But it is hard to know them from friends, they are so obsequious and full of protestations; for a wolf resembles a dog, so doth a flatterer a friend.
Interpretation
True friends can often be difficult to distinguish from flatterers or insincere people.
In this quote, Walter Raleigh illustrates the challenge of discerning genuine friendships from those that are merely self-serving. He compares the subtle similarities between a flattery-driven relationship and a true friendship to the resemblance between a wolf and a dog, suggesting that without careful consideration, one may confuse deceitful behavior with loyalty and affection.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of true friendship, this quote can highlight the challenge of finding sincere companions.
Passions are liken'd best to floods and streams:_x000D_ _x000D_ The shallow murmur, but the deep are dumb;_x000D_ _x000D_ So, when affection yields discourse, it seems_x000D_ _x000D_ The bottom is but shallow whence they come._x000D_ _x000D_ They that are rich in words, in words discover
Silence in love betrays more woe - Than words though ne'er so witty; A beggar that is dumb, you know, may challenge double pity.
Even such isTime, which takes in trust Our youth, our joys, and all we have, And pays us but with age and dust, Who in the dark and silent grave When we have wandered all our ways Shuts up the story of our days, And from which earth, and grave, and dust The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.
If she undervalues me, _x000D_ _x000D_ What care I how fair she be?
If all the world and love were young,_x000D_ _x000D_ And truth in every shepherd's tongue,_x000D_ _x000D_ These pretty pleasures might me move_x000D_ _x000D_ To live with thee, and be thy love.
It is the nature of men having escaped one extreme, which by force they were constrained long to endure, to run headlong into the other extreme, forgetting that virtue doth always consist in the mean.
One must lose one's life to find it.
You yourself are the teacher, and the pupil, you're the master, you're the guru, you are the leader, you are everything! And, to understand is to transform what is.
If I see anything vital around me, it is precisely that spirit of adventure, which seems indestructible and is akin to curiosity.
Fill what is empty, empty what is full, and scratch where it itches.
You can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself.
The revealed Word awakened me, but it was the preached Word that saved me, and I must ever attach peculiar value to the hearing of the truth, for by it I received the joy and peace in which my soul delights.
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