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A Man's Personal Defects Will Commonly Have With The Rest Of The World Precisely That Importance Which They Have To Himself. If He Makes Light Of Them, So Will Other Men.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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A Man's Personal Defects

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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A Man's Personal Defects Will Commonly Have With The Rest Of The World Precisely That Importance Which They Have To Himself. If He Makes Light Of Them, So Will Other Men.

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He Who Loves The Bristle Of Bayonets Only Sees In The Glitter What Beforehand He Feels In His Heart. It Is Avarice And Hatred; It Is That Quivering Lip, That Cold, Hating Eye, Which Built Magazines And Powder-houses.

With The Past, I Have Nothing To Do; Nor With The Future. I Live Now.

Everything In Creation Has Its Appointed Painter Or Poet And Remains In Bondage Like The Princess In The Fairy Tale 'til Its Appropriate Liberator Comes To Set It Free.

A Deep Man Believes That The Evil Eye Can Whither, The Heart's Blessing Can Heal, And That Love Can Overcome All Odds.

It Sometimes Occurs That Memory Has A Personality Of Its Own And Volunteers Or Refuses Its Information At Its Will, Not At Mine.

Come Out Of The Azure. Love The Day. Do Not Leave The Sky Out Of Your Landscape.

The Cities Drain The Country Of The Best Part Of Its Population: The Flower Of The Youth, Of Both Sexes, Goes Into The Towns, Andthe Country Is Cultivated By A So Much Inferior Class. The Land,--travel A Whole Day Together,--looks Poverty-stricken, And The Buildings Plain And Poor.

The Persons Who Constitute The Natural Aristocracy, Are Not Found In The Actual Aristocracy, Or, Only On Its Edge; As The Chemicalenergy Of The Spectrum Is Found To Be Greatest Just Outside Of The Spectrum.

I See The Spectacle Of Morning From The Hilltop Over Against My House, From Daybreak To Sunrise, With Emotions Which An Angel Might Share. The Long Slender Bars Of Cloud Float Like Fishes In The Sea Of Crimson Light. From The Earth, As A Shore, I Look Out Into That Silent Sea. I Seem To Partake Its Rapid Transformations; The Active Enchantment Reaches My Dust, And I Dilate And Conspire With The Morning Wind.

The World Leaves No Track In Space, And The Greatest Action Of Man No Mark In The Vast Idea.

Do The Thing And You Will Have The Power. But They That Do Not The Thing, Had Not The Power.

Where The Banana Grows Man Is Sensual And Cruel.

There Are As Many Pillows Of Illusion As Flakes In A Snow-storm. We Wake From One Dream Into Another Dream.

The Italians Are Fond Of Red Clothes, Peacock Plumes, And Embroidery; And I Remember One Rainy Morning In The City Of Palermo, The Street Was Ablaze With Scarlet Umbrellas.

Nature Is What You May Do. There Is Much You May Not Do.

You Need Someone Who Can Inspire You To Be What You Know You Can Be

Because The Soul Is Progressive, It Never Quite Repeats Itself, But In Every Act Attempts The Production Of A New And Fairer Whole.

Thought Makes Everything Fit For Use.

The Only Gift Is A Portion Of Thyself . . . The Poet Brings His Poem; The Shepherd His Lamb. . . .

I Covet Truth; Beauty Is Unripe Childhood's Cheat; I Leave It Behind With The Games Of Youth.

Our Life Is Not So Much Threatened As Our Perception. Ghostlike We Glide Through Nature, And Should Not Know Our Place Again.

The Best Picture Makes Us Say, I Am A Painter Also.

But Every Jet Of Chaos Which Threatens To Exterminate Us Is Convertible By Intellect Into Wholesome Force. Fate Is Unpenetrated Causes.

The Finished Man Of The World Must Eat Of Every Apple At Once. He Must Hold His Hatreds Also At Arm's Length, And Not Remember Spite. He Has Neither Friends Nor Enemies, But Values Men Only As Channels Of Power.

