Quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson
You must pay for conformity. All goes well as long as you run with conformists. But you, who are honest men in other particulars, know that there is alive somewhere a man whose honesty reaches to this point also, that he shall not kneel to false gods, and, on the day when you meet him, you sink into the class of counterfeits.
The peril of every fine faculty is the delight of playing with it for pride. Talent is commonly developed at the expense of character, and the greater it grows, the more is the mischief. Talent is mistaken for genius, a dogma or system for truth, ambition for greatest, ingenuity for poetry, sensuality for art.
If eyes were made for seeing, Then Beauty is its own excuse for being.
There is no teaching until the pupil is brought into the same state or principle in which you are; a transfusion takes place; he is you, and y...
That which we call character is a reserved force which acts directly by presence, and without means. It is conceived of as a certain undemonstrable force, a familiar or genius, by whose impulses the man is guided, but whose counsels he cannot impart.
Without the great arts which speak to the sense of beauty, a man seems to me a poor, naked, shivering creature. These are his becoming draperi...
A child is a curly, dimpled lunatic.
Who shall forbid a wise skepticism, seeing that there is no practical question on which any thing more than an approximate solution can be had...
Men who for truth and honor's sake Stand fast and suffer long. Brave men who work while others sleep, Who dare while others fly... They build a nation's pillars deep And lift them to the sky.
Where do we find ourselves? In a series of which we do not know the extremes, and believe that it has none. We wake and find ourselves on a st...
We rail at trade, but the historian of the world will see that it was the principle of liberty; that it settled America, and destroyed feudalism, and made peace and keeps peace; that it will abolish slavery.
Every experiment, by multitudes or by individuals, that has a sensual and selfish aim, will fail.
Be true to your own act and congratulate yourself if you have done something strange and extravagant to break the monotony of a decorous age.
To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; to leave the world a little better; whether by a healthy child, a garden patch of a redeemed social condition; to know that one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is the meaning of success.
Peace cannot be achieved through violence, it can only be attained through understanding. Peace
To laugh often and much; To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; To know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
There are two classes of poets - the poets by education and practice, these we respect; and poets by nature, these we love.
Leave this hypocritical prating about the masses. Masses are rude, lame, unmade, pernicious in their demands and influence, and need not to be flattered, but to be schooled. I wish not to concede anything to them, but to tame, drill, divide, and break them up, and draw individuals out of them.
We grant no dukedoms to the few, We hold like rights and shall;—...
Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves, but deal in our privacy with the last honesty and truth.
Great men are they who see that the spiritual is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world.
Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves.
To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
A good intention clothes itself with power.
The first farmer was the first man. All historic nobility rests on the possession and use of land.
