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In The First Place, All Books That Get Fairly Into The Vital Air Of The World Were Written By The Successful Class, By The Affirming And Advancing Class, Who Utter What Tens Of Thousands Feel Though They Cannot Say.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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In The First Place,

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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In The First Place, All Books That Get Fairly Into The Vital Air Of The World Were Written By The Successful Class, By The Affirming And Advancing Class, Who Utter What Tens Of Thousands Feel Though They Cannot Say.

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More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Energetic Action Of The Times Develops Individualism, And The Religious Appear Isolated. I Esteem This A Step In The Right Direction. Heaven Deals With Us On No Representative System. Souls Are Not Saved In Bundles.

Allow Yourself To Trust Joy And Embrace It. You Will Find You Dance With Everything.

A Man Is Like A Bit Of Labrador Spar, Which Has No Luster As You Turn It In Your Hand, Until You Come To A Particular Angle; Then It Shows Deep And Beautiful Colors.

It Is Only When Mind And Character Slumber That The Dress Can Be Seen. If The Intellect Were Always Awake, And Every Noble Sentiment, The Man Might Go In Huckaback Or Mats, And His Dress Would Be Admired And Imitated.

Headwinds Are Sore Vexations And The More Passengers The Sorer.

If You Cannot Be Free Be As Free As You Can.

We Are Very Near To Greatness: One Step And We Are Safe; Can We Not Take The Leap?

The Quality Of The Imagination Is To Flow And Not To Freeze.

In A World Of Infinite Choice People Are Struggling To Figure Out What To Do.

Of Lower States, Of Acts Of Routine And Sense, We Can Tell Somewhat; But The Masterpieces Of God, The Total Growths And Universalmovements Of The Soul, He Hideth; They Are Incalculable. I Can Know That Truth Is Divine And Helpful; But How It Shall Help Me I Can Have No Guess, For So To Be Is The Sole Inlet Of So To Know.

There Was Never Anything That Did Not Proceed From A Thought.

When There Is Sympathy, There Needs But One Wise Man In A Company And All Are Wise,--so, A Blockhead Makes A Blockhead Of His Companion. Wonderful Power To Benumb Possesses This Brother.

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.

It Is For Want Of Self-culture That The Superstition Of Travelling, Whose Idols Are Italy, England, Egypt, Retains Its Fascinationfor All Educated Americans.

Let Us Be Poised, Wise And Our Own Today.

Poetry Makes Its Own Pertinence, And A Single Stanza Outweighs A Book Of Prose.

The Men Who Carry Their Points Do Not Need To Inquire Of Their Constituents What They Should Say, But Are Themselves The Country Which They Represent: Nowhere Are Its Emotions Or Opinions So Instant And So True As In Them; Nowhere So Pure From A Selfish Infusion.

I Cannot Find Language Of Sufficient Energy To Convey My Sense Of The Sacredness Of Private Integrity. All Men, All Things, The State, The Church, Yea The Friends Of The Heart Are Phantasms And Unreal Beside The Sanctuary Of The Heart. With So Much Awe, With So Much Fear, Let It Be Respected.

Finish Each Day And Be Done With It. You Have Done What You Could. Learn From It... Tomorrow Is A New Day.

Rude Poets Of The Tavern Hearth, Squandering Your Unquoted Mirth, Which Keeps The Ground, And Never Soars, While Jake Retorts, And Reuben Roars; Tough And Screaming, As Birch-bark, Goes Like Bullet To Its Mark; While The Solid Curse And Jeer Never Balk The Waiting Ear.

The People Fancy They Hate Poetry, And They Are All Poets And Mystics.

Human Society Is Made Up Of Partialities. Each Citizen Has An Interest And A View Of His Own, Which, If Followed Out To The Extreme, Would Leave No Room For Any Other Citizen.

All History Is Biography.

Go Out Of The House To See The Moon, And 't Is Mere Tinsel; It Will Not Please As When Its Light Shines Upon Your Necessary Journey. The Beauty That Shimmers In The Yellow Afternoons Of October, Who Could Ever Clutch It? Go Forth To Find It, And It Is Gone: 't Is Only A Mirage As You Look From The Windows Of Diligence.

Ever The Words Of The Gods Resound; But The Porches Of Man's Ear Seldom In This Low Life's Round Are Unsealed, That He May Hear.

No Orator Can Top The One Who Can Give Good Nicknames.

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. . . .

Popularity Is For Dolls.