Art Is Evidence Of Our Most Creative Moment.

Men Are Lenses Through Which We Read Our Own Minds.

I Cannot Go To The Houses Of My Nearest Relatives, Because I Do Not Wish To Be Alone. Society Exists By Chemical Affinity, And Not Otherwise.

Shallow Men Believe In Luck.

The World Always Had The Same Bankrupt Look, To Foregoing Ages As To Us.

Beauty Through My Senses Stole; I Yielded Myself To The Perfect Whole.

Nature And Books Belong To The Eyes That See Them. It Depends On The Mood Of The Man, Whether He Shall See The Sunset Or The Fine Poem. There Are Always Sunsets, And There Is Always Genius; But Only A Few Hours So Serene That We Can Relish Nature Or Criticism. The More Or Less Depends On Structure Or Temperament. Temperament Is The Iron Wire On Which The Beads Are Strung. Of What Use Is Fortune Or Talent To A Cold And Defective Store?

First Be A Good Animal.

In The True Mythology, Love Is An Immortal Child, And Beauty Leads Him As A Guide; Nor Can We Express A Deeper Sense Than When We Say, Beauty Is The Pilot Of The Young Soul.

The Secret Of The Illusoriness Is In The Necessity Of A Succession Of Moods Or Objects. Gladly We Would Anchor, But The Anchorageis Quicksand.

Thus Inevitably Does The Universe Wear Our Color, And Every Object Fall Successively Into The Subject Itself. The Subject Exists, The Subject Enlarges; All Things Sooner Or Later Fall Into Place. As I Am, So I See; Use What Language We Will, We Can Never Say Anything But What We Are.

Truth Is Too Simple For Us: We Do Not Like Those Who Unmask Our Illusions.

Money Often Costs Too Much, And Power And Pleasure Are Not Cheap.

When A Man Thinks Happily, He Finds No Foot-track In The Field He Traverses. All Spontaneous Thought Is Irrespective Of All Else.

Almost All People Descend To Meet. All Association Must Be A Compromise, And, What Is Worst, The Very Flower And Aroma Of The Flower Of Each Of The Beautiful Natures Disappears As They Approach Each Other.

Man Exists For His Own Sake And Not To Add A Laborer To The State.

There Is One Topic Peremptorily Forbidden To All Well-bred, To All Rational Mortals, Namely, Their Distempers.

The Lover Of Letters Loves Power Too.

We Love Force And We Care Very Little How It Is Exhibited.

The Poet Knows That He Speaks Adequately, Then, Only When He Speaks Somewhat Wildly.

For A Great Nature, It Is A Happiness To Escape A Religious Training; Religion Of Character Is So Apt To Be Invaded.

We Prize Books, And They Prize Them Most Who Are Themselves Wise.

...in The Wilderness, I Find Something More Dear And Connate Than In The Streets Or Villages...in The Woods We Return To Reason And Faith.

As Long As Our Civilization Is Essentially One Of Property, Of Fences, Of Exclusiveness, It Will Be Mocked By Delusions.

Wherever Snow Falls, Or Water Flows, Or Birds Fly, Wherever Day And Night Meet In Twilight, Wherever The Blue Heaven Is Hung By Clouds, Or Sown With Stars, Wherever Are Forms With Transparent Boundaries, Wherever Are Outlets Into Celestial Space, Wherever Is Danger, And Awe, And Love, There Is Beauty, Plenteous As Rain, Shed For Thee, And Though Thou Shouldest Walk The World Over, Thou Shalt Not Be Able To Find A Condition Inopportune Or Ignoble.

The Martyr Cannot Be Dishonored. Every Lash Inflicted Is A Tongue Of Fame; Every Prison A More Illustrious Abode.

Patience And Fortitude Conquer All Things.

Never Try To Make Anyone Like You: You Know, And God Knows, That One Of You Is Enough.

I Believe In Eternity. I Can Find Greece, Palestine, Italy, Spain, And The Islands, - The Genius And Creative Principle Of Each And Of All Eras, In My Own Mind.

