the best
of themselves; but melancholy discoveries supervene; and then what
generally happens is that the idealising friend is angry with the other
for disappointing his hopes, not with himself for drawing an extravagant
picture.

Such friendships have a sort of emotional sensuality about them; and to
be dismayed by later discoveries is to decline upon Rousseau's vice of
handing in his babies to the Foundling Hospital, instead of trying to
bring them up honestly; what lies at the base of it is the indolent
shirking of the responsibilities for the natural consequences of
friendship. The mistake arises from a kind of selfishness, the
selfishness that thinks more of what it wants and desires to get, than
of taking what there is soberly and gratefully.

It is often said that it is the duty and privilege of a friend to warn
his friend faithfully against his faults. I believe that this is a
wholly mistaken principle. The essence of the situation is rather a
cordial partnership, of which the basis is liberty. What I mean
by liberty is not a freedom from responsibility, but an absence of
obligation. I do not, of course, mean that one is to take all one can
get and give as little as one likes, but rather that one must respect
one's friend enough--and that is implied in the establishment of the
relation--to abstain from directing him, unless he desires and asks for
direction. The telling of faults may be safely left to hostile critics,
and to what Sheridan calls "damned good-natured" acquaintances. But the
friend must take for granted that his friend desires, in a general way,
what is good and true, even though he may pursue it on different
lines. One's duty is to encourage and believe in one's friend, not to
disapprove of and to censure him. One loves him for what he is, not for
what he might be if he would only take one's advice. The point is that
it must be all a free gift, not a mutual improvement society--unless
indeed that is the basis of the compact. After all, a man can only feel
responsible to God. One goes astray, no doubt, like a sheep that is
lost; but it is not the duty of another sheep to butt one back into the
right way, unless indeed one appeals for help. One may have pastors
and directors, but they can never be equal friends. If there is to be
superiority in friendship, the lesser must willingly crown the greater;
the greater must not ask to be crowned. The secure friendship is
that which begins in comradeship,