Arthur Schopenhauer and his dog (2023) Painting by Noël Van Hoof

Just as paper money circulates in place of silver, so in the world instead of esteem and true friendship, there are circulating outward expressions and gestures imitated as naturally as possible. Meanwhile, on the other hand, one can also wonder whether there are people who deserve this true friendship. In any case, I value the wagging of an honest dog more than a hundred such expressions and gestures.
True, genuine friendship presupposes an intense, purely objective, and wholly disinterested participation in the fortunes of the other, and this in turn is a process of genuine identification with that friend. To this the selfishness of human nature is so contradictory that true friendship belongs to that category of things which, like the colossal sea-serpents, cannot be known whether they belong to the realm of fable or really exist. In the meantime, there are certainly all sorts of human associations, which, although they are mainly based on disguised egoistic motives of the most varied nature, are nevertheless mingled with a touch of true and sincere friendship, which enables them to such an extent that in this world of imperfections they have any right to bear the name of friendship. They are far above everyday associations, which are rather such that we should not speak a word with most of our close acquaintances if we heard them speak of us in our absence.
From: “The Wisdom of Life”, an essay from “Parerga und Paralipomena” (1851)

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Arthur Schopenhauer