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It Is The Property Of The Religious Spirit To Be The Most Refining Of All Influences. No External Advantages, No Culture Of The Tastes, No Habit Of Command, No Association With The Elegant, Or Even Depth Of Affection, Can Bestow That Delicacy And That Grandeur Of Bearing Which Belong Only To The Mind Accustomed To Celestial Conversation,--all Else Is But Gilt And Cosmetics, Beside This, As Expressed In Every Look And Gesture.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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It Is The Property

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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It Is The Property Of The Religious Spirit To Be The Most Refining Of All Influences. No External Advantages, No Culture Of The Tastes, No Habit Of Command, No Association With The Elegant, Or Even Depth Of Affection, Can Bestow That Delicacy And That Grandeur Of Bearing Which Belong Only To The Mind Accustomed To Celestial Conversation,--all Else Is But Gilt And Cosmetics, Beside This, As Expressed In Every Look And Gesture.

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Emancipation Is The Demand Of Civilization. That Is A Principle; Everything Else Is An Intrigue.

Heaven Often Protects Valuable Souls Charged With Great Secrets, Great Ideas, By Long Shutting Them Up With Their Own Thoughts.

Silent Rushes The Swift Lord Through Ruined Systems Still Restored, Broadsowing, Bleak And Void To Bless, Plants With Worlds The Wilderness; Waters With Tears Of Ancient Sorrow Apples Of Eden Ripe To-morrow. House And Tenant Go To Ground, Lost In God, In Godhead Found.

The Brevity Of Human Life Gives A Melancholy To The Profession Of The Architect.

The Public Values The Invention More Than The Inventor Does. The Inventor Knows There Is Much More And Better Where This Came From.

Men Have Looked Away From Themselves And At Things So Long That They Have Come To Esteem The Religious, Learned And Civil Institutions As Guards Of Property, And They Deprecate Assaults On These, Because They Feel Them To Be Assaults On Property. They Measure Their Esteem Of Each Other By What Each Has, And Not By What Each Is.

He Takes Men Out Of Time And Makes Them Feel Eternity.

Cannot We Let [children] Be Themselves, And Enjoy Life In Their Own Way? You Are Trying To Make Another You. One's Enough.

Life Is A Series Of Surprises.

The Youth, Intoxicated With His Admiration Of A Hero, Fails To See, That It Is Only A Projection Of His Own Soul, Which He Admires.

Society Is An Illusion To The Young Citizen. It Lies Before Him In Rigid Repose, With Certain Names, Men, And Institutions, Rootedlike Oak-trees To The Centre, Round Which All Arrange Themselves The Best They Can. But The Old Statesman Knows That Society Is Fluid; There Are No Such Roots And Centres; But Any Particle May Suddenly Become The Centre Of The Movement, And Compel The System To Gyrate Round It, As Every Man Of Strong Will, Like Pisistratus, Or Cromwell, Does For A Time, And Every Man Of Truth, Like Plato, Or Paul, Does Forever.

From Within Or From Behind, A Light Shines Through Us Upon Things, And Makes Us Aware That We Are Nothing, But The Light Is All.

The Populace Drags Down The Gods To Their Own Level.

The Interminable Forests Should Become Graceful Parks, For Use And Delight.

No One Can Cheat You Out Of Ultimate Success But Yourself.

Life Wastes Itself Whilst We Are Preparing To Live.

A Child Convinced Against His Will Is Of The Same Opinion Still. The Reward For A Thing Well Done, Is To Have Done It.

Every Reform Was Once A Private Opinion, And When It Shall Be A Private Opinion Again, It Will Solve The Problem Of The Age.

How Much More The Seeker Of Abstract Truth, Who Needs Periods Of Isolation, And Rapt Concentration, And Almost A Going Out Of Thebody To Think!

Drudgery, Calamity, Exasperation, Want, Are Instructors In Eloquence And Wisdom.

The World When Seen Through A Little Child's Eyes, Greatly Resembles Paradise. Happiness Is Doing With A Smile What You Have To Do Anyway. This Time, Like All Time, Is A Very Good One If We But Know What To Do With It.

I Think I Have Done Well, If I Have Acquired A New Word From A Good Author; And My Business With Him Is To Find My Own, Though Itwere Only To Melt Him Down Into An Epithet Or An Image For Daily Use.

