and his affection was termed a breathing in, or 
 inspiring (eto-Trvav) ; which expresses the pure and 
 mental connection between the two persons, and 
 corresponds with the name of the other, viz. : atVag, 
 i.e., listener or bearer. Now it appears to have been 
 
 16
 
 Tagan Sif Early ff^orld 
 
 the practice for every youth of good character to FRATERNI- 
 have his lover ; and on the other hand every well- TY IN ARMS 
 educated man was bound by custom to be the lover IN SPARTA 
 of some youth. Instances of this connection are 
 furnished by several of the royal family of Sparta ; 
 thus, Agesilaus, while he still belonged to the herd 
 (ayf'Xn) of youths, was the hearer (cuVa?) of Lysan- 
 der, and himself had in his turn also a nearer ; his 
 son Archidamus was the lover of the son of Spho- 
 drias, the noble Cleonymus ; Cleomenes III. was 
 when a young man the hearer of Xenares, and later 
 in life the lover of the brave Panteus. The connec- 
 tion usually originated from the proposal of the 
 lover ; yet it was necessary that the listener should 
 accept him with real affection, as a regard to the 
 riches of the proposer was considered very dis- 
 graceful ; sometimes, however, it happened that 
 the proposal originated from the other party. The 
 connection appears to have been very intimate and 
 faithful ; and was recognised by the State. If his 
 relations were absent, the youth might be repre- 
 sented in the public assembly by his lover ; in battle 
 too they stood near one another, where their fide- 
 lity and affection were often shown till death ; while 
 at home the youth was constantly under the eyes 
 of his lover, who was to him as it were a model and 
 pattern of life; which explains why, for many 
 
 * 7 a SIII;KT THREE
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 faults, particularly want of ambition, the lover 
 could be punished instead of the listener." 
 
 CRETE " r I "VHIS ancient national custom prevailed with 
 X still greater force in Crete ; which island was 
 hence by many persons considered as the original 
 seat of the connection in question. Here too it was 
 disgraceful for a well-educated youth to be without 
 a lover ; and hence the party loved was termed 
 jcXftvoc, the praised; the lover being simply called 
 ^lArjrwp. It appears that the youth was always 
 carried away by force, the intention of the ravisher 
 being previously communicated to the relations, 
 who however took no measures of precaution, and 
 only made a feigned resistance ; except when the 
 ravisher appeared, either in family or talent, un- 
 worthy of the youth. The lover then led him away 
 to his apartment (avSpaov), and afterwards, with 
 any chance companions, either to the mountains 
 or to his estate. Here they remained two months 
 (the period prescribed by custom), which were 
 passed chiefly in hunting together. After this time 
 had expired, the lover dismissed the youth, and at 
 his departure gave him, according to custom, an 
 ox, a military dress, and brazen cup, with other 
 things ; and frequently these gifts were increased 
 by the friends of the ravisher. The youth then sac- 
 rificed the ox to Jupiter, with which he gave a feast 
 
 18
 
 Pagan & Early W^orld 
 
 to his companions : and now he stated how he had 
 been pleased with his lover ; and he had complete 
 liberty by law to punish any insult or disgraceful 
 treatment. It depended now on the choice of the 
 youth whether the connection should be broken 
 off or not. If it was kept up, the companion in arms 
 (TrapadraTTje), as the youth was then called, wore 
 the military dress which had been given him, and 
 fought in battle next his lover, inspired with double 
 valour by the gods of war and love, according to 
 the notions of the Cretans ; and even in man's age 
 he was distinguished by the first place and rank in 
 the course, and certain insignia worn about the 
 body. 
 
 "Institutipns, so systematic and regular as these, 
 did not exist in any Doric State except Crete and 
 Sparta ; but the feelings on which they were foun- 
 ded seem to have been common to all the Dorians. 
 The loves of Philolaus, a Corinthian of the family 
 of the Bacchiadae, and the lawgiver of Thebes, and 
 of Diocles the Olympic conqueror, lasted until 
 death ; and even their graves were turned towards 
 one another in token of their affection ; and an- 
 other person of the same name was honoured in 
 Megara, as a noble instance of self-devotion for the 
 object of his love." Ibid. 
 
 For an account of Philolaus and Diocles, Aris- 
 19
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 totle (Pol. ii. 12) may be referred to. The second 
 Diocles was an Athenian who died in battle for the 
 youth he loved. 
 
 DIOCLES "TTIS tomb was honoured with the vayt<r/uaTa of 
 _LA heroes, and a yearly contest for skill in kis- 
 sing formed part of his memorial celebration." 
 J.A.Symondi "A Problem in Greek Ethics " privately 
 printed, 1883; see also 'Theocritus, Idyll xii. infra. 
 
 fAHN, in his Albanesiscbe Studien, says 
 that the Dorian customs of comrade- 
 ship still flourish in Albania "just as 
 described by the ancients," and are 
 closely" entwined with the whole life of the people 
 though he says nothing of any military signifi- 
 cation. It appears to be a quite recognised institution 
 for a young man to take to himself a youth or boy as 
 his special comrade. He instructs, and when neces- 
 sary reproves, the younger ; protects him, and 
 makes him presents of various kinds. The relation 
 generally, though not always ends with the mar- 
 riage of the elder. The following is reported by 
 Hahn as in the actual words of his informant (an 
 Albanian) :
 
 Pagan ^f Early World 
 
 Ci / 
 
 "T OVE of this kind is occasioned by the sight ALBANIAN 
 -> of a beautiful -youth ; who thus kindles in CUSTOMS 
 the lover a feeling of wonder and causes his heart 
 to open to the sweet sense which springs from the 
 contemplation of beauty. By degrees love steals 
 in and takes possession of the lover, and to such 
 a degree that all his thoughts and feelings are ab- 
 sorbed in it. When near the beloved he loses him- 
 self in the sight of him ; when absent he thinks of 
 him only." These loves, he continued, "are with a 
 few exceptions as pure as sunshine, and the highest 
 and noblest affections that the human heart can 
 entertain." Hahn y vo\. I, p. 166. 
 
 Hahn also mentions that troops of youths, like 
 the Cretan and Spartan agelae^ are formed in Alba- 
 nia, of twenty-five or thirty members each. The 
 comradeship usually begins during adolescence, 
 each member paying a fixed sum into a common 
 fund, and the interest being spent on two or three 
 annual feasts, generally held out of doors. 
 
 HE Sacred Band of Thebes, or The- 
 ban Band, was a battalion composed 
 entirely of friends and lovers ; and 
 forms a remarkable example of mili- 
 
 21
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 tary comradeship. The references to it in later 
 Greek literature are very numerous, and there 
 seems no reason to doubt the general truth of the 
 traditions concerning its formation and its complete 
 annihilation by Philip of Macedon at the battle of 
 Chaeronea (B. c. 338). Thebes was the last strong- 
 hold of Hellenic independence, and with the The- 
 ban Band Greek freedom perished. But the mere 
 existence of this phalanx, and the fact of its renown, 
 show to what an extent comradeship was recognised 
 and prized as an institution among these peoples. 
 The following account is taken from Plutarch's Life 
 ofPelopidas, dough's translation : 
 
 THE "/^ ORGIDAS, according to some, first formed 
 THEBAN ^Jf the Sacred Band of 300 chosen men, to whom 
 BAND as being a guard for the citadel the State allowed 
 provision, and all things necessary for exercise ; 
 and hence they were called the city band, as cita- 
 dels of old were usually called cities. Others say 
 that it was composed of young men attached to 
 each other by personal affection, and a pleasant 
 saying of Pammenes is current, that Homer's 
 Nestor was not well skilled in ordering an army, 
 when he advised the Greeks to rank tribe and tribe, 
 
 22
 
 Varan P Early W^orld 
 
 o ~s 
 
 and family and family, together, that so 'tribe 
 might tribe, and kinsmen kinsmen aid,' but that 
 he should have joined lovers and their beloved. 
 For men of the same tribe or family little value one 
 another when dangers press ; but a band cemented 
 together by friendship grounded upon love is 
 never to be broken, and invincible ; since the lov- 
 ers, ashamed to be base in sight of their beloved, 
 and the beloved before their lovers, willingly rush 
 into danger for the relief of one another. Nor can 
 that be wondered at since they have more regard 
 for their absent lovers than for others present ; as 
 in the instance of the man who, when his enemy 
 was going to kill him, earnestly requested him to 
 run him through the breast, that his lover might 
 not blush to see him wounded in the back. It is a 
 tradition likewise that lolaus, who assisted Her- 
 cules in his labours and fought at his side, was be- 
 loved of him ; and Aristotle observes that even in 
 his time lovers plighted their faith at lolaus' tomb. 
 It is likely, therefore, that this band was called sac- 
 red on this account ; as Plato calls a lover a divine 
 friend. It is stated that it was never beaten till the 
 battle at Chaeronea ; and when Philip after the 
 fight took a view of the slain, and came to the place 
 where the three hundred that fought his phalanx 
 lay dead together, he wondered, and understanding 
 
 2 3
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 THE tnat it was the band of lovers, he shed tears and 
 THEBAN sa id, 'Perish any man who suspects that these men 
 BAND either did or suffered anything that was base.' 
 
 "It was not the disaster of Laius, as the poets im- 
 agine, that first gave rise to this form of attachment 
 among the Thebans, but their law-givers, design- 
 ing to soften whilst they were young their natural 
 fickleness, brought for example the pipe into great 
 esteem, both in serious and sportive occasions, and 
 gave great encouragement to these friendships in 
 the Palaestra, to temper the manner and character 
 of the youth. With a view to this, they did well 
 again to make Harmony, the daughter of Mars 
 and Venus, their tutelar deity ; since where force 
 and courage is joined with gracefulness and win- 
 ning behaviour, a harmony ensues that combines 
 all the elements of society in perfect consonance 
 and order. 
 
 "Gorgidas distributed this sacred Band all 
 through the front ranks of the infantry, and thus 
 made their gallantry less conspicuous ; not being 
 united in one body, but mingled with many others 
 of inferior resolution, they had no fair opportunity 
 of showing what they could do. But Pelopidas, 
 having sufficiently tried their bravery at Tegyrae, 
 where they had fought alone, and around his own 
 person, never afterwards divided them, but keep- 
 24
 
 Pagan & Early World 
 
 o ./ 
 
 ing them entire, and as one man, gave them the 
 first duty in the greatest battles. For as horses run 
 brisker in a chariot than single, not that their joint 
 force divides the air with greater ease, but because 
 being matched one against another circulation kin- 
 dles and enflames their courage ; thus, he thought, 
 brave men, provoking one another to noble ac- 
 tions, would prove most serviceable and most res- 
 olute where all were united together." 
 
 ^TORIES of romantic friendship form 
 a staple subject of Greek literature, 
 and were everywhere accepted and 
 prized. The following quotations 
 
 from Athenaeus and Plutarch contain allusions to 
 
 the Theban Band, and other examples : 
 
 " A ^^ t ^ ie Lacedaemonians offer sacrifices to ATHEN- 
 \. Love before they go to battle, thinking that 
 safety and victory depend on the friendship of 
 those who stand side by side in the battle array. 
 . . . And the regiment among the Thebans, which 
 is called the Sacred Eand^ is wholly composed of 
 mutual lovers, indicating the majesty of the God, 
 as these men prefer a glorious death to a shameful 
 and discreditable life." Atben<eus y bk. xiii., ch. 12. 
 
 lolaus, above-mentioned, is said to have been the
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 charioteer of Hercules, and his faithful companion. 
 As the comrade of Hercules he was worshipped be- 
 side him in Thebes, where the gymnasium was 
 named after him. Plutarch alludes to this friend- 
 ship again in his treatise on Love (Eroticus y par. 
 
 X 7) : 
 
 IOLAUS " A ND as to the loves of Hercules, it is difficult 
 -I\. to record them because of their number ; but 
 those who think that lolaus was one of them do to 
 this day worship and honour him, and make their 
 loved ones swear fidelity at his tomb." 
 
 And in the same treatise : 
 
 PLUT- "CONSIDER also how Love (Eros) excels in 
 ARCH ON \_j W arlike feats, and is by no means idle, as Eu- 
 LOVE npides called him, nor a carpet knight, nor 'sleep- 
 ing on soft maidens' cheeks.' For a man inspired 
 by Love needs not Ares to help him when he goes 
 out as a warrior against the enemy, but at the bid- 
 ding of his own god is 'ready' for his friend 'to go 
 through fire and water and whirlwinds.' And in 
 Sophocles' play, when the sons of Niobe are being 
 shot at and dying, one of them calls out for no 
 helper or assister but his lover. 
 
 "And you know of course how it was that Cleo- 
 machus, the Pharsalian, fell in battle. . . . When 
 26
 
 Pagan @P Early World 
 
 o / 
 
 the war between the Eretrians and Chalcidians was 
 at its height, Cleomachus had come to aid the 
 latter with a Thessalian force ; and the Chalcidian 
 infantry seemed strong enough, but they had great 
 difficulty in repelling the enemy's cavalry. So they 
 begged that high-souled hero, Cleomachus, to 
 charge the Eretrian cavalry first. And he asked the 
 youth he loved, who was by, if he would be a spec- 
 tator of the fight, and he saying he would, and 
 affectionately kissing him and putting his helmet 
 on his head, Cleomachus, with a proud joy, put 
 himself at the head of the bravest of the Thessa- 
 lians, and charged the enemy's cavalry with such 
 impetuosity that he threw them into disorder and 
 routed them ; and the Eretrian infantry also fleeing 
 in consequence, the Chalcidians won a splendid 
 victory. However, Cleomachus got killed, and 
 they show his tomb in the market place at Chalcis, 
 over which a huge pillar stands to this day." Erot- 
 icus, par. 1 7, trans. Bohns Classics. 
 
 And further on in the same : 
 
 :< A ND among you Thebans, Pemptides, is it not 
 JL\. usual for the lover to give his boylove a com- 
 plete suit of armour when he is enrolled among the 
 men ? And did not the erotic Pammenes change 
 the disposition of the heavy-armed infantry, cen- 
 27 '
 
 ATHEN- 
 
 ON THE 
 
 SAME 
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 suring Homer as knowing nothing about love, 
 because he drew up the Achaeans in order of battle 
 in tribes and clans, and did not put lover and love 
 together, that so * spear should be next to spear and 
 helmet to helmet' (Iliad^ xiii. 131), seeing that 
 love is the only invincible general. For men in 
 battle will leave in the lurch clansmen and friends, 
 aye, and parents and sons, but what warrior ever 
 broke through or charged through lover and love, 
 seeing that when there is no necessity lovers 
 frequently display their bravery and contempt 
 of life." 
 
 [E following is from the Deipnoso- 
 pbists of Athenaeus (bk.xiii.ch. 78) : 
 
 '"OUT Hieronymus the Peripate- 
 JL/ tic says that the loves of youths 
 used to be much encouraged, for 
 this reason, that the vigour of the young and their 
 close agreement in comradeship have led to the 
 overthrow of many a tyranny. For in the presence 
 of his favorite a lover would rather endure any- 
 thing than earn the name of coward ; a thing which 
 was proved in practice by the Sacred Band, estab- 
 lished at Thebes under Epaminondas ; as well as 
 by the death of the Pisistratidae, which was brought 
 about by Harmodius and Aristogeiton. 
 28
 
 Tagan P Early W^orld 
 
 o ./ 
 
 "And at Agrigentum in Sicily the same was 
 shown by the mutual love of Chariton and Melan- 
 ippus of whom Melanippus was the younger 
 beloved, as Heraclides of Pontus tells in his Trea- 
 tise on Love. For these two having been accused 
 of plotting against Phalaris, and being put to tor- 
 ture in order to force them to betray their accom- 
 plices, not only did not tell, but even compelled 
 Phalaris to such pity of their tortures that he re- 
 leased them with many words of praise. Where- 
 upon Apollo, pleased at his conduct, granted to 
 Phalaris a respite from death ; and declared the 
 same to the men who inquired of the Pythian 
 priestess how they might best attack him. He also 
 gave an oracular saying concerning Chariton .... 
 
 * Blessed indeed was Chariton and Melanippus, 
 Pioneers of Godhead, and of mortals the one 
 most' beloved."' 
 
 Epaminondas, the great Theban general and 
 statesman, so we are told by the same author, ' ldplural 
 had for his young comrades Asopichus and Cephi- 
 sodorus, "the latter of whom fell with him at 
 Mantineia, and is buried near him." 
 
 29
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 jHESE are mainly instances of what 
 might be called " military comrade- 
 iship," but as may be supposed, 
 friendship in the early world did not 
 rest on this alone. With the growth of culture 
 other interests came in ; and among the Greeks es- 
 pecially association in the pursuit of art or politics 
 or philosophy became a common ground. Parmen- 
 ides, the philosopher, whose life was held peculiarly 
 holy, loved his pupil Zeno (see Plato Parm y 127 A) : 
 
 PARMEN- "T)ARMENIDES and Zeno came to Athens, he 
 IDES AND JL said, at the great Panathenaean festival ; the 
 ZENO former was, at the time of his visit, about 65 years 
 old, very white with age, but well-favoured. Zeno 
 was nearly 40 years of age, of a noble figure and 
 fair aspect ; and in the days of his youth he was re- 
 ported to have been beloved of Parmenides." 
 
 Pheidias, the sculptor, loved Pantarkes, a youth 
 of Elis, and carved his portrait at the foot of the 
 Olympian Zeus (Pausanias v. n), and politicians 
 and orators like Demosthenes and ^Eschines were 
 proud to avow their attachments. It was in a house 
 
 30
 
 Pagan P Early World 
 
 o S 
 
 of ill-fame, according to Diogenes Laertius (ii. 105) 
 that Socrates first met Phaedo : 
 
 ur T^HIS unfortunate youth was a native of Elis. PHAEDO 
 
 JL Taken prisoner in war, he was sold in the 
 public market to a slave dealer, who then acquired 
 the right by Attic law to engross his earnings for 
 his own pocket. A friend of Socrates, perhaps 
 Cebes, bought him from his master, and he became 
 one of the chief members of the Socratic circle. His 
 name is given to the Platonic dialogue on immor- 
 tality, and he lived to found what is called the 
 Eleo-Socratic School. No reader of Plato forgets 
 how the sage on the eve of his death stroked the 
 beautiful long hair of Phaedo, and prophesied that 
 he would soon have to cut it short in mourning for 
 his teacher." J. A. Symonds, A Problem in Greek 
 Ethics p. 58. 
 
 The relation of friendship to the pursuit of phil- 
 osophy is a favorite subject with Plato, and is illus- 
 trated by some later quotations (see infra ch. 2). 
 
 CONCLUDE the present section by 
 the insertion of three stories taken 
 from classical sources. Though of 
 a legendary character, it is probable 
 that they enshrine some memory or tradition of 
 
 31
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 actual facts. The story of Hiirmodius and Aristo- 
 geiton at any rate is treated by Herodotus and 
 Thucydides as a matter of serious history. The 
 names of these two friends were ever on the lips of 
 the Athenians as the founders of the city's freedom, 
 and to be born of their blood was esteemed among 
 the highest of honours. But whether historical or 
 not, these stories have much the same value for us, 
 in so far as they indicate the ideals on which the 
 Greek mind dwelt, and which it considered possible 
 of realisation. 
 
 THE "^^fOW the attempt of Aristogeiton and Har- 
 
 STORY OF -*-^ m dius arose out of a love affair, which I will 
 
 H ARMO- narrate at length ; and the narrative will show that 
 
 DIUS AND *ke Athenians themselves give quite an inaccurate 
 
 AR1STO- account or * their own tyrants, and of the incident 
 
 PFTTON i* 1 question, and know no more than other Hel- 
 . * _j. . .. . . . 
 
 lenes. .risistratus died at an advanced age in pos- 
 
 session of the tyranny, and then, not as is the 
 common opinion Hipparchus, but Hippias (who 
 was the eldest of his sons) succeeded to his power. 
 "Harmodius was in the flower of his youth, and 
 Aristogeiton, a citizen of the middle class, became 
 his lover. Hipparchus made an attempt to gain 
 
 3*
 
 Paran @f Early World 
 
 o */ 
 
 the affections of Harmodius, but he would not 
 listen to him, and told Aristogeiton. The latter was 
 naturally tormented at the idea, and fearing that 
 Hipparchus, who was powerful, would resort to 
 violence, at once formed such a plot as a man in 
 his station might for the overthrow of the tyranny. 
 Meanwhile Hipparchus made another attempt; 
 he had no better success, and thereupon he deter- 
 mined, not indeed to take any violent step, but to 
 insult Harmodius in some underhand manner, so 
 that his motive could not be suspected.". . . 
 
 "When Hipparchus found his advances repelled cai administration 
 by Harmodius he carried out his intention of in- ^ l . h f ,. , 
 
 i . mi . n Pisistratidae 
 
 suiting him. There was a young sister or his whom 
 Hipparchus and his friends first invited to come 
 and carry a sacred basket in a procession, and then 
 rejected her, declaring that she had never been in- 
 vited by them at all because she was unworthy. 
 At this Harmodius was very angry, and Aristo- 
 geiton for his sake more angry still. They and the 
 other conspirators had already laid their prepara- 
 tions, but were waiting for the festival of the great 
 Panathenaea, when the citizens who took part in 
 the procession assembled in arms ; for to wear 
 arms on any other day would have aroused sus- 
 picion. Harmodius and Aristogeiton were to be- 
 gin the attack, and the rest were immediately to 
 
 33 a SHKBT Fot R
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 join in, and engage with the guards. The plot had 
 been communicated to a few only, the better to 
 avoid detection ; but they hoped that, however few 
 struck the blow, the crowd who would be armed, 
 although not in the secret, would at once rise and 
 assist in the recovery of their own liberties. 
 
 "The day of the festival arrived, and Hippias 
 went out of the city to the place called the Cerami- 
 cus, where he was occupied with his guards in 
 marshalling the procession. Harmodius and 
 Aristogeiton, who were ready with their daggers, 
 stepped forward to do the deed. But seeing one 
 of the conspirators in familiar conversation with 
 Hippias, who was readily accessible to all, they 
 took alarm and imagined that they had been be- 
 trayed, and were on the point of being seized. 
 Whereupon they determined to take their revenge 
 first on the man who had outraged them and way 
 the cause of their desperate attempt. So they 
 rushed, just as they were, within the gates. They 
 found Hipparchus near the Leocorium, as it was 
 called, and then and there falling upon him with 
 all the blind fury, one of an injured lover, the other 
 of a man smarting under an insult, they smote and 
 slew him. The crowd ran together, and so Aristo- 
 geiton for the present escaped the guards ; but he 
 was afterwards taken, and not very gently handled 
 34
 
 &* Early World 
 
 * 
 
 (i.e., tortured]. Harmodius perished on the spot." 
 Tbuc: vi. 54-56, trans, by B. Jowett. 
 
 C T)HOCIS preserves from early times the mem- THE 
 JL ory of the union between Orestes and Pylades, STORY OF 
 who taking a god as witness of the passion between ORESTES 
 them, sailed through life together as though in one AND 
 boat. Both together put to death Klytemnestra, as PYLADES 
 though both were sons of Agamemnon ; and .fllgis- 
 thus was slain by both. Pylades suffered more than 
 his friend by the punishment which pursued Ores- 
 tes. He stood by him when condemned, nor did 
 they limit their tender friendship by the bounds of 
 Greece, but sailed to the furthest boundaries of the 
 Scythians the one sick, the other ministering to 
 him. When they had come into the Tauric land 
 straightway they were met by the matricidal fury ; 
 and while the barbarians were standing round in a 
 circle Orestes fell down and lay on the ground, 
 seized by his usual mania, while Pylades * wiped 
 away the foam, tended his body, and covered him 
 with his well-woven cloak' acting not only like a 
 lover but like a father. 
 
