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I have loved my friends as I do virtue, my soul, my God.
Thomas Browne
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Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote expresses a profound love for friends that parallels the love for virtuous qualities and spiritual values.

In this quote, Thomas Browne emphasizes the deep and sacred nature of friendship, equating his affection for friends with his love for virtue, his own soul, and even God. This highlights the immense value he places on friendships, suggesting they are integral to his moral and spiritual existence, and that true friendship is intertwined with the essence of what is virtuous and deeply meaningful in life.

Themes

FriendshipLoveVirtueSoulDevotion

In practice

Example use cases

In a speech about the importance of community, one might say, 'As Thomas Browne said, I have loved my friends as I do virtue, my soul, my God, emphasizing the value of deep connections.'

More from Thomas Browne

No one should approach the temple of science with the soul of a money changer.
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Content may dwell in all stations. To be low but above contempt may be high enough to be happy.
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Thus there are two books from whence I collect my Divinity; besides that written one of God, another of his servant Nature, that universal and public Manuscript, that lies expans'd unto the eyes of all; those that never saw him in the one, have discovered him in the other.
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To be content with death may be better than to desire it.
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Life itself is but the shadow of death, and souls departed but the shadows of the living.
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The long habit of living indisposeth us for dying.
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