The Sweetness of Friendship

 Kahlil Gibran - On Friendship

    “Your friend is your needs answered. 

    He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving. 

    And he is your board and your fireside.

    For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.

    When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the ‘nay’ in your own mind, nor do you withhold the ‘ay.’

    And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart; 

    For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed. 

    When you part from your friend, you grieve not; 

    For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain. 

    And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit. 

    For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery us not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.

    And let your best be for your friend. 

    If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also. 

    For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill? 

    Seek him always with hours to live. 

    For it is his to fill your need but not your emptiness. 

    And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, 

and sharing of pleasures. 

    For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.”

Kahlil Gibran

“Those who accept the Holy Spirit’s purpose as their own share also His vision. And what enables Him to see His purpose shine forth from every altar now is yours as well as His. He sees no strangers; only dearly loved and loving friends. He sees no thorns but only lilies, gleaming in the gentle glow of peace that shines on everything He looks upon and loves.”

A Course in Miracles T-20.II.5:2-6

“A blundering despatch, mistakenly announcing the death of a friend, occasions the same grief that the friend’s real death would bring. You think that your anguish is occasioned by your loss. Another despatch, correcting the mistake, heals your grief, and you learn that your suffering was merely the result of your belief. Thus it is with all sorrow, sickness, and death. You will learn at length that there is no cause for grief, and divine wisdom will then be understood. Error, not Truth, produces all the suffering on earth.”

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 386:15-29