 "When it was determined that one should remain 
 to be put to death, and the other should go to My- 
 cenae to convey a letter, each wishes to remain for 
 the sake of the other, thinking that if he saves the 
 life of his friend he saves his own life. Orestes re- 
 
 35
 
 Friendship- Customs 
 
 fused to take the letter, saying that Pylades was 
 more worthy to carry it, acting more like the lover 
 than the beloved. 'For,' he said/the slaying of this 
 man would be a great grief to me, as I am the cause 
 of these misfortunes.' And he added, 'Give the 
 tablet to him, for (turning to Pylades) I will send 
 thee to Argos, in order that it may be well with 
 thee ; as for me, let anyone kill me who desires it.' 
 "Such love is always like that; for when from boy- 
 hood a serious love has grown up and it becomes 
 adult at the age of reason, the long-loved object re- 
 turns reciprocal affection, and it is hard to deter- 
 mine which is the lover of which, for as from a 
 mirror the affection of the lover is reflected from 
 the beloved." 'Trans, from Lucians Amores, by W. 
 J. Baylis. 
 
 IAMON and Phintias, initiates in the Pytha- 
 gorean mysteries, contracted so faithful a 
 friendship towards each other, that when Dionysius 
 of Syracuse intended to execute one of them, and 
 he had obtained permission from the tyrant to re- 
 turn home and arrange his affairs before his death, 
 "For the two men the other did not hesitate to give himself up as a 
 1V had "their posses- pledge of his friend's return." He whose neck had 
 sions in common." been in danger was now free ; and he who might 
 
 T A/* Ji /J ^ ^ 
 
 Vita Pytfagora ^ ave lived in safety was now in danger of death. So 
 bk. i. ch. 33. everybody, and especially Dionysius, were won- 
 
 36 
 
 D
 
 Pagan & Early W^orld 
 
 o / 
 
 dering what would be the upshot of this novel and THE 
 dubious affair. At last, when the day fixed was close STORY OF 
 at hand, and he had not returned, everyone con- DAMON 
 demned the one who stood security, for his stupid- AND 
 ity and rashness. But he insisted that he had no- PYTHIAS 
 thing to fear in the matter of his friend's constancy. (OR 
 And indeed at the same moment and the hour fixed PHINTIAS) 
 by Dionysius, he who had received leave, returned. 
 The tyrant, admiring the courage of both, remitted 
 the sentence which had so tried their loyalty, and 
 asked them besides to receive him in the bonds of 
 their friendship, saying that he would make his 
 third place in their affection agreeable by his utmost 
 goodwill and effort. Such indeed are the powers of 
 friendship : to breed contempt of death, to overcome 
 the sweet desire of life, to humanise cruelty, to turn 
 hate into love, to compensate punishment by lar- 
 gess ; to which powers almost as much veneration 
 is due as to the cult of the immortal gods. For if 
 with these rests the public safety, on those does pri- 
 vate happiness depend ; and as the temples are the 
 sacred domiciles of these, so of those are the loyal 
 hearts of men as it were the shrines consecrated by 
 some holy spirit." Valerius Maximus y bk. iv. ch. 7. 
 De Amiciti< Vinculo. 
 
 37
 
 II. 
 
 The Vlace of Friendship in 
 Greek Life & Thought
 
 The Place of Friendship in 
 Greek Life & Thought 
 
 J o 
 
 iHE extent to which the idea of friend- 
 ship (in a quite romantic sense) pen- 
 etrated the Greek mind is a thing very 
 difficult for us to realise ; and some 
 modern critics entirely miss this point. They laud 
 the Greek culture to the skies, extolling the warlike 
 bravery of the people, their enthusiastic political and 
 social sentiment, their wonderful artistic sense, and 
 so forth ; and at the same time speak of the stress 
 they laid on friendship as a little peculiarity of no 
 particular importance not seeing that the latter was 
 the chief source of their bravery and independence, 
 one of the main motives of their art, and so far an or- 
 ganic part of their whole polity that it is difficult to 
 imagine the one without the other. The Greeks
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 themselves never made this mistake ; and their liter- 
 ature abounds with references to the romantic attach- 
 ment as the great inspiration of political and individ- 
 ual life. Plato, himself, may almost be said to have 
 founded his philosophy on this sentiment. 
 
 Nothing is more surprising to the modern than 
 to find Plato speaking, page after page, of Love, as 
 the safeguard of states and the tutoress of philoso- 
 phy, and then to discover that what we call love, i.e., 
 the love between man and woman, is not meant at all 
 scarcely comes within his consideration but only 
 the love between men what we should call roman- 
 tic friendship. His ideal of this latter love is ascetic ; 
 it is an absorbing passion, but it is held in strong con- 
 trol. The other love the love of women is for 
 him a mere sensuality. In this, to some extent, lies 
 the explanation of his philosophical position. 
 
 But it is evident that in this fact in the fact that 
 among the Greeks the love of women was considered 
 for the most part sensual, while the romance of love 
 went to the account of friendship, we have the 
 strength and the weakness of the Greek civilisation. 
 
 42
 
 in Greek Life & Thought 
 
 J o 
 
 Strength, because by the recognition everywhere of 
 romantic comradeship, public and private life was 
 filled by a kind of divine fire ; weakness, because by 
 the non-recognition of woman's equal part in such 
 comradeship, her saving, healing, and redeeming in- 
 fluence was lost, and the Greek culture doomed to be 
 to that extent one-sided. It will, we may hope, be 
 the great triumph of the modern love (when it be- 
 comes more of a true comradeship between man and 
 woman than it yet is) to give both to society and to 
 the individual the grandest inspirations, and perhaps 
 in conjunction with the other attachment, to lift the 
 modern nations to a higher level of political and ar- 
 tistic advancement than even the Greeks attained. 
 I quote one or two modern writers on the subject, 
 and then some passages from Plato and others indi- 
 cating the philosophy of friendship as entertained 
 among the Greeks. 
 
 43
 
 Place of Friendship 
 JISHOP THIRLWALL, that excel- 
 lent thinker and scholar, in his History 
 of Greece (vol. i, p. 176) says: 
 
 BISHOP ypt^i@ "f\NE of the noblest and most am- 
 TH1RL- ** Q ^ \J iable sides of the Greek char- 
 WALL ON acter is the readiness with which it lent itself to con- 
 GREEK struct intimate and durable friendships ; and this is 
 FRIEND- a feature no less prominent in the earliest than in 
 SHIP the latest times. It was indeed connected with the 
 comparatively low estimation in which female so- 
 ciety was held ; but the devotedness and constancy 
 with which these attachments were maintained was 
 not the less admirable and engaging. The heroic 
 companions whom we find celebrated, partly by 
 Homer and partly in traditions, which if not of 
 equal antiquity were grounded on the same feeling, 
 seem to have but one heart and soul, with scarcely 
 a wish or object apart, and only to live, as they are 
 always ready to die, for one another. It is true that 
 the relation between them is not always one of 
 perfect equality : but this is a circumstance which, 
 while it often adds a peculiar charm to the poetical 
 description, detracts little from the dignity of the 
 idea which it presents. Such were the friendships of 
 Hercules and lolaus, of Theseus and Pirithous, of 
 Orestes and Pylades : and though these may owe 
 
 44
 
 in Greek Life P Thought 
 
 the greater part of their fame to the later epic or 
 even dramatic poetry, the moral groundwork un- 
 doubtedly subsisted in the period to which the tra- 
 dition referred. The argument of the Iliad mainly 
 turns on the affection of Achilles for Patroclus 
 whose love for the greater hero is only tempered by 
 reverence for his higher birth and his unequalled 
 prowess. But the mutual regard which united 
 Idomeneus and Meriones, Diomedes and Sthene- 
 lus though, as the persons themselves are less im- 
 portant, it is kept more in the background is 
 manifestly viewed by the poet in the same light. 
 The idea of a Greek hero seems not to have beeTT 
 thought complete, without such a brother in arms 
 by his side." 
 
 The following is from Ludwig Frey (Der Eroiund 
 die Kunst, p. 33) : 
 
 " T ET it then be repeated : love for a youth was COM- 
 
 J-/ for the Greeks something sacred, and can on- PARED 
 
 ly be compared with our German homage to TO 
 
 women say the chivalric love of mediaeval times.'* CHIVALRY 
 
 LOWES DICKINSON, in his Greek 
 View of Life, noting the absence of ro- 
 mance in the relations between men 
 and women of that civilisation, says : 
 45
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 EDUCA-T^TEVERTHELESS, it would be a mistake to 
 TIONAL i. l| conclude, from these conditions, that the ele- 
 AND POL- ment of romance was absent from Greek life. The 
 ITICAL fact is simply that with them it took a different 
 VALUE form, that of passionate friendship between men. 
 Such friendships, of course, occur in all nations and 
 at all times, but among the Greeks they were, we 
 might say, an institution. Their ideal was the de- 
 velopment and education of the younger by the 
 older man, and in this view they were recognised 
 and approved by custom and law as an important 
 factor in the state." Greek View of Life, p. 167. 
 
 IO much indeed were the Greeks impressed with 
 the manliness of this passion, with its power to 
 prompt to high thought and heroic action, that 
 some of the best of them set the love of man for 
 man far above that of man for woman. The one, 
 they maintained, was primarily of the spirit, the 
 other primarily of the flesh; the one bent upon sha- 
 ping to the type of all manly excellence both the 
 body and the soul of the beloved, the other upon a 
 passing pleasure of the senses." Ibid, p. 172. 
 
 The following are some remarks of J. A. Symonds 
 on the same subject : 
 
 PARTLY owing to the social habits of their 
 cities, and partly to the peculiar notions which 
 
 "S" 
 
 p 

 
 in Greek Life & Thought 
 
 v J c* 
 
 they entertained regarding the seclusion of free RELATION 
 women in the home, all the higher elements of TO 
 spiritual and mental activity, and the conditions WOMEN 
 under which a generous passion was conceivable, 
 had become the exclusive privileges of men. It was 
 not that women occupied a semi-servile station, as 
 some students have imagined, or that within the 
 sphere of the household they were not the respec- 
 ted and trusted helpmates of men. But circum- 
 stances rendered it impossible for them to excite 
 romantic and enthusiastic passion. The exaltation 
 of the emotions was reserved for the male sex." 
 A Problem in Greek Ethics, p. 68. 
 
 And he continues : 
 
 "OOCRATES therefore sought to direct and J. A. SYM- 
 Omoralise a force already existing. In the Pbxdrus ONDS 
 he describes the passion of love between man and ON 
 boy as a * mania, not different in quality from that SOCRATES 
 which inspires poets ; and after painting that fervid 
 picture of the lover, he declares that the true object 
 of a noble life can only be attained by passionate 
 friends, bound together in the chains of close yet 
 temperate comradeship, seeking always to advance 
 in knowledge, self-restraint, and intellectual illu- 
 mination. The doctrine of the Symposium is not dif- 
 ferent, except that Socrates here takes a higher 
 
 47
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 flight. The same love is treated as the method 
 whereby the soul may begin her mystic journey to 
 the region of essential beauty, truth, and goodness. 
 It has frequently been remarked that Plato's dia- 
 logues have to be read as poems even more than as 
 philosophical treatises; and if this be true at all, it is 
 particularly true of both the Ph<edrus and the Sym- 
 posium. The lesson which both essays seem inten- 
 ded to inculcate, is this : love, like poetry and pro- 
 phecy, is a divine gift, which diverts men from the 
 common current of their lives ; but in the right use 
 of this gift lies the secret of all human excellence. 
 The passion which grovels in the filth of sensual 
 grossness may be transformed into a glorious en- 
 enthusiasm, a winged splendour, capable of soaring 
 the contemplation of eternal verities." 
 
 N the Symposium or Banquet of Plato 
 (8.0.428 B.C. 347), a supper party is 
 supposed, at which a discussion on 
 love and friendship takes place. The 
 friends present speak in turn the enthusiastic 
 Phaedrus,the clear-headed Pausanias, the grave doc- 
 tor Eryximachus, the comic and acute Aristophanes, 
 the young poet Agathon ; Socrates, tantalising, sug- 
 gestive, and quoting the profound sayings of the 
 
 48
 
 in Greek Life & "Thought 
 prophetess Diotima; and Alcibiades, drunk, and 
 quite ready to drink more ; each in his turn, out 
 of the fulness of his heart, speaks ; and thus in this 
 most dramatic dialogue we have love discussed from 
 every point of view, and with insight, acumen, ro- 
 mance and humour unrivalled. 
 
 Phsedrus and Pausanias, in the two following 
 quotations, take the line which perhaps most thor- 
 oughly represents the public opinion of the day as 
 to the value of friendship in nurturing a spirit of 
 honour and freedom, especially in matters military 
 and political : 
 ttr inHUS numerous are the witnesses who ac- FROM THE 
 
 -L knowledge love to be the eldest of the gods. SPEECH 
 And not only is he the eldest, he is also the source QF 
 of the greatest benefits to us. For I know not any PHJEDRUS 
 greater blessing to a young man beginning life j]\j THE 
 than a virtuous lover, or to the lover than a be- SYMPOS- 
 loved youth. For the principle which ought to be 
 the guide of men who would nobly live that prin- 
 ciple, I say, neither kindred, nor honour, nor 
 wealth, nor any other motive is able to implant so 
 well as love. Of what am I speaking? of the sense 
 of honour and dishonour, without which neither 
 
 49 a SHKET Fivu
 
 Tlace of Friendship 
 
 states nor individuals ever do any good or great 
 work. And I say that a lover who is detected in do- 
 ing any dishonorable act, or submitting through 
 cowardice when any dishonour is done to him by 
 another, will be more pained at being detected by 
 his beloved than at being seen by his father, or 
 by his companions, or by anyone else. The beloved 
 too, when he is seen in any disgraceful situation, 
 has the same feeling about his lover. And if there 
 were only some way of contriving that a state or an 
 army should be made up of lovers and their loves, 
 they would be the very best governors of their own 
 city, abstaining from all dishonour, and emulating 
 one another in honour ; and when fighting at one 
 another's side, although a mere handful, they 
 would overcome the world. For what lover would 
 not choose rather to be seen by all mankind than 
 by his beloved, either when abandoning his post or 
 throwing away his arms ? He would be ready to die 
 a thousand deaths rather than endure this. Or who 
 would desert his beloved, or fail him in the hour of 
 danger ? The veriest coward would become an in- 
 spired hero, equal to the bravest, at such a time ; 
 love would inspire him. That courage which, as 
 Homer says, the god breathes into the soul of 
 heroes, love of his own nature infuses into the 
 lover." Symposium of Plato, trans. B. Jowett. 
 
 50
 
 in Greek^ Life $f Thought 
 
 " T N Ionia and other places, and generally in coun- SPEECH 
 JL tries which are subject to the barbarians, the OF 
 custom is held to be dishonorable ; loves of youths PAUSAN1 AS 
 share the evil repute of philosophy and gymnas- 
 tics, because they are inimical to tyranny ; for the 
 interests of rulers require that their subjects should 
 be poor in spirit, and that there should be no strong 
 bond of friendship or society among them, which 
 love above all other motives is likely to inspire, as 
 our Athenian tyrants learned by experience." Ibid. 
 
 JRISTOPHANES goes more deeply 
 into the nature of this love of which 
 they are speaking. He says it is a 
 profound reality a deep and inti- 
 mate union, abiding after death, and making of the 
 lovers "one departed soul instead of two." But in 
 order to explain his allusion to "the other half" it 
 must be premised that in the earlier part of his speech 
 he has in a serio-comic vein pretended that human 
 beings were originally constructed double, with four 
 legs, four arms, etc. ; but that as a punishment for 
 their sins Zeus divided them perpendicularly, "as 
 folk cut eggs before they salt them," the males into 
 
 51 
 
 Of 
 LIBRARY
 
 VI ace of Friendship 
 
 two parts, the females into two, and the hermaphro- 
 dites likewise into two since when, these divided 
 people have ever pursued their lost halves, and 
 "thrown their arms around and embraced each 
 other, seeking to grow together again." And so, 
 speaking of those who were originally males, he says: 
 
 A ND these when they grow up are our states- 
 \. men, and these only, which is a great proof of 
 the truth of what I am saying. And when they reach 
 manhood they are lovers of youth, and are not 
 naturally inclined to marry or beget children, which 
 they do, if at all, only in obedience to the law, but 
 they are satisfied if they may be allowed to live with 
 one another unwedded ; and such a nature is prone 
 to love and ready to return love, always embracing 
 that which is akin to him. And when one of them 
 finds his other half, whether he be a lover of youth 
 or a lover of another sort, the pair are lost in an 
 amazement of love and friendship and intimacy, 
 and one will not be out of the other's sight, as I may 
 say, even for a moment : they will pass their whole 
 lives together ; yet they could not explain what 
 they desire of one another. For the intense yearn- 
 ing that each of them has towards the other does 
 not appear to be the desire of lovers' intercourse,
 
 in Greek^ Life & Thought 
 
 but of something else which the soul of either evi- 
 dently desires and cannot tell, and of which she 
 only has a dark and doubtful presentiment. Sup- 
 pose Hephaestus, with his instruments, to come to 
 the pair who are lying side by side and say to them, 
 'What do you people want of one another?' they 
 would be unable to explain. And suppose further 
 that when he saw their perplexity he said : 'Do you 
 desire to be wholly one ; always day and night to be 
 in one another's company ? for if this is what you 
 desire, I am ready to melt you into one and let you 
 grow together, so that being two you shall become 
 one, and while you live, live a common life as if 
 you were a single man, and after your death in the 
 world below still be one departed soul instead of 
 two I ask whether this is what you lovingly de- 
 sire, and whether you are satisfied to attain this ?' 
 there is not a man of them who when he heard the 
 proposal would deny or would not acknowledge 
 that this meeting and melting in one another's 
 arms, this becoming one instead of two, was the 
 very expression of his ancient need." Ibid. 
 
 ^OCRATES, in his speech, and es- 
 pecially in the later portion of it where 
 he quotes his supposed tutoress Di- 
 otima, carries the argument up to its 
 53
 
 *Place of Friendship 
 
 highest issue. After contending for the essentially 
 creative, generative nature of love, not only in the 
 Body but in the Soul, he proceeds to say that it is not 
 so much the seeking of a lost half which causes the 
 creative impulse in lovers, as the fact that in our 
 mortal friends we are contemplating (though un- 
 consciously) an image of the Essential and Divine 
 Beauty ; it is this that affects us with that wonderful 
 "mania," and lifts us into the region where we be- 
 come creators. And he follows on to the conclusion 
 that it is by wisely and truly loving our visible 
 friends that at last, after long long experience, there 
 dawns upon us the vision of that Absolute Beauty 
 which by mortal eyes must ever remain unseen : 
 
 SPEECH "TTE who has been instructed thus far in the 
 OF X JL things of love, and who has learned to see 
 SOCRATES the beautiful in due order and succession, when he 
 comes towards the end will suddenly perceive a 
 nature of wondrous beauty .... beauty absolute, 
 separate, simple and everlasting, which without 
 diminution and without increase, or any change, is 
 imparted to the evergrowing and perishing beau- 
 ties of all other things. He who, from these ascen- 
 
 54
 
 in Greek Life & Thought 
 
 J o 
 
 ding under the influence of true love, begins to 
 perceive that beauty, is not far from the end." Ibid. 
 
 This is indeed the culmination, for Plato, of all 
 existence the ascent into the presence of that end- 
 less Beauty of which all fair mortal things are but the 
 mirrors. But to condense this great speech of So- 
 crates is impossible ; only to persistent and careful 
 reading (if even then) will it yield up all its treasures. 
 N the dialogue named Pb^drus the 
 same idea is worked out, only to some 
 extent in reverse order. As in the 
 Symposium the lover by rightly loving 
 atlast rises to the vision of the Supreme Beauty ; so 
 in the Pb<edrus it is explained that in reality every 
 soul has at some time seen that Vision (at the time, 
 namely, of its true initiation, when it was indeed 
 winged) but has forgotten it ; and that it is the 
 dim reminiscence of that Vision, constantly working 
 within us, which guides us to our earthly loves and 
 renders their effect upon us so transporting. Long 
 ago, in some other condition of being, we saw 
 Beauty herself: 
 
 55
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 SOCRAT LS T) UT of beauty, I repeat again that we saw her 
 IN THE JD there shining in company with the celestial 
 
 PH.5DDRUS forms ; and coming to earth we find her here too, 
 shining in clearness through the clearest aperture 
 of sense. For sight is the keenest of our bodily sen- 
 ses ; though not by that is wisdom seen ; her love- 
 liness would have been transporting if there had 
 been a visible image of her, and the same is true of 
 the loveliness of the other ideas as well. But this is 
 the privilege of beauty, that she is the loveliest and 
 also the most palpable to sight. Now he who is not 
 newly initiated, or who has become corrupted, does 
 not easily rise out of this world to the sight of 
 true beauty in the other; he looks only at her 
 earthly namesake, and instead of being awed at the 
 sight of her, like a brutish beast he rushes on to 
 enjoy and beget ; he consorts with wantonness, and 
 is not afraid or ashamed of pursuing pleasure in 
 violation of nature. But he whose initiation is re- 
 cent, and who has been the spectator of many 
 glories in the other world, is amazed when he sees 
 anyone having a god-like face or form, which is the 
 expression of Divine Beauty; and at first a shudder 
 runs through him, and again the old awe steals 
 over him ; then looking upon the face of his be- 
 loved as of a god he reverences him, and if he were 
 not afraid of being thought a downright madman, 
 
 56
 
 in Greek Life & Thought 
 j <5 
 
 he would sacrifice to his beloved as to the image 
 of a god." The Pb<edrus of Plato, trans. B. Jowett. 
 
 And again : 
 
 ' A ND so the beloved who, like a god, has re- 
 <L\. ceived every true and loyal service from his 
 lover, not in pretence but in reality, being also 
 himself of a nature friendly to his admirer, if in for- 
 mer days he has blushed to own his passion and 
 turned away his lover, because his youthful com- 
 panions or others slanderously told him that he 
 would be disgraced, now as years advance, at the 
 appointed age and time, is led to receive him into 
 communion. For fate which has ordained that 
 there shall be no friendship among the evil has also 
 ordained that there shall ever be friendship among 
 the good. And when he has received him into com- 
 munion and intimacy, then the beloved is amazed 
 at the goodwill of the lover ; he recognises that the 
 inspired friend is worth all other friendships or 
 kinships, which have nothing of friendship in 
 them in comparison. And when this feeling con- 
 tinues and he is nearer to him and embraces him, 
 in gymnastic exercises and at other times of meet- 
 ing, then does the fountain of that stream, which 
 Zeus when he was in love with Ganymede named 
 desire, overflow upon the lover, and some enters 
 
 SI
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 into his soul, and some when he is filled flows out 
 again ; and as a breeze or an echo rebounds from 
 the smooth rocks and returns whence it came, so 
 does the stream of beauty, passing the eyes which 
 are the natural doors and windows of the soul, re- 
 turn again to the beautiful one ; there arriving and 
 quickening the passages of the wings, watering 
 them and inclining them to grow, and filling the 
 soul of the beloved also with love." Ibid. 
 