Life Has No Memory. That Which Proceeds In Succession Might Be Remembered, But That Which Is Coexistent, Or Ejaculated From A Deeper Cause, As Yet Far From Being Conscious, Knows Not Its Own Tendency.

Don't Waste Life In Doubts And Fears; Spend Yourself On The Work Before You, Well Assured That The Right Performance Of This Hour's Duties Will Be The Best Preparation For The Hours And Ages That Will Follow It.

History - A Biography Of A Few Stout And Earnest Persons

Invention Breeds Invention. No Sooner Is The Electric Telegraph Devised Than Gutta-percha, The Very Material It Requires, Is Found. The Aeronaut Is Provided With Gun-cotton, The Very Fuel He Wants For His Balloon.

'well,' Said Red Jacket [to Someone Complaining That He Had Not Enough Time], 'i Suppose You Have All There Is.'

No Man Gains Credit For His Cowardly Courtesies.

So Shall We Come To Look At The World With New Eyes.

As Men Get On In Life, They Acquire A Love For Sincerity, And Somewhat Less Solicitude To Be Lulled Or Amused. In The Progress Ofthe Character, There Is An Increasing Faith In The Moral Sentiment, And A Decreasing Faith In Propositions.

Earth Endures; Stars Abide.

Nature Never Hurries: Atom By Atom, Little By Little, She Achieves Her Work. The Lesson One Learns From Yachting Or Planting Is The Manners Of Nature; Patience With The Delays Of Wind And Sun, Delays Of The Seasons, Bad Weather, Excess Or Lack Of Water.

Writing Should Be The Settlement Of Dew On The Leaf.

The World Exists For The Education Of Each Man.

All Great Masters Are Chiefly Distinguished By The Power Of Adding A Second, A Third, And Perhaps A Fourth Step In A Continuous Line. Many A Man Has Taken The First Step. With Every Additional Step You Enhance Immensely The Value Of Your First.

Not In Nature But In Man Is All The Beauty And Worth He Sees. The World Is Very Empty, And Is Indebted To This Gilding, Exalting Soul For All Its Pride.

The Crime Which Bankrupts Men And States Is Job-work-declining From Your Main Design, To Serve A Turn Here And There. Nothing Is Beneath You, If It Is In The Direction Of Your Life, Nothing Is Great Or Desirable If It Is Off From That. I Think We Are Entitled Here To Draw A Straight Line And Say That Society Can Never Prosper But Must Always Be Bankrupts, Until Every Man Does That Which He Was Created To Do.

Excellence Is The New Forever.

As There Is A Use In Medicine For Poisons, So The World Cannot Move Without Rogues.

The Exceptional Life Depends Not On Working Harder, But On Different, Even Opposite, Actions From Habit And The Crowd.

Idealism Sees The World In God. It Beholds The Whole Circle Of Persons And Things, Of Actions And Events, Of Country And Religion,not As Painfully Accumulated, Atom After Atom, Act After Act, In An Aged Creeping Past, But As One Vast Picture, Which God Paints On The Instant Eternity, For The Contemplation Of The Soul.

The Maxim Of Courts Is That Manner Is Power.

Life Has A Way Of Demanding That You Live It.

As Long As Civilization Is Essentially One Of Property, Of Fences, Of Exclusiveness, It Will Be Mocked By Delusions. Our Riches Will Leave Us Sick; There Will Be Bitterness In Our Laughter, And Our Wine Will Burn Our Mouth. Only That Good Profits Which We Can Taste With All Doors Open, And Which Serves All Men.

The Wise Man, The True Friend, The Finished Character, We Seek Everywhere, And Only Find In Fragments.

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.

It Is Handsomer To Remain In The Establishment Better Than The Establishment, And Conduct That In The Best Manner, Than To Make Asally Against Evil By Some Single Improvement, Without Supporting It By A Total Regeneration.

By Degrees We May Come To Know The Primitive Sense Of The Permanent Objects Of Nature, So That The World Shall Be To Us An Open Book, And Every Form Significant Of Its Hidden Life And Final Cause.

All Reform Aims, In Some One Particular, To Let The Soul Have Its Way Through Us; In Other Words, To Engage Us To Obey.

All Stealing Is Comparative. If You Come To Absolutes, Pray Who Does Not Steal.

People Only See What They Are Prepared To See.

Echo Waits With Art And Care And Will The Faults Of Song Repair.

