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A Song Is No Song Unless The Circumstance Is Free And Fine. If A Singer Sing From A Sense Of Duty Or From Seeing No Way To Escape,i Had Rather Have None. Those Only Can Sleep Who Do Not Care To Sleep; And Those Only Write Or Speak Best Who Do Not Too Much Respect The Writing Or The Speaking.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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A Song Is No

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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A Song Is No Song Unless The Circumstance Is Free And Fine. If A Singer Sing From A Sense Of Duty Or From Seeing No Way To Escape,i Had Rather Have None. Those Only Can Sleep Who Do Not Care To Sleep; And Those Only Write Or Speak Best Who Do Not Too Much Respect The Writing Or The Speaking.

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More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

Nothing Can Bring You Peace But Yourself. Nothing Can Bring You Peace But The Triumph Of Principles.

It Is Not Length Of Life, But Depth Of Life.

We Are Made Aware That Magnitude Of Material Things Is Relative, And All Objects Shrink And Expand To Serve The Passion Of The Poet. Thus, In His Sonnets, The Lays Of Birds, The Scents And Dyes Of Flowers, He Finds To Be The Shadow Of His Beloved; Time, Which Keeps Her From Him, Is His Chest; The Suspicion She Has Awakened, Is Her Ornament

I Like People Who Can Do Things

Within, I Do Not Find Wrinkles And Used Heart, But Unspent Youth.

Cities Of Mortals Woe-begone Fantastic Care Derides, But In The Serious Landscape Lone Stern Benefit Abides.

These Are The Voices Which We Hear In Solitude, But They Grow Faint And Inaudible As We Enter Into The World. Society Everywhere Is In Conspiracy Against The Manhood Of Everyone Of Its Members. Society Is A Joint-stock Company, In Which The Members Agree, For The Better Securing Of His Bread To Each Shareholder, To Surrender The Liberty And Culture Of The Eater. The Virtue In Most Request Is Conformity. Self-reliance Is Its Aversion. It Loves Not Realities And Creators, But Names And Customs.

Of All The Ways To Lose A Person, Death Is The Kindest

What You Are Comes To You.

Law Of Attraction

Truth Gathers Itself Spotless And Unhurt After All Our Surrenders And Concealments And Partisanship; Never Hurt By The Treachery Or Ruin Of Its Best Defenders, Whether Luther, Or William Penn, Or St. Paul.

Let Us Interrogate The Great Apparition, That Shines So Peacefully Around Us.

Happiness Is A Perfume You Cannot Pour On Others Without Getting Some On Yourself.

If We Shall Take The Good We Find, Asking No Questions, We Shall Have Heaping Measures.

Philanthropies And Charities Have A Certain Air Of Quackery.

The Believing We Do Something When We Do Nothing Is The First Illusion Of Tobacco.

Only Those Books Come Down Which Deserve To Last . All The Gilt Edges, Vellum And Morocco, All The Presentation Copies To All The Libraries Will Not Preserve A Book In Circulation Beyond Its Intrinsic Date.

The Law Of Nature Is Alternation For Evermore. Each Electrical State Superinduces The Opposite. The Soul Environs Itself With Friends, That It May Enter Into A Grander Self-acquaintance Or Solitude; And It Goes Alone For A Season, That It May Exalt Its Conversation Or Society.

Life Is Very Narrow. Bring Any Club Or Company Of Intelligent Men Together Again After Ten Years, And If The Presence Of Some Penetrating And Calming Genius Could Dispose Them To Frankness, What A Confession Of Insanities Would Come Up!

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.

Those Who Have Ruled Human Destinies, Like Planets, For Thousands Of Years, Were Not Handsome Men.

Before A Leaf-bud Has Burst, Its Whole Life Acts; In The Full-blown Flower There Is No More; In The Leafless Root There Is No Less.