 For Plato the real power which ever moves the 
 soul is this reminiscence of the Beauty which exists 
 before all worlds. In the actual world the soul lives 
 but in anguish, an exile from her true home ; but in 
 the presence of her friend, who reveals the Divine, 
 she is loosed from her suffering and comes to her 
 haven of rest. 
 
 SOCRATES " A ND wherever she [the soul] thinks that she 
 ** 
 
 IN THE ** w ^ b eno ld the beautiful one, thither in her 
 PHjEDRUS desire she runs. And when she has seen him, and 
 bathed herself with the waters of desire, her con- 
 straint is loosened, and she is refreshed, and has no 
 more pangs and pains ; and this is the sweetest of 
 all pleasures at the time, and is the reason why the 
 soul of the lover will never forsake his beautiful 
 one, whom he esteems above all ; he has forgotten 
 
 58
 
 in Greek Life & Thought 
 
 mother and brethren and companions, and he 
 thinks nothing of the neglect and loss of his pro- 
 perty ; the rules and proprieties of life, on which 
 he formerly prided himself, he now despises, and 
 is ready to sleep like a servant, wherever he is 
 allowed, as near as he can to his beautiful one, who 
 is not only the object of his worship, but the only 
 physician who can heal him in his extreme agony." 
 Ibid. 
 
 another time, in the Banquet of 
 Xenophon, Socrates is again made 
 to speak at length on the subject of 
 Love though not in so inspired a 
 strain as in Plato : 
 
 "HP^RULY, to speak for one, I never remember THE 
 
 J. the time when I was not in love ; I know too BANQUET 
 that Charmides has had a great many lovers, and OF 
 being much beloved has loved again. As for XENO- 
 Critobulus, he is still of an age to love, and to be PHON 
 beloved ; and Nicerates too, who loves so passion- 
 ately his wife, at least as report goes, is equally be- 
 loved by her. . . . And as for you, Callias, you love, 
 as well as the rest of us ; for who is it that is igno- 
 rant of your love for Autolycus ? It is the town- 
 talk ; and foreigners, as well as our citizens, are 
 59
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 acquainted with it. The reason for your loving 
 him, I believe to be that you are both born of illus- 
 trious families; and at the same time are both 
 possessed of personal qualities that render you yet 
 more illustrious. For me, I always admired the 
 sweetness and evenness of your temper ; but much 
 more when I consider that your passion for Auto- 
 lycus is placed on a person who has nothing luxu- 
 rious or affected in him ; but in all things shows 
 a vigour and temperance worthy of a virtuous 
 soul ; which is a proof at the same time that if he 
 is infinitely beloved, he deserves to be so. I con- 
 fess indeed I am not firmly persuaded whether 
 there be but one Venus or two, the celestial and 
 the vulgar; and it may be with this goddess, as 
 with Jupiter, who has many different names 
 though there is still but one Jupiter. But I know 
 very well that both the Venuses have quite 
 different altars, temples and sacrifices. The vulgar 
 Venus is worshipped after a common negligent 
 manner; whereas the celestial one is adored in 
 purity and sanctity of life. The vulgar inspires 
 mankind with the love of the body only, but the 
 celestial fires the mind with the love or the soul, 
 with friendship, and a generous thirst after noble 
 actions. . . . Nor is it hard to prove, Callias, that 
 gods and heroes have always had more passion and 
 60
 
 in Greek Life & Thought 
 
 J o 
 
 esteem for the charms of the soul, than those of the 
 body : at least this seems to have been the opinion 
 of our ancient authors. For we may observe in the 
 fables of antiquity that Jupiter, who loved several 
 mortals on account of their personal beauty only, 
 never conferred upon them immortality. Where- 
 as it was otherwise with Hercules, Castor, Pollux, 
 and several others ; for having admired and ap- 
 plauded the greatness of their courage and the 
 beauty of their minds, he enrolled them in the 
 number of the gods. . . . You are then infinitely 
 obliged to the gods, Callias, who have inspired you 
 with love and friendship for Autolycus, as they 
 have inspired Critobulus with the same for Aman- 
 dra ; for real and pure friendship knows no differ- 
 ence in sexes." Banquet of Xenophon viii. 
 
 AUTARCH, who wrote in the first 
 century A.D. (nearly 500 years after 
 Plato), carried on the tradition of his 
 master, though with an admixture of 
 later influences ; and philosophised about friend- 
 ship, on the basis of true love being a reminiscence. 
 
 " r I \HE rainbow is I suppose a reflection caused 
 JL by the sun's rays falling on a moist cloud, 
 making us think the appearance is in the cloud. 
 61
 
 Place of Friendship 
 
 PLU- Similarly erotic fancy in the case of noble souls 
 TARCH causes a reflection of the memory from things 
 PHILOSO- which here appear and are called beautiful to what 
 PHISES is really divine and lovely and felicitous and won- 
 derful. But most lovers pursuing and groping 
 after the semblance of beauty in youths and wo- 
 men, as in mirrors," can derive nothing more cer- 
 tain than pleasure mixed with pain. And this 
 seems the love-delirium of Ixion, who instead of 
 the joy he desired embraced only a cloud, as chil- 
 dren who desire to take the rainbow into their 
 hands, clutching at whatever they see. But differ- 
 ent is the behaviour of the noble and chaste lover : 
 for he reflects on the divine beauty that can only be 
 felt, while he uses the beauty of the visible body 
 only as an organ of the memory, though he em- 
 braces it and loves it, and associating with it is still 
 more inflamed in mind. And so neither in the body 
 do they sit ever gazing at and desiring this light, 
 nor after death do they return to this world again, 
 and skulk and loiter about the doors and bed- 
 chambers of newly-married people, disagreeable 
 ghosts of pleasure-loving and sensual men and 
 women, who do not rightly deserve the name of 
 
 "For now we see by means of a mirror darkly (lit. enigmatically); 
 but then face to face ; now I know in part ; but then shall I know even 
 as also I am known." I Cor. xiii. 12. 
 
 62
 
 in Greek Life @P Thought 
 
 lovers. For the true lover, when he has got into the 
 other world and associated with beauties as much 
 as is lawful, has wings and is initiated and passes 
 his time above in the presence of his Deity, dan- 
 cing and waiting upon him, until he goes back to 
 the meadows of the Moon and Aphrodite, and 
 sleeping there commences a new existence. But 
 this is a subject too high for the present occasion." 
 Plutarch's Eroticus xx. trans. Bohns Classics.
 
 III. 
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 among Greeks & Romans 
 
 a SHEET Six
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 among Greeks & Romans 
 
 HE fact, already mentioned, that the 
 romance of love among the Greeks 
 was chiefly felt towards male friends, 
 naturally led to their poetry being 
 largely inspired by friendship ; and Greek literature 
 contains such a great number of poems of this sort, 
 that I have thought it worth while to dedicate the 
 main portion of the following section to quotations 
 from them. No translations of course can do justice 
 to the beauty of the originals, but the few specimens 
 given may help to illustrate the depth and tender- 
 ness as well as the temperance and sobriety which 
 on the whole characterised Greek feeling on this 
 subject, at any rate during the best period of Hel- 
 lenic culture. The remainder of the section is devo- 
 ted to Roman poetry of the time of the Caesars. 
 
 6?
 
 'Poetry of Friendship 
 
 It is not always realised that the Iliad of Homer 
 turns upon the motive of friendship, but the ex- 
 tracts immediately following will perhaps make this 
 clear. E. F. M. Benecke in his Position of Women in 
 Greek Poetry (p. 76) says of the Iliad: 
 
 MOTIVE " T T is a story of which the main motive is the love 
 
 OF A of Achilles for Patroclus. This solution is as- 
 
 HOMER'S toundingly simple, and yet it took me so long to 
 
 ILIAD bring myself to accept it that I am quite ready to 
 
 forgive anyone who feels a similar hesitation. But 
 
 those who do accept it cannot fail to observe, on 
 
 further consideration, how thoroughly suitable a 
 
 motive of this kind would be in a national Greek 
 
 epic. For this is the motive running through the 
 
 whole of Greek life, till that life was transmuted by 
 
 the influence of Macedonia. The lover-warriors 
 
 Achilles and Patroclus are the direct spiritual 
 
 ancestors of the sacred Band of Thebans, who died 
 
 to a man on the field of Chaeronaea." 
 
 The following two quotations are from The Greek 
 Poets by J. A. Symonds, ch. iii. p. 80 et seq. : 
 
 "'"T^VHE Iliad therefore has for its whole subject 
 
 A the passion of Achilles that ardent energy 
 
 or fiJjvtg of the hero which displayed itself first as 
 
 anger against Agamemnon, and afterwards as love 
 
 68
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 for the lost Patroclus. The truth of this was per- j. A. SYM- 
 
 ceived by one of the greatest poets and profoundest ONDS 
 
 critics of the modern world, Dante. When Dante, ON THE 
 
 in the Inferno^ wished to describe Achilles, he SAME 
 wrote, with characteristic brevity : 
 
 "Achille 
 Che per amore al fine combatteo." 
 
 ("Achilles 
 Who at the last was brought to fight by love.") 
 
 "In this pregnant sentence Dante sounded the 
 whole depth of the Iliad. The wrath of Achilles for 
 Agamemnon, which prevented him at first from 
 fighting ; the love of Achilles, passing the love of 
 women, for Patroclus, which induced him to fore- 
 go his anger and to fight at last ; these are the two 
 poles on which the Iliad turns." 
 
 After his quarrel with Agamemnon, not even all 
 the losses of the Greeks and the entreaties of Aga- 
 memnon himself will induce Achilles to fight not 
 till Patroclus is slain by Hector Patroclus, his dear 
 friend "whom above all my comrades I honoured, 
 even as myself." Then he rises up, dons his armour, 
 and driving the Trojans before him revenges him- 
 self on the body of Hector. But Patroclus lies yet
 
 Voetry of Friendship 
 
 unburied ; and when the fighting is over, to Achilles 
 comes the ghost of his dead friend : 
 
 ACHILLES "HpHE son of Peleus, by the shore of the roaring 
 
 AND A sea lay, heavily groaning, surrounded by his 
 
 PATRO- Myrmidons ; on a fair space of sand he lay, where 
 
 CLUS the waves lapped the beach. Then slumber took 
 
 him, loosing the cares of his heart, and mantling 
 
 softly around him, for sorely wearied were his 
 
 radiant limbs with driving Hector on by windy 
 
 Troy. There to him came the soul of poor Patro- 
 
 clus, in all things like himself, in stature, and in the 
 
 beauty of his eyes and voice, and on the form was 
 
 raiment like his own. He stood above the hero's 
 
 head, and spake to him : 
 
 '"Sleepest thou, and me hast thou forgotten, 
 Achilles ? Not in my life wert thou neglectful of 
 me, but in death. Bury me soon, that I may pass 
 the gates of Hades. Far off the souls, the shadows 
 of the dead, repel me, nor suffer me to join them 
 on the river bank ; but, as it is, thus I roam around 
 the wide-doored house of Hades. But stretch to 
 me thy hand I entreat ; for never again shall I re- 
 turn from Hades when once ye shall have given 
 me the meed of funeral fire. Nay, never shall we 
 sit in life apart from our dear comrades and take 
 counsel together. But me hath hateful fate envel- 
 70
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 oped fate that was mine at the moment of 
 my birth. And for thyself, divine Achilles, it is 
 doomed to die beneath the noble Trojan's wall. 
 Another thing I say to thee, and bid thee do it if 
 thou wilt obey me : lay not my bones apart from 
 thine, Achilles, but lay them together ; for we were 
 brought up together in your house, when Mence- 
 tius brought me, a child, from Opus to your house, 
 because of woeful bloodshed on the day in which 
 I slew the son of Amphidamas, myself a child, not 
 willing it but in anger at our games. Then did the 
 horseman, Peleus, take me, and rear me in his 
 house, and cause me to be called thy squire. So 
 then let one grave also hide the bones of both of us, 
 the golden urn thy goddess-mother gave to thee.' 
 "Him answered swift-footed Achilles: 
 'Why, dearest and most honoured, hast thou 
 hither come, to lay on me this thy behest? All 
 things most certainly will I perform, and bow to 
 what thou biddest. But stand thou near: even for 
 one moment let us throw our arms upon each 
 other's neck, and take our fill of sorrowful wailing.' 
 "So spake he, and with his outstretched hands he 
 clasped, but could not seize. The spirit, earthward, 
 like smoke, vanished with a shriek. Then all as- 
 tonished arose Achilles, and beat his palms to- 
 gether, and spake a piteous word : 
 
 7*
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 'Heavens ! is there then, among the dead, soul 
 and the shade of life, but thought is theirs no more 
 at all ? For through the night the soul of poor Pat- 
 roclus stood above my head, waiting and sorrowing 
 loud, and bade me do his will; it was the very 
 semblance of himself/ 
 
 "So spake he, and in the hearts of all of them he 
 raised desire of lamentation ; and while they were 
 yet mourning, to them appeared rose-fingered 
 dawn about the piteous corpse." Iliad, xxiii. 
 59 et seq. 
 
 LATO in the Symposium dwells ten- 
 derly on this relation between Ach- 
 illes and Patroclus : 
 [ A ND great] "was the reward of 
 
 AROVF "^^ t ^ ie true ^ ove ^ Achilles to ~ 
 
 ' wards his lover Patroclus his lover and not his 
 love (the notion that Patroclus was the beloved 
 one is a foolish error into which .ZEschylus has fal- 
 len, for Achilles was surely the fairer of the two, 
 fairer also than all the other heroes; and, as 
 Homer informs us, he was still beardless, and 
 younger far). And greatly as the gods honour the 
 virtue of love, still the return of love on the part of 
 the beloved to the lover is more admired and 
 valued and rewarded by them, for the lover has a 
 72
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 nature more divine and worthy of worship. Now 
 Achilles was quite aware, for he had been told by 
 his mother, that he might avoid death and return 
 home, and live to a good old age, if he abstained 
 from slaying Hector. Nevertheless he gave his life 
 to revenge his friend, and dared to die, not only on 
 his behalf, but after his death. Wherefore the 
 gods honoured him even above Alcestis, and sent 
 him to the Islands of the Blest." Symposium, speech 
 ofPhtedrus, trans, by B. Jowett. 
 
 And on this passage Symonds has the following 
 note : 
 
 "T)LATO, discussing the Myrmidones of JEs- CRITI- 
 jL chylus, remarks in the Symposium that the CISM OF 
 tragic poet was wrong to make Achilles the lover PLATO'S 
 of Patroclus, seeing that Patroclus was the elder of VIEW 
 the two, and that Achilles was the youngest and 
 most beautiful of all the Greeks. The fact however 
 is that Homer raises no question in our minds 
 about the relation of lover and beloved. Achilles 
 and Patroclus are comrades. Their friendship is 
 equal. It was only the reflective activity of the 
 Greek mind, working upon the Homeric legend 
 by the light of subsequent custom, which intro- 
 duced these distinctions." The Greek Poets y ch. iii. 
 p. 103. 
 
 73
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 From the time of Homer onwards, Greek litera- 
 ture was full of songs celebrating friendship : 
 
 ATHEN-" A ND in fact there was such emulation about 
 -IA. composing poems of this sort, and so far was 
 any one from thinking lightly of the amatory 
 poets, that ^Eschylus, who was a very great poet, 
 and Sophocles too introduced the subject or the 
 loves of men on the stage in their tragedies : the 
 one describing the love of Achilles for Patroclus, 
 and the other, in his Niobe, the mutual love of her 
 sons (on which account some have given an ill 
 name to that tragedy) ; and all such passages as 
 those are very agreeable to the spectators." Athen- 
 <eus y bk. xiii. ch. 75. 
 
 >NE of the earlier Greek poets was 
 Theognis (B.C. 550) whose Gnomae 
 or Maxims were a series of verses 
 mostly addressed to his young friend 
 Kurnus, whom by this means he sought to guide 
 and instruct out of the stores of his own riper ex- 
 perience. The verses are reserved and didactic for 
 the most part, but now and then, as in the following 
 passage, show deep underlying feeling : 
 
 74
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 *T O, I have given thee wings wherewith to fly FROM 
 A-/ Over the boundless ocean and the earth ; THEOG- 
 Yea, on the lips of many shalt thou lie 
 
 The comrade of their banquet and their mirth. 
 Youths in their loveliness shall make thee sound 
 
 Upon the silver flute's melodious breath ; 
 And when thou goest darkling underground 
 
 Down to the lamentable house of death, 
 Oh yet not then from honour shalt thou cease, 
 
 But wander, an imperishable name, 
 Kurnus, about the seas and shores of Greece, 
 
 Crossing from isle to isle the barren main. 
 Horses thou shalt not need, but lightly ride 
 
 Sped by the Muses of the violet crown, 
 And men to come, while earth and sun abide, 
 
 Who cherish song shall cherish thy renown. 
 Yea, I have given thee wings ! and in return 
 
 Thou givest me the scorn with which I burn.*' 
 
 Theognis Gnomai, lines 237-254, 
 trans, by G. Lowes Dickinson. 
 
 Theognis had his well-loved disci- 
 ples, so had the poetess Sappho (600 
 B.C.) Her devotion to her girl-friends 
 and companions is indeed proverbial. 
 
 75
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 SAPPHOXTTHAT Alcibiades and Charmides and Phse- 
 V V drus were to Socrates, Gyrinna and Atthis 
 and Anactoria were to the Lesbian." Max Tyrius, 
 quoted in H. T. Whartoris Sappho y p. 23. 
 
 Perhaps the few lines of Sappho, translated or 
 paraphrased by Catullus under the title To Lesbia, 
 form the most celebrated fragment of her extant 
 work. They may be roughly rendered thus : 
 
 TO"T)EER of all the gods unto me appeareth 
 LESBIA -I He of men who sitting beside thee heareth 
 Close at hand thy syllabled words sweet spoken, 
 Or loving laughter 
 
 That sweet laugh which flutters my heart and 
 
 bosom. 
 
 For, at sight of thee, in an instant fail me 
 Voice and speech, and under my skin there courses 
 Swiftly a thin flame ; 
 
 Darkness is on my eyes, in my ears a drumming, 
 Drenched in sweat my frame, my body trembling ; 
 Paler ev'n than grass 'tis, I doubt, but little 
 From death divides me." 
 
 76
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 iVERAL of the odes of Anacreon 
 (B.C. 520) are addressed to his young 
 friend Bathyllus. The following short 
 *one has been preserved to us by Ath- 
 enaeus (bk. xiii. 17): 
 
 "f\ BOY, with virgin-glancing eye, 
 V-/ I call thee, but thou dost not hear; 
 Thou know'st not how my soul doth cry BATHYL- 
 For thee, its charioteer." 
 
 Anacreon had not the passion and depth of Sap- 
 pho, but there is a mark of genuine feeling in some 
 of his poems, as in this simple little epigram : 
 
 |N their hindquarters horses PIGRAM 
 
 Are branded oft with fire, ON 
 
 And anyone knows a Parthian LOVERS 
 
 Because he wears a tiar; 
 And I at sight of lovers 
 
 Their nature can declare, 
 For in their hearts they too 
 Some subtle flame-mark bear.'* 
 
 The following fragment is from Pindar's Ode to 
 his young friend Theoxenos in whose arms Pin- 
 dar is said to have died (B.C. 442) : 
 
 77 
 
 o
 
 PINDAR 
 TO 
 
 THEOX- 
 ENOS 
 
 cc 
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 OSOUL, 'tis thine in season meet, 
 To pluck of love the blossom sweet, 
 
 When hearts are young : 
 But he who sees the blazing beams, 
 The light that from that forehead streams, 
 
 And is not stung ; 
 Who is not storm-tossed with desire, 
 Lo ! he, I ween, with frozen fire, 
 Of adamant or stubborn steel 
 Is forged in his cold heart that cannot feel." 
 
 Trans, by J. Aldington Symonds y 
 The Greek Poets y vol. i, p. 286. 
 
 LATO'S epigrams on Aster and Aga- 
 thon are well known. The two first- 
 quoted make a play of course on the 
 name Aster (star). 
 
 To Aster: 
 
 EPI- "'TT^HOU wert the morning star among the living, 
 GRAMS 1 Ere thy fair light had fled ; 
 
 OF Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving 
 PLATO New splendour to the dead." 
 
 (Shelley.) 
 
 78
 
 Greeks ^f Romans 
 
 To the same: 
 
 <<r T^HOU at the stars dost gaze, who art my star 
 
 A O would that I were 
 Heaven, to gaze on thee, ever with thousands of 
 eyes." 
 
 To Agathon : 
 
 "HT^HEE as I kist, behold ! on my lips my own 
 
 JL soul was trembling; 
 
 For, bold one, she had come, meaning to find her 
 way through." 
 
 There are many other epigrams and songs on the 
 same subject from the Greek writers. The following 
 is by Meleager (a native of Gadara in Palestine) 
 about 60 B.C., and one of the sweetest and most 
 human of the lyric poets: 
 
 "O MORTALS crossed in love ! the Southwind, MELEA- 
 ^J see! GER 
 
 That blows so fair for sailor folk, hath ta'en 
 Half of my soul, Andragathos, from me. 
 
 Thrice happy ships, thrice blessed billowy main, 
 And four times favored wind that bears the youth, 
 O would I were a Dolphin ! so, in truth, 
 High on my shoulders ferried he should come 
 To Rhodes, sweet haunt of boys, his island-home." 
 From the Greek Anthology, ii. 402. 
 
 79
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 Also from the Greek Anthology : 
 
 EPIGRAM /^V SAY, and again repeat, fair, fair and still 
 \~J I will say it 
 
 How fair, my friend, and good to see, thou art ; 
 On pine or oak or wall thy name I do not blazon 
 Love has too deeply graved it in my heart." 
 
 "T)ERHAPS the most beautiful [says J. A. Sy- 
 JL monds] of the sepulchral epigrams is one by 
 an unknown writer, of which I here give a free 
 paraphrase. Anth. Pal. y vii. 346 : 
 
 EPITAPH 'Of our great love, Parthenophil, 
 
 ANONY- This little stone abideth still 
 MOUS Sole sign and token : 
 
 I seek thee yet, and yet shall seek, 
 Tho' faint mine eyes, my spirit weak 
 With prayers unspoken. 
 
 Meanwhile best friend of friends, do thou, 
 If this the cruel fates allow, 
 
 By death's dark river, 
 Among those shadowy people, drink 
 No drop for me on Lethe's brink : 
 
 Forget me never!" 
 
 The Greek Poefs, vol. 2, p. 298. 
 80
 
 Greeks &* Romans 
 HEOCRITUS, though coming late 
 in the Greek age (about 300 B.C.) 
 when Athens had yielded place to 
 Alexandria, still carried on the Greek 
 tradition in a remarkable way. A native of Syracuse, 
 he caught and echoed in a finer form the life and 
 songs of the country folk of that region them- 
 selves descendants of Dorian settlers. Songs and 
 ballads full of similar notes linger among the Greek 
 peasants, shepherds and fisher-folk, even down to 
 the present day. 
 
 The following poem (trans, by M. J. Chapman, 
 1836) is one of the best known and most beautiful 
 of his Idyls : 
 
 IDYL XII. 
 