Teach Me Your Mood, O Patient Stars. Who Climb Each Night, The Ancient Sky. Leaving On Space No Shade, No Scars, No Trace Of Age, No Fear To Die.

We Are Always Getting Ready To Live But Never Living.

Law Of Attraction

In The Woods, Too, A Man Casts Off His Years, As The Snake His Slough, And At What Period Soever Of Life, Is Always A Child. In The Woods Is Perpetual Youth. Within These Plantations Of God A Decorum And Sanctity Reign, A Perennial Festival Is Dressed, And The Guest Sees Not How He Should Tire Of Them In A Thousand Years. In The Woods We Return To Reason And Faith.

Thought Dissolves The Material Universe By Carrying The Mind Up Into A Sphere Where All Is Plastic.

Greatness Once And Forever Has Down With Opinion.

Democracy Is Morose, And Runs To Anarchy.

A Cultivated Man, Wise To Know And Bold To Perform, Is The End To Which Nature Works.

I Have Just Been Conversing With One Man, To Whom No Weight Of Adverse Experience Will Make It For A Moment Appear Impossible That Thousands Of Human Beings Might Exercise Towards Each Other The Grandest And Simplest Sentiments, As Well As A Knot Of Friends, Or A Pair Of Lovers.

The Unstable Estimates Of Men Crowd To Him Whose Mind Is Filled With A Truth, As The Heaped Waves Of The Atlantic Follow The Moon.

There Are Always Difficulties Arising That Tempt You To Believe Your Critics Are Right.

Education Should Be As Broad As Man.

The City Is Always Recruited From The Country. The Men In Cities Who Are The Centres Of Energy, The Driving-wheels Of Trade, Politics Or Practical Arts, And The Women Of Beauty And Genius, Are The Children Or Grandchildren Of Farmers, And Are Spending The Energies Which Their Fathers' Hardy, Silent Life Accumulated In Frosty Furrows In Poverty, Necessity And Darkness.

What Forests Of Laurel We Bring, And The Tears Of Mankind, To Those Who Stood Firm Against The Opinion Of Their Contemporaries!

Solitary Converse With Nature; For Thence Are Ejaculated Sweet And Dreadful Words Never Uttered In Libraries. Ah! The Spring Days, The Summer Dawns, And October Woods!

There Is Virtue Yet In The Hoe And The Spade, For Learned As Well As For Unlearned Hands. And Labor Is Everywhere Welcome; Alwayswe Are Invited To Work.

Art Is The Need To Create; But In Its Essence, Immense And Universal, It Is Impatient Of Working With Lame Or Tied Hands, And Of Making Cripples And Monsters, Such As All Pictures And Statues Are. Nothing Less Than The Creation Of Man And Nature Is Its End.

Man Is Physical As Well As Metaphysical, A Thing Of Shreds And Patches, Borrowed Unequally From Good And Bad Ancestors, And A Misfit From The Start.

The Populace Drags Down The Gods To Their Own Level.

My Doom And My Strength Is To Be Solitary.

A System-grinder Hates The Truth.

Each Man Is A Hero And An Oracle To Somebody.

Steam Is No Stronger Now Than It Was A Hundred Years Ago, But It Is Put To Better Use.

As Every Man Is Hunted By His Own Daemon, Vexed By His Own Disease, This Checks All His Activity.

It Is In Bad Taste," Is The Most Formidable Word An Englishman Can Pronounce.

Delicious Is A Just And Firm Encounter Of Two In A Thought, In A Feeling.

The Good Lawyer Is Not The Man Who Has An Eye To Every Side And Angle Of Contingency, And Qualifies All His Qualifications, But Who Throws Himself On Your Part So Heartily, That He Can Get You Out Of A Scrape.

All Nobility In Its Beginnings Was Somebody's Natural Superiority.

Tis The Old Secret Of The Gods That They Come In Low Disguises. 'tis The Vulgar Great Who Come Dizened With Gold And Jewels. Real Kings Hide Away Their Crowns In Their Wardrobes, And Affect A Plain And Poor Exterior.