The Poet Alone Knows Astronomy, Chemistry, Vegetation, And Animation, For He Does Not Stop At These Facts, But Employs Them As Signs. He Knows Why The Plain, Or Meadow Of Space, Was Strown With These Flowers We Call Suns, And Moons, And Stars; Why The Deep Is Adorned With Animals, With Men, And Gods; For, In Every Word He Speaks He Rides On Them As The Horses Of Thought.

Converse With A Mind That Is Grandly Simple, And Literature Looks Like Word-catching.

The Basis Of Good Manners Is Self-reliance. Necessity Is The Law Of All Who Are Not Self-possessed.

It Is The Last Lesson Of Modern Science, That The Highest Simplicity Of Structure Is Produced, Not By Few Elements, But By The Highest Complexity.

Man Is Priest, And Scholar, And Statesman, And Producer, And Soldier. In The Divided Or Social State These Functions Are Parcelled Out To Individuals, Each Of Whom Aims To Do His Stint Of The Joint Work, Whilst Each Other Performs His.

Colleges Hate Geniuses, Just As Convents Hate Saints.

O Friend, Never Strike Sail To A Fear! Come Into Port Greatly, Or Sail With God The Seas.

The Life Of Man Is A Self-evolving Circle, Which, From A Ring Imperceptibly Small, Rushes On All Sides Outwards To New And Largercircles, And That Without End.

Quotation Confesses Inferiority.

We Acquire The Strength We Have Overcome.

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.

Welcome Evermore To Gods And Men Is The Self-helping Man.

Defect In Manners Is Usually The Defect Of Fine Perceptions. Men Are Too Coarsely Made For The Delicacy Of Beautiful Carriage And Customs. It Is Not Quite Sufficient To Good Breeding, A Union Of Kindness And Independence.

Wit Makes Its Own Welcome, And Levels All Distinctions. No Dignity, No Learning, No Force Of Character, Can Make Any Stand Against Good Wit.

A Beautiful Woman Is A Picture Which Drives All Beholders Nobly Mad.

Do Not Say Things. What You Are Stands Over You The While, And Thunders, So That I Cannot Hear What You Say To The Contrary.

The Greatest Discoveries Are Those That Shed Light Unto Ourselves.

Good Nature Is Stronger Than Tomahawks.

There Are Books... Which Rank In Our Life With Parents And Lovers And Passionate Experiences.

From Washington, Proverbially "the City Of Distances," Through All Its Cities, States, And Territories, It Is A Country Of Beginnings, Of Projects, Of Designs, And Expectations.

How Much We Forgive To Those Who Yield Us The Rare Spectacle Of Heroic Manners! We Will Pardon Them The Want Of Books, Or Arts, And Even Of Gentler Virtues. How Tenaciously We Remember Them!

Do Your Work, But Do Your Thing.

Funny Basketball

Concentration Is The Secret Of Srength.

Every Book Is A Quotation; And Every House Is A Quotation Out Of All Forests, And Mines, And Stone Quarries; And Every Man Is A Quotation From All His Ancestors.

Wise Men Read Very Sharply All Of Your Private History In Your Look And Gait And Behavior.

I Am Not Engaged To Christianity By Decent Forms, Or Saving Ordinances; It Is Not Usage, It Is Not What I Do Not Understand, That Binds Me To It -- Let These Be The Sandy Foundations Of Falsehoods. What I Revere And Obey In It Is Its Reality, Its Boundless Charity, Its Deep Interior Life, The Rest It Gives To My Mind, The Echo It Returns To My Thoughts, The Perfect Accord It Makes With My Reason Through All Its Representation Of God And His Providence; And The Persuasion And Courage That Come Out Thence To Lead Me Upward And Onward.

The Finest Poetry Was First Experience.

Plato Is Philosophy, And Philosophy, Plato,--at Once The Glory And The Shame Of Mankind, Since Neither Saxon Nor Roman Have Availed To Add Any Idea To His Categories.