There Are Men Whose Manners Have The Same Essential Splendor As The Simple And Awful Sculpture On The Friezes Of The Parthenon, And The Remains Of The Earliest Greek Art.

People Destined To Meet Will Do So, Apparently By Chance, At Precisely The Right Moment.

In Our Mechanics' Fair, There Must Be Not Only Bridges, Ploughs, Carpenter's Planes, And Baking Troughs, But Also Some Few Finer Instruments,--rain-gauges, Thermometers, And Telescopes; And In Society, Besides Farmers, Sailors, And Weavers, There Must Be A Few Persons Of Purer Fire Kept Specially As Gauges And Meters Of Character; Persons Of A Fine, Detecting Instinct, Who Note The Smallest Accumulations Of Wit And Feeling In The Bystander.

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

I Confess Myself Utterly At A Loss In Suggesting Particular Reforms In Our Ways Of Teaching. No Discretion That Can Be Lodged With A School-committee, With The Overseers Or Visitors Of An Academy, Of A College, Can At All Avail To Reach These Difficulties And Perplexities, But They Solve Themselves When We Leave Institutions And Address Individuals.

A Man Makes Inferiors His Superiors By Heat; Self Control Is The Rule. Anger Is An Uncontrollable Feeling That Betrays What You Are When You Are Not Yourself. Anger Is That Powerful Internal Force That Blows Out The Light Of Reason. Know This To Be The Enemy: It Is Anger, Born Of Desire.

Everything Intercepts Us From Ourselves.

We Live In Succession, In Division, In Parts, In Particles. Meantime Within Man Is The Soul Of The Whole; The Wise Silence; The Universal Beauty, To Which Every Part And Particle Is Equally Related; The Eternal One.

To Speak Truly, Few Adult Persons Can See Nature. Most Persons Do Not See The Sun.

But Genius Looks Forward: The Eyes Of Men Are Set In His Forehead, Not In His Hindhead: Man Hopes: Genius Creates.

Our Relations To Each Other Are Oblique And Casual.

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.

If Thou Fill Thy Brain With Boston And New York, With Fashion And Covetousness, And Wilt Stimulate Thy Jaded Senses With Wine And French Coffee, Thou Shalt Find No Radiance Of Wisdom In The Lonely Waste Of The Pinewoods.

The Beautiful Is Never Plentiful.

Scholarship Is To Be Created Not By Compulsion, But By Awakening A Pure Interest In Knowledge.

To Educate The Wise Man, The State Exists; And With The Appearance Of The Wise Man, The State Expires. The Appearance Of Charactermakes The State Unnecessary. The Wise Man Is The State.

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.

Grow Angry Slowly - There's Plenty Of Time.

The Mind, Once Stretched By A New Idea, Never Returns To Its Original Dimensions.

If Man Has Good Corn, Or Wood, Or Boards, Or Pigs To Sell, Or Can Make Better Chairs Or Knives, Crucibles, Or Church Organs, Than Anybody Else, You Will Find A Broad, Hard-beaten Road To His House, Though It Be In The Woods.

God May Forgive Sins, He Said, But Awkwardness Has No Forgiveness In Heaven Or Earth.

Great Is The Art, Great Be The Manners, Of The Bard. He Shall Not His Brain Encumber With The Coil Of Rhythm And Number; But, Leaving Rule And Pale Forethought, He Shall Aye Climb For His Rhyme. "pass In, Pass In," The Angels Say

Who Are The Farmer's Servants? ... Geology And Chemistry, The Quarry Of The Air, The Water Of The Brook, The Lightning Of The Cloud, The Castings Of The Worm, The Plough Of The Frost.

Excite The Soul, And The Weather And The Town And Your Condition In The World All Disappear; The World Itself Loses Its Solidity, Nothing Remains But The Soul And The Divine Presence In Which It Lives.

The Man For Whom The Law Exists - The Man Of Forms, The Conservative - Is A Tame Man.

Nature Never Wears A Mean Appearance. Neither Does The Wisest Man Extort Her Secret, And Lose His Curiosity By Finding Out All Her Perfection.

Nature Is Methodical, And Doeth Her Work Well. Time Is Never To Be Hurried.

When A Natural King Becomes A Titular King, Every Body Is Pleased And Satisfied.

Nature Always Wears The Colors Of The Spirit.

God Is Unity, But Always Works In Variety.

Everything In Nature Contains All The Powers Of Nature. Everything Is Made Of One Hidden Stuff.