The Household Is A School Of Power. There, Within The Door, Learn The Tragi-comedy Of Human Life.

Culture Implies All Which Gives The Mind Possession Of Its Own Powers, As Languages To The Critic, Telescope To The Astronomer. Culture Alters The Political Status Of An Individual. It Raises A Rival Royalty In A Monarchy. 'tis King Against King. It Is Ever A Romance Of History In All Dynasties--the Co-presence Of The Revolutionary Force In Intellect. It Creates A Personal Independence Which The Monarch Cannot Look Down, And To Which He Must Often Succumb.

Insist On Yourself; Never Imitate. Your Own Gift You Can Offer With The Cumulative Force Of A Whole Life's Cultivation, But Of The Adopted Talent Of Another, You Have Only An Extemporaneous, Half Possession.

The First Lesson Of History Is That Evil Is Good.

Men Of Character Are The Conscience Of The Society To Which They Belong.

Shallow Men Believe In Luck. Strong Men Believe In Cause And Effect.

It Is In Rugged Crises, In Unbearable Endurance, And In Aims Which Put Sympathy Out Of The Question, That The Angel Is Shown.

I Give You Joy Of Your Free And Brave Thought. I Have Great Joy In It. I Find Incomparable Things Said Incomparably Well, As They Must Be. I Find The Courage Of Treatment Which So Delights Us, And Which Large Perception Only Can Inspire.

Nobody Trips Over Mountains. It Is The Small Pebble That Causes You To Stumble. Pass All The Pebbles In Your Path And You Will Find You Have Crossed The Mountain. The Mind Does Not Create What It Perceives, Anymore Than The Eye Creates The Rose.

In Every Company, There Is Not Only The Active And Passive Sex, But, In Both Men And Women, A Deeper And More Important Sex Of Mind, Namely, The Inventive Or Creative Class Of Both Men And Women, And The Uninventive Or Accepting Class.

Wherever There Is Power There Is Age.

Enthusiasm Is One Of The Most Powerful Engines Of Success. When You Do A Thing, Do It With All Your Might. Put Your Whole Soul Into It. Stamp It With Your Own Personality. Be Active, Be Energetic, Be Enthusiastic And Faithful, And You Will Accomplish Your Object. Nothing Great Was Ever Achieved Without Enthusiasm.

Every Industrious Man, In Every Lawful Calling, Is A Useful Man. And One Principal Reason Why Men Are So Often Useless Is That They Neglect Their Own Profession Or Calling, And Divide And Shift Their Attention Among A Multiplicity Of Objects And Pursuits.

Lawyers Are A Prudent Race Though Not Very Fond Of Liberty.

Our Opinions Of The World, Are Confessions Of Character.

To Aim To Convert A Man By Miracles Is A Profanation Of The Soul. A True Conversion, A True Christ, Is Now, As Always, To Be Madeby The Reception Of Beautiful Sentiments.

Each Man Too Is A Tyrant In Tendency, Because He Would Impose His Idea On Others; And Their Trick Is Their Natural Defence. Jesuswould Absorb The Race; But Tom Paine Or The Coarsest Blasphemer Helps Humanity By Resisting This Exuberance Of Power.

Whilst The Rights Of All As Persons Are Equal, In Virtue Of Their Access To Reason, Their Rights In Property Are Very Unequal. Oneman Owns His Clothes, And Another Owns A Country.

Every Word We Speak Is Million-faced Or Convertible To An Indefinite Number Of Applications. If It Were Not So We Could Read No Book. Your Remark Would Only Fit Your Case, Not Mine.

If We Consider What Happens In Conversation, In Reveries, In Remorse, In Times Of Passion, In Surprises, In The Instructions Of Dreams, Wherein Often We See Ourselves In Masquerade,--the Droll Disguises Only Magnifying And Enhancing A Real Element, And Forcing It On Our Distinct Notice,--we Shall Catch Many Hints That Will Broaden And Lighten Into Knowledge Of The Secret Of Nature.