The Great Object Of Education Should Be Commensurate With The Object Of Life. It Should Be A Moral One; To Teach Self-trust: To Inspire The Youthful Man With An Interest In Himself; With A Curiosity Touching His Own Nature; To Acquaint Him With The Resources Of His Mind, And To Teach Him That There Is All His Strength.

Many A Profound Genius, I Suppose, Who Fills The World With Fame Of His Exploding Renowned Errors, Is Yet Everyday Posed And Baffled By Trivial Questions At His Own Supper Table.

The Forest Is My Loyal Friend A Delphic Shrine To Me.

In The Country, Without Any Interference From The Law, The Agricultural Life Favors The Permanence Of Families.

Alas For America As I Must So Often Say, The Ungirt, The Diffuse, The Profuse, Procumbent, One Wide Ground Juniper, Out Of Which No Cedar, No Oak Will Rear Up A Mast To The Clouds! It All Runs To Leaves, To Suckers, To Tendrils, To Miscellany. The Air Is Loaded With Poppy, With Imbecility, With Dispersion, & Sloth.

I Take This Evanescence And Lubricity Of All Objects, Which Lets Them Slip Through Our Fingers Then When We Clutch Hardest, To Be The Most Unhandsome Part Of Our Condition.

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 Common Experience Is, That The Man Fits Himself As Well As He Can To The Customary Details Of That Work Or Trade He Falls Into, And Tends It As A Dog Turns A Spit. Then He Is Part Of The Machine He Moves; The Man Is Lost.

Men Achieve A Certain Greatness Unawares When Working To Another Aim.

You Cannot Do A Kindness Too Soon.

We Shall One Day Learn To Supersede Politics By Education. What We Call Our Root-and-branch Reforms Of Slavery, War, Gambling, Intemperance, Is Only Medicating The Symptoms. We Must Begin Higher Up, Namely, In Education.

The Rich Mind Lies In The Sun And Sleeps, And Is Nature.

Virtue Runs Before The Muse, And Defies Her Skill; She Is Rapt And Doth Refuse To Wait A Painter's Will.

The Foundations Of A Person Are Not In Matter But In Spirit.

A Man Makes Inferiors His Superiors By Heat; Self-control Is The Rule.

Knowledge Exists To Be Imparted.

How We Hate This Solemn Ego That Accompanies The Learned, Like A Double, Wherever He Goes.

People That Seem So Glorious Are All Show; Underneath They Are Like Everyone Else.

There Is Properly No History, Only Biography.

The City Is Recruited From The Country.

Trust Thyself: Every Heart Vibrates To That Iron String.

In Spite Of Warnings, Change Rarely Occurs Until The Status Quo Becomes More Painful Than Change. People Seem Not To See That Their Opinion Of The World Is Also A Confession Of Their Character.

Repose And Cheerfulness Are The Badge Of The Gentleman - Repose In Energy. The Greek Battle Pieces Are Calm; The Heroes, In Whatever Violent Actions Engaged, Retain A Serene Aspect.

Napoleon Said Of Massena, That He Was Not Himself Until The Battle Began To Go Against Him; Then, When The Dead Began To Fall In Ranks Around Him, Awoke His Powers Of Combination, And He Put On Terror And Victory As A Robe.

Throb Thine With Nature's Throbbing Breast.

Don't Ever Give Up On Something Or Someone That You Can't Go A Full Day Without Thinking About.

The Beautiful Rests On The Foundations Of The Necessary.

The World Exists, As I Understand It, To Teach The Science Of Liberty.

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

There Is One Mind Common To All Individual Men. Every Man Is An Inlet To The Same And To All Of The Same. He That Is Once Admitted To The Right Of Reason Is Made A Freeman Of The Whole Estate. What Plato Has Thought, He May Think; What A Saint Has Felt, He May Feel; What At Any Time Has Befallen Any Man, He Can Understand. Who Hath Access To This Universal Mind Is A Party To All That Is Or Can Be Done, For This Is The Only And Sovereign Agent

So In Accepting The Leading Of The Sentiments, It Is Not What We Believe Concerning The Immortality Of The Soul, Or The Like, But The Universal Impulse To Believe, That Is The Material Circumstance, And Is The Principal Fact In This History Of The Globe.