We Hear Eagerly Every Thought And Word Quoted From An Intellectual Man. But In His Presence Our Own Mind Is Roused To Activity, And We Forget Very Fast What He Says.

The Good Husband Finds Method As Efficient In The Packing Of Fire-wood In A Shed, Or In The Harvesting Of Fruits In The Cellar, As In Peninsular Campaigns Or The Files Of The Department Of State.

The Virtue Of Art Lies In Detachment, In Sequestering One Object From The Embarrassing Variety. Until One Thing Comes Out From Theconnection Of Things, There Can Be Enjoyment, Contemplation, But No Thought.

The True Preacher Can Be Known By This, That He Deals Out To The People His Life,--life Passed Through The Fire Of Thought.

Tomorrow Is A New Day. You Shall Begin It Well And Serenely

There Are No Days In Life So Memorable As Those Which Vibrate To Some Stroke Of The Imagination.

We Are The Children Of Many Sires, And Every Drop Of Blood In Us In Its Turn Betrays Its Ancestor.

We Are Of Different Opinions At Different Hours, But We Always May Be Said To Be At Heart On The Side Of Truth.

Different Opinions

What The Tender And Poetic Youth Dreams To-day, And Conjures Up With Inarticulate Speech, Is To-morrow The Vociferated Result Of Public Opinion, And The Day After Is The Character Of Nations.

There Are Some Men Above Grief And Some Men Below It.

Good Thoughts Are No Better Than Good Dreams If You Don't Follow Through.

There Is Nothing In History To Parallel The Influence Of Jesus Christ.

I Learn Immediately From Any Speaker How Much He Has Already Lived, Through The Poverty Or The Splendor Of His Speech. Life Lies Behind Us As The Quarry From Whence We Get Tiles And Copestones For The Masonry Of Today. This Is The Way To Learn Grammar. Colleges And Books Only Copy The Language Which The Field And The Work-yard Made.

Give No Bounties: Make Equal Laws: Secure Life And Prosperity And You Need Not Give Alms.

The Condition Which High Friendship Demands Is Ability To Do Without It.

The Etymologist Finds The Deadest Word To Have Been Once A Brilliant Picture.

What Is The Hardest Task In The World? To Think.

But Only That Soul Can Be My Friend Which I Encounter On The Line Of My Own March, That Soul To Which I Do Not Decline, And Which Does Not Decline Me, But, Native Of The Same Celestial Latitude, Repeats In Its Own All My Experience.

The Goof Man, In Dealing With His People, Taxes Them With Luxury.

There Is A Crack In Everything God Has Made

Solitude, The Safeguard Of Mediocrity, Is To Genius, The Stern Friend, The Cold, Obscure Shelter Where Moult The Wings Which Will Bear It Farther Than Suns And Stars.

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

Perception Is A Mirror Not A Fact. And What I Look On Is My State Of Mind, Reflected Outward.

Thefts Never Enrich; Alms Never Impoverish; Murder Will Speak Out Of Stone Walls. The Least Admixture Of A Lie-for Example, The Taint Of Vanity, The Least Attempt To Make A Good Impression, A Favorable Appearance-will Instantly Vitiate The Effect.

For You, O Broker, There Is No Other Principle But Arithmetic. For Me, Commerce Is Of Trivial Import; Love, Faith, Truth Of Character, The Aspiration Of Man, These Are Sacred; Nor Can I Detach One Duty, Like You, From All Other Duties, And Concentrate My Forces Mechanically On The Payment Of Moneys.

Manners Have Been Somewhat Cynically Defined To Be A Contrivance Of Wise Men To Keep Fools At A Distance. Fashion Is Shrewd To Detect Those Who Do Not Belong To Her Train, And Seldom Wastes Her Attentions. Society Is Very Swift In Its Instincts, And If You Do Not Belong To It, Resists And Sneers At You, Or Quietly Drops You.

Nothing Divine Dies. All Good Is Eternally Reproductive. The Beauty Of Nature Re-forms Itself In The Mind, And Not For Barren Contemplation, But For New Creation.

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

To Believe In Luck, If It Were Not A Solecism So To Use The Word Believe, Is Skepticism.

A Woman Should Always Challenge Our Respect, And Never Move Our Compassion.