 " A RT come, dear youth ? two days and nights THEOCRI- 
 .TYaway! TUS 
 
 (Who burn with love, grow aged in a day.) IDYL XII. 
 
 As much as apples sweet the damson crude 
 Excel ; the blooming spring the winter rude ; 
 In fleece the sheep her lamb; the maid in sweetness 
 The thrice-wed dame ; the fawn the calf in fleet- 
 ness; 
 
 T 
 
 a SHEET SEVEN
 
 Poetry of friendship 
 
 The nightingale in song all feathered kind 
 So much thy longed-for presence cheers my mind. 
 To thee I hasten, as to shady beech, 
 The traveller, when from the heaven's reach 
 The sun fierce blazes. May our love be strong, 
 To all hereafter times the theme of song ! 
 'Two men each other loved to that degree, 
 That either friend did in the other see 
 A dearer than himself. They lived of old 
 Both golden natures in an age of gold.' 
 
 O father Zeus ! ageless immortals all ! 
 Two hundred ages hence may one recall, 
 Down-coming to the irremeable river, 
 This to my mind, and this good news deliver : 
 'E'en now from east to west, from north to south, 
 Your mutual friendship lives in every mouth.' 
 This, as they please, th' Olympians will decide : 
 Of thee, by blooming virtue beautified, 
 My glowing song shall only truth disclose ; 
 With falsehood's pustules I'll not shame my nose. 
 If thou dost sometime grieve me, sweet the plea- 
 sure 
 
 Of reconcilement, joy in double measure 
 To find thou never didst intend the pain, 
 And feel myself from all doubt free again. 
 
 82
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 And ye Megarians, at Nisaea dwelling, 
 Expert at rowing, mariners excelling, 
 Be happy ever ! for with honours due 
 Th' Athenian Diocles, to friendship true 
 Ye celebrate. With the first blush of spring 
 The youth surround his tomb : there who shall 
 
 bring 
 
 The sweetest kiss, whose lip is purest found, 
 Back to his mother goes with garlands crowned. 
 Nice touch the arbiter must have indeed, 
 And must, methinks, the blue-eyed Ganymede 
 Invoke with many prayers a mouth to own 
 True to the touch of lips, as Lydian stone 
 To proof of gold which test will instant show 
 The pure or base, as money changers know." 
 
 The following Idyl, of which I append a render- 
 ing, is attributed to Theocritus : 
 
 IDYL XXIX. 
 
 " r I ^HEY say, dear boy, that wine and truth agree ; 
 J. And, being in wine, I'll tell the truth to thee 
 Yes, all that works in secret in my soul. 
 'Tis this : thou dost not love me with thy whole 
 Untampered heart. I know ; for half my time 
 Is spent in gazing on thy beauty's prime ; 
 
 83
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 IDYL The other half is nought. When thou art good, 
 XXIX. My days are like the gods' ; but when the mood 
 Tormenting takes thee, 'tis my night of woe. 
 How were it right to vex a lover so ? 
 Take my advice, my lad, thine elder friend, 
 'Twill make thee glad and grateful in the end : 
 In one tree build one nest, so no grim snake 
 May creep upon thee. For to-day thou'lt make 
 Thy home on one branch, and to-morrow changing 
 Wilt seek another, to what's new still ranging; 
 And should a stranger praise your handsome face, 
 Him more than three-year-proven friend you'll 
 
 grace, 
 
 While him who loved you first you'll treat as cold 
 As some acquaintanceship of three days old. 
 Thou fliest high, methinks, in love and pride; 
 But I would say : keep ever at thy side 
 A mate that is thine equal ; doing so, 
 The townsfolk shall speak well of thee alway, 
 And love shall never visit thee with woe 
 Love that so easily men's hearts can flay, 
 And mine has conquered that was erst of steel. 
 Nay, by thy gracious lips I make appeal : 
 Remember thou wert younger a year agone 
 And we grow grey and wrinkled, all, or e'er 
 We can escape our doom ; of mortals none 
 His youth retakes again, for azure wings 
 84
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 Are on her shoulders, and we sons of care 
 Are all too slow to catch such flying things. 
 
 Mindful of this, be gentle, is my prayer, 
 And love me, guileless, ev'n as I love thee ; 
 So when thou hast a beard, such friends as were 
 Achilles and Patroclus we may be." 
 
 ION was a poet of about the same 
 period as Theocritus, but of whom 
 little is known. The following is a 
 fragment translated by A. Lang: 
 
 ">^ W I 
 
 "TTAPPY are they that love, when with equal BION 
 -Ll love they are rewarded. Happy was Theseus, 
 when Pirithous was by his side, yea tho' he went 
 down to the house of implacable Hades. Happy 
 among hard men and inhospitable was Orestes, for 
 that Pylades chose to share his wanderings. And he 
 was happy, Achilles ^acides, while his darling 
 lived, happy was he in his death, because he 
 avenged the dread fate of Patroclus." Theocritus^ 
 Bion and MoschuS) Golden Treasury series, p. 182. 
 
 The beautiful Lament for Bion by Moschus is in- 
 teresting in this connection, and should be com-
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 pared with Shelley's lament for Keats in Adonais 
 for which latter poem indeed it supplied some 
 suggestions : 
 
 LAMENT "^VTE mountain valleys, pitifully groan ! 
 FOR BION X Rivers and Dorian springs for Bion weep ! 
 
 BY Ye plants drop tears ! ye groves lamenting moan ! 
 MOSCHUS Exhale your life, wan flowers ; your blushes deep 
 In grier, anemonies and roses, steep ! 
 In softest murmurs, Hyacinth ! prolong 
 The sad, sad woe thy lettered petals keep ; 
 Our minstrel sings no more his friends among 
 Sicilian muses! now begin the doleful song." 
 
 M. J. Chapman trans, in the 
 Greek Pastoral Poets, 1836. 
 
 The allusion to Hyacinth is thus explained by 
 Chapman : 
 
 STORY OF" 
 HYA- 
 
 TT YACINTHUS, a Spartan youth, the son 
 JL JL of Clio, was in great favour with Apollo. 
 CINTHUS Zephyrus, being enraged that he preferred Ap- 
 ollo to him, blew the discus when flung by 
 Apollo, on a day that Hyacinthus was playing at 
 discus-throwing with that god, against the head 
 of the youth, and so killed him. Apollo, being 
 86
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 unable to save his life, changed him into the flower 
 which was named after him, and on whose petals 
 the Greeks fancied they could trace the notes of 
 grief, at, ai. a A festival called the Hyacinthia was "Seen within the 
 
 1 i j r .1 j i j.e ' flower we call 
 
 celebrated for three days in each year at Sparta, in Larkspur 
 honour of the god and his unhappy favorite." Note 
 to MoschuSy Idyl iii. 
 
 The story of Apollo and Hyacinth is gracefully 
 told by Ovid, in the tenth book of his Metamor- 
 phoses : 
 
 "AyTIDWAY betwixt the past and coming night TOLD BY 
 J.VJL Stood Titan a when the pair, their limbs un- OVID 
 
 robed, 
 
 And glist'ning with the olive's unctuous juice, 
 In friendly contest with the discus vied." 
 
 [The younger one is struck by the discus ; and 
 like a fading flower] 
 
 "To its own weight unequal drooped the head 
 Of Hyacinth ; and o'er him wailed the god : 
 Liest thou so, CEbalia's child, of youth 
 Untimely robbed, and wounded by my fault 
 At once my grief and guilt ? This hand hath dealt
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 Thy death ! 'Tis I who send thee to the grave ! 
 And yet scarce guilty, unless guilt it were 
 To sport, or guilt to love thee ! Would this life 
 Might thine redeem, or be with thine resigned ! 
 But thou since Fate denies a god to die 
 Be present with me ever ! Let thy name 
 Dwell ever in my heart and on my lips, 
 Theme of my lyre and burden of my song ; 
 And ever bear the echo of my wail 
 Writ on thy new-born flower ! The time shall come 
 When, with thyself associate, to its name 
 The mightiest of the Greeks shall link his own. 
 
 Prophetic as Apollo mourned, the blood 
 That with its dripping crimson dyed the turf 
 Was blood no more : and sudden sprang to life 
 A flower." 
 
 Ovid's Metamorphoses trans. 
 H. King, London, 1871. 
 
 Roman literature, generally, as 
 'might be expected, with its more 
 materialistic spirit, the romance of 
 friendship is little dwelt upon ; 
 though the grosser side of the passion, in such 
 writers as Catullus and Martial, is much in evi-
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 dence. Still we find in Virgil a notable instance. His 
 2nd Eclogue bears the marks of genuine feeling ; 
 and, according to some critics, he there under the 
 guise of Shepherd Corydon's love for Alexis 
 celebrates his own attachment to the youthful 
 Alexander : 
 
 "f^ORYDON, keeper of cattle, once loved the VIRGIL 
 \Jt fair lad Alexis; ECLOGUE 
 
 But he, the delight of his master, permitted no II. 
 
 hope to the shepherd. 
 Corydon, lovesick swain, went into the forest of 
 
 beeches, 
 And there to the mountains and woods the one 
 
 relief of his passion 
 With useless effort outpoured the following artless 
 
 complainings : 
 Alexis, barbarous youth, say, do not my mournful 
 
 lays move thee? 
 Showing me no compassion, thou'lt surely compel 
 
 me to perish. 
 Even the cattle now seek after places both cool and 
 
 shady ; 
 Even the lizards green conceal themselves in the 
 
 thorn-bush. > 
 
 89
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 Thestylis, taking sweet herbs, such as garlic and 
 
 thyme, for the reapers 
 Faint with the scorching noon, doth mash them 
 
 and bray in a mortar. 
 Alone in the heat of the day am I left with the 
 
 screaming cicalas, 
 While patient in tracking thy path, I ever pursue 
 
 thee, BeloveU" 
 
 Tram, by J. W. Baylis. 
 
 There is a translation of this same 2nd Eclogue, 
 by Abraham Fraunce (1591) which is interesting 
 not only on account of its felicity of phrase, 
 but because, as in the case of some other Elizabe- 
 than hexameters, the metre is ruled by quantity, i.e., 
 length of syllables, instead of by accent. The follow- 
 ing are the first five lines of Fraunce's translation : 
 
 CORYDON "QILLY shepherd Corydon lov'd hartyly fayre 
 
 AND O lad Alexis, 
 ALEXIS His master's dearling, but saw noe matter of 
 
 hoping ; 
 
 Only amydst darck groves thickset with broade- 
 shadoe beech-trees 
 
 90
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 Dayly resort did he make, thus alone to the woods, 
 
 to the mountayns, 
 With broken speeches fond thoughts there vaynly 
 
 revealing." 
 
 TULLUS also (b. B.C. 87) has some 
 verses of real feeling : 
 
 UINTIUS, if 'tis thy wish and CATUL- 
 will LUS TO 
 
 That I should owe my eyes to thee, QUINTIUS 
 
 Or anything that's dearer still, 
 
 If aught that's dearer there can be ; 
 
 Then rob me not of that I prize, 
 
 Of the dear form that is to me, 
 Oh ! far far dearer than my eyes, 
 
 Or aught, if dearer aught there be." 
 
 Catullus, trans. Hon. J. Lamb, 1821. 
 
 ' T F all complying, thou would'st grant fO 
 
 J. Thy lovely eyes to kiss, my fair, JUVEN- 
 
 Long as I pleased ; oh ! I would plant TIUS 
 Three hundred thousand kisses there. 
 
 Nor could I even then refrain, 
 
 Nor satiate leave that fount of blisses,
 
 Poetry of Friendship 
 
 Tho' thicker than autumnal grain 
 
 Should be our growing crop of kisses." 
 
 (Ibid.) 
 
 TO " T ONG at our leisure yesterday 
 LICINIUS A-V Idling, Licinius, we wrote 
 Upon my tablets verses gay, 
 Or took our turns, as fancy smote, 
 At rhymes and dice and wine. 
 
 But when I left, Licinius mine, 
 Your grace and your facetious mood 
 Had fired me so, that neither food 
 Would stay my misery, nor sleep 
 My roving eyes in quiet keep. 
 But still consumed, without respite, 
 I tossed about my couch in vain 
 And longed for day if speak I might, 
 Or be with you again. 
 
 But when my limbs with all the strain 
 Worn out, half dead lay on my bed, 
 Sweet friend to thee this verse I penned, 
 That so thou mayest condescend 
 To understand my pain. 
 
 So now, Licinius, beware! 
 And be not rash, but to my prayer 
 A gracious hearing tender ; 
 
 92
 
 Greeks & Romans 
 
 Lest on thy head pounce Nemesis: 
 A goddess sudden and swift she is 
 Beware lest thou offend her!" 
 
 The following little poem is taken from Martial : 
 
 S a vineyard breathes, whose boughs with MARTIAL 
 grapes are bending, TO 
 
 Or garden where are hived Sicanian bees; DIADU- 
 As upturned clods when summer rain 's descending MENOS 
 
 Or orchards rich with blossom-laden trees ; 
 So, cruel youth, thy kisses breathe so sweet 
 Would'st thou but grant me all their grace, 
 complete!" 
 
 93
 
 IV. 
 
 Friendship in Early 
 Christian & Medueval Times
 
 Friendship in Early 
 Christian & Mediaeval Times 
 
 [E quotations we have given from 
 Plato and others show the very high 
 [ideal of friendship which obtained in 
 the old world, and the respect ac- 
 corded to it. With the incoming of the Christian 
 centuries, and the growth of Alexandrian and 
 Germanic influences, a change began to take place. 
 Woman rose to greater freedom and dignity and 
 influence than before. The romance of love began to 
 centre round her." The days of chivalry brought a Benecke, 
 
 ... f . . . _,, Woman in 
 
 new devotion into the world, and the Church ex- Greek Poetry, 
 
 alted the Virgin Mother to the highest place in tSs^mSce' ' 
 heaven. Friendship between men ceased to be re- m reek 
 garded in the old light i.e., as a thing of deep 
 
 97 a SHKBT EIGHT
 
 Friendship 
 
 feeling, and an important social institution. It was 
 even, here and there, looked on with disfavour 
 and lapses from the purity or chastity of its standard 
 were readily suspected and violently reprobated. 
 Certainly it survived in the monastic life for a long 
 period ; but though inspiring this to a great extent, 
 its influence was not generally acknowledged. The 
 Family, in the modern and more limited sense of 
 the word (as opposed to the clan), became the re- 
 cognised unit of social life, and the ideal centre of all 
 good influences (as illustrated in the worship of the 
 Holy Family). At the same time, by this very 
 shrinkage of the Family, as well as by other in- 
 fluences, the solidarity of society became to some 
 extent weakened, and gradually the more commu- 
 nistic forms of the early world gave place to the 
 individualism of the commercial period. 
 
 The special sentiment of comrade-love or attach- 
 ment (being a thing inherent in human nature) 
 remained of course through the Christian centuries, 
 as before, and unaltered except that being no 
 
 longer recognised it became a private and personal 
 
 98
 
 Early Christian & Mediceval 
 
 affair, running often powerfully enough beneath the 
 surface of society, but openly unacknowledged, and 
 so far deprived of some of its dignity and influence. 
 Owing to this fact there is nothing, for this period, 
 to be quoted in the way of general ideal or public 
 opinion on the subject of friendship, and the follow- 
 ing sections therefore become limited to the expres- 
 sion of individual sentiments and experiences, in 
 prose and poetry. These we find, during the mediae- 
 val period, largely colored by religion; while at 
 the Renaissance and afterwards they are evidently 
 affected by Greek associations. 
 
 i OLLOWING are some passages from 
 S. Augustine: 
 
 "TN those years when I first began SAINT 
 
 JL to teach in my native town, I had AUGUS- 
 made a~rnend, one who through having the same TINE 
 interests was very dear to me, one of my own age, 
 and like me in the first flower of youth. We had 
 grown up together, and went together to school, 
 and used to play together. But he was not yet so 
 great a friend as afterwards, nor even then was our 
 friendship true ; for friendship is not true unless 
 
 99
 
 Friendship 
 
 Thou cementest it between those who are united 
 to Thee by that 'love which is shed abroad in our 
 hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.' 
 Yet our friendship was but too sweet, and fermen- 
 ted by the pursuit of kindred studies. For I had 
 turned him aside from the true faith (of which as 
 a youth he had but an imperfect grasp) to perni- 
 cious and superstitious fables, for which my moth- 
 er grieved over me. And now in mind he erred 
 with me, and my soul could not endure to be 
 separated from him. But lo, Thou didst follow 
 close behind Thy fugitives, Thou both God of 
 vengeance and fountain of mercies didst convert 
 us by wonderful ways ; behold, Thou didst take 
 him out of this life, when scarcely a year had our 
 close intimacy lasted sweet to me beyond the 
 
 sweetness of my whole life 
 
 "No ray of light pierced the gloom with which 
 my heart was enveloped by this grief, and wher- 
 ever I looked I beheld death. My native place was 
 a torment to me, and my father's house strangely 
 joyless; and whatever I had shared with him, 
 without him was now turned into a huge torture. 
 My longing eyes sought him everywhere, and 
 found him not ; and I hated the very places, be- 
 cause he was not in them, neither could they say to 
 me 'he is coming,' as they used to do when he was 
 100
 
 Early Christian & Mediaeval 
 
 alive and was absent. And I became a great puzzle 
 to myself, and I asked my soul why it was so sad, 
 and why so disquieted within me ; and it knew not 
 what to answer. And if I said 'Trust thou in God,' 
 it rightly did not obey ; for that dearest one whom 
 it had lost was both truer and better than that 
 phantasm in which it was bidden to trust. Weeping 
 was the only thing which was sweet to me, and it 
 succeeded my friend in the dearest place in my 
 heart." S. Augustine, Confessions, bk. 4, ch. iv. 
 Trans, by Rev. W. H. Hutchings, M.A. 
 
 C T WAS miserable, and miserable is every soul SAINT 
 J. which is fettered by the love of perishable AUGUS- 
 things ; he is torn to pieces when he loses them, TINE 
 and then he perceives how miserable he was in 
 reality while he possessed them. And so was I 
 then, and I wept most bitterly, and in that bitter- 
 ness I found rest. Thus was I miserable, and that 
 miserable life I held dearer than my friend. For 
 though I would fain have changed it, yet to it I 
 clung even more than to him ; and I cannot say 
 whether I would have parted with it for his sake, 
 as it is related, if true, that Orestes and Pylades 
 were willing to do, for they would gladly have 
 died for each other, or together, for they preferred 
 death to separation from each other. But in me 
 a feeling which I cannot explain, and one of a con- 
 101
 
 Friendship 
 
 tradictory nature had arisen ; for I had at once an 
 unbearable weariness of living, and a fear of dying. 
 For I believe the more I loved him, the more 
 I hated and dreaded death which had taken him 
 from me, and regarded it as a most cruel enemy ; 
 and I felt as if it would soon devour all men, now 
 that its power had reached him. . . . For I mar- 
 velled that other mortals lived, because he whom 
 I had loved, without thought of his ever dying, 
 was dead ; and that I still lived I who was an- 
 other self when he was gone, was a greater mar- 
 vel still. Well said a certain one of his friend, 
 'Thou half of my soul ;' for I felt that his soul and 
 mine were 'one soul in two bodies': and therefore 
 life was to me horrible, because I hated to live as 
 half of a life ; and therefore perhaps I feared to die, 
 lest he should wholly die whom I had loved so 
 greatly." Ibid y ch. vi. 
 
 is interesting to see, in these ex- 
 tracts from S. Augustine, and in 
 those which follow from Monta- 
 lembert, the points of likeness and 
 difference between the Christian ideal of love and 
 that of Plato. Both are highly transcendental, both 
 
 seem to contemplate an inner union of souls, be- 
 
 102
 
 Early Christian & Mediaeval 
 
 yond the reach of space and time ; but in Plato the 
 union is in contemplation of the Eternal Beauty, 
 while in the Christian teachers it is in devotion to a 
 personal God. 
 
 "TF inanimate nature was to them an abundant MONTA- 
 JL source of pleasure they had a life still more LEMBERT 
 lively and elevated in the life of the heart, in the QN THE 
 double love which burned in them the love of MONKS 
 their brethren inspired and consecrated by the 
 love of God." Monks of the West y introdn., ch. v. 
 
 "Tj^ VERYTHING invited and encouraged them 
 Jt-v to choose one or several souls as the intimate 
 companions of their life. . . . And to prove how 
 little the divine love, thus understood and prac- 
 tised, tends to exclude or chill the love of man for 
 man, never was human eloquence more touching 
 or more sincere than in that immortal elegy by 
 which S. Bernard laments a lost brother snatched 
 by death from the cloister : c Flow, flow my tears, 
 so eager to flow ! he who prevented your flowing 
 is here no more ! It is not he who is dead, it is I who 
 now live only to die. Why, O why have we loved, 
 and why have we lost each other.'" Ibid. 
 
 " r 1 ^HE mutual affection which reigned among 
 -1 the monks flowed as a mighty stream through 
 103
 
 Friendship 
 
 the annals of the cloister. It has left its trace even 
 in the formulas,' collected with care by modern 
 erudition. . . . The correspondence of the most 
 illustrious, of Geoffrey de Vendome, of Pierre le 
 Ve'ne' rable, and of S. Bernard, give proofs of it at 
 every page." Ibid. 
 
 iINT ANSELM'S letters to brother 
 monks are full of expressions of the 
 same ardent affection. Montalembert 
 'gives several examples: 
 
 SAINT "QOULS well-beloved of my soul," he wrote to 
 ANSELM O two near relatives whom he wished to draw to 
 Bee, "my eyes ardently desire to behold you ; my 
 arms expand to embrace you ; my lips sigh for 
 your kisses ; all the life that remains to me is con- 
 sumed with waiting for you. I hope in praying, 
 and I pray in hoping come and taste how gra- 
 cious the Lord is you cannot fully know it while 
 you find sweetness in the world." 
 
 TO HIS "'T7VAR from the eyes, far from the heart' say the 
 
 FRIEND -T vulgar. Believe nothing of it ; if it was so, the 
 
 LAN- farther you were distant from me the cooler my 
 
 FRANC l ve f r vou would be ; whilst on the contrary, 
 
 the less I can enjoy your presence, the more the 
 
 desire of that pleasure burns in the soul of your 
 
 friend." 
 
 104
 
 Early Christian & Mediaeval 
 
 ur T^O Gondulf, Anselm 1 put no other or TO 
 
 J. longer salutations at the head of my letter, GON- 
 because I can say nothing more to him whom DULPH 
 I love. All who know Gondulph and Anselm 
 know well what this means, and how much love is 
 understood in these two names." . . . "How could 
 I forget thee ? Can a man forget one who is placed 
 like a seal upon his heart ? In thy silence I know 
 that thou lovest me ; and thou also, when I say no- 
 thing, thou knowest that I love thee. Not only 
 have I no doubt of thee, but I answer for thee that 
 thou art sure of me. What can my letter tell thee 
 that thou knowest not already, thou who art my 
 second soul ? Go into the secret place of thy heart, 
 look there at thy love for me, and thou shalt see 
 mine for thee." . . . "Thou knewest how much 
 I love thee, but I knew it not. He who has sep- 
 arated us has alone instructed me how dear to me 
 thou wert. No, I knew not before the experience 
 of thy absence how sweet it was to have thee, how 
 bitter to have thee not. Thou hast another friend 
 whom thou hast loved as much or more than me to 
 console thee, but I have no longer thee ! thee ! 
 thee ! thou understandest ? and nothing to replace 
 thee. Those who rejoice in the possession of thee 
 may perhaps be offended by what I say. Ah ! let 
 them content themselves with their joy, and per- 
 mit me to weep for him whom I ever love." 
 105
 
 Friendship 
 
 [E story of Amis and Amile, a me- 
 diaeval legend, translated by William 
 jMorris (as well as by Walter Pater) 
 >from the Bibliotheca Etzeviriana, is 
 very quaint and engaging in its old-world extrava- 
 gance and supernaturalism : 
 
 THE A MIS and Amile were devoted friends, twins 
 
 STORY OF JT\. in resemblance and life. On one occasion, 
 
 AMIS having strayed apart, they ceased not to seek each 
 
 AND other for two whole years. And when at last they 
 
 AMILE met "they lighted down from their horses, and 
 
 embraced and kissed each other, and gave thanks 
 
 to God that they were found. And they swore 
 
 fealty and friendship and fellowship perpetual, 
 
 the one to the other, on the sword of Amile, 
 
 wherein were relics." Thence they went together 
 
 to the court of "Charles, king of France." 
 