Every Man Has A Vocation. The Talent Is The Call.

Men Consort In Camp And Town But The Poet Dwells Alone.

Popularity Is For Dolls.

Friendship, Like The Immortality Of The Soul, Is Too Good To Be Believed.

Half A Man's Wisdom Goes With His Courage.

The Religion That Is Afraid Of Science Dishonors God And Commits Suicide. Every Influx Of Atheism, Of Skepticism, Is Thus Made Useful As A Mercury Pill Assaulting And Removing A Diseased Religion, And Making Way For Truth.

Truth Is Beautiful, Without Doubt; But So Are Lies.

The Reliance On Authority Measures The Decline Of Religion, The Withdrawal Of The Soul.

Crime And Punishment Grow Out Of One Stem. Punishment Is A Fruit That Unsuspected Ripens Within The Flower Of The Pleasure Which Concealed It.

Homeopathy Is Insignificant As An Act Of Healing, But Of Great Value As Criticism On The Hygeia Or Medical Practice Of The Time.

There The Great Planter Plants Of Fruitful Worlds The Grain, And With A Million Spells Enchants The Souls That Walk In Pain.

In Our Definitions, We Grope After The Spiritual By Describing It As Invisible. The True Meaning Of Spiritual Is Real; That Law Which Executes Itself, Which Works Without Means, And Which Cannot Be Conceived As Not Existing.

Work And Thou Canst Escape The Reward; Whether The Work Be Fine Or Course, Planting Corn Or Writing Epics, So Only It Be Honest Work, Done To Thine Own Approbation, It Shall Earn A Reward To The Senses As Well As To The Thought.

Nations Have Lost Their Old Omnipotence; The Patriotic Tiedoes Not Hold. Nations Are Getting Obsolete, We Go And Live Where We Will.

There Is A Mortifying Experience In Particular, Which Does Not Fail To Wreak Itself Also In The General History; I Mean "the Foolish Face Of Praise," The Forced Smile Which We Put On In Company Where We Do Not Feel At Ease, In Answer To Conversation Which Does Not Interest Us. The Muscles, Not Spontaneously Moved But Moved, By A Low Usurping Wilfulness, Grow Tight About The Outline Of The Face, With The Most Disagreeable Sensation.

Life Is Our Dictionary.

Life Itself Is ... A Sleep Within A Sleep.

Plant Your Dreams And Miracles Will Grow.

There Is Creative Reading As Well As Creative Writing.

Let It Suffice That In The Light Of These Two Facts, Namely, That The Mind Is One, And That Nature Is Its Correlative, History Isto Be Read And Written.

All Things With Which We Deal Preach To Us. What Is A Farm But A Mute Gospel? The Chaff And The Wheat, Weeds And Plants, Blight, Rain, Insects, Sun,--it Is A Sacred Emblem From The First Furrow Of Spring To The Last Stack Which The Snow Of Winter Overtakes In The Fields.

We Love It Because It Is Self Dependent, Self Derived, And Therefore Of An Old Immaculate Pedigree, Even If Shown In A Young Person.

We Surround Ourselves With The True Image Of Ourselves.

Nothing Can Work Damage To Me Except Myself; The Harm That I Sustain I Carry About With Me And Never Am A Real Sufferer Except By My Own Fault.

But The Man And Woman Of Seventy Assume To Know All, They Have Outlived Their Hope, They Renounce Aspiration, Accept The Actual For The Necessary And Talk Down To The Young. Let Them Then Become Organs Of The Holy Ghost; Let Them Be Lovers; Let Them Behold Truth; And Their Eyes Are Uplifted, Their Wrinkles Smoothed, They Are Perfumed Again With Hope And Power.

The First Wealth Is Health.

By Necessity, By Proclivity, And By Delight, We All Quote. In Fact, It Is As Difficult To Appropriate The Thoughts Of Others As It Is To Invent.

The Visible Heavens And Earth Sympathize With Jesus.