The Man Of Genius Inspires Us With A Boundless Confidence In Our Own Powers.

Do What You Know And Perception Is Converted Into Character.

The True Thrift Is Always To Spend On The Higher Plane; To Invest And Invest, With Keener Avarice, That He May Spend In Spiritualcreation, And Not In Augmenting Animal Existence. Nor Is The Man Enriched, In Repeating The Old Experiments Of Animal Sensation; Nor Unless Through New Powers And Ascending Pleasures He Knows Himself By The Actual Experience Of Higher Good To Be Already On The Way To The Highest.

The Religion That Is Afraid Of Science Dishonors God And Commits Suicide.

To A Dull Mind All Of Nature Is Leaden. To The Illumined Mind The Whole World Burns And Sparkles With Light.

An English Family Consists Of A Few Persons, Who, From Youth To Age, Are Found Revolving Within A Few Feet Of Each Other, As If Tied By Some Invisible Ligature, Tense As That Cartilage Which We Have Seen Attaching The Two Siamese.

Foolish, Whenever You Take The Meanness And Formality Of That Thing You Do, Instead Of Converting It Into The Obedient Spiracle Ofyour Character And Aims.

An Empire Is An Immense Egotism.

The Music That Can Deepest Reach And Cure All Ill Is Cordial Speech.

The Connection Between Our Knowledge And The Abyss Of Being Is Still Real, And The Explication Must Be Not Less Magnificent.

We Do What We Must, And Call It By The Best Names We Can, And Would Fain Have The Praise Of Having Intended The Result Which Ensues.

When I Have Attempted To Join Myself To Others By Services, It Proved An Intellectual Trick,-no More. They Eat Your Service Like Apples, And Leave You Out. But Love Them, And They Feel You, And Delight In You All The Time.

A Determined Man, By His Very Attitude And The Tone Of His Voice, Puts A Stop To Defeat, And Begins To Conquer.

Instead Of Making Christianity A Vehicle Of Truth, You Make Truth Only A Horse For Christianity.

It Is The Fine Souls Who Serve Us, And Not What Is Called Fine Society. Fine Society Is Only A Self-protection Against The Vulgarities Of The Street And The Tavern.

The Finest Poetry Was First Experience.

If You Would Lift Me Up, You've Got To Be On Higher Ground.

The Poisons Are Our Principal Medicines, Which Kill The Disease And Save The Life.

The Victories Of Character Are Instant, And Victories For All.

It Is A Tie Between Men To Have Read The Same Book.

If You Put A Chain Around The Neck Of A Slave, The Other End Fastens Itself Around Your Own.

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.

To Fill The Hour──that Is Happiness.

Time Management

The Squirrel Hoards Nuts And The Bee Gathers Honey, Without Knowing What They Do, And They Are Thus Provided For Without Selfishness Or Disgrace.

What We Love That We Have, But By Desire We Bereave Ourselves Of The Love.

There Is Always A Best Way Of Doing Everything, If It Be To Boil An Egg. Manners Are The Happy Ways Of Doing Things.

Numbers Serve To Discipline Rhetoric. Without Them It Is Too Easy To Follow Flights Of Fancy, To Ignore The World As It Is And To Remold It Nearer The Heart's Desire.

I Hate The Giving Of The Hand Unless The Whole Man Accompanies It.

We Lie In The Lap Of Immense Intelligence.

Jesus Christ Belonged To The True Race Of The Prophets. He Saw With An Open Eye The Mystery Of The Soul. . Alone In All History He Estimated The Greatness Of Man.

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.

Every Genuine Work Of Art Has As Much Reason For Being As The Earth And The Sun.

In Youth, We Clothe Ourselves With Rainbows, With Hope & Love, & Go As Brave As The Zodiack. In Age We Put Out Another Sort Of Perspiration; Gout, Fever, Rheumatism, Caprice, Doubt, Fretting, And Avarice.

The Problem Of Restoring To The World Original And Eternal Beauty Is Solved By Redemption Of The Soul.

Do What You Fear And Your Fear Will Die.

Commonsense Is The Wick Of The Candle.

The Wise And Just Man Will Always Feel That He Stands On His Own Feet; That He Imparts Strength To The State, Not Receives Security From It; And If All Went Down, He And Such As He Would Quite Easily Combine In A New And Better Constitution.