If We Encounter A Man Of Rare Intellect, We Should Ask Him What Books He Reads.

A Man Is Reputed To Have Thought And Eloquence; He Cannot, For All That, Say A Word To His Cousin Or His Uncle. They Accuse His Silence With As Much Reason As They Would Blame The Insignificance Of A Dial In The Shade. In The Sun It Will Mark The Hour. Among Those Who Enjoy His Thought, He Will Regain His Tongue.

With Thought, With The Ideal, Is Immortal Hilarity, The Rose Of Joy. Round It All The Muses Sing.

I Pay The Schoolmaster, But 'tis The Schoolboys That Educate My Son.

In A Tavern Everybody Puts On Airs Except The Landlord.

Human Condition

Our Young People Are Diseased With The Theological Problems Of Original Sin, Origin Of Evil, Predestination, And The Like. These Never Presented A Practical Difficulty To Any Man,--never Darkened Across Any Man's Road, Who Did Not Go Out Of His Way To Seek Them. These Are The Soul's Mumps, And Measles, And Whooping- Coughs, And Those Who Have Not Caught Them Cannot Describe Their Health Or Prescribe A Cure. A Simple Mind Will Not Know These Enemies.

Our Eyes Are Holden That We Cannot See Things That Stare Us In The Face, Until The Hour Arrives When The Mind Is Ripened; Then We Behold Them, And The Time When We Saw Them Not Is Like A Dream.

A Man Is Like A Bit Of Labrador Spar, Which Has No Lustre As You Turn It In Your Hand Until You Come To A Particular Angle; Then It Shows Deep And Beautiful Colors. There Is No Adaptation Or Universal Applicability In Men, But Each Has His Special Talent, And The Mastery Of Successful Men Consists In Adroitly Keeping Themselves Where And When That Turn Shall Be Oftenest To Be Practiced.

I Do Then With My Friends As I Do With My Books. I Would Have Them Where I Can Find Them, But I Seldom Use Them.

A Vivid Thought Brings The Power To Paint It; And In Proportion To The Depth Of Its Source Is The Force Of Its Projection.

The Chief Value Of The New Fact Is To Enhance The Great And Constant Fact Of Life.

There Are Two Classes Of Poets - The Poets By Education And Practice, These We Respect; And Poets By Nature, These We Love.

The Gods We Worship Write Their Names On Our Faces; Be Sure Of That. And A Man Will Worship Something ... That Which Dominates Will Determine His Life And Character. Therefore It Behooves Us To Be Careful What We Worship, For What We Are Worshipping We Are Becoming.

The Cannon Will Not Suffer Any Other Sound To Be Heard For Miles And For Years Around It.

Wit Makes Its Own Welcome, And Levels All Distinction. No Dignity, No Learning, No Force Of Character, Can Make Any Stand Against Good Wit. It Is Like Ice, On Which No Beauty Of Form, No Majesty Of Carriage, Can Plead Any Immunity; They Must Walk Gingerly, According To The Laws Of Ice, Or Down They Must Go, Dignity And All.

The Sower May Mistake And Sow His Peas Crookedly; The Peas Make No Mistake, But Come Up And Show His Line.

The Laws Of Light And Of Heat Translate Each Other;-so Do The Laws Of Sound And Colour; And So Galvanism, Electricity And Magnetism Are Varied Forms Of This Selfsame Energy.

Manners Are The Happy Ways Of Doing Things.

Be Yourself; No Base Imitator Of Another, But Your Best Self. There Is Something Which You Can Do Better Than Another. Listen To The Inward Voice And Bravely Obey That. Do The Things At Which You Are Great, Not What You Were Never Made For.