Yet Some Natures Are Too Good To Be Spoiled By Praise, And Wherever The Vein Of Thought Reaches Down Into The Profound, There Is No Danger From Vanity. Solemn Friends Will Warn Them Of The Danger Of The Head's Being Turned By The Flourish Of Trumpets, But They Can Afford To Smile.

Our Culture, Therefore, Must Not Omit The Arming Of The Man. Let Him Hear In Season, That He Is Born Into The State Of War, And That The Commonwealth And His Own Well-being Require That He Should Not Go Dancing In The Weeds Of Peace, But Warned, Self- Collected, And Neither Defying Nor Dreading The Thunder, Let Him Take Both Reputation And Life In His Hand, And, With Perfect Urbanity, Dare The Gibbet And The Mob By The Absolute Truth Of His Speech, And The Rectitude Of His Behaviour.

Moller, In His Essay On Architecture, Taught That The Building Which Was Fitted Accurately To Answer Its End Would Turn Out To Be Beautiful, Though Beauty Had Not Been Intended. I Find The Like Unity In Human Structures Rather Virulent And Pervasive.

It Seems As If The Day Was Not Wholly Profane In Which We Have Given Heed To Some Natural Object.

The Hues Of The Opal, The Light Of The Diamond, Are Not To Be Seen If The Eye Is Too Near.

There Is Some Reason To Believe That When A Man Does Not Write His Poetry It Escapes By Other Vents Through Him, Instead Of The One Vent Of Writing; Clings To His Form And Manners, Whilst Poets Have Often Nothing Poetical About Them Except Their Verses.

The Best Lightning Rod For Your Protection Is Your Own Spine.

It Is Hard To Go Beyond Your Public. If They Are Satisfied With Cheap Performance, You Will Not Easily Arrive At Better. If They Know What Is Good, And Require It. You Will Aspire And Burn Until You Achieve It. But From Time To Time, In History, Men Are Born A Whole Age Too Soon.

Music Causes Us To Think Eloquently.

We Are Always Getting Ready To Live, But Never Living... The Wave Moves Onward But The Particles Of Which It Is Composed Do Not... It Cannot Be But That At Intervals Throughout Society There Are Real Men Intermixed . . . As The Carpenter Puts One Iron Bar In His Bannister For Every Five Or Six Wooden Ones.

Genius Is Intellect Constructive.

Flowers So Strictly Belong To Youth, That We Adult Men Soon Come To Feel, That Their Beautiful Generations Concern Not Us: We Havehad Our Day; Now Let The Children Have Theirs. The Flowers Jilt Us, And We Are Old Bachelors With Our Ridiculous Tenderness.

Every Word Was Once A Poem. Every New Relation Is A New Word.

It Is The Quality Of The Moment, Not The Number Of Days, Or Events, Or Of Actors, That Imports.

Good Breeding, A Union Of Kindness And Independence.

He Who Should Inspire And Lead His Race Must Be Defended From Travelling With The Souls Of Other Men, From Living, Breathing, Reading, And Writing In The Daily, Time-worn Yoke Of Their Opinions.

The Reward Of A Thing Well Done, Is To Have Done It.

Perhaps Love Is Only The Highest Symbol Of Friendship, As All Other Things Seem Symbols Of Love.

Men In All Ways Are Better Than They Seem.

No Man Can Help Another Without Helping Himself.

The Hearing Ear Is Always Found Close To The Speaking Tongue; And No Genius Can Long Or Often Utter Anything Which Is Not Invited And Gladly Entertained By Men Around Him.

If Government Knew How, I Should Like To See It Check, Not Multiply, The Population. When It Reaches Its True Law Of Action, Every Man That Is Born Will Be Hailed As Essential.

For What Are They All In Their High Conceit, When Man In The Bush With God May Meet?

Outside Among Your Fellows, Among Strangers, You Must Preserve Appearances, A Hundred Things You Cannot Do; But Inside, The Terrible Freedom.

Manners Make The Fortune Of The Ambitious Youth.

