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Essential honour must be in a friend,
Not such as every breath fans to and fro;
But born within, is its own judge and end,
And dares not sin, though sure that none should know.
Where friendship's spoke, honesty's understood;
For none can be a friend that is not good.

— Katherine Philips

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More quotes by Katherine Philips

I did but see him and he disappeared,
I did but pluck the rose-bud and it fell,
A sorrow unforeseen and scarcely feared,
For ill can mortals their afflictions spell.

Friendship's an abstract of this noble flame,
'Tis love refined and purged from all its dross,
The next to angel's love, if not the same,
As strong as passion is, though not so gross:
It antedates a glad eternity
And is an heaven in epitome.

Religion, which true policy befriends,
Design'd by God to serve man's noblest ends,
Is by that old deceiver's subtle play
Made the chief party in its own decay,
And meets the eagle's destiny, whose breast
Felt the same shaft which his own feathers drest.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Katherine Philips (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.