 Here soon after, Amis took Amile's place in a 
 tournament, saved his life from a traitor, and won 
 for him the King's daughter to wife. But so it hap- 
 pened that, not long after, he himself was stricken 
 with leprosy and brought to Amile's door. And 
 when Amile and his royal bride knew who it was 
 they were sore grieved, and they brought him in 
 and placed him on a fair bed, and put all that they 
 106
 
 Early Christian ^f Mediaeval 
 
 had at his service. And it came to pass one night 
 "whenas Amis and Amile lay in one chamber 
 without other company, that God sent to Amis 
 Raphael his angel, who said to him: c Sleepest thou, 
 Amis?' And he, who deemed that Amile had 
 called to him, answered: *I sleep not, fair sweet 
 fellow.' Then the angel said to him : 'Thou hast 
 answered well, for thou art the fellow of the citi- 
 zens of heaven, and thou hast followed after Job, 
 and Thoby in patience. Now I am Raphael, an 
 angel of our Lord, and am come to tell thee of a 
 medicine for thine healing, whereas he hath heard 
 thy prayers. Thou shalt tell to Amile thy fellow, 
 that he slay his two children and wash thee in their 
 blood, and thence thou shalt get the healing of 
 thy body.'" 
 
 Amis was shocked when he heard these words, 
 and at first refused to tell Amile ; but the latter 
 had also heard the angel's voice, and pressed him 
 to tell. Then when he knew he too was sorely 
 grieved. But at last he determined in his mind not 
 even to spare his children for the sake of his friend, 
 and going secretly to their chamber he slew them, 
 and bringing some of their blood washed Amis 
 who immediately was healed. He then arrayed 
 Amis in his best clothes and, after going to the 
 church to give thanks, they met Amile's wife who 
 107
 
 Friendship 
 
 (not knowing all) rejoiced greatly too. But Amile, 
 going apart again to the children's chamber to 
 weep over them, found them at play in bed, with 
 only a thread of crimson round their throats to 
 mark what had been done ! 
 
 The two knights fell afterwards and were killed 
 in the same battle; "for even as God had joined 
 them together by good accord in their life-days, 
 so in their death they were not sundered." And a 
 miracle was added, for even when they were 
 buried apart from each other the two coffins leapt 
 together in the night and were found side by side 
 in the morning. 
 
 Of this story Mr. Jacobs, in his introduction to 
 William Morris' translation, says : "Amis and Amil 
 were the David and Jonathan, the Orestes and 
 Pylades, of the mediaeval world." There were some 
 thirty other versions of the legend "in almost all 
 the tongues of Western and Northern Europe" 
 their "peerless friendship" having given them a 
 place among the mediaeval saints. (See Old French 
 Romances trans, by William Morris, London, 1896.) 
 
 108
 
 Eastern Countries 
 
 >T may not be out of place here, and 
 before passing on to the times of the 
 Renaissance and Modern Europe, to 
 give one or two extracts relating to 
 Eastern countries. The honour paid to friendship 
 in Persia, Arabia, Syria and other Oriental lands 
 has always been great, and the tradition of this 
 attachment there should be especially interesting to 
 us, as having arisen independently of classic or 
 Christian ideals. The poets of Persia, Saadi and 
 Jelal-ud-din Rumi (i3th cent.),Hafiz (i4th cent.), 
 Jami (i5th cent.), and others, have drawn much of 
 their inspiration from this source ; but unfortunate- 
 ly for those who cannot read the originals, their 
 work has been scantily translated, and the trans- 
 lations themselves are not always very reliable. 
 The extraordinary way in which, following the 
 method of the Sufis, and of Plato, they identify the 
 mortal and the divine love, and see in their beloved 
 an image or revelation of God himself, makes their 
 poems difficult of comprehension to the Western 
 
 109
 
 Friendship 
 
 mind. Apostrophes to Love, Wine, and Beauty 
 often, with them, bear a frankly twofold sense, 
 material and spiritual. To these poets of the mid- 
 region of the earth, the bitter antagonism between 
 matter and spirit, which like an evil dream has 
 haunted so long both the extreme Western and the 
 extreme Eastern mind, scarcely exists ; and even the 
 body "which is a portion of the dust-pit" has 
 become perfect and divine. 
 
 " TT* VERY form you see has its archetype in the 
 
 KJ placeless world. . . . 
 
 From the moment you came into the world of 
 being 
 
 A ladder was placed before you that you might 
 escape (ascend). 
 
 First you were mineral, later you turned to plant, 
 
 Then you became an animal : how should this be 
 a secret to you ? 
 
 Afterwards you were made man, with knowledge, 
 reason, faith; 
 
 Behold the body, which is a portion of the dust- 
 pit, how perfect it has grown ! 
 
 When you have travelled on from man, you will 
 doubtless become an angel ; 
 no
 
 Eastern Countries 
 
 After that you are done with earth : your station is 
 
 in heaven. 
 
 Pass again even from angelhood : enter that ocean, 
 That your drop may become a sea which is a hun- 
 
 dred seas of 'Oman.'" 
 
 From the Divani Shamsi Tabriz of 
 Jalalu-ddin Rumt, trans, by R. 
 A. Nicholson. 
 
 "''TWERE better that the spirit which wears 
 
 A not true love as a garment 
 Had not been : its being is but shame. 
 Be drunken in love, for love is all that exists. . . . 
 Dismiss cares and be utterly clear of heart, 
 Like the face of a mirror, without image or picture. 
 When it becomes clear of images, all images are 
 contained in it." Ibid. 
 
 "T TAPPY the moment when we are seated in the 
 J. J- palace, thou and I, 
 
 With two forms and with two figures, but with 
 one soul, thou and I." Ibid. 
 
 a man came and knocked at the door of 
 his friend. 
 
 His friend said, 'Who art thou, O faithful one?' 
 He said, c 'Tis I.' He answered, 'There is no 
 admittance. 
 
 in
 
 Friendship 
 
 There is no room for the raw at my well-cooked 
 
 feast. 
 
 Naught but fire of separation and absence 
 Can cook the raw one and free him from hypocrisy! 
 Since thy j^fhas not yet left thee, 
 Thou must be burned in fiery flames.' 
 The poor man went away, and for one whole year 
 Journeyed burning with grief for his friend's 
 
 absence. 
 His heart burned till it was cooked ; then he went 
 
 again 
 
 And drew near to the house of his friend. 
 He knocked at the door in fear and trepidation 
 Lest some careless word should fall from his lips. 
 His friend shouted, 'Who is that at the door?' 
 He answered, ''Tis thou who art at the door, O 
 
 beloved ! ' 
 
 The friend said, 'Since 'tis I, let me come in, 
 There is not room for two I's in one house.' ' 
 
 From the Masnavi of Jalalu-ddin 
 \urni, trans, by E. H. WTilnfield. 
 
 >ME short quotations here following 
 are taken from Flowers culled from 
 Persian Gardens (Manchester, 1 872) : 
 
 "T7VERYONE, whether he be 
 abstemious or self-indulgent 
 112
 
 Eastern Countries 
 
 is searching after the Friend. Every place may be 
 the abode of love, whether it be a mosque or a sy- 
 nagogue. . . . On thy last day, though the cup be in 
 thy hand, thou may'st be borne away to Paradise 
 even from the corner of the tavern." Hafiz. 
 
 " T HAVE heard a sweet word which was spoken 
 J. by the old man of Canaan (Jacob) 'No 
 tongue can express what means the separation of 
 friends." Hafiz. 
 
 ""VT EITHER of my own free will cast I myself 
 J.^1 into the fire ; for the chain of affection was 
 laid upon my neck. I was still at a distance when 
 the fire began to glow, nor is this the moment that 
 it was lighted up within me. Who shall impute it 
 to me as a fault, that I am enchanted by my friend, 
 that I am content in casting myself at his feet?" 
 Saadi. 
 
 Hahn in his Albanesische Studien, already quoted 
 (p. 20), gives some of the verses of Nee, in or Nesim 
 Bey, a Turco-Albanian poet, of which the following 
 is an example : 
 
 "TITHATE'ER, my friend, or false or true, 
 VV The world may tell thee, give no ear, 
 
 For to separate us, dear, 
 The world will say that one is two. 
 
 1 J 3 a SHEET NINE
 
 Friendship 
 
 Who should seek to separate us 
 
 May he never cease to weep. 
 The rain at times may cease ; but he 
 
 In Summer's warmth or Winter's sleep 
 
 May he never cease to weep." 
 
 ESIDES literature there is no doubt a 
 vast amount of material embedded in 
 the customs and traditions of these 
 countries and awaiting adequate re- 
 cognition and interpretation. The following quo- 
 tations may afford some glimpses of interest. 
 
 Suleyman the Magnificent. The story of Suley- 
 man's attachment to his Vezir Ibrahim is told as 
 follows by Stanley Lane-Poole: 
 
 SULEY- "C ULEYMAN, great as he was, shared his great- 
 MAN AND *^ n ess with a second mind, to which his reign 
 IBRAHIM owed much of its brilliance. The Grand Vezir 
 Ibrahim was the counterpart of the Grand Mon- 
 arch Suleyman. He was the son of a sailor at Parga, 
 and had been captured by corsairs, by whom he 
 was sold to be the slave of a widow at Magnesia. 
 Here he passed into the hands of the young prince 
 Suleyman, then Governor of Magnesia, and soon 
 his extraordinary talents and address brought him 
 promotion. . . . From being Grand Falconer on the 
 114
 
 Eastern Countries 
 
 accession of Suleyman, he rose to be first minister 
 and almost co-Sultan in 1523. 
 
 "He was the object of the Sultan's tender regard : 
 an emperor knows better than most men how soli- 
 tary is life without friendship and love, and Suley- 
 man loved this man more than a brother. Ibrahim 
 was not only a friend, he was an entertaining and 
 instructive companion. He read Persian, Greek 
 and Italian ; he knew how to open unknown worlds 
 to the Sultan's mind, and Suleyman drank in his 
 Vezir's wisdom with assiduity. They lived to- 
 gether : their meals were shared in common ; even 
 their beds were in the same room. The Sultan gave 
 his sister in marriage to the sailor's son, and Ibra- 
 him was at the summit of power." Turkey , Story of 
 Nations series, p. 174. 
 
 . S. BUCKINGHAM, in his Travels 
 in Assyria, Media and Persia, speaking 
 
 1 of his guide whom he had engaged at 
 Bagdad, and who was supposed to 
 have left his heart behind him in that city, says : 
 
 " A MIDST all this I was at a loss to conceive 
 \. how the Dervish could find much enjoyment 
 [in the expedition] while laboring under the strong 
 passion which I supposed he must then be feeling 
 
 "5
 
 Friendship 
 
 STORY for the object of his affections at Bagdad, whom he 
 OF A had quitted with so much reluctance. What was 
 BAGDAD my surprise however on seeking an explanation of 
 DERVISH this seeming inconsistency, to find it was the son, 
 and not the daughter, of his friend Elias who held 
 so powerful a hold on his heart. I shrank back from 
 the confession as a man would recoil from a ser- 
 pent on which he had unexpectedly trodden . . . 
 but in answer to enquiries naturally suggested by 
 the subject he declared he would rather suffer 
 death than do the slightest harm to so pure, so 
 innocent, so heavenly a creature as this. . . . 
 
 "I took the greatest pains to ascertain by a severe 
 and minute investigation, how far it might be pos- 
 sible to doubt of the purity of the passion by which 
 this Affgan Dervish was possessed, and whether 
 it deserved to be classed with that described as pre- 
 vailing among the ancient Greeks ; and the result 
 fully satisfied me that both were the same. Ismael 
 was however surprised beyond measure when I as- 
 sured him that such a feeling was not known at all 
 among the peoples of Europe." Travels, &c. y 2nd 
 edition, vol. i, p. 159. 
 
 ar ~pVHE Dervish added a striking instance of the 
 
 -L force of these attachments, and the sympathy 
 
 which was felt in the sorrows to which they led, by 
 
 the following fact from his own history. The place 
 
 116
 
 Eastern Countries 
 
 of his residence, and of his usual labour, was near AN- 
 the bridge of the Tigris, at the gate of the Mosque OTHER 
 of the Vizier. While he sat here, about five or six STORY 
 years since, surrounded by several of his friends 
 who came often to enjoy his conversation and 
 beguile the tedium of his work, he observed, pas- 
 sing among the crowd, a young and beautiful 
 Turkish boy, whose eyes met his, as if by destiny, 
 and they remained fixedly gazing on each other for 
 some time. The boy, after blushing like the first 
 hue of a summer morning,' passed on, frequently 
 turning back to look on the person who had regar- 
 ded him so ardently. The Dervish felt his heart 
 * revolve within him,' for such was his expression, 
 and a cold sweat came across his brow. He hung 
 his head upon his graving-tool in dejection, and ex- 
 cused himself to those about him by saying he felt 
 suddenly ill. Shortly afterwards the boy returned, 
 and after walking to and fro several times, drawing 
 nearer and nearer, as if under the influence of some 
 attracting charm, he came up to his observer and 
 said, *Is it really true, then, that you love me?' 
 'This,' said Ismael, 'was a dagger in my heart; 
 I could make no reply.' The friends who were near 
 him, and now saw all explained, asked him if there 
 had been any previous acquaintance existing be- 
 tween them. He assured them that they had never 
 117
 
 Friendship 
 
 seen each other before. 'Then,' they replied, 'such 
 an event must be from God.' 
 
 "The boy continued to remain for a while with 
 this party, told with great frankness the name and 
 rank of his parents, as well as the place of his resi- 
 dence, and promised to repeat his visit on the fol- 
 lowing day. He did this regularly for several 
 months in succession, sitting for hours by the 
 Dervish, and either singing to him or asking him 
 interesting questions, to beguile his labours, until 
 as Ismael expressed himself, 'though they were 
 still two bodies they became one soul.' The youth 
 at length fell sick, and was confined to his bed, 
 during which time his lover, Ismael, discontinued 
 entirely his usual occupations and abandoned him- 
 self completely to the care of his beloved. He 
 watched the changes of his disease with more than 
 the anxiety of a parent, and never quitted his bed- 
 side, night or day. Death at length separated them; 
 but even when the stroke came the Dervish could 
 not be prevailed on to quit the corpse. He con- 
 stantly visited the grave that contained the re- 
 mains of all he held dear on earth, and planting 
 myrtles and flowers there after the manner of the 
 East, bedewed them daily with his tears. His 
 friends sympathised powerfully in his distress, 
 which he said 'continued to feed his grief until he 
 118
 
 Eastern Countries 
 
 pined away to absolute illness, and was near follow- 
 ing the fate of him whom he deplored." /</W, p. 1 60. 
 
 TT^ROM all this, added to many other examples EXPLAN- 
 
 X/ of a similar kind, related as happening be- ATI ON 
 
 tween persons who had often been pointed out to 
 
 me in Arabia and Persia, I could no longer doubt 
 
 the existence in the East of an affection for male 
 
 youths, of as pure and honorable a kind as that 
 
 which is felt in Europe for those of the other 
 
 sex . . . and it would be as unjust to suppose that 
 
 this necessarily implied impurity of desire as to 
 
 contend that no one could admire a lovely coun- 
 
 tenance and a beautiful form in the other sex, and 
 
 still be inspired with sentiments of the most pure 
 
 and honorable nature towards the object of his 
 
 admiration." Ibid, p. 163. 
 
 E powerful reason why this passion may 
 exist in the East, while it is quite unknown 
 in the West, is probably the seclusion of women in 
 the former, and the freedom of access to them in 
 the latter. . . . Had they [the Asiatics] the unres- 
 trained intercourse which we enjoy with such su- 
 perior beings as the virtuous and accomplished 
 females of our own country they would find no- 
 thing in nature so deserving of their love as 
 these." Ibid, p. 165. 
 
 119
 
 V. 
 
 The Renaissance 
 and ^Modern Times
 
 The Renaissance 
 and Modern Times 
 
 , ITH the Renaissance, and the impe- 
 tus it gave at that time to the study 
 of Greek and Roman models, the 
 exclusive domination of Christian- 
 ity and the Church was broken. A literature of 
 friendship along classic lines began to spring up. 
 Montaigne (b. 1533) was saturated with classic 
 learning. His essays were doubtless largely formed 
 upon the model of Plutarch. His friendship with 
 Stephen de la Boetie was evidently of a romantic 
 and absorbing character. It is referred to in the fol- 
 lowing passage by William Hazlitt ; and the des- 
 cription of it occupies a large part of Montaigne's 
 
 Essay on Friendship. 
 
 123
 
 "Deia 
 ir^ er ? t - ud 
 
 Volontaire 
 
 Friendship 
 
 MON- ur T^HE most important event of his counsellor's 
 TAIGNE A life at Bordeaux was the friendship which he 
 AND there formed with Stephen de la Boetie, an affec- 
 STEPHEN tion which makes a streak of light in modern bio- 
 DE LA graphy almost as beautiful as that left us by Lord 
 BOETIE Brook and Sir Philip Sydney. Our essayist and his 
 friend esteemed, before they saw, each other. La 
 Boetie had written a little work" in which Mon- 
 taigne recognised sentiments congenial with his 
 own, and which indeed bespeak a soul formed in 
 the mould of classic times. Of Montaigne, la 
 Boetie had also heard accounts, which made him 
 
 11111- i 
 
 eager to behold him, and at length they met at 
 a large entertainment given by one of the magis- 
 trates of Bordeaux. They saw and loved, and were 
 thenceforward all in all to each other. The picture 
 that Montaigne in his essays draws of this friend- 
 ship is in the highest degree beautiful and touch- 
 ing ; nor does la Boetie's idea of what is due to this 
 sacred bond betwixt soul and soul fall far short of 
 the grand perception which filled the exalted mind 
 of his friend. . . . Montaigne married at the age of 
 33, but, as he informs us, not of his own wish or 
 choice. c Might I have had my wish,' says he, 
 *I would not have married Wisdom herself if she 
 would have had me.'" Life ofMontaignt, by 
 Hazlitt. 
 
 124
 
 Renaissance & Modern limes 
 
 The following is from Montaigne's Essay, bk. I, 
 ch. xxvii: 
 
 " A S to marriage, besides that it is a covenant, MON- 
 \. the making of which is only free, but the con- TAIGNE 
 tinuance in it forced and compelled, having an- ON 
 other dependence than that of our own free will, FRIEND- 
 and a bargain moreover commonly contracted to SHIP 
 other ends, there happen a thousand intricacies in 
 it to unravel, enough to break the thread, and to 
 divert the current, of a lively affection : whereas 
 friendship has no manner of business or traffic with 
 anything but itself. . . . For the rest, what we com- 
 monly call friends and friendships are nothing but 
 an acquaintance and connection, contracted either 
 by accident or upon some design, by means of 
 which there happens some little intercourse be- 
 twixt our souls : but, in the friendship I speak of, 
 they mingle and melt into one piece, with so 
 universal a mixture that there is left no more sign 
 of the seam by which they were first conjoined. If 
 any one should importune me to give a reason 
 why I loved him [Stephen de la Boetie] I feel it 
 could no otherwise be expressed than by making 
 answer, * Because it was he; because it was I.* 
 There is, beyond what I am able to say, I know 
 not what inexplicable and inevitable power that 
 brought on this union. We sought one another 
 125
 
 Friendship 
 
 long before we met, and from the characters we 
 heard of one another, which wrought more upon 
 our affections than in reason mere reports should 
 do, and, as I think, by some secret appointment of 
 heaven ; we embraced each other in our names ; 
 and at our first meeting, which was accidentally at 
 a great city entertainment, we found ourselves so 
 mutually pleased with one another we became 
 at once mutually so endeared that thenceforward 
 nothing was so near to us as one another. . . . 
 
 "Common friendships will admit of division, 
 one may love the beauty of this, the good humour 
 of that person, the liberality of a third, the paternal 
 affection of a fourth, the fraternal love of a fifth, 
 and so on. But this friendship that possesses the 
 whole soul, and there rules and sways with an ab- 
 solute sovereignty, can admit of no rival. ... In 
 good earnest, if I compare all the rest of my life 
 with the four years I had the happiness to enjoy 
 the sweet society of this excellent man, 'tis nothing 
 but smoke, but an obscure and tedious night. 
 From the day that I lost him I have only led a sor- 
 rowful and languishing life ; and the very plea- 
 sures that present themselves to me, instead of 
 administering anything of consolation, double my 
 affliction for his loss. We were halves throughout, 
 and to that degree that, methinks, by outliving 
 him I defraud him of his part." 
 126
 
 Renaissance ^2? Modern Times 
 
 HILIP SIDNEY, born 1554, was 
 remarkable for his strong personal 
 attachments. Chief among his allies 
 were his school-mate and distant rel- 
 
 ative, Fulke Greville (born in the same year as him- 
 self), and his college friend Edward Dyer (also 
 about his own age). He wrote youthful verses to 
 both of them. The following, according to the 
 fashion of the age, are in the form of an invocation 
 to the pastoral god Pan : 
 
 for my two loves* sake, SIDNEY 
 
 In whose love I pleasure take ; GRE V ILLE 
 
 Only two do me delight ANE 
 
 With their ever-pleasing sight ; DYER 
 Of all men to thee retaining 
 Grant me with these two remaining." 
 
 An interesting friendship existed also between Sid- 
 ney and the well-known French Protestant, Hubert 
 Languet many years his senior whose conver- 
 sation and correspondence helped much in the for- 
 mation of Sidney's character. These two had shared 
 
 127
 
 Friendship 
 
 together the perils of the massacre of S. Bartholo- 
 mew, and had both escaped from France across the 
 Rhine to Germany, where they lived in close inti- 
 macy at Frankfort for a length of time ; and after 
 this a warm friendship and steady correspondence 
 varied by occasional meetings continued between 
 the two until Languet's death. Languet had been 
 Professor of Civil Law at Padua, and from 1 550 for- 
 wards was recognised as one of the leading political 
 agents of the Protestant Powers. 
 