For Every Minute You Remain Angry, You Give Up Sixty Seconds Of Peace Of Mind.

If The Stars Should Appear One Night In A Thousand Years, How Would Men Believe And Adore; And Preserve For Many Generations The Remembrance Of The City Of God Which Had Been Shown! But Every Night Come Out These Envoys Of Beauty, And Light The Universe With Their Admonishing Smile.

Everything Good Is On The Highway.

The World Is Full Of Judgment-days, And Into Every Assembly That A Man Enters, In Every Action He Attempts, He Is Gauged And Stamped.

As Many Languages As He Has, As Many Friends, As Many Arts And Trades, So Many Times Is He A Man.

We Must Have Kings, We Must Have Nobles; Nature Is Always Providing Such In Every Society; Only Let Us Have The Real Instead Of The Titular. In Every Society Some Are Born To Rule, And Some To Advise. The Chief Is The Chief All The World Over, Only Not His Cap And Plume. It Is Only This Dislike Of The Pretender Which Makes Men Sometimes Unjust To The True And Finished Man.

The Scholar Is That Man Who Must Take Up Into Himself All The Ability Of The Time, All The Contributions Of The Past, All The Hopes Of The Future. He Must Be An University Of Knowledges.

Continual Failure Is A Road To Success - If You Have The Strength To Go On.

Road To Success

Then, Though I Prize My Friends, I Cannot Afford To Talk With Them And Study Their Visions, Lest I Lose My Own. It Would Indeed Give Me A Certain Household Joy To Quit This Lofty Seeking, This Spiritual Astronomy, Or Search Of Stars, And Come Down To Warm Sympathies With You; But Then I Know Well I Shall Mourn Always The Vanishing Of My Mighty Gods.

Every Violation Of Truth Is Not Only A Sort Of Suicide In The Liar, But Is A Stab At The Health Of Human Society.

Treat Your Friend As A Spectacle.

When Believers And Unbelievers Live In The Same Manner - I Distrust The Religion.

Proverbs Are The Literature Of Reason, Or The Statements Of Absolute Truth, Without Qualification. Like The Sacred Books Of Each Nation, They Are The Sanctuary Of Its Intuitions.

The Good Writer Seems To Be Writing About Himself, But Has His Eye Always On That Thread Of The Universe Which Runs Through Himself And All Things.

All The World Loves A Lover.

The Intellect,-that Is Miraculous! Who Has It, Has The Talisman: His Skin And Bones, Though They Were Of The Color Of Night, Are Transparent, And The Everlasting Stars Shine Through, With Attractive Beams.

There Is No Man Of Nature's Worth In The Circle Of The Earth.

In America And Europe, The Nomadism Is Of Trade And Curiosity.

Everywhere I Am Hindered Of Meeting God In My Brother, Because He Has Shut His Own Temple Doors And Recites Fables Merely Of His Brother's, Or His Brother's Brother's God.

Humility Is The Secret Of The Wise.

Difficulties Exist To Be Surmounted.

What You Do Speaks So Loud That I Cannot Hear What You Say.

Science In England, In America, Is Jealous Of Theory, Hates The Name Of Love And Moral Purpose. There's Revenge For This Humanity.what Manner Of Man Does Science Make? The Boy Is Not Attracted. He Says, I Do Not Wish To Be Such A Kind Of Man As My Professor Is.

Every Experiment, By Multitudes Or By Individuals, That Has A Sensual And Selfish Aim, Will Fail.

The Astonishment Of Life Is The Absence Of Any Appearances Of Reconciliation Between The Theory And The Practice Of Life.

Poverty Demoralizes. A Man In Debt Is So Far A Slave; And Wall-street Thinks It Easy For A Millionaire To Be A Man Of His Word, Aman Of Honor, But, That, In Failing Circumstances, No Man Can Be Relied On To Keep His Integrity.

What Is Well Done, I Feel As If I Did; What Is Ill-done, I Reck Not Of.