In Dealing With The State, We Ought To Remember That Its Institutions Are Not Aboriginal, Though They Existed Before We Were Born; That They Are Not Superior To The Citizen; That Every One Of Them Was Once The Act Of A Single Man; Every Law And Usage Was A Man's Expedient To Meet A Particular Case; That They All Are Imitable, All Alterable; We May Make As Good; We May Make Better.

Wisdom Will Never Let Us Stand With Any Man On An Unfriendly Footing. We Refuse Sympathy And Intimacy With People, As If We Waited For Some Better Sympathy Or Intimacy To Come. But Whence And When: Tomorrow Will Be Like Today. Life Wastes Itself While We Are Preparing To Live.

Nature Is Thoroughly Mediate. It Is Made To Serve. It Receives The Dominion Of Man As Meekly As The Ass On Which The Saviour Rode.it Offers All Its Kingdoms To Man As The Raw Material Which He May Mould Into What Is Useful. Man Is Never Weary Of Working It Up.

Each Of Us Sees In Others What We Carry In Our Own Hearts.

You Cannot Do Wrong Without Suffering Wrong.

The Course Of Everything Goes To Teach Us Faith.

How Silent, How Spacious, What Room For All, Yet Without Place To Insert An Atom--in Graceful Succession, In Equal Fullness, In Balanced Beauty, The Dance Of The Hours Goes Forward Still. Like An Odor Of Incense, Like A Strain Of Music, Like A Sleep, It Is Inexact And Boundless. It Will Not Be Dissected, Nor Unraveled, Nor Shown.

In This Distribution Of Functions, The Scholar Is The Delegated Intellect. In The Right State, He Is, Man Thinking. In The Degenerate State, When The Victim Of Society, He Tends To Become A Mere Thinker, Or, Still Worse, The Parrot Of Other Men's Thinking.

Old Age Brings Along With Its Uglinesses The Comfort That You Will Soon Be Out Of It, - Which Ought To Be A Substantial Relief To Such Discontented Pendulums As We Are.

Some Men's Words I Remember So Well That I Must Often Use Them To Express My Thought. Yes, Because I Perceive That We Have Heard The Same Truth, But They Have Heard It Better.

Men Have Come To Speak Of The Revelation As Somewhat Long Ago Given And Done, As If God Were Dead. The Injury To Faith Throttles The Preacher; And The Goodliest Of Institutions Becomes An Uncertain And Inarticulate Voice.

One Man's Justice Is Another's Injustice; One Man's Beauty Another's Ugliness; One Man's Wisdom Anpther's Folly.

A Woman's Strength Is The Unresistible Might Of Weakness.

In America The Geography Is Sublime, But The Men Are Not; The Inventions Are Excellent, But The Inventors One Is Sometimes Ashamed Of.

The Pest Of Society Are The Egotist, They Are Dull And Bright, Sacred And Profane, Course And Fine. It Is A Disease That Like The Flu Falls On All Constitutions.

A Day For Toil, An Hour For Sport, But For A Friend Is Life Too Short.

Great Genial Power, One Would Almost Say, Consists In Not Being Original At All; In Being Altogether Receptive; In Letting The World Do All, And Suffering The Spirit Of The Hour To Pass Unobstructed Through The Mind.

It Is Not An Arbitrary "decree Of God," But In The Nature Of Man, That A Veil Shuts Down On The Facts Of To-morrow; For The Soul Will Not Have Us Read Any Other Cipher Than That Of Cause And Effect. By This Veil, Which Curtains Events, It Instructs The Children Of Men To Live In To-day.

The Only Thing Grief Has Taught Me Is To Know How Shallow It Is.

Truth Is The Summit Of Being; Justice Is The Application Of It To Affairs.

The Essence Of All Jokes, Of All Comedy, Seems To Be An Honest Or Well Intended Halfness; A Non Performance Of That Which Is Pretended To Be Performed, At The Same Time That One Is Giving Loud Pledges Of Performance. The Balking Of The Intellect, Is Comedy And It Announces Itself In The Pleasant Spasms We Call Laughter.