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

I Ought To Go Upright And Vital, And Speak The Rude Truth In All Ways.

It Is Sublime To Think And Say Of Another, I Need Never Meet, Or Speak, Or Write To Him: We Need Not Reinforce Ourselves, Or Send Tokens Of Remembrance; I Rely On Him As On Myself: If He Did Thus And Thus, I Know It Was Right.

The Blazing Evidence Of Immortality Is Our Dissatisfaction With Any Other Solution.

I Read The Other Day Some Verses Written By An Eminent Painter Which Were Original And Not Conventional.

Don't Hang A Dismal Picture On The Wall, And Do Not Daub With Sables And Glooms In Your Conversation. Don't Be A Cynic And Disconsolate Preacher. Don't Bewail And Bemoan. Omit The Negative Propositions. Nerve Us With Incessant Affirmatives. Don't Waste Yourself In Rejection, Nor Bark Against The Bad, But Chant The Beauty Of The Good. When That Is Spoken Which Has A Right To Be Spoken, The Chatter And The Criticism Will Stop. Set Down Nothing That Will Not Help Somebody.

It Is Contended That Those Who Have Been Bred At Eton, Harrow, Rugby, And Westminster, That The Public Sentiment Within Each Of Those Schools Is High-toned And Manly; That, In Their Playgrounds, Courage Is Universally Admired, Meanness Despised, Manly Feelings And Generous Conduct Are Encouraged: That An Unwritten Code Of Honor Deals To The Spoiled Child Of Rank, And To The Child Of Upstart Wealth An Even-handed Justice, Purges Their Nonsense Out Of Both, And Does All That Can Be Done To Make Them Gentlemen.

There Is Guidance For Each Of Us, And By Lowly Listening We Shall Hear The Right Word.

What We Call Results Are Beginnings.

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.

In Every Society Some Men Are Born To Rule, And Some To Advise.

I Feel The Same Truth How Often In My Trivial Conversation With My Neighbours, That Somewhat Higher In Each Of Us Overlooks This By-play, And Jove Nods To Jove From Behind Each Of Us.

A Mind Does Not Receive Truth As A Chest Receives Jewels That Are Put Into It, But As The Stomach Takes Up Food Into The System. It Is No Longer Food, But Flesh, And Is Assimilated. The Appetite And The Power Of Digestion Measure Our Right To Knowledge. He Has It Who Can Use It. As Soon As Our Accumulation Overruns Our Invention Or Power To Use, The Evils Of Intellectual Gluttony Begin,— Congestion Of The Brain, Apoplexy And Strangulation.

All Things Are Moral; And In Their Boundless Changes Have An Unceasing Reference To Spiritual Nature.

The Moment We Indulge Our Affections, The Earth Is Metamorphosed, There Is No Winter And No Night; All Tragedies, All Ennui S, Vanish, All Duties Even.

Half A Man's Wisdom Goes With His Courage.

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

The Only Compensation Which War Offers For Its Manifold Mischiefs, Is In The Great Personal Qualities To Which It Gives Scope And Occasion.

Personal Qualities

Nothing Can Be More Delicate Without Being Fantastical, Nothing More Firm And Based In Nature And Sentiment, Than The Courtship And Mutual Carriage Of The Sexes.

Though Love Repine, And Reason Chafe, There Came A Voice Without Reply,- "'tis Man's Perdition To Be Safe, When For The Truth He Ought To Die."

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.

The Great Poet Makes Us Feel Our Own Wealth, And Then We Think Less Of His Compositions. His Best Communication To Our Mind Is To Teach Us To Despise All He Has Done.

The Civility Of No Race Can Be Perfect Whilst Another Race Is Degraded. It Is A Doctrine Alike Of The Oldest And Of The Newest Philosophy, That Man Is One, And That You Cannot Injure Any Member, Without A Sympathetic Injury To All The Members

Beauty Is The Virtue Of The Body As Virtue Is The Beauty Of The Soul

There Is One Other Reason For Dressing Well, Namely That Dogs Respect It, And Will Not Attack You In Good Clothes.

It Has Come To Be Practically A Sort Of Rule In Literature That A Man, Having Once Shown Himself Capable Of Original Writing, Is Entitled Thenceforth To Steal From The Writings Of Others At Discretion.

