I don't need a friend who changes when I change and who nods when I nod; my shadow does that much better.
Interpretation
True friends remain consistent and supportive, regardless of changes in circumstances.
This quote by Plutarch emphasizes the importance of genuine friendship, suggesting that true friends should stand by each other through changes instead of simply conforming or agreeing out of convenience. The comparison to a shadow highlights that a superficial companion is not truly valuable, as they lack the depth and support that a real friend provides.
In practice
Using this quote in a speech about the qualities of true friendship.
Sometimes small incidents, rather than glorious exploits, give us the best evidence of character. So, as portrait painters are more exact in doing the face, where the character is revealed, than the rest of the body, I must be allowed to give my more particular attention to the marks of the souls of men.
It were better to have no opinion of God at all than such a one as is unworthy of him; for the one is only belief - the other contempt.
Come back with your shield - or on it
The richest soil, if uncultivated, produces the rankest weeds.
For the correct analogy for the mind is not a vessel that needs filling, but wood that needs igniting.
Our senses through ignorance of Reality, falsely tell us that what appears to be, is. FEAR = False Evidence Appearing Real
There is magic in the memory of schoolboy friendships; it softens the heart, and even affects the nervous system of those who have no heart.
Haec ego non multis (scribo), sed tibi: satis enim magnum alter alteri theatrum sumus. I am writing this not to many, but to you: certainly we are a great enough audience for each other.
I am able to say that I was very much liked at the school. I even had quite some ascendancy over my comrades, and as soon as I appeared in the school yard, I was surrounded by young friends, most of them bigger than I, but who were quite willing to give the appearance of disciples; they would have defended me furiously if necessary.
Where are you heading, if you’ve got the choice?” James lifted an invisible sword. “‘Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart!’ Like my dad.” Snape made a small, disparaging noise. James turned on him. “Got a problem with that?” “No,” said Snape, though his slight sneer said otherwise. “If you’d rather be brawny than brainy —” “Where’re you hoping to go, seeing as you’re neither?” interjected Sirius.
Among true and real friends, all is common; and were ignorance and envy and superstition banished from the world, all mankind would be friend.
The Lord Jesus is "a friend who never changes." There is no fickleness about Him: those whom He loves, He loves to the end.
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