People Only See What They Are Prepared To See. If You Look For What Is Good And What You Can Be Grateful For You Will Find It Everywhere.

The Sciences, Even The Best,-mathematics And Astronomy,-are Like Sportsmen, Who Seize Whatever Prey Offers, Even Without Being Able To Make Any Use Of It.

It Is Bad Enough That Our Geniuses Cannot Do Anything Useful, But It Is Worse That No Man Is Fit For Society Who Has Fine Traits.he Is Admired At A Distance, But He Cannot Come Near Without Appearing A Cripple.

A Great Man Is Always Willing To Be Little.

Enthusiasm Is One Of The Most Powerful Engines Of Success. When You Do A Thing, Do It With All Your Might.

Enthusiasm For Life

Make Yourself Necessary To Somebody.

Self Improvement

Friendship Love

Do What You're Afraid To Do.

Good Manners Are Made Up Of Petty Sacrifices.

Society Is Frivolous, And Shreds Its Day Into Scraps, Its Conversation Into Ceremonies And Escapes.

The Philosophy Of Waiting Is Sustained By All The Oracles Of The Universe.

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.

No Man Has Ever Had A Point Of Pride That Was Not Injurious To Him.

Life Is A Perpetual Instruction In Cause And Effect.

Life Is Too Short To Waste . . . 'twill Soon Be Dark; Up! Mind Thine Own Aim, And God Speed The Mark!

The Poise Of A Plant, The Bended Tree Recovering Itself From The Strong Wind, The Vital Resources Of Every Vegetable And Animal, Are Also Demonstrations Of The Self-sufficing, And Therefore Self-relying Soul. All History From Its Highest To Its Trivial Passages Is The Various Record Of This Power.

Don't Make A Novel To Establish A Principle Of Political Economy. You Will Spoil Both.

If With Love Thy Heart Has Burned; If Thy Love Is Unreturned; Hide Thy Grief Within Thy Breast, Though It Tear Thee Unexpressed; For When Love Has Once Departed From The Eyes Of The False-hearted, And One By One Has Torn Off Quite The Bandages Of Purple Light; Though Thou Wert The Loveliest Form The Soul Had Ever Dressed, Thou Shalt Seem, In Each Reply, A Vixen To His Altered Eye; Thy Softest Pleadings Seem Too Bold, Thy Praying Lute Will Seem To Scold; Though Thou Kept The Straightest Road, Yet Thou Errest Far And Broad.

Neither Is A Dictionary A Bad Book To Read. There Is No Can't In It, No Excess Of Explanation, And It Is Full Of Suggestion, The Raw Material Of Possible Poems And Histories.

Our Fear Of Death Is Like Our Fear That Summer Will Be Short, But When We Have Had Our Swing Of Pleasure, Our Fill Of Fruit, And Our Swelter Of Heat, We Say We Have Had Our Day.

Society Everywhere Is In Conspiracy Against The Manhood Of Every One Of Its Members. The Virtue In Most Request Is Conformity. Self-reliance Is Its Aversion. It Loves Not Realities And Creators, But Names And Customs.

I Know Of No Such Unquestionable Badge And Ensign Of A Sovereign Mind As That Of Tenacity Of Purpose.

Half A Man's Wisdom Goes With His Courage.

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

We Are Symbols, And Inhabit Symbols.

Let A Man Behave In His Own House As A Guest.

Nature Does Not Cocker Us: We Are Children, Not Pets: She Is Not Fond: Everything Is Dealt To Us Without Fear Or Favor, After Severe Universal Laws.

There Is Always Room For A Man Of Force And He Makes Room For Many. Society Is A Troop Of Thinkers And The Best Heads Among Them Take The Best Places.

Good Judgment Comes From Experience, And A Lot Of That Comes From Bad Judgment. The One Thing In The World, Of Value, Is The Active Soul.

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

For All Men Live By Truth, And Stand In Need Of Expression. In Love, In Art, In Avarice, In Politics, In Labor, In Games, We Study To Utter Our Painful Secret. The Man Is Only Half Himself, The Other Half Is His Expression.

We Cannot Describe The Natural History Of The Soul, But We Know That It Is Divine. All Things Are Known To The Soul. It Is Not To Be Surprised By Any Communication. Nothing Can Be Greater Than It, Let Those Fear And Those Fawn Who Will. The Soul Is In Her Native Realm; And It Is Wider Than Space, Older Than Time, Wide As Hope, Rich As Love. Pusillanimity And Fear She Refuses With A Beautiful Scorn; They Are Not For Her Who Putteth On Her Coronation Robes, And Goes Out Through Universal Love To Universal Power.