 PHILIP" r T^HE elder man immediately discerned in Sid- 
 SIDNEY JL ney a youth of no common quality, and the 
 AND attachment he conceived for him savoured of ro- 
 HUBERT mance. We possess a long series of Latin letters 
 LANGUET from Languet to his friend, which breathe the ten- 
 derest spirit of affection, mingled with wise coun- 
 sel and ever watchful thought for the young man's 
 higher interests. . . . There must have been some- 
 thing inexplicably attractive in his [Sidney's] 
 person and his genius at this time ; for the tone of 
 Languet's correspondence can only be matched 
 by that of Shakespeare in the sonnets written for 
 his unknown friend." Sir Philip Sidney, English 
 Men of Letters Series, pp. 27, 28. 
 
 128
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 Of this relation Fox Bourne says : 
 
 ' XT O love-oppressed youth can write with more 
 .L^l earnest passion and more fond solicitude, 
 or can be troubled with more frequent fears and 
 more causeless jealousies, than Languet, at this 
 time 55 years old, shows in his letters to Sidney, 
 now 19." 
 
 iT may be appropriate here to intro- 
 duce two or three sonnets from 
 Michel Angelo (b. 1475). Michel 
 Angelo, one of the greatest, perhaps 
 the greatest, artist of the Italian Renaissance, was 
 deeply imbued with the Greek spirit. His concep- 
 tion of Love was close along the line of Plato's. For 
 him the body was the symbol, the expression, the 
 dwelling place of some divine beauty. The body 
 may be loved, but it should only be loved as a sym- 
 bol, not for itself. Diotima in the Symposium had said 
 that in our mortal loves we first come to recognise 
 (dimly) the divine form of beauty which is Eternal. 
 Maximus Tyrius (Dissert, xxvi. 8) commenting on 
 this, confirms it, saying that nowhere else but in the 
 
 1 ^ 9 a SHEET TEN
 
 Friendship 
 
 human form, "the loveliest and most intelligent of 
 bodily creatures," does the light of divine beauty 
 shine so clear. Michel Angelo carried on the con- 
 ception, gave it noble expression, and held to it 
 firmly in the midst of a society which was certainly 
 willing enough to love the body (or try to love it) 
 merely for its own sake. And Giordano Bruno 
 (b. 1550) at a later date wrote as follows: 
 
 " A LL the loves if they be heroic and not 
 JL\. purely animal, or what is called natural, and 
 slaves to generation as instruments in some way 
 of nature have for object the divinity, and tend 
 towards divine beauty, which first is communica- 
 ted to, and shines in, souls, and from them or 
 rather through them is communicated to bodies ; 
 whence it is that well-ordered affection loves the 
 body or corporeal beauty, insomuch as it is an in- 
 dication of beauty of spirit." Gli Eroici Furori (dial, 
 iii. 13), trans. L. Williams. 
 
 HE labours of Von Scheffler and 
 others have now pretty conclusive- 
 ly established that the love-poems of 
 Michel Angelo were for the most 
 130
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 part written to male friends though this fact was 
 disguised by the pious frauds of his nephew, who 
 edited them in the first instance. Following are 
 three of his sonnets, translated by J. A. Symonds. 
 It will be seen that the last line of the first contains 
 a play on the name of his friend : 
 
 To Tommaso de* Cavalieri: 
 A CHE PIU DEBB'IO. 
 
 "'ITTHY should I seek to ease intense desire MICHEL 
 VV With still more tears and windy words of ANGELO'S 
 grief, SONNETS 
 
 When heaven, or late or soon, sends no relief 
 To souls whom love hath robed around with 
 
 fire. 
 
 Why need my aching heart to death aspire, 
 When all must die? Nay death beyond belief 
 Unto these eyes would be both sweet and brief, 
 Since in my sum of woes all joys expire ! 
 
 Therefore because I cannot shun the blow 
 I rather seek, say who must rule my breast, 
 Gliding between her gladness and her woe? 
 
 If only chains and bands can make me blest, 
 No marvel if alone and bare I go 
 An armd Knight's captive and slave confessed."
 
 Friendship 
 
 NON VIDER GLI OCCHI MIEI. 
 
 O mortal thing enthralled these longing eyes 
 When perfect peace in thy fair face I found ; 
 But far within, where all is holy ground, 
 My soul felt Love, her comrade of the skies : 
 For she was born with God in Paradise ; 
 Nor all the shows of beauty shed around 
 This fair false world her wings to earth have 
 
 bound ; 
 Unto the Love of Loves aloft she flies. 
 
 Nay, things that suffer death quench not the fire 
 
 Of deathless spirits ; nor eternity 
 
 Serves sordid Time, that withers all things rare. 
 Not love but lawless impulse is desire : 
 
 That slays the soul ; our love makes still more 
 fair 
 
 Our friends on earth, fairer in death on high." 
 
 VEGGIO NEL TUO BEL VISO. 
 
 < TT*ROM thy fair face I learn, O my loved lord, 
 JL That which no mortal tongue can rightly say ; 
 The soul imprisoned in her house of clay, 
 Holpen by thee to God hath often soared : 
 And tho' the vulgar, vain, malignant horde 
 Attribute what their grosser wills obey, 
 Yet shall this fervent homage that I pay, 
 This love, this faith, pure joys for us afford. 
 132
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 Lo, all the lovely things we find on earth, 
 Resemble for the soul that rightly sees, 
 That source of bliss divine which gave us birth : 
 
 Nor have we first fruits or remembrances 
 Of heaven elsewhere. Thus, loving loyally, 
 I rise to God and make death sweet by thee." 
 
 ,ICHARD BARNFIELD, one of the 
 Elizabethan singers (b. 1574) wrote 
 a long poem, dedicated to "The 
 Ladie Penelope Rich" and entitled 
 "The Affectionate Shepheard," which he describes 
 as "an imitation of Virgil in the 2nd Eclogue, of 
 Alexis." I quote the first two stanzas : 
 
 I. 
 
 "OCARCE had the morning starre hid from the RICHARD 
 O light BARN- 
 
 Heaven's crimson Canopie with stars bespangled, FIELD 
 But I began to rue th' unhappy sight 
 Of that fair boy that had my heart intangled ; 
 
 Cursing the Time, the Place, the sense, the sin ; 
 
 I came, I saw, I view'd, I slipped in. 
 
 133
 
 Friendship 
 
 II. 
 
 If it be sin to love a sweet-fac'd Boy, 
 (Whose amber locks trust up in golden tramels 
 Dangle adown his lovely cheekes with joye 
 When pearle and flowers his faire haire enamels) 
 If it be sin to love a lovely Lad, 
 Oh then sinne I, for whom my soule is sad." 
 
 These stanzas, and the following three sonnets 
 (also by Barnfield) from a series addressed to a 
 youth, give a fair sample of a considerable class of 
 Elizabethan verses, in which classic conceits were 
 mingled with a certain amount of real feeling : 
 
 SONNET IV. 
 
 BARN- "nr^WO stars there are in one fair firmament 
 FIELD'S A (Of some intitled Ganymede's sweet face) 
 SONNETS Which other stars in brightness do disgrace, 
 As much as Po in cleanness passeth Trent. 
 Nor are they common-natur'd stars ; for why, 
 These stars when other shine vaile their pure 
 
 light, 
 
 And when all other vanish out of sight 
 They add a glory to the world's great eie : 
 
 134
 
 Renaissance ^f Modern Times 
 
 By these two stars my life is only led, 
 
 In them I place my joy, in them my pleasure, 
 Love's piercing darts and Nature's precious 
 treasure, 
 
 With their sweet food my fainting soul is fed : 
 Then when my sunne is absent from my sight 
 How can it chuse (with me) but be darke night?" 
 
 SONNET XVIII. 
 
 '1VTOT Megabetes, nor Cleonymus 
 
 .LN (Of whom great Plutarch makes such 
 
 mention, 
 Praysing their faire with rare invention), 
 
 As Ganymede were halfe so beauteous. 
 
 They onely pleased the eies of two great kings, 
 But all the world at my love stands amazed, 
 Nor one that on his angel's face hath gazed, 
 
 But (ravisht with delight) him presents bring : 
 
 Some weaning lambs, and some a suckling kyd, 
 Some nuts, and fil-beards, others peares and 
 
 plums ; 
 Another with a milk-white heyfar comes ; 
 
 As lately Agon's man (Damcetas) did ; 
 But neither he nor all the Nymphs beside, 
 Can win my Ganymede with them t' abide." 
 
 '35
 
 Friendship 
 
 SONNET XIX. 
 
 c A H no ; nor I my selfe : tho' my pure love 
 -Z~jL (Sweete Ganymede) to thee hath still been 
 
 pure, 
 
 And ev'n till my last gaspe shall aie endure, 
 Could ever thy obdurate beuty move : 
 Then cease, oh goddesse sonne (for sure thou art 
 A Goddesse sonne that can resist desire), 
 Cease thy hard heart, and entertain love's fire 
 Within thy sacred breast : by Nature's art. 
 
 And as I love thee more than any Creature 
 (Love thee, because thy beautie is divine, 
 Love thee, because my selfe, my soule, is thine : 
 
 Wholie devoted to thy lovely feature), 
 Even so of all the vowels, I and U 
 Are dearest unto me, as doth ensue." 
 
 'RANCIS BACON'S essay Of friend- 
 ship is known to everybody. Not- 
 withstanding the somewhat cold and 
 pragmatic style and genius of the 
 author, the subject seems to inspire him with a 
 certain enthusiasm ; and some good things are said.
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 'T)UT we may go farther and affirm most truly 
 J3 that it is a mere and miserable solitude to want 
 true friends, without which the world is but a 
 wilderness ; and even in this scene also of solitude, 
 whosoever in the frame of his nature and affec- 
 tions is unfit for friendship, he taketh it of the 
 beast, and not from humanity. A principal fruit of 
 friendship is the ease and discharge of the fulness 
 of the heart, which passions of all kinds do cause 
 and induce. We know diseases of stoppings and 
 suffocations are the most dangerous in the body ; 
 and it is not much otherwise in the mind : you may 
 take sarza to open the liver, steel to open the 
 spleen, flower of sulphur for the lungs, castoreum 
 for the brain ; but no receipt openeth the heart 
 but a true friend, to whom you may impart griefs, 
 joys, fears, hopes, suspicions, counsels, and what- 
 soever lieth upon the heart to oppress it, in a kind 
 of civil shrift or confession. . . . 
 
 "Certainly if a man would give it a hard phrase, 
 those that want friends to open themselves unto, 
 are cannibals of their own hearts ; but one thing is 
 most admirable (wherewith I will conclude this 
 first fruit of friendship) which is, that this com- 
 municating of a man's self to his friend worketh 
 two contrary effects, for it redoubleth joys, and 
 cutteth griefs in halfs ; for there is no man that im- 
 
 137
 
 Friendship 
 
 parteth his joys to his friend, but he joyeth the 
 more, and no man that imparteth his griefs to his 
 friend, but he grieveth the less." Essay 27, Of 
 
 friendship. 
 
 \ 
 
 [AKESPEARE'S sonnets have been 
 much discussed, and surprise and even 
 doubt have been expressed as to their 
 having been addressed (the first 126 
 of them) to a man friend ; but no one who reads 
 them with open mind can well doubt this con- 
 clusion ; nor be surprised at it, who knows anything 
 of Elizabethan life and literature. "Were it not for 
 the fact," says F. T. Furnivall, "that many critics 
 really deserving the name of Shakespeare students, 
 and not Shakespeare fools, have held the Sonnets to 
 be merely dramatic, I could not have conceived that 
 poems so intensely and evidently autobiographic 
 and self-revealing, poems so one with the spirit and 
 inner meaning of Shakespeare's growth and life, 
 could ever have been conceived to be other than 
 what they are the records of his own loves and 
 fears." 
 
 138
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 SONNET XVIII. 
 
 HALL I compare thee to a summer's day? 
 
 Thou art more lovely and more temperate : 
 Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 
 And summer's lease hath all too short a date. 
 Some time too hot the eye of heaven shines, 
 And often is his gold complexion dimmed; 
 And every fair from fair sometime declines, 
 By chance, or nature's changing course, un- 
 trimmed ; 
 
 But thy eternal summer shall not fade, 
 Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest ; 
 Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 
 When in eternal lines to time thou growest. 
 So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, 
 So long lives this, and this gives life to thee." 
 
 SONNET XX. 
 
 " A WOMAN ' S & ce > with Nature's own hand 
 JL\. painted, 
 
 Hast thou, the master-mistress of my passion ; 
 A woman's gentle heart, but not acquainted 
 With shifting change, as is false women's fashion ; 
 An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling, 
 Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth; 
 A man in hue, all hues in his controlling, 
 Which steals men's eyes, and women's souls ama- 
 zeth; 139
 
 Friendship 
 
 And for a woman wert thou first created ; 
 Till Nature, as she wrought thee, fell a-doting, 
 And by addition me of thee defeated, 
 By adding one thing to my purpose nothing. 
 But since she pricked thee out for women's 
 
 pleasure, 
 
 Mine be thy love, and thy love's use their 
 treasure." 
 
 SONNET CIV. 
 
 lr I ^O me, fair friend, you never can be old, 
 
 A For as you were when first your eye I ey'd, 
 Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold 
 Have from the forest shook three summers' pride; 
 Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turned 
 In process of the seasons I have seen ; 
 Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burned, 
 Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green. 
 
 Ah ! yet doth beauty, like a dial hand, 
 
 Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived; 
 
 So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth 
 stand, 
 
 Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived; 
 For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred, 
 Ere you were born was beauty's summer dead." 
 
 140
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 SONNET CVIII. 
 
 *T T T'HAT'S in the brain that ink may character, 
 VV Which hath not figur'd to thee my true 
 
 spirit ? 
 
 What's new to speak, what new to register, 
 That may express my love, or thy dear merit ? 
 Nothing, sweet boy ; but yet, like prayers divine, 
 I must each day say o'er the very same, 
 Counting no old thing old, thou mine, I thine, 
 Even as when first I hallow'd thy fair name. 
 
 So that eternal love, in love's fresh case, 
 Weighs not the dust and injury of age; 
 Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place, 
 But makes antiquity for aye his page ; 
 
 Finding the first conceit of love there bred, 
 Where time and outward form would show it 
 dead." 
 
 [AT Shakespeare, when the drama 
 needed it, could fully and warmly 
 inter into the devotion which one 
 man may feel for another, as well as 
 into the tragedy which such devotion may entail, is 
 shown in his Merchant of Venice by the figure of 
 
 141
 
 Friendship 
 
 Antonio, over whom from the first line of the play 
 ("In sooth I know not why I am so sad") there 
 hangs a shadow of destiny. The following lines are 
 from Act iv. sc. i : 
 
 Antonio: "/COMMEND me to your honor- 
 
 \*Ji able wife; 
 
 Tell her the process of Antonio's end ; 
 Say how I loved you, speak me fair in death ; 
 And when the tale is told, bid her be judge, 
 Whether Bassanio had not once a love. 
 Repent not you that you shall lose your friend, 
 And he repents not that he pays your debt ; 
 For, if the Jew do cut but deep enough, 
 I'll pay it instantly with all my heart. 
 
 Bassanio: Antonio, I am married to a wife, 
 Who is as dear to me as life itself; 
 But life itself, my wife, and all the world, 
 Are not with me esteem'd above thy life : 
 I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all, 
 Here to this devil, to deliver you." 
 
 We may also, in this connection, quote his Henry 
 the Fifth (act iv. scene 6) for the deaths of the Duke 
 
 142
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 of York and the Earl of Suffolk at the battle of 
 Agincourt. Exeter, addressing Henry, says : 
 
 UFFOLK first died; and York, all haggled 
 over, 
 
 Comes to him, where in gore he lay insteep'd, 
 And takes him by the beard, kisses the gashes, 
 That bloodily did yawn upon his face; 
 He cries aloud, * Tarry, dear cousin Suffolk! 
 My soul shall thine keep company to heaven : 
 Tarry, sweet soul, for mine; then fly abreast, 
 As in this glorious and well-foughten field 
 We kept together in our chivalry ! ' 
 Upon these words I came and cheered him up : 
 He smiled me in the face, raught me his hand, 
 And, with a feeble gripe, says, 'Dear my Lord, 
 Commend my service to my sovereign.* 
 So did he turn, and over Suffolk's neck 
 He threw his wounded arm, and kissed his lips; 
 And so, espoused to death, with blood he seal'd 
 A testament of noble-ending love." 
 
 Shakespeare, with his generous many-sided nature 
 was, as the Sonnets seem t6 show, and as we should 
 expect, capable of friendship, passionate friendship, 
 towards both men and women. Perhaps this marks 
 
 H3
 
 Friendship 
 
 the highest reach of temperament. That there are 
 cases in which devotion to a man-friend altogether 
 replaces the love of the opposite sex is curiously 
 shown by the following extract from Sir Thomas 
 Browne : 
 
 SIR " T NEVER yet cast a true affection on a woman ; 
 THOMAS A but I have loved my friend as I do virtue, my 
 
 BROWNE soul, my God I love my friend before myself, 
 
 and yet methinks I do not love him enough : some 
 few months hence my multiplied affection will 
 make me believe I have not loved him at all. When 
 I am from him, I am dead till I be with him ; when 
 I am with him, I am not satisfied, but would be still 
 nearer him. . . . This noble affection falls not on 
 yulgar and common constitutions, but on such 
 as are marked for virtue : he that can love his 
 friend with this noble ardour, will in a competent 
 degree affect all." Sir Thomas Browne, Religio 
 Medici y 1642. 
 
 [LLI AM PENN (b. 1 644) the foun- 
 der of Pennsylvania, and of Phila- 
 delphia,"The city of brotherly love" 
 was a great believer in friendship. 
 He says in his Fruits of Solitude : 
 
 144
 
 Renaissance ^f Modern Times 
 
 " A TRUE friend unbosoms freely, advises WILLIAM 
 *L\. justly, assists readily, adventures boldly, PENN 
 takes all patiently, defends courageously, and con- 
 tinues a friend unchangeably. ... In short, choose 
 a friend as thou dost a wife, till death separate you. 
 . . . Death cannot kill what never dies. Nor can 
 spirits ever be divided that love and live in the 
 same Divine Principle; the Root and Record of 
 
 their friendship This is the comfort of friends, 
 
 that though they may be said to die, yet their 
 friendship and society are, in the best sense, ever 
 present, because immortal." 
 
 T may be worth while here to insert 
 two passages from Macaulay's His- 
 tory of England. The first deals with 
 the remarkable intimacy between the 
 Young Prince William of Orange and "a gentle- 
 man of his household" named Bentinck. William's 
 escape from a malignant attack of small-pox 
 
 "was attributed partly to his own singular equani- WILLIAM 
 mity, and partly to the intrepid and indefatigable QF 
 friendship of Bentinck. From the hands of Ben- ORANGE 
 tinck alone William took food and medicine by 
 Bentinck alone William was lifted from his bed 
 and laid down in it. 'Whether Bentinck slept or 
 
 a SHEET ELEVEN
 
 Friendship 
 
 not while I was ill,' said William to Temple with 
 great tenderness, C I know not. But this I know, 
 that through sixteen days and nights, I never once 
 called for anything but that Bentinck was instantly 
 at my side.' Before the faithful servant had en- 
 tirely performed his task, he had himself caught 
 the contagion." (But he recovered.) History of 
 England, ch. vii. 
 
 The second passage describes the devotion of the 
 Princess Anne (daughter of James II. and after- 
 wards Queen Anne) to Lady Churchill a devotion 
 which had considerable influence on the political 
 situation. 
 
 PRINCESS" TT is a common observation that differences of 
 ANNE A taste, understanding, and disposition are no 
 AND impediments to friendship, and that the closest in- 
 LADY timacies often exist between minds, each of which 
 CHUR- supplies what is wanting in the other. Lady 
 CHILL Churchill was loved and even worshipped by 
 Anne. The princess could not live apart from the 
 object of her romantic fondness. She married, and 
 was a faithful and even an affectionate wife ; but 
 Prince George, a dull man, whose chief pleasures 
 were derived from his dinner and his bottle, ac- 
 quired over her no influence comparable to that 
 146
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 exercised by her female friend, and soon gave him- 
 self up with stupid patience to the dominion of 
 that vehement and commanding spirit by which 
 his wife was governed." History of England^ ch. vii. 
 
 HAT the tradition of Greek thought 
 was not quite obliterated in England 
 by the Puritan movement is shown 
 by the writings of Archbishop Potter, 
 who speaks with approval of friendship as followed 
 among the Greeks, "not only in private, but by the ARCH- 
 public allowance and encouragement of their laws; * ,v~c 
 for they thought there could be no means more 
 effectual to excite their youth to noble undertakings, 
 nor any greater security to their commonwealths, 
 than this generous passion." He then quotes Ath- 
 enaeus, saying that "free commonwealths and all 
 those states that consulted the advancement of 
 their own honour, seem to have been unanimous in 
 establishing laws to encourage and reward it." John 
 Potter y Antiquities of 'Greece^ 1698. 
 
 The 1 8th century however in England, with 
 its leaning towards formalism, was perhaps not 
 
 H7
 
 Friendship 
 
 favorable to the understanding of the Greek 
 spirit. At any rate there is not much to show in that 
 direction. In Germany the classical tradition in art 
 was revived by Raphael Mengs, while Winckel- 
 mann, the art critic, showed himself one of the best 
 interpreters of the Hellenic world that has ever 
 lived. His letters too, to his personal friends, 
 breathe a spirit of the tenderest and most passionate 
 devotion : "Friendship," he says, "without love is 
 mere acquaintanceship." Winckelmann met, in 
 1762, in Rome, a young nobleman, Reinhold von 
 Berg, to whom he became deeply attached : 
 
 WINCKEL-" A LMOST at first sight there sprang up, on 
 
 MANN'S -^J^ Winckelmann's side, an attachment as ro- 
 
 LETTERS mantic, emotional and passionate as love. In a 
 
 letter to his friend he said,* From the first moment 
 
 an indescribable attraction towards you, excited by 
 
 something more than form and feature, caused me 
 
 to catch an echo of that harmony which passes 
 
 human understanding and which is the music of 
 
 the everlasting concord of things. ... I was aware 
 
 of the deep consent of our spirits, the instant I saw 
 
 you.' And in a later letter : * No name by which 
 
 I might call you would be sweet enough or suffi- 
 
 148
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 cicnt for my love ; all that I could say would be far 
 too feeble to give utterance to my heart and soul. 
 Truly friendship came from heaven and was not 
 created by mere human impulses. . . . My one 
 friend, I love you more than any living thing, and 
 time nor chance nor age can ever lessen this love." 
 Ludwig Frey, Der Eros und die Kunst y Leipzig, 
 
 p. 211. 
 
 |OETHE, that universal genius, has 
 some excellent thoughts on this sub- 
 ject; speaking of Winckelmann he 
 says : 
 
 "HT^HE affinities of human beings in Antiquity GOETHE 
 
 J. give evidence of an important distinction be- QN 
 tween ancient and modern times. The relation to WINCKEL- 
 women, which among us has become so tender and MANN 
 full of meaning, hardly aspired in those days be- 
 yond the limits of vulgar necessity. The relation 
 of parents to their children seems in some respects 
 to have been tenderer. More to them than all other 
 feelings was the friendship between persons of the 
 male sex (though female friends too, like Chloris 
 and Thyia, were inseparable, even in Hades). In 
 these cases of union between two youths, the 
 passionate fulfilment of loving duties, the joys of 
 149
 
 Friendship 
 
 inseparableness, the devotion of one for the other, 
 the unavoided companionship in death, fill us with 
 astonishment ; indeed one reels oneself ashamed 
 when poets, historians, philosophers and orators 
 overwhelm us with legends, anecdotes, sentiments 
 and ideas, containing such meaning and feeling. 
 Winckelmann felt himself born for a friendship of 
 this kind not only as capable of it, but in the 
 highest degree in need of it; he became conscious 
 of his true self only under the form of friendship." 
 Goethe on Winckelmann. 
 
