Friendship

“It is going to be very dangerous, Sam. ‘It is already dangerous. Most likely neither of us will come back.’
‘If you don’t come back, sir, then I shan’t, that’s certain,’ said Sam.

‘Don’t you leave him! they said to me.
Leave him! I said. I never mean to. I am going with him, if he climbs to the Moon, and if any of those Black Rulers try to stop him, they’ll have Sam Gamgee to reckon with, I said.

They laughed.’ “

J. R. R. Tolkien, from The Fellowship of the Ring

Leaving Without Regret

“Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.”

C. S. Lewis

Adventure of Virtue

“Keep before your eyes the supreme adventure of virtue. If you are brave, think of the man who was braver than you. If you are kind, think of the man who was kinder than you. That is what was meant by having a patron saint.”

G. K. Chesterton (“The War on Holidays,” Utopia of Usurers)