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

There Are Many Faculties In Man, Each Of Which Takes Its Turn Of Activity, And That Faculty Which Is Paramount In Any Period And Exerts Itself Through The Strongest Nation, Determines The Civility Of That Age: And Each Age Thinks Its Own The Perfection Of Reason.

All Things Are Moral. That Soul, Which Within Us Is A Sentiment, Outside Of Us Is A Law. We Feel Its Inspiration; Out There In History We Can See Its Fatal Strength.

It Is An Esoteric Doctrine Of Society, That A Little Wickedness Is Good To Make Muscle; As If Conscience Were Not Good For Hands And Legs.

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.

Skepticism? Yes, But A Saint Is A Skeptic Once In Twenty-four Hours.

He Cumbers Himself Never About Consequences, About Interests; He Gives An Independent, Genuine Verdict. You Must Court Him: He Does Not Court You. But The Man Is, As It Were, Clapped Into Jail By His Consciousness.

Necessity Does Everything Well.

It Is Wonderful How Soon A Piano Gets Into A Log-hut On The Frontier. You Would Think They Found It Under A Pine-stump. With It Comes A Latin Grammar, And One Of Those Tow-head Boys Has Written A Hymn On Sunday. Now Let Colleges, Now Let Senates Take Heed! For Here Is One Who, Opening These Fine Tastes On The Basis Of The Pioneer's Iron Constitution, Will Gather All Their Laurels In His Strong Hands.

Every Ship That Comes To America Got Its Chart From Columbus.

Painting Was Called Silent Poetry And Poetry Speaking Painting.

Let Us Take Our Bloated Nothingness Out Of The Path Of The Divine Circuits.

Great Men Are They Who See That Spiritual Is Stronger Than Any Material Force - That Thoughts Rule The World.

In The Right Hands, Literature Is Not Resorted To As A Consolation, And By The Broken And Decayed, But As A Decalogue.

Make Yourself Necessary To The World, And Mankind Will Give You Bread.

The Highest Virtue Is Always Against The Law.

Life Is Wasted In The Necessary Preparation Of Finding What Is The True Way, And We Die Just As We Enter It.

Any Work Looks Wonderful To Me Except The One Which I Can Do.

Peace Cannot Be Achieved Through Violence, It Can Only Be Attained Through Understanding.

Tis The Good Reader That Makes The Good Book; In Every Book He Finds Passages Which Seem Confidences Or Asides Hidden From All Else And Unmistakenly Meant For His Ear; The Profit Of Books Is According To The Sensibility Of The Reader; The Profoundest Thought Or Passion Sleeps As In A Mine, Until It Is Discovered By An Equal Mind And Heart.

The Wise Know That Foolish Legislation Is A Rope Of Sand, Which Perishes In The Twisting.

The First And Last Lesson Of Religion Is, "the Things That Are Seen, Are Temporal; The Things That Are Unseen, Are Eternal." It Puts An Affront Upon Nature.

To The Men Of This World, To The Animal Strength And Spirits, To The Men Of Practical Power, Whilst Immersed In It, The Man Of Ideas Appears Out Of His Reason. They Alone Gave Reason.

Again, The Great Number Of Cultivated Men Keep Each Other Up To A High Standard. The Habit Of Meeting Well-read And Knowing Men Teaches The Art Of Omission And Selection.

Universities Are Of Course Hostile To Geniuses, Which, Seeing And Using Ways Of Their Own, Discredit The Routine: As Churches And Monasteries Persecute Youthful Saints.

The Gift, To Be True, Must Be The Flowing Of The Giver Unto Me, Correspondent To My Flowing Unto Him.

The Astronomers Said, 'give Us Matter And A Little Motion And We Will Construct The Universe. It Is Not Enough That We Should Have Matter, We Must Also Have A Single Impulse, One Shove To Launch The Mass And Generate The Harmony Of The Centrifugal And Centripetal Forces.' ... There Is No End To The Consequences Of The Act. That Famous Aboriginal Push Propagates Itself Through All The Balls Of The System, And Through Every Atom Of Every Ball.

The Great Majority Of Men Are Bundles Of Beginnings

A Beautiful Woman Is A Practical Poet, Taming Her Savage Mate, Planting Tenderness, Hope And Eloquence In All Whom She Approaches.