 Some of Goethe's poems further illustrate this 
 subject. In the Saki Nameh of his West-Oestlichen 
 Divan he has followed the style of a certain class of 
 Persian love-songs. The following poem is from 
 a Cupbearer to his Master: 
 
 POEM "TN the market-place appearing 
 BY None thy Poet-fame dispute ; 
 
 GOETHE J to S lac % hear % sin g in g> 
 
 I too hearken when thou'rt mute. 
 
 Yet I love thee, when thou printest 
 
 Kisses not to be forgot, 
 Best of all, for words may perish, 
 
 But a kiss lives on in thought. 
 
 150
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 Rhymes on rhymes fair meaning carry, 
 
 Thoughts to think bring deeper joy; 
 Sing to other folk, but tarry 
 
 Silent with thy serving-boy." 
 
 loUNT AUGUST VON PLATEN 
 (born at Ansbach in Bavaria, 1796) 
 was in respect of style one of the most 
 finished and perfect of German poets. 
 His nature (which was refined and self-controlled) 
 led him from the first to form the most romantic 
 attachments with men. He freely and openly ex- 
 pressed his feelings in his verses ; of which a great 
 number are practically love-poems addressed to his 
 friends. They include a series of twenty-six sonnets 
 to one of his friends, Karl Theodor German. Of 
 these Raffalovich says (Uranisme y Lyons, 1896, 
 
 P-350 : 
 
 "HT^HESE sonnets to Karl Theodor German are AUGUST 
 
 JL among the most beautiful in German litera- VON 
 ture. Platen in the sonnet surpasses all the German PLATEN 
 poets, including even Goethe. In them perfection 
 of form, and poignancy or wealth of emotion are
 
 Friendship 
 
 illustrated to perfection. The sentiment is similar 
 to that of the sonnets of Shakespeare (with their 
 personal note), and the form that of the Italian or 
 French sonnet." 
 
 Platen, however, was unfortunate in his affairs of 
 the heart, and there is a refrain of suffering in his 
 poems which conies out characteristically in the 
 following sonnet : 
 
 PLATEN'S "QINCE pain is life and life is only pain, 
 SONNETS O Why he can feel what I have felt before, 
 
 Who seeing joy sees it again no more 
 The instant he attempts his joy to gain ; 
 Who, caught as in a labyrinth unaware, 
 The outlet from it never more can find; 
 Whom love seems only for this end to bind 
 In order to hand over to Despair; 
 
 Who prays each dizzy lightning-flash to end him, 
 Each star to reel his thread of life away 
 
 With all the torments which his heart are rending ; 
 And envies even the dead their pillow of clay, 
 
 Where Love no more their foolish brains can steal. 
 
 He who knows this, knows me, and what I feel." 
 
 One of Platen's sonnets deals with an incident, 
 referred to in an earlier page, namely, the death of 
 
 152
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 the poet Pindar in the theatre, in the arms of his 
 young friend Theoxenos : 
 
 ,,/^~\H! when I die, would I might fade away QN THE 
 v>/ Like the pale stars, swiftly and silently, DEATH 
 Would that death's messenger might come to QF 
 
 me .> PINDAR 
 
 As once it came to Pindar so they say. 
 
 Not that I would in Life, or in my Verse, 
 With him, the great Incomparable, compare; 
 Only his Death, my friend, I ask to share : 
 
 But let me now the gracious tale rehearse. 
 
 Long at the play, hearing sweet Harmony, 
 
 He sat ; and wearied out at last, had lain 
 His cheek upon his dear one's comely knee ; 
 
 Then when it died away the choral strain 
 He who thus cushioned him said : Wake and come ! 
 
 But to the Gods above he had gone home." 
 
 i HE correspondence of Richard Wag- 
 ner discloses the existence of a very 
 warm friendship between him and 
 Ludwig II., the young king of Ba- 
 varia. Ludwig as a young man appears to have been 
 a very charming personality, good looking, en- 
 gaging and sympathetic ; everyone was fond of him. 
 
 H3
 
 Friendship 
 
 Yet his tastes led him away from "society," into re- 
 tirement, and the companionship of Nature and 
 a few chosen friends often of humble birth. Al- 
 ready at the age of fifteen he had heard Lohengrin, 
 and silently vowed to know the composer. One of 
 his first acts when he came to the throne was to send 
 for Wagner ; and from the moment of their meeting 
 a personal intimacy sprang up between them, which 
 in due course led to the establishment of the theatre 
 at Bayreuth, and to the liberation of Wagner's 
 genius to the world. Though the young king at 
 a later time lost his reason probably owing to his 
 over-sensitive emotional nature this does not de- 
 tract from the service that he rendered to Music by 
 his generous attachment. How Wagner viewed the 
 matter may be gathered from Wagner's letters. 
 WAGNER "TTE, the king, loves me, and with the deep 
 AND J_ JL feeling and glow of a first love ; he perceives 
 LUDWIG and knows everything about me, and understands 
 II. me as my own soul. He wants me to stay with him 
 always. ... I am to be free and my own master, not 
 his music-conductor only my very self and his 
 friend." Letters to Mme. Eliza Wille^ 4th May, 1 8 64. 
 154
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 1 T T is true that I have my young king who gen- 
 J. uinely adores me. You cannot form an idea of 
 our relations. I recall one of the dreams of my 
 youth. I once dreamed that Shakespeare was alive : 
 that I really saw and spoke to him : I can never for- 
 get the impression that dream made on me. Then 
 I would have wished to see Beethoven, though he 
 was already dead. Something of the same kind 
 must pass in the mind of this lovable man when 
 with me. He says he can hardly believe that he 
 really possesses me. None can read without as- 
 tonishment, without enchantment, the letters he 
 writes to me." Ibid y 9th Sept., 1864. 
 
 * T HOPE now for a long period to gain strength 
 J. again by quiet work. This is made possible for 
 me by the love of an unimaginably beautiful and 
 thoughtful being : it seems that it had to be even 
 so greatly gifted a man and one so destined for 
 me, as this young King of Bavaria. What he is to 
 me no one can imagine. My guardian ! In his love 
 I completely rest and fortify myself towards the 
 completion of my task." Letter to his brother-in-law , 
 loth Sept., 1865. 
 
 '55
 
 Friendship 
 
 these letters we see chiefly of course 
 the passionate sentiments of which 
 Ludwig was capable ; but that Wag- 
 ner fully understood the feeling and 
 appreciated it may be gathered from various pass- 
 ages in his published writings such as the follow- 
 ing, in which he seeks to show how the devotion of 
 comradeship became the chief formative influence 
 of the Spartan State: 
 
 WAGNER * tr TPHIS beauteous naked man is the kernel of all 
 JL Spartanhood ; from genuine delight in the 
 beauty of the most perfect human body that of 
 the male arose that spirit of comradeship which 
 pervades and shapes the whole economy of the 
 Spartan State. This love of man to man, in its 
 primitive purity, proclaims itself as the noblest and 
 least selfish utterance of man's sense of beauty, for 
 it teaches man to sink and merge his entire self in 
 the object of his affection;" and again: "The 
 higher element of that love of man to man consisted 
 even in this : that it excluded the motive of egoistic 
 physicalism. Nevertheless it not only included a 
 purely spiritual bond of friendship, but this spiri- 
 tual friendship was the blossom and the crown of 
 the physical friendship. The latter sprang directly 
 156 
 
 ON 
 
 GREEK 
 COMRADE- 
 SHIP
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 from delight in the beauty, aye in the material 
 bodily beauty of the beloved comrade ; yet this de- 
 light was no egoistic yearning, but a thorough 
 stepping out of self into unreserved sympathy 
 with the comrade's joy in himself; involuntarily 
 betrayed by his life-glad beauty-prompted bearing. 
 This love, which had its basis in the noblest plea- 
 sures of both eye and soul not like our modern 
 postal correspondence of sober friendship, half bus- 
 iness-like, half sentimental was the Spartan's on- 
 ly tutoress of youth, the never-ageing instructress 
 alike of boy and man, the ordainer of common 
 feasts and valiant enterprises ; nay the inspiring 
 helpmeet on the battlefield. For this it was that 
 knit the fellowship of love into battalions of war, 
 and fore-wrote the tactics of death-daring, in res- 
 cue of the imperilled or vengeance for the slaugh- 
 tered comrade, by the infrangible law of the soul's 
 most natural necessity." The Art-work of the Future, 
 trans, by W. A. Ellis. 
 
 ma y close this record of celebrated 
 Germans with the name of K. H. 
 Ulrichs, a Hanoverian by birth who 
 ^occupied for a long time an official 
 position in the revenue department at Vienna, and 
 who became well known about 1866 through his 
 
 157
 
 Friendship 
 
 writings on the subject of friendship. He gives, in 
 his pamphlet Memnon y an account of the "story of 
 his heart" in early years. In an apparently quite 
 natural way, and independently of outer influences, 
 his thoughts had from the very first been of friends 
 of his own sex. At the age of 14, the picture of a 
 Greek hero or god, a statue, seen in a book, woke in 
 him the tenderest longings. 
 
 K. H. "fTHHIS picture (he says), put away from me, as 
 ULRICHS A it was, a hundred times, came again a hun- 
 dred times before the eyes of my soul. But of 
 course for the origin of my special temperament it 
 is in no way responsible. It only woke up what was 
 already slumbering there a thing which might 
 have been done equally well by something else." 
 
 From that time forward the boy worshipped with 
 a kind of romantic devotion elder friends, young 
 men in the prime of early manhood ; and later still 
 his writings threw a flood of light on the "urning" 
 temperament as he called it of which he was 
 himself so marked an example. 
 
 Some of Ulrich's verses are scattered among his 
 
 prose writings : 
 
 158
 
 Renaissance &* Modern Times 
 
 To his friend Eberhard. 
 
 A ND so farewell! perchance on Earth ULRICHS' 
 JHL God's finger as 'twixt thee and me VERSES 
 Will never make that wonder clear 
 Why thus It drew me unto thee.*' 
 
 Memnoit) Leipzig, 1898, p. 104. 
 
 And this: 
 
 " T T was the day of our first meeting 
 JL That happy day, in Davern's grove 
 I felt the Spring wind's tender greeting, 
 
 And April touched my heart to love. 
 Thy hand in mine lay kindly mated ; 
 Thy gaze held mine quite fascinated 
 
 So gracious wast, and fair ! 
 Thy glance my life-thread almost severed ; 
 My heart for joy and gladness quivered, 
 
 Nigh more than it could bear. 
 
 There in the grove at evening's hour 
 
 The breeze thro* budding twigs hath ranged, 
 
 And lips have learned to meet each other, 
 And kisses mute exchanged." 
 
 Memnon, p. 23. 
 '59
 
 Friendship 
 
 3 O return to England. With the begin- 
 ning of the 1 9th century we find two 
 great poets, Byron and Shelley, both 
 interested in and even writing in a 
 romantic strain on the subject in question. 
 
 Byron's attachment, when at Cambridge, to Eddle- 
 ston the chorister, a youth two years younger than 
 himself, is well known. In a youthful letter to Miss 
 Pigot he, Byron, speaks of it in enthusiastic terms : 
 
 "Trin. Coll., Camb., July 5th, 1807. 
 
 BYRON'S" T REJOICE to hear you are interested in my pro- 
 LETTERS J. te"g6 ; he has been my almost constant associate 
 since October, 1 805, when I entered Trinity Col- 
 lege. His voice first attracted my attention, his 
 countenance fixed it, and his manners attached me to 
 him for ever. He departs for a mercantile house in 
 town in October, and we shall probably not meet 
 till the expiration of my minority, when I shall 
 leave to his decision either entering as a partner 
 through my interest or residing with me alto- 
 gether. Of course he would in his present frame of 
 mind prefer the latter, but he may alter his opinion 
 previous to that period ; however he shall have his 
 choice. I certainly love him more than any human 
 being, and neither time nor distance have had the 
 160
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 least effect on my (in general) changeable dispo- 
 sition. In short we shall put Lady E. Butler and 
 Miss Ponsonby to the blush, Pylades and Orestes 
 out of countenance, and want nothing but a catas- 
 trophe like Nisus and Euryalus to give Jonathan 
 and David the 'go by.' He certainly is more at- 
 tached to me than even I am in return. During the 
 whole of my residence at Cambridge we met every 
 day, summer and winter, without passing one tire- 
 some moment, and separated each time with in- 
 creasing reluctance." 
 
 Eddleston gave Byron a cornelian (brooch-pin) 
 which Byron prized much, and is said to have kept 
 all his life. He probably refers to it, and to the in- 
 equality of condition between him and Eddleston, 
 in the following stanza from his poem, The Adieu y 
 written about this time: 
 
 " A ^^ thou, my friend, whose gentle love 
 JL\. Yet thrills my bosom's chords, ADIEU 
 
 How much thy friendship was above 
 
 Description's power or words ! 
 Still near my breast thy gift I wear 
 Which sparkled once with Feeling's tear, 
 
 Of Love, the pure, the sacred gem ; 
 Our souls were equal, and our lot 
 In that dear moment quite forgot ; 
 
 Let pride alone condemn." 
 161 
 
 a SHEET TWELVB
 
 Friendship 
 
 [E Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss 
 Sarah Ponsonby mentioned in the 
 above letter were at that time living 
 at Llangollen, in Wales, and were 
 known as the "Ladies of Llangollen," their roman- 
 tic attachment to each other having already become 
 proverbial. When Miss Ponsonby was seventeen, 
 and Lady E. Butler some twenty years older, they 
 had run away from their respective and respectable 
 homes in Ireland, and taking a cottage at Llangollen 
 lived there, inseparable companions, for the rest 
 of their lives. Letters and diaries of contemporary 
 celebrities mention their romantic devotion. (The 
 Duke of Wellington was among their visitors.) 
 Lady Eleanor died in 1829, at the age of ninety; 
 and Miss Ponsonby only survived her "beloved 
 one" (as she always called her) by two years. 
 
 S to the allusion to Nisus and Eu- 
 ryalus, Byron's paraphrase of the 
 episode (from the nth book of 
 Virgil's -^Eneid) serves to show his 
 
 interest in it : 
 
 162 

 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 "XJISUS, the guardian of the portal, stood, BYRON'S 
 IN Eager to gild his arms with hostile blood ; NISUS ANE 
 Well-skilled in fight the quivering lance to wield, EURYA- 
 Or pour his arrows thro* the embattled field : LUS 
 From Ida torn, he left his Sylvan cave, 
 And sought a foreign home, a distant grave. 
 
 To watch the movements of the Daunian host, 
 With him Euryalus sustains the post; 
 No lovelier mien adorn'd the ranks of Troy, 
 And beardless bloom yet graced the gallant boy ; 
 Tho' few the seasons of his youthful life, 
 As yet a novice in the martial strife, 
 'Twas his, with beauty, valour's gifts to share 
 A soul heroic, as his form was fair. 
 
 These burn with one pure flame of generous 
 
 love; 
 
 In peace, in war, united still they move; 
 Friendship and glory form their joint reward ; 
 And now combined they hold their nightly guard." 
 
 [The two then carry out a daring raid on the 
 enemy, in which Euryalus is slain. Nisus, coming to 
 his rescue is after performing prodigies of valor 
 slain too.] 
 
 "Thus Nisus all his fond affection proved 
 Dying, revenged the fate of him he loved ;
 
 T. MOORE 
 
 ON 
 
 BYRON 
 
 Friendship 
 
 Then on his bosom sought his wonted place, 
 And death was heavenly in his friend's embrace ! 
 
 Celestial pair ! if aught my verse can claim, 
 Wafted on Time's broad pinion, yours is fame ! 
 Ages on ages shall your fate admire, 
 No future day shall see your names expire, 
 While stands the Capitol, immortal dome! 
 And vanquished millions hail their empress, 
 Rome!" 
 
 Byron's friendships, in fact, with young men were 
 so marked that Moore in his Life and Letters of Lord 
 Byron seems to have felt it necessary to mention and, 
 to some extent, to explain them : 
 
 "TOURING his stay in Greece (in 1 8 10) we find 
 -L-/ him forming one of those extraordinary 
 friendships if attachment to persons so inferior 
 to himself can be called by that name of which 
 I have already mentioned two or three instances 
 in his younger days, and in which the pride of 
 being a protector and the pleasure of exciting gra- 
 titude seem to have contributed to his mind the 
 chief, pervading charm. The person whom he now 
 adopted in this manner, and from similar feelings 
 to those which had inspired his early attachments 
 to the cottage boy near Newstead and the young 
 chorister at Cambridge, was a Greek youth, named 
 164
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 Nicolo Giraud, the son, I believe, of a widow lady 
 in whose house the artist Lusieri lodged. In this 
 young man he seems to have taken the most lively 
 and even brotherly interest." 
 
 [ELLEY, in his fragmentary Essay 
 Friendship stated by his friend 
 )Hogg to have been written " not long 
 ^before his death" says: 
 
 <T REMEMBER forming an attachment of this SHELLEY 
 A kind at school. I cannot recall to my memory ON 
 the precise epoch at which this took place ; but FR1END- 
 I imagine it must have been at the age of eleven or SHIP 
 twelve. The object of these sentiments was a boy 
 about my own age, of a character eminently gener- 
 ous, brave and gentle, and the elements of human 
 feeling seemed to have been, from his birth, geni- 
 ally compounded within him. There was a delicacy 
 and a simplicity in his manners, inexpressibly attrac- 
 tive. It has never been my fortune to meet with 
 him since my schoolboy days ; but either I con- 
 found my present recollections with the delusions 
 of past feelings, or he is now a source of honour 
 and utility to everyone around him. The tones of 
 his voice were so soft and winning, that every 
 word pierced into my heart ; and their pathos was 
 so deep that in listening to him the tears have in-
 
 Friendship 
 
 voluntarily gushed from my eyes. Such was the 
 being for whom I first experienced the sacred 
 sentiments of friendship." 
 
 It may be noted that Hogg takes the reference as 
 to himself! 
 
 'H this passage we may compare 
 'the following from Leigh Hunt: 
 
 LEIGH 7 /B^B^!M"T F l had rea P ed no other benefit 
 
 HUNT tlJ^mA^jfc^ A from Christ Hospital, the school 
 ON ^^^^Z-s would be ever dear to me from the 
 SCHOOL- recollection of the friendships I formed in it, and 
 LIFE of the first heavenly taste it gave me of that most 
 spiritual of the affections. ... If ever I tasted a 
 disembodied transport on earth, it was in those 
 friendships which I entertained at school, before 
 I dreamt of any maturer feeling. I shall never for- 
 get the impression it made on me. I loved my 
 friend for his gentleness, his candour, his truth, 
 his good repute, his freedom even from my own 
 livelier manner, his calm and reasonable kindness. 
 It was not any particular talent that attracted me 
 to him, or anything striking whatsoever. I should 
 say, in one word, it was his goodness. I doubt 
 whether he ever had a conception of a tithe of the 
 regard and respect I entertained for him; and 
 I smile to think of the perplexity (though he never 
 166
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 showed it) which he probably felt sometimes at my 
 enthusiastic expressions ; for I thought him a kind 
 of angel. It is no exaggeration to say, that, take 
 away the unspiritual part of it the genius and the 
 knowledge and there is no height of conceit in- 
 dulged in by the most romantic character in Shake- 
 speare, which surpassed what I felt towards the 
 merits I ascribed to him, and the delight which 
 I took in his society. With the other boys I played 
 antics, and rioted in fantastic jests; but in his 
 society, or whenever I thought of him, I fell into 
 a kind of Sabbath state of bliss ; and I am sure 
 I could have died for him. 
 
 "I experienced this delightful affection towards 
 three successive schoolfellows, till two of them had 
 for some time gone out into the world and for- 
 gotten me ; but it grew less with each, and in more 
 than one instance became rivalled by a new set of 
 emotions, especially in regard to the last, for I fell 
 in love with his sister at least, I thought so. But 
 on the occurrence of her death, not long after, 
 I was startled at finding myself assume an air of 
 greater sorrow than I felt, and at being willing to 
 be relieved by the sight of the first pretty face that 
 turned towards me My friend, who died him- 
 self not long after his quitting the University, was 
 of a German family in the service of the court, very 
 
 167
 
 Friendship 
 
 refined and musical." Autobiography of Leigh Hunt y 
 Smith and Elder ^ 1870, p. 75. 
 
 this subject of boy-friendships and 
 their intensity Lord Beaconsfield has, 
 in Coningsbjy a quite romantic pass- 
 age, which notwithstanding its sen- 
 timental setting may be worth quoting; because, 
 after all, it signalises an often-forgotten or uncon- 
 sidered aspect of school-life : 
 
 LORD " A T school, friendship is a passion. It entrances 
 BEACONS- ** the being i it tears ^e soul. All loves of after- 
 FIELD'S life can never bring its rapture, or its wretched- 
 "CON- ness ; no li ss so absorbing, no pangs of jealousy 
 INGSBY" or despair so crushing and so keen ! What tender- 
 ness and what devotion; what illimitable confi- 
 dence, infinite revelations of inmost thoughts; 
 what ecstatic present and romantic future ; what 
 bitter estrangements and what melting reconcilia- 
 tions ; what scenes of wild recrimination, agitating 
 explanations, passionate correspondence; what 
 insane sensitiveness, and what frantic sensibility ; 
 what earthquakes of the heart and whirlwinds of 
 the soul are confined in that simple phrase, a 
 schoolboy's friendship ! " 
 168
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 )LFRED TENNYSON, in his great 
 poem In Memoriam, published about 
 the middle of the 1 9th century, gives 
 superb expression to his love for his 
 lost friend, Arthur Hallam. Reserved, dignified, in 
 sustained meditation and tender sentiment, yet half 
 revealing here and there a more passionate feeling ; 
 expressing in simplest words the most difficult and 
 elusive thoughts (e.g.. Cantos 128 and 129), as well 
 as the most intimate and sacred moods of the soul ; 
 it is indeed a great work of art. Naturally, being 
 such, it was roundly abused by the critics on its first 
 appearance. The Times solemly rebuked its language 
 as unfitted for any but amatory tenderness, and be- 
 cause young Hallam was a barrister spent much wit 
 upon the poet's "Amaryllis of the Chancery bar." 
 Tennyson himself, speaking of In Memoriam y men- 
 tioned (see Memoir by his son, p. 800) "the number 
 of shameful letters of abuse he had received 
 about it!" 
 
 169
 
 Friendship 
 
 CANTO XIII. 
 
 TENNY-"nPEARS of the widower, when he sees, 
 
 SON'S A A late-lost form that sleep reveals, 
 "IN ME- And moves his doubtful arms, and feels 
 MORIAM" Her place is empty, fall like these; 
 
 Which weep a loss for ever new, 
 
 A void where heart on heart reposed ; 
 
 And, where warm hands have prest and closed, 
 
 Silence, till I be silent too. 
 
 Which weep the comrade of my choice, 
 An awful thought, a life removed, 
 The human-hearted man I loved, 
 
 A spirit, not a breathing voice. 
 