Half A Man's Wisdom Goes With His Courage.

Imagination Is Not A Talent Of Some Men But Is The Health Of Every Man.

Friendship Buys Friendship.

The Sky Is The Daily Bread Of The Eyes.

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.

A Good Form Strikes All Eyes Pleasantly, Long Before They Have Any Science On The Subject; And A Beautiful Face Sets Twenty Hearts In Palpitation, Prior To All Consideration Of The Mechanical Proportions Of The Features And Head.

And What Greater Calamity Can Fall Upon A Nation Than The Loss Of Worship.

In The Great Books Of India, An Empire Spoke To Us, Nothing Small Or Unworthy, But Large, Serene, Consistent, The Voice Of An Old Intelligence, Which In Another Age And Climate Had Pondered And Thus Disposed Of The Questions That Exercise Us.

You Cannot Make A Cheap Palace.

It Is Long Ere We Discover How Rich We Are. Our History, We Are Sure, Is Quite Tame: We Have Nothing To Write, Nothing To Infer. But Our Wiser Years Still Run Back To The Despised Recollections Of Childhood. . . .

I Hate The Prostitution Of The Name Of Friendship To Signify Modish And Worldly Alliances.

Not Gold But Only Men Can Makea People Great And Strong;men Who For Truth And Honors Sakestand Fast And Suffer Long. Brave Men Who Work While Others Sleep,who Dare While Others Flythey Build A Nations Pillars Deepand Lift Them To The Sky.

When The Man Is At Home, His Standing In Society Is Well Known And Quietly Taken; But When He Is Abroad, It Is Problematical, And Is Dependent On The Success Of His Manners.

For, Though The Origin Of Most Of Our Words Is Forgotten, Each Word Was At First A Stroke Of Genius, And Obtained Currency, Because For The Moment It Symbolized The World To The First Speaker And To The Hearer. The Etymologist Finds The Deadest Word To Have Been Once A Brilliant Picture.

Beauty Brings Its Own Fancy Price, For All That A Man Hath Will He Give For His Love.

We Take Care Of Our Health; We Lay Up Money; We Make Our Roof Tight, And Our Clothing Sufficient; But Who Provides Wisely That He Shall Not Be Wanting In The Best Property Of All, -friends?

In Failing Circumstances No One Can Be Relied On To Keep Their Integrity.

As A Man Thinketh, So Is He, And As A Man Chooseth, So Is He.

Not A Ray Is Dimmed, Not An Atom Worn; Nature's Oldest Force Is As Good As New.

The Stars Awaken A Certain Reverence, Because Though Always Present, They Are Inaccessible; But All Natural Objects Make A Kindred Impression, When The Mind Is Open To Their Influence. Nature Never Wears A Mean Appearance.

The Conservative Assumes Sickness As A Necessity, And His Social Frame Is A Hospital, His Total Legislation Is For The Present Distress, A Universe In Slippers And Flannels, With Bib And Papspoon, Swallowing Pills And Herb-tea.

There Is Health In Table Talk And Nursery Play. We Must Wear Old Shoes And Have Aunts And Cousins.

Lose Yourself In Nature And Find Peace

It Was A Pleasure And A Privilege To Walk With Him [h.d. Thoreau]. He Knew The Country Like A Fox Or A Bird, And Passed Through It As Freely By Paths Of His Own.

The Crystal Sphere Of Thought Is As Concentrical As The Geological Structure Of The Globe. As Our Soils And Rocks Lie In Strata, Concentric Strata, So Do All Men's Thinkings Run Laterally, Never Vertically.

The One Prudence In Life Is Concentration; The One Evil Is Dissipation: And It Makes No Difference Whether Our Dissipations Are Coarse Or Fine; Property And Its Cares, Friends And A Social Habit, Or Politics, Or Music, Or Feasting. Everything Is Good Which Takes Away One Plaything And Delusion More, And Drives Us Home To Add One Stroke Of Faithful Work.