The Oversoul Is Before Time, And Time, Father Of All Else, Is One Of His Children.

In Imitation Is A Bit Suicide.

Let Not A Man Guard His Dignity, But Let His Dignity Guard Him.

A Man Cannot Utter Two Or Three Sentences Without Disclosing To Intelligent Ears Precisely Where He Stands In Life And Thought, Whether In The Kingdom Of The Senses And The Understanding, Or In That Of Ideas And Imagination, Or In The Realm Of Intuitions And Duty.

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.

I Could Better Eat With One Who Did Not Respect The Truth Or The Laws, Than With A Sloven And Unpresentable Person. Moral Qualities Rule The World, But At Shorter Distances, The Senses Are Despotic.

Science Is Organized Knowledge. Wisdom Is Organized Life. Football Is Four 15-minute Quarters. Plus Timeouts And Commercials.

A Scholar Is A Candle Which The Love And Desire Of All Men Will Light.

'tis A Superstition To Insist On A Special Diet. All Is Made At Last Of The Same Chemical Atoms.

His Heart Was As Great As The World, But There Was No Room In It To Hold The Memory Of A Wrong.

The Last Change In Our Point Of View Gives The Whole World A Pictorial Air.

The Soul Is The Perceiver And The Revealer Of Truth.

The Merit Claimed For The Anglican Church Is That, If You Let It Alone, It Will Let You Alone.

There Is No Den In The Wide World To Hide A Rogue. Commit A Crime, And The Earth Is Made Of Glass. Commit A Crime, And It Seems As If A Coat Of Snow Fell On The Ground, Such As Reveals In The Woods The Track Of Every Partridge And Fox And Squirrel And Mole.

The Affirmative Of Affirmatives... Is Love.

The Way To Learn German, Is, To Read The Same Dozen Pages Over And Over A Hundred Times, Till You Know Every Word And Particle In Them, And Can Pronounce And Repeat Them By Heart.

When Its Errands Are Noble And Adequate, A Steamboat Bridging The Atlantic Between Old And New England, And Arriving At Its Ports With The Punctuality Of A Planet, Is A Step Of Man Into Harmony With Nature.

The Richest Of All Lords Is Use, And Ruddy Health The Loftiest Muse. Live In The Sunshine, Swim The Sea, Drink The Wild Air's Salubrity.

Every Man Is Actually Weak, And Apparently Strong. To Himself, He Seems Weak; To Others, Formidable.

In Dreams We Are True Poets; We Create The Persons Of The Drama; We Give Them Appropriate Figures Faces, Costumes; They Are Perfect In Their Organs, Attitudes, Manners; Moreover They Speak After Their Own Characters, Not Ours; And We Listen With Surprise To What They Say.

The World Is Emblematic. Parts Of Speech Are Metaphors, Because The Whole Of Nature Is A Metaphor Of The Human Mind.

Science Surpasses The Old Miracles Of Mythology.

Trust Your Instinct To The End, Though You Can Render No Reason.

Now That Is The Wisdom Of A Man, In Every Instance Of His Labor, To Hitch His Wagon To A Star, And See His Chore Done By The Gods Themselves. That Is The Way We Are Strong, By Borrowing The Might Of The Elements. The Forces Of Steam, Gravity, Galvanism, Light, Magnets, Wind, Fire, Serve Us Day By Day And Cost Us Nothing.

No Man Has A Right Perception Of Any Truth, Who Has Not Been Reacted On By It, So As To Be Ready To Be Its Martyr.

If A Man Carefully Examine His Thoughts He Will Be Surprised To Find How Much He Lives In The Future. His Well-being Is Always Ahead. Such A Creature Is Probably Immortal.

Meek Young Men Grow Up In Libraries, Believing It Their Duty To Accept The Views Which Cicero, Which Locke, Which Bacon, Have Given, Forgetful That Cicero, Locke, And Bacon Were Only Young Men In Libraries, When They Wrote These Books.

There Is A Certain Satisfaction In Coming Down To The Lowest Ground Of Politics, For We Get Rid Of Cant And Hypocrisy.

The Beautiful Laws Of Time And Space, Once Dislocated By Our Inaptitude, Are Holes And Dens. If The Hive Be Disturbed By Rash And Stupid Hands, Instead Of Honey, It Will Yield Us Bees.

