We picture Thomas More during his lifetime as the centre of a great company of friends. A list of their names would be a roll-call of the leading scholars, ecclesiastics and public men of his day. Nor may we forget the younger men who gathered round him and the patriarchal household of which he was the life and the spirit. Wherever he went he made friends. His official visits to the Low Countries widened the circle. Above all we may recall the strongest friendship of all, that with Erasmus Roterdamus, surely one of the great friendships of history.
     What was it that drew men to him? There was, of course, his natural good humour, his friendliness and courtesy; in a word, he was a companionable man. I like to think of him strolling with his friends in his garden with the river flowing by; William Roper recalled walking with him " along the Thames side at Chelsea "; so the friends of Utopia " sat down to talk in the garden ", and in the Dialogue concerning Heresies " when we had after dinner a little paused, your friend and I drew ourselves aside into the garden " and there continued their discussion.
     There was, of course, much more in his friendship than geniality and kindness of heart. He was a man of wise counsel, unswayed by passion or self-interest. Above all, his friends saw in him a man of absolute integrity whose whole life was the expression of a deep religious conviction.