The Englishman Who Has Lost His Fortune Is Said To Have Died Of A Broken Heart.

When Fear Enters The Heart Of A Man At Hearing The Names Of Candidates And The Reading Of Laws That Are Proposed, Then Is The State Safe, But When These Things Are Heard Without Regard, As Above Or Below Us, Then Is The Commonwealth Sick Or Dead.

The Voyage Of The Best Ship Is A Zigzag Line Of A Hundred Tacks. See The Line From A Sufficient Distance And It Straightens Itself To The Average Tendency.

We Walk Alone In The World. Friends, Such As We Desire, Are Dreams And Fables.

We Do Not Quite Forgive A Giver. The Hand That Feeds Us Is In Some Danger Of Being Bitten. We Can Receive Anything From Love, Forthat Is A Way Of Receiving It From Ourselves; But Not From Any One Who Assumes To Bestow. We Sometimes Hate The Meat Which We Eat, Because There Seems Something Of Degrading Dependence In Living It.

Tomorrow Is A New Day; Begin It Well And Serenely And With Too High A Spirit To Be Encumbered With Your Old Nonsense.

Positive Thinking

Though Thou Loved Her As Thyself, As A Self Of Purer Clay, Tho' Her Parting Dims The Day, Stealing Grace From All Alive, Heartily Know, When Half-gods Go, The Gods Arrive.

If The Individuals Who Compose The Purest Circles Of Aristocracy In Europe, The Guarded Blood Of Centuries, Should Pass In Review,in Such Manner As That We Could, At Leisure, And Critically Inspect Their Behavior, We Might Find No Gentleman, And No Lady; For, Although Excellent Specimens Of Courtesy And High-breeding Would Gratify Us In The Assemblage, In The Particulars, We Should Detect Offence. Because, Elegance Comes Of No Breeding, But Of Birth.

There Is A Crack In Everything God Has Made

It Behooves Us To Be Careful What We Worship, For What We Are Worshipping We Are Becoming.

Fear God, And Where You Go Men Shall Think They Walk In Hallowed Cathedrals.

Whatever Is Old Corrupts, And The Past Turns To Snakes.

Money Is The Representative Of A Certain Quantity Of Corn Or Other Commodity. It Is So Much Warmth, So Much Bread.

Keep The Town For Occasions, But The Habits Should Be Formed In Retirement.

A Little Fact Is Worth A Whole Limbo Of Dreams.

When The Act Of Reflection Takes Place In The Mind, When We Look At Ourselves In The Light Of Thought, We Discover That Our Life Is Embosomed In Beauty.

It Is Noticed, That The Consideration Of The Great Periods And Spaces Of Astronomy Induces A Dignity Of Mind, And An Indifferenceto Death.

Murder In The Murderer Is No Such Ruinous Thought As Poets And Romancers Will Have It; It Does Not Unsettle Him, Or Fright Him From His Ordinary Notice Of Trifles; It Is An Act Quite Easy To Be Contemplated.

There Is No Luck In Literary Reputation. They Who Make Up The Final Verdict Upon Every Book Are Not The Partial And Noisy Readers Of The Hour When It Appears; But A Court As Of Angels, A Public Not To Be Bribed, Not To Be Entreated, And Not To Be Overawed, Decides Upon Every Man's Title To Fame.

Greek Architecture Is The Flowering Of Geometry.

The Boxer's Ring Is The Enjoyment Of The Part Of Society Whose Animal Nature Alone Has Been Developed.

Living Without Laughing Isn't Living. Be Silly. Be Honest. Be Kind.

The Subject Is Said To Have The Property Of Making Dull Men Eloquent.

What New Thoughts Are Suggested By Seeing A Face Of Country Quite Familiar, In The Rapid Movement Of The Rail-road Car!

There Is The Illusion Of Time, Which Is Very Deep; Who Has Disposed Of It? Mor Come To The Conviction That What Seems The Succession Of Thought Is Only The Distribution Of Wholes Into Causal Series.

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