Artists Must Be Sacrificed To Their Art.

Human Beings Cannot Endure The Geological Chaos They Encounter Under The Soil Of Their Own Gardens.

There Are No Fixtures In Nature. The Universe Is Fluid And Volatile. Permanence Is But A Word Of Degrees.

The History Of Reform Is Always Identical; It Is The Comparison Of The Idea With The Fact. Our Modes Of Living Are Not Agreeable To Our Imagination. We Suspect They Are Unworthy. We Arraign Our Daily Employments.

Live In The Sunshine, Swim The Sea, Drink The Wild Air.

For Everything You Gain, You Lose Something.

Missing Someone

When A Thought Of Plato Becomes A Thought To Me,--when A Truth That Fired The Soul Of Pindar Fires Mine, Time Is No More. When I Feel That We Two Meet In A Perception, That Our Two Souls Are Tinged With The Same Hue, And Do As It Were Run Into One, Why Should I Measure Degrees Of Latitude, Why Should I Count Egyptian Years?

Whatever Limits Us We Call Fate.

We Say The Cows Laid Out Boston. Well, There Are Worse Surveyors.

My Good Hoe As It Bites The Ground Revenges My Wrongs, And I Have Less Lust To Bite My Enemies. In The Smoothing The Rough Hillocks, I Smooth My Temper.

The Charm Of The Best Courages Is That They Are Inventions, Inspirations, Flashes Of Genius.

Science Does Not Know Its Debt To Imagination. Goethe Did Not Believe That A Great Naturalist Could Exist Without This Faculty.

I Must Be Myself. I Cannot Break Myself Any Longer For You, Or You. If You Can Love Me For What I Am, We Shall Be The Happier. If You Cannot, I Will Still Seek To Seserve That You Should.

A Man Must Thank His Defects, And Stand In Some Terror Of His Talents. A Transcendent Talent Draws So Largely On His Forces As Tolame Him; A Defect Pays Him Revenues On The Other Side.

Thus Is Man Made Equal To Every Event. He Can Face Danger For The Right. A Poor, Tender, Painful Body, He Can Run Into Flame Or Bullets Or Pestilence, With Duty For His Guide.

The Domestic Man, Who Loves No Music So Well As His Kitchen Clock, And The Airs Which The Logs Sing To Him As They Burn On The Hearth, Has Solaces Which Others Never Dream Of.

Sleep Takes Off The Costume Of Circumstance, Arms Us With Terrible Freedom, So That Every Will Rushes To Deed. A Skillful Man Reads His Dreams For His Self-knowledge; Yet Not The Details, But The Quality. What Part Does He Play In Them - A Cheerful, Manly Part, Or A Poor, Drivelling Part? However Monstrous And Grotesque Their Apparitions, They Have A Substantial Truth.

The Shows Of The Day, The Dewy Morning, The Rainbow, Mountains, Orchards In Blossom, Stars, Moonlight, Shadows In Still Water, Andthe Like, If Too Eagerly Hunted, Become Shows Merely, And Mock Us With Their Unreality.

Every Person Has His Or Her Own Vocation-talent Is The Call.

A State Of War Or Anarchy, In Which Law Has Little Force, Is So Far Valuable, That It Puts Every Man On Trial. The Man Of Principle Is Known As Such, And Even In The Fury Of Faction Is Respected.

What I Must Do Is All That Concerns Me, Not What The People Think. This Rule, Equally Arduous In Actual And In Intellectual Life, May Serve For The Whole Distinction Between Greatness And Meanness.

The Only Right Is What Is After My Constitution; The Only Wrong Is What Is Against It.

Our Age Is Retrospective. It Builds The Sepulchres Of The Fathers. It Writes Biographies, Histories And Criticism.