The Nobler The Truth Or Sentiment, The Less Imports The Question Of Authorship.

In Art, The Hand Can Never Execute Anything Higher Than The Heart Can Imagine.

I Cannot Remember The Books I've Read Any More Than The Meals I Have Eaten; Even So, They Have Made Me.

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. Your Genuine Action Will Explain Itself, And Will Explain Your Other Genuine Actions. Your Conformity Explains Nothing. Act Singly, And What You Have Already Done Singly Will Justify You Now. Greatness Appeals To The Future.

These Are The Voices Which We Hear In Solitude, But They Grow Faint And Inaudible As We Enter Into The World.

The Intellect Searches Out The Absolute Order Of Things As They Stand In The Mind Of God, And Without The Colors Of Affection. The Intellectual And The Active Powers Seem To Succeed Each Other, And The Exclusive Activity Of The One Generates The Exclusive Activity Of The Other. There Is Something Unfriendly In Each To The Other, But They Are Like The Alternate Periods Of Feeding And Working In Animals; Each Prepares And Will Be Followed By The Other.

Bonaparte Knew But One Merit, And Rewarded In One And The Same Way The Good Soldier, The Good Astronomer, The Good Poet, The Good Player.

The Greatest Genius Is The Most Indebted Person.

The Aspect Of Nature Is Devout. Like The Figure Of Jesus, She Stands With Bended Head, And Hands Folded Upon The Breast. The Happiest Man Is He Who Learns From Nature The Lesson Of Worship.

Every Man's Task [his 'great Dream' And Impassioned Life-goal] Is His Life Preserver.

He Presents Me With What Is Always An Acceptable Gift Who Brings Me News Of A Great Thought Before Unknown. He Enriches Me Without Impoverishing Himself.

Concentration Is The Secret Of Strength In Politics, In War, In Trade, In Short In All Management Of Human Affairs.

Focus And Concentration

I Would Put Myself In The Attitude To Look In The Eye An Abstract Truth, And I Cannot. I Blench And Withdraw On This Side And On That. I Seem To Know What He Meant Who Said, No Man Can See God Face To Face And Live.

...as There Is No Screen Or Ceiling Between Our Heads And The Infinite Heavens, So Is There No Bar Or Wall In The Soul Where Man, The Effect, Ceases, And God, The Cause, Begins. The Walls Are Taken Away. We Lie Open On One Side To The Deeps Of Spiritual Nature, To The Attributes Of God. Justice We See And Know, Love, Freedom, Power. These Natures No Man Ever Got Above, But They Tower Over Us, And Most In The Moment When Our Interests Tempt Us To Wound Them.

Use Makes A Better Soldier Than The Most Urgent Considerations Of Duty,--familiarity With Danger Enabling Him To Estimate The Danger. He Sees How Much Is The Risk, And Is Not Afflicted With Imagination; Knows Practically Marshal Saxe's Rule, That Every Soldier Killed Costs The Enemy His Weight In Lead.

For It Is Only The Finite That Has Wrought And Suffered; The Infinite Lies Stretched In Smiling Repose.

And What Avails It That Science Has Come To Treat Space And Time As Simply Forms Of Thought, And The Material World As Hypothetical, And Withal Our Pretension Of Property And Even Of Self-hood Are Fading With The Rest, If, At Last, Even Our Thoughts Are Not Finalities, But The Incessant Flowing And Ascension Reach These Also, And Each Thought Which Yesterday Was A Finality, To-day Is Yielding To A Larger Generalization?

There Is, In All Great Poets, A Wisdom Of Humanity Which Is Superior To Any Talents They Exercise.

Talent Alone Cannot Make A Writer. There Must Be A Man Behind The Book; A Personality Which, By Birth And Quality, Is Pledged To The Doctrines There Set Forth, And Which Exists To See And State Things So, And Not Otherwise.

Genius Detects Through The Fly, Through The Caterpillar, Through The Grub, Through The Egg, The Constant Individual; Through Countless Individuals The Fixed Species; Through Many Species The Genus; Through All Genera The Steadfast Type; Through All The Kingdoms Of Organized Life The Eternal Unity. Nature Is A Mutable Cloud Which Is Always And Never The Same.

A Man Finds Room In The Few Square Inches Of The Face For The Traits Of All His Ancestors; For The Expression Of All His History, And His Wants.

He Who Is Not Everyday Conquering Some Fear Has Not Learned The Secret Of Life.

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Steven Curtis Chapman

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