Keep well thy FRIENDS when thou hast gotten them

Meaning & Analysis

Once you have gained friends, it is important to maintain and cherish those relationships with care and loyalty.

Insights

Nurturing Relationships

Emphasizes that friendship requires ongoing attention, effort, and constancy; acquiring friends is only the first step, sustaining them is equally vital.

Value of Loyalty

Highlights the importance of steadfastness and faithfulness in friendship, warning against carelessness or haste in abandoning friends.

Deliberation and Commitment

Encourages prudence in choosing friends initially but stresses the need for firm commitment once friendships are formed, promoting stability in social bonds.

Literary and Historical Resonance

Echoes advice from classical and Renaissance writers, including Shakespeare’s metaphorical exhortation to 'grapple friends unto thy soul with hoops of steel,' illustrating the enduring cultural emphasis on friendship’s strength.

Social Wisdom

The proverb reflects a widespread societal understanding that friendships are precious and fragile, requiring patience and vigilance to endure.

Psychological Importance

Modern psychology supports this principle, showing that consistent investment in close relationships fosters trust, intimacy, and emotional well-being.

Rhetorical Devices

Imperative Mood

The direct command engages the reader personally, underscoring the moral urgency of maintaining friendships.

Metaphor

Shakespearean parallels use vivid imagery such as 'hoops of steel' to convey the strength and security with which one should hold on to friends.

Parallelism

Balanced phrasing (‘keep well thy friends’) reinforces the idea of care and attentiveness in a rhythmic, memorable way.

friendshiployaltynurturingcommitmentconstancyrelationships

Analyzed with gpt-4.1 on July 12, 2025

Transcription

Quotations

Receyue no man rashly into thy frendeshypp and when thou hast receyued him cast him nat of.

— 1550, TAV., Flowers Sent., s. A5v

— 1596, DEL., s. M7v

Be slow to fall in friendship, but when thou art in, continue firme and constant.

— 1597, BODENHAM, Wit's Commonw., f. 62v

Forsake not thy old freind.

— 1639, CL., p. 25

Be not to hasty in purchasing of friends; but once purchased, let them not go.

— 1666, TOR., It. Prov., 21, p. 7

Shakespeare Citations

Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel.

— Ham, I.iii

Keep thy friend Under thy own life's key.

— AWW, I.i

Related Proverbs

F695 A FRIEND is not so soon gotten as lost 95.8%A12 The ABUNDANCE of things engenders disdainfulness 95.7%C679 COUNSEL breaks not the head 95.7%N84 To give and keep there is NEED of wit 95.7%F741 Have but few FRIENDS though much acquaintance 95.5%F712 Never trust much to a new FRIEND or an old enemy 95.5%F105 A FAULT wilfully committed deserves no pardon 95.5%E225 Always have an EYE to the door 95.4%F12 An ingenuous FACE is a good letter of recommendation 95.4%P239 He has put off the PERSON of a judge that puts on the person of a friend (accuser) 95.4%C357 Hew not too high lest the CHIPS fall into the eye 95.3%A15 There is no ACCORD where every man would be a lord 95.3%D413 He that DOES well wearies not himself 95.3%F41 There is FALSEHOOD (flattery) in fellowship 95.3%C569 Ill (Evil) COMPANY brings a man to the gallows 95.3%P82 It is tedious PARTING with a thing we love 95.2%L210 He is not so daft as he LETS him 95.2%G248 That GOD will have see shall not wink 95.2%C266 When good CHEER is lacking our friends will be packing 95.2%Y11 The ill YEAR comes in swimming 95.2%

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