XXVII. Friendship in Emblem

1.

The Hearts thus intermixed speak
A Love that no bold shock can break:

2.

Which by its panting Centinel
It does not to the other tell?

3.

That Friendship Hearts so much refines,
It nothing but it self designs:
The Hearts are free from lower ends,
For each point to the other tends.

4.

But still those Flames do so much raise,
That while to either they incline
They yet are noble and divine.

5.

From smoke or hurt those Flames are free,
From grosness or mortality:
The Heart (like Moses Bush presumed)
6.

The Compasses that stand above
For Friends, like them, can prove this true,
They are, and yet they are not, two.

7.

And in their posture is exprest
Each follows where the other leans,
And what each does each other means.

8.

And as when one foot does stand fast,
The steddy part does regulate
9.

So Friends are onely two in this,

Can never be a Friend at all.

10.

And as that useful Instrument
So Friendship from good Angels springs,
To teach the world Heroick things.

11.

As these are found out in design
So Friendship governs actions best,
Prescribing unto all the rest.

12.

13.

And like to them, so Friends may own
Extension, not Division:
But Head, like Souls, knows no such fate.

14.

And as each part so well is knit,
That their Embraces ever fit:
So Friends are such by destiny,
And no third can the place supply.

15.

There needs no Motto to the Seal:
But that we may the mind reveal
To the dull Eye, it was thought fit
That Friendship onely should be writ.

16.

But as there are Degrees of bliss,
But such as will transmit to Fame