 Come Time, and teach me, many years, 
 
 I do not suffer in a dream ; 
 
 For now so strange do these things seem, 
 Mine eyes have leisure for their tears ; 
 
 My fancies time to rise on wing, 
 
 And glance about the approaching sails, 
 As tho' they brought but merchant's bales, 
 
 And not the burden that they bring." 
 
 170
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 CANTO XVIII. 
 
 TIS well, 'tis something, we may stand 
 Where he in English earth is laid, 
 And from his ashes may be made 
 The violet of his native land. 
 
 'Tis little ; but it looks in truth 
 As if the quiet bones were blest 
 Among familiar names to rest 
 
 And in the places of his youth. 
 
 Come then, pure hands, and bear the head 
 That sleeps, or wears the mask of sleep, 
 And come, whatever loves to weep, 
 
 And hear the ritual of the dead. 
 
 Ah yet, ev'n yet, if this might be, 
 I, falling on his faithful heart, 
 Would breathing thro' his lips impart 
 
 The life that almost dies in me : 
 
 That dies not, but endures with pain, 
 And slowly forms the firmer mind, 
 Treasuring the look it cannot find, 
 
 The words that are not heard again." 
 
 171
 
 Friendship 
 
 CANTO LIX. 
 
 "IN ME- "TF, in thy second state sublime, 
 MORIAM" A Thy ransom'd reason change replies 
 
 With all the circle of the wise, 
 The perfect flower of human time ; 
 
 And if thou cast thine eyes below, 
 How dimly character'd and slight, 
 How dwarf 'd a growth of cold and night, 
 
 How blanch'd with darkness must I grow 1 
 
 Yet turn thee to the doubtful shore, 
 Where thy first form was made a man ; 
 I loved thee, Spirit, and love, nor can 
 
 The soul of Shakspeare love thee more." 
 
 CANTO CXXVII. 
 
 EAR friend, far ofF, my lost desire, 
 So far, so near, in woe or weal ; 
 O loved the most when most I feel 
 There is a lower and a higher ; 
 
 Known and unknown, human, divine! 
 Sweet human hand and lips and eye, 
 Dear heavenly friend that canst not die, 
 
 Mine, mine, for ever, ever, mine ! 
 
 172
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 Strange friend, past, present and to be ; 
 
 Loved deeplier, darklier understood; 
 
 Behold I dream a dream of good 
 And mingle all the world with thee." 
 
 CANTO CXXVIII. 
 
 <r THHY voice is on the rolling air; 
 JL I hear thee where the waters run; 
 
 Thou standest in the rising sun, 
 And in the setting thou art rair. 
 
 What art thou then? I cannot guess; 
 But tho' I seem in star and flower 
 To feel thee some diffusive power, 
 
 I do not therefore love thee less : 
 
 My love involves the love before; 
 
 My love is vaster passion now; 
 
 Tho' mixed with God and Nature thou, 
 I seem to love thee more and more. 
 
 Far off thou art, but ever nigh ; 
 
 I have thee still, and I rejoice; 
 
 I prosper, circled with thy voice; 
 I shall not lose thee tho' I die." 
 
 173
 
 Friendship 
 
 'OLLOWING is a little poem by 
 Robert Browning entitled May and 
 Deathy which may well be placed near 
 the stanzas of In Memoriam : 
 
 BROWN- M T WISH that when you died last May, 
 
 ING'S * Charles, there had died along with you 
 "MAY AND Three parts of Spring's delightful things; 
 DEATH" Ay, and for me the fourth part too. 
 A foolish thought, and worse, perhaps ! 
 There must be many a pair of friends 
 Who arm-in-arm deserve the warm 
 
 Moon-births and the long evening-ends. 
 
 So, for their sake, be May still May ! 
 
 Let their new time, as mine of old, 
 Do all it did for me; I bid 
 
 Sweet sights and sounds throng manifold. 
 
 Only one little sight, one plant 
 
 Woods have in May, that starts up green 
 
 Save a sole streak which, so to speak, 
 
 Is Spring's blood, spilt its leaves between 
 
 That, they might spare; a certain wood 
 Might miss the plant; their loss were small; 
 
 But I whene'er the leaf grows there 
 It's drop comes from my heart, that's all." 
 
 '74
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 ETWEEN Browning and Whitman 
 
 we may insert a few lines from R. W. 
 
 Emerson : 
 
 "HpHE only way to have a friend RALPH 
 JL is to be one. ... In the last WALDO 
 analysis love is only the reflection of a man's own EMERSON 
 worthiness from other men. Men have sometimes 
 exchanged names with their friends, as if they 
 would signify that in their friend each loved his 
 own soul. 
 
 "The higher the style we demand of friendship, 
 of course the less easy to establish it with flesh and 
 blood. . , . Friends, such as we desire, are dreams 
 and fables. But a sublime hope cheers ever the 
 faithful heart, that elsewhere, in other regions of 
 the universal power, souls are now acting, en- 
 during, and daring, which can love us, and which 
 we can love." Essay on Friendship. 
 
 These also from Henry D. Thoreau : 
 
 word is oftener on the lips of men than HENRY D. 
 Friendship, and indeed no thought is more THOREAU 
 familiar to their aspirations. All men are dreaming 
 of it, and its drama, which is always a tragedy, is 
 enacted daily. It is the secret of the universe. You 
 may thread the town, you may wander the coun- 
 try, and none shall ever speak of it, yet thought is
 
 Friendship 
 
 everywhere busy about it, and the idea of what is 
 possible in this respect affects our behaviour to- 
 wards all new men and women, and a great many 
 old ones. Nevertheless I can remember only two 
 or three essays on this subject in all literature. . . . 
 To say that a man is your friend, means commonly 
 no more than this, that he is not your enemy. 
 Most contemplate only what would be the acci- 
 dental and trifling advantages of friendship, as 
 that the friend can assist in time of need, by his 
 substance, or his influence, or his counsel; but 
 he who foresees such advantages in this relation 
 proves himself blind to its real advantage, or in- 
 deed wholly inexperienced in the relation itself. 
 . . . What is commonly called Friendship is only 
 a little more honour among rogues. But some- 
 times we are said to love another, that is, to 
 stand in a true relation to him, so that we give the 
 best to, and receive the best from, him. Between 
 whom there is hearty truth there is love ; and in 
 proportion to our truthfulness and confidence in 
 one another our lives are divine and miraculous, 
 and answer to our ideal. There are passages of 
 affection in our intercourse with mortal men and 
 women, such as no prophecy had taught us to ex- 
 pect, which transcend our earthly life, and antici- 
 pate heaven for us." From On the Concord River.
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 CONCLUDE this collection with 
 a few quotations from Whitman, for 
 whom "the love of comrades" per- 
 haps stands as the most intimate part 
 of his message to the world "Here the frailest 
 leaves of me and yet my strongest lasting." Whit- 
 man, by his great power, originality and initiative, 
 as well as by his deep insight and wide vision, is in 
 many ways the inaugurator of a new era to man- 
 kind ; and it is especially interesting to find that this 
 idea of comradeship, and of its establishment as a 
 social institution, plays so important a part with him. 
 We have seen that in the Greek age, and more or 
 less generally in the ancient and pagan world, com- 
 radeship was an institution ; we have seen that in 
 Christian and modern times, though existent, it was 
 socially denied and ignored, and indeed to a great 
 extent fell under a kind of ban; and now Whitman's 
 attitude towards it suggests to us that it really is 
 destined to pass into its third stage, to arise again, 
 and become a recognised factor of modern life, and 
 
 SHEET THIRTEEN
 
 Friendship 
 
 even in a more extended and perfect form than 
 at first." 
 
 WALT"TT is to the development, identification, and 
 WHITMAN A general prevalence of that fervid comradeship 
 (the adhesive love, at least rivaling the amative 
 love hitherto possessing imaginative literature, if 
 not going beyond it), that I look for the counter- 
 balance and offset of our materialistic and vulgar 
 American Democracy, and for the spiritualisation 
 thereof. Many will say it is a dream, and will not 
 follow my inferences ; but I confidently expect a 
 time when there will be seen, running like a half- 
 hid warp through all the myriad audible and vis- 
 ible worldly interests of America, threads of manly 
 friendship, fond and loving, pure and sweet, strong 
 and lifelong, carried to degrees hitherto unknown 
 not only giving tone to individual character, and 
 making it unprecedently emotional, muscular, he- 
 roic, and refined, but having deepest relations to 
 general politics. I say Democracy infers such 
 loving comradeship, as its most inevitable twin or 
 
 As Whitman in this connection (like Tennyson in connection with 
 In Memoriam) is sure to be accused of morbidity, it may be worth while 
 to insert the following note from In re Walt Whitman, p. 115, "Dr. 
 Drink ard in 1870, when Whitman broke down from rupture of a small 
 blood-vessel in the brain, wrote to a Philadelphia doctor detailing 
 Whitman's case, and stating that he was a man ' with the most natural 
 habits, bases, and organisation he had ever seen.'" 
 
 I 7 8
 
 Renaissance &* Modern Times 
 
 counterpart, without which it will be incomplete, 
 in vain, and incapable of perpetuating itself." 
 Democratic Vistas^ note. 
 
 The three following poems are taken from Leaves 
 of Grass: 
 
 ECORDERS ages hence, "LEAVES 
 
 AV Come, I will take you down underneath this OF 
 
 impassive exterior, I will tell you what to GRASS" 
 say of me, 
 Publish my name and hang up my picture as that 
 
 of the tenderest lover, 
 The friend the lover's portrait, of whom his friend 
 
 his lover was fondest, 
 Who was not proud of his songs, but of the mea- 
 
 sureless ocean of love within him, and freely 
 
 pour'd it forth, 
 Who often walk'd lonesome walks thinking of his 
 
 dear friends, his lovers, 
 Who pensive away from one he lov'd often lay 
 
 sleepless and dissatisfied at night, 
 Who knew too well the sick, sick dread lest the one 
 
 he lov'd might secretly be indifferent to him, 
 Whose happiest days were far away through fields, 
 
 in woods, on hills, he and another wandering 
 
 hand in hand, they twain apart from other men, 
 179
 
 Friendship 
 
 Who oft as he saunter'd the streets curv'd with his 
 arm the shoulder of his friend, while the arm of 
 his friend rested upon him also." 
 
 Leaves of Grass, 1891-2 edn., p. 102. 
 
 C T T 7*HEN I heard at the close of the day how 
 V V my name had been receiv'd with plaudits 
 
 in the capitol, still it was not a happy night for 
 
 me that follow'd, 
 And else when I carous'd, or when my plans were 
 
 accomplish'd, still I was not happy, 
 But the day when I rose at dawn from the bed of 
 
 perfect health, refresh'd, singing, inhaling the 
 
 ripe breath of autumn, 
 When I saw the full moon in the west grow pale 
 
 and disappear in the morning light, 
 When I wander'd alone over the beach, and un- 
 dressing bathed, laughing with the cool waters, 
 
 and saw the sun rise, 
 And when I thought how my dear friend my lover 
 
 was on his way coming, O then I was happy, 
 O then each breath tasted sweeter, and all that day 
 
 my food nourish'd me more, and the beautiful 
 
 day pass'd well, 
 And the next came with equal joy, and with the 
 
 next at evening came my friend, 
 
 1 80
 
 Renaissance & Modern Times 
 
 And that night while all was still I heard the waters 
 
 roll slowly continuously up the shores, 
 I heard the hissing rustle of the liquid and sands as 
 
 directed to me whispering to congratulate me, 
 For the one I love most lay sleeping by me under 
 
 the same cover in the cool night, 
 In the stillness in the autumn moonbeams his face 
 
 was inclined toward me, 
 And his arm lay lightly around my breast and 
 
 that night I was happy." 
 
 p. 103. 
 
 * T HEAR it was charged against me that I sought 
 
 A to destroy institutions, 
 
 But really I am neither for nor against institutions, 
 
 (What indeed have I in common with them? or 
 what with the destruction of them ?) 
 
 Only I will establish in the Mannahatta and in 
 every city of these States inland and seaboard, 
 
 And in the fields and woods, and above every keel 
 little or large that dents the water, 
 
 Without edifices or rules or trustees or any argu- 
 ment, 
 
 The institution of the dear love of comrades." 
 
 Ibid, p. 107. 
 181
 
 Index
 
 INDEX 
 
 Achilles and Patroclus, 45, 68 et seq., 74, 85 
 
 jBschyhtS) on Achilles, 72, 73 
 
 African Customs, 4, 5, 6, 14 
 
 Agathon, epigram to, by Plato, 79 
 
 Agesilaus and Lysander, 1 7 
 
 Albania, Customs, 20, 21 
 
 Amis and Amile, story of, 106 
 
 Anacreon, epigram, 775/0 Bathyllus, 77 
 
 ^##, Princess, and Lady Churchill, 146 
 
 Anselms letters to brother Monks, 104; /o Lanfranc, 
 
 104; /o Gondulph, 105 
 Apollo and Hyacinth, 8 8 
 Arabia, customs, 12, 109, 119 
 Archidamus and Cleonymus, 17 
 Aristophanes, speech of, $i et seq. 
 Aster, epigrams to, by Plato, 78 
 Athen<eus quoted, 25, 28, 74, 147 
 Augustine, Saint, his friend, 99 */ ^. 
 
 Bacon, Francis, quoted, 137 
 Bagdad Dervish, story of, 1 1 6 ; another story, 117 
 Balonda, ceremonies among, 4 
 Banyai, customs among the, 14 
 Barnfield, Richard, " 7%<? Affectionate Shepheard," 133; 
 Sonnets, 134 */ 5^. 
 
 184
 
 Index 
 
 Baylis, J. W., quoted, 36, 90 
 
 Beaconsfield, Lord, on boy-friendships, 168 
 
 Bengali coolies, 7 
 
 Benecke, E. F. M., quoted, 68, 97 
 
 Bernard, Saint, 103 
 
 Bion, quoted, 86 
 
 Blood, mutual tasting of, 5 
 
 Browne, Sir Thomas, " Religio Medici" quoted, 144 
 
 Browning, Robert, poem by, 1 74 
 
 Bruno, Giordano, quoted, 130 
 
 Buckingham, J. S., Travels in Assyria, &c., 1 1 5 */ seq. 
 
 Butler, Lady E., and Miss Ponsonby, 161, 162 
 
 Byron, letter to Miss Pigot, 1 60 ; friendship with 
 Eddleston, 1 6 1 ; paraphrase of story ofNisus and 
 Euryalus, 163; comments by T. Moore, 1 64 
 
 Cattias and Autolycus, 59 
 
 Catullus, 89; to Quintius, 92; to Juventius, 92; to 
 
 Licinius, 93 
 
 Ch<eron<ea, battle of, 22, 23, 68 
 Chariton and Melanippus, 15; story of, 29 
 Chivalry, customs of, in Arabia and Africa, 1 1, 12, 14 
 Chivalry, medieval, compared with Greek friendship, 
 
 i5>45>47 
 Christian influences, 97 */ jf^. 
 
 Christian and Greek Ideals compared, 98 
 Cleomachus, story of, 27
 
 Index 
 
 Comrade-attachment^ an institution in the early world, 
 i et seq., 41, 46, 177, &V.; an essential part of 
 Greek civilisation, 41, 42 et seq.; romance of, 42, 
 46, 47, 52, 53, 56-60, 68 et seq.; heroic quality, 
 n, 12, 13, 16,21-25,28,31-37,50,51,^.; 
 Educational value, 16-21, 46, 49, 74; relation 
 to Chivalry, 1 1-16, 45, 47, 97 ; relation to Poli- 
 tics, 42, 46, 49, 50, 99, 147; relation to Phil- 
 osophy, 30, 47-63 ; relation to the Divine Love, 
 48, 54-59> 63, 130, 132, 133, 145 
 
 Cratinus and Aristodemus, 1 5 
 
 Crete, customs, 17 
 
 Damon and Pythias, 8 ; story of, 36 
 Dante quoted, 69 
 
 David and Jonathan, 6, 7, 15, 108 
 Democratic Vistas quoted, 178 
 Dickinson, G. L., quoted, 45, 75 
 Diodes, tomb honoured by lovers, 20, 82 
 Diodes and Philolaus, 1 5, 1 9 
 Diomedes and Sthenelus, 45 
 Diotima the prophetess, 53, 129 
 Dorian customs, 1 6 et seq. 
 
 Eastern countries and poets, 109 
 Eighteenth Century, influence of, 147 
 Emerson, R. W., essay on friendship, 175 
 Epaminondas, 28, 29 
 
 186
 
 Index 
 
 Epigrams, Greek Anthology , 80; of 'Plato , 78, 79 
 Epitaph^ Greek Anthology ', 80 
 Exchange of gifts, 5, 6, 7, 1 8, 36; </ **, 5, 6; 
 of flowers, 7 
 
 Flower Friends, 7 
 
 Fraunce, Abraham, translation of Virgil, 9 1 
 
 Fr^y, Ludwig, quoted, 45, 149 
 
 Ganymede, 57, 82 
 Germans, primitive, II, 13 
 Germany, modern, 147 */ J^. 
 Goethe, on Winckelmann and Greek friendship, 149; 
 />0 ^y, 150 
 friendship compared with medieval chivalry, 
 
 Hafiz, quoted, 113 
 
 Hallam, Arthur, and Tennyson, 169 <?/ J^^. 
 
 Harmodius and Aristogeiton, 15, 28 ; j/ory o/^ 32 
 
 Hazlitt, Wm., Life of Montaigne quoted, 124 
 
 Hercules and loldus, 23, 25, 44 
 
 Hermaphrodites, 52 
 
 Homer s Iliad, motive of, 68-72 
 
 Hyacinth, favorite of Apollo, 87; j/ory o/J 88 
 
 Idomeneus and Meriones, 45 
 
 " / Memoriam" Tennyson s, reviled by the " Times, 
 169 ; quoted, 170 */ J^. 
 187
 
 Index 
 
 loldus, 23, 25, 44 
 
 Jalal-ud-din Rumi, 109, no, in 
 Jealousy in friendship y 9 
 
 Kasendi, an African ceremony, 5 
 Khalifa at Khartoum, 1 2 
 
 Lacedemonians, customs among, 25 
 
 Ladies, the, of Llangollen, 161, 162 
 
 "Leaves of Grass" quoted, 179-181 
 
 Zog^ ##/ school-friendships, 166, 167 
 
 Lowr answerable for his friend, 1 8 ; disgraceful for 
 
 a youth not to have a lover, ibid 
 Lovers invincible in battle, n, 12, 13, 23, 24, 28 
 Lucian quoted, 35 
 Ludwig of Bavaria and R. Wagner, 153 et seq. 
 
 Macaulay s History of England quoted, 145, 146 
 Manganjas, ceremonies among, 5 
 Mania, divine, 54 
 Marquesas Islands, 9 
 Martial's epigrams, quoted, 94 
 Maximus Tyrius quoted, 129 
 "M^y #*/ Death," poem by Browning, 1 74 
 Meleager, verses by, 79 
 Melville, Herman, quoted, 8 */ J^. 
 Michel Angela, Sonnets, 129; ?0/<?^, 131 <?/J<^. 
 Military Comradeship, 1 1 / J*?. 
 
 188
 
 Index 
 
 Monastic life, friendship in, 97, 103 et seq. 
 Montaigne and Stephen de la Boetie, 123 et seq.; on 
 
 marriage, 125 
 
 Montalembert quoted, 103 et seq. 
 Moore, T., on Byron" s friendships, 164 
 Moschus, lament for Bion, 86 
 Mulamirin, or bodyguard of Khalifa, 13 
 Miiller, History and Antiquities of the Doric Race, 
 
 1 6 et seq. 
 
 Niobe, the sons of, 26, 27 
 
 Orestes and Pylades, 15, 44; story of, 35 
 
 Parmenides and Zeno, 30 
 
 Persia, customs, 109, 119 
 
 Penn, William, quoted, 145 
 
 Ph^edo, story of, 31 
 
 Phtfdrus, of Plato, 47, 49, 55 
 
 Pheidias and Pantarkes, 30 
 
 Philip of Macedon and the Theban Band, 23 
 
 Pindar to Theoxenos, 78; see also 153 
 
 Platen, Count August von, 151; sonnets to his friend 
 
 Karl Theodor German, 151, 152; sonnet on 
 
 death of Pindar, 153 
 
 Plato quoted, 16, 48 et seq., 72, 73 ; epigrams, 78 
 Plutarch quoted, 22, 26, 27, 6 1 etseq.; refer red to, 123 
 Polynesian Apollo, 9 
 Polynesian* customs, 8 */ ;*f. 
 
 189
 
 Index 
 
 Potter, Archbishop, quoted, 147 
 
 Raffahvich quoted, 151 
 Reminiscence, true love a, 55-59 
 Renaissance, influence of, 99, 123 
 
 Saadi quoted, 113 
 
 Sacred Band, see Theban Band 
 
 Sacredness of friendship in the early world, 10, 37, 45 
 
 Sappho, 75 ; to Lesbia, 76 
 
 School-friendships, 165 et seq. 
 
 Sentiment of Comradeship, influenced by Christianity, 
 
 97 et seq.; by the Renaissance, 99, 123 ; its place 
 
 in the monastic life, 97, 103 et seq.; in modern 
 
 Democracy, 178 
 Shakespeare, 128, 138, 152; sonnets quoted, 139 et 
 
 seq.; Merchant of Venice, 142 ; Henry V., 143 
 Shelley, Adonais, 86; essay on friendship, 165 
 Sidney, Philip, friendship with Fulke Greville, 127; 
 
 with Hubert Languet, 127, 128 
 Sininyane and Moshoshoma, 5, 6 
 Socrates, his views, 47 ; quoted, 53 */ jf ., 58, 59, 75 
 Socrates and Ph<edo, 3 1 
 Sophocles, his tragedy of Niobe, 74 
 Sparta, customs, 16 
 
 Suleyman the Magnificent and Ibrahim, 114 
 Symonds, J. A., quoted, 15, 20, 31, 47, 68, 79 
 
 190
 
 Index 
 
 Symposium of Plato ', 48 et seq.; speech of Phtedrus, 
 49 ; of Pausanias, 51 ; of Aristophanes^ 52 ; of 
 Socrates, 53, 54; #/J0 72 
 
 Symposium of Xenophon, 59-61 
 
 Tacitus, Germania, 1 1 
 
 Tahiti, customs in, 8 
 
 Tennyson, Alfred, and his friend Hallam, 169; "/# 
 
 Memoriam" quoted, 170 */ J^. 
 Theban Band, account of, 21 et seq.; also 28, 68 
 Theocritus, Idyl xii., 80 et seq.; Idyl xxix., 84 
 Theognis and Kumus, 74, 75 
 Theseus and Pirithous, 15, 44, 85 
 Thirlivall, Bishop, quoted, 44 
 Thoreau, H. D., quoted, 175-6 
 Thucidides quoted, 32 
 
 Ulrichs, K. H., 157; i;m quoted, 159 
 
 Valerius Maximus quoted, 37 
 
 ffrf//, ind Eclogue, 90; imitated, 133 
 
 Vision, the divine, 55, 56, 58 
 
 Wagner, Richard, friendship with Ludwig //., 153; 
 letters, 154, 155; 0# Greek comradeship, 156 
 
 Whitman, Walt, his "!ove of comrades," 177; Democra- 
 tic Vistas quoted, 178; Leaves of Grass quoted, 
 179-181 
 
 William of Orange and Bentinck, 145 
 
 Winckelmann, 148; ^/j /<?//m, 148; G0?//fo o, 149 
 
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