The love that is friendship, philia, is perhaps more intimate than any other kind of love. . . . Seeing the world as friend is like seeing the world for the first time. Such seeing is actually a metaphysical sharing of one's being with the beloved other, as the other shares her being with us. . . . Through the intimacy of friendship all of the things of the world become radiant, shining, alive, and the Earth as a whole becomes the Earth-Sun.
— Robert Sardello, Love and the Soul