And Last Of All, High Over Thought, In The World Of Morals, Fate Appears As Vindicator, Levelling The High, Lifting The Low, Requiring Justice In Man, And Always Striking Soon Or Late When Justice Is Not Done. What Is Useful Will Last, What Is Hurtful Will Sink.

For Every Benefit You Receive A Tax Is Levied.

Each Truth That A Writer Acquires Is A Lantern, Which He Turns Full On What Facts And Thoughts Lay Already In His Mind, And Behold, All The Mats And Rubbish Which Had Littered His Garret Become Precious. Every Trivial Fact In His Private Biography Becomes An Illustration Of This New Principle, Revisits The Day, And Delights All Men By Its Piquancy And New Charm.

How Painful To Give A Gift To Any Person Of Sensibility, Or Of Equality! It Is Next Worst To Receiving One

Nature Always Wears The Colors Of The Spirit. To A Man Laboring Under Calamity The Heat Of His Own Fire Hath Sadness In It. Then There Is A Kind Of Contempt Of The Landscape Felt By Him Who Has Just Lost By Death A Dear Friend. The Sky Is Less Grand As It Shuts Down Over Less Worth In The Population.

We Are Thus Assisted By Natural Objects In The Expression Of Particular Meanings. But How Great A Language To Convey Such Pepper-corn Informations!

The Sensual Man Conforms Thoughts To Things; The Poet Conforms Things To His Thoughts.

For It Is Not Metres, But A Metre-making Argument That Makes A Poem, - A Thought So Passionate And Alive That Like The Spirit Of A Plant Or An Animal It Has An Architecture Of Its Own, And Adorns Nature With A New Thing.

Debt, Grinding Debt, Whose Iron Face The Widow, The Orphan, And The Sons Of Genius Fear And Hate; Debt, Which Consumes So Much Time, Which So Cripples And Disheartens A Great Spirit With Cares That Seem So Base, Is A Preceptor Whose Lessons Cannot Be Foregone, And Is Needed Most By Those Who Suffer From It Most.

God Knows That All Sorts Of Gentlemen Knock At The Door; But Whenever Used In Strictness And With Any Emphasis, The Name Will Be Found To Point At Original Energy.

There Is Hope In Extravagance, There Is None In Routine.

All Great Men Come Out Of The Middle Classes.

In Analysing History Do Not Be Too Profound, For Often The Causes Are Quite Superficial.

Cunning Is Strength Withheld.

Wherever A Man Commits A Crime, God Finds A Witness. Every Secret Crime Has Its Reporter.

We Are Shut Up In Schools And College Recitation Rooms For Ten Or Fifteen Years, And Come Out At Last With A Bellyful Of Words And Do Not Know A Thing.

Improve Your Spare Moments And They Will Become The Brightest Gems In Your Life.

Happy Is The House That Shelters A Friend! It Might Well Be Built, Like A Festal Bower Or Arch, To Entertain Him A Single Day. Happier, If He Know The Solemnity Of That Relation, And Honor Its Law! He Offers Himself A Candidate For That Covenant Comes Up, Like An Olympian, To The Great Games, Where The First- Born Of The World Are The Competitors.

To The Body And Mind Which Have Been Cramped By Noxious Work Or Company, Nature Is Medicinal And Restores Their Tone.

To Be A Star, You Must Shine Your Own Light, Follow Your Path, And Don't Worry About The Darkness, For That Is When The Stars Shine Brightest. Always Do What You Are Afraid To Do.

All Necessary Truth Is Its Own Evidence.

The Aid We Can Give Each Other Is Only Incidental, Lateral, And Sympathetic.

You Have First An Instinct, Then An Opinion, Then A Knowledge, As The Plant Has Root, Bud, And Fruit.

It Is Very Odd That Nature Should Be So Unscrupulous. She Is No Saint . . .

The Spirit Of Our American Radicalism Is Destructive And Aimless; It Is Not Loving; It Has No Ulterior And Divine Ends; But Is Destructive Only Out Of Hatred And Selfishness.

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