Europe Has Always Owed To Oriental Genius Its Divine Impulses. What These Holy Bards Said, All Sane Men Found Agreeable And True.

The Orator Is Thereby An Orator That Keeps His Feet Ever On A Fact.

If In The Least Particular, One Could Derange The Order Of Nature, Who Would Accept The Gift Of Life?

There Are Three Wants Which Never Can Be Satisfied: That Of The Rich, Who Wants Something More; That Of The Sick, Who Wants Something Different; And That Of The Traveler, Who Says Anywhere But Here.

...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.

If You Meet A Sectary, Or A Hostile Partisan, Never Recognize The Dividing Lines; But Meet On What Common Ground Remains,--if Onlythat The Sun Shines, And The Rain Rains For Both; The Area Will Widen Very Fast, And Ere You Know It The Boundary Mountains, On Which The Eye Had Fastened, Have Melted Into Air.

In The Greek Cities, It Was Reckoned Profane, That Any Person Should Pretend A Property In A Work Of Art, Which Belonged To All Who Could Behold It.

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.

Do Not Be Too Timid And Squeamish About Your Actions. All Life Is An Experiment. The More Experiments You Make The Better. What If They Are A Little Coarse And You May Get Your Coat Soiled Or Torn? What If You Do Fail, And Get Fairly Rolled In The Dirt Once Or Twice? Up Again, You Shall Never Be So Afraid Of A Tumble.

Is Not, Indeed, Every Man A Student, And Do Not All Things Exist For The Student's Behoof?

The Sweetest Music Is Not In The Oratorio, But In The Human Voice When It Speaks From Its Instant Life Tones Of Tenderness, Truth, Or Courage.

Thought And Knowledge Are Natures In Which Apparatus And Pretension Avail Nothing. Gowns, And Pecuniary Foundations, Though Of Towns Of Gold, Can Never Countervail The Least Sentence Or Syllable Of Wit. Forget This, And Out American Colleges Will Recede In Their Public Importance Whilst They Grow Richer Every Year.

Wherever A Man Comes, There Comes Revolution. The Old Is For Slaves.

Why Should The Way I Feel Depend On The Thoughts In Someone Else's Head?

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

Freedom Is Not The Right To Live As We Please, But The Right To Find How We Ought To Live In Order To Fulfill Our Potential.

This Day Is All That Is Good And Fair. It Is Too Dear, With Its Hopes And Invitations, To Waste A Moment On The Yesterdays.

The Man (or Woman) Who Can Make Hard Things Easy Is The Educator.

We Are All Inventors, Each Sailing Out On A Voyage Of Discovery, Guided Each By A Private Chart, Of Which There Is No Duplicate. The World Is All Gates, All Opportunities.

A Man Complained That On His Way Home To Dinner He Had Every Day To Pass Through That Long Field Of His Neighbor's. I Advised Him To Buy It, And It Would Never Seem Long Again.

The Moral Equalizes All; Enriches, Empowers All. It Is The Coin Which Buys All, And Which All Find In Their Pocket. Under The Whipof The Driver, The Slave Shall Feel His Equality With Saints And Heroes.

If The East Loves Infinity, The West Delights In Boundaries.

But The Wise Know That Foolish Legislation Is A Rope Of Sand, Which Perishes In The Twisting; That The State Must Follow, And Notlead The Character And Progress Of The Citizen; The Strongest Usurper Is Quickly Got Rid Of; And They Only Who Build On Ideas, Build For Eternity; And That The Form Of Government Which Prevails, Is The Expression Of What Cultivation Exists In The Population Which Permits It.

To Say Then, The Majority Are Wicked, Means No Malice, No Bad Heart In The Observer, But, Simply That The Majority Are Unripe, Andhave Not Yet Come To Themselves, Do Not Yet Know Their Opinion.

There Is A Time In Every Man's Education When He Arrives At The Conviction That Envy Is Ignorance; That Imitation Is Suicide; That He Must Take Himself For Better, For Worse, As His Portion; That Though The Wide Universe Is Full Of Good, No Kernel Of Nourishing Corn Can Come To Him But Through His Toil Bestowed On That Plot Of Ground Which Is Given To Him To Till. The Power Which Resides In Him Is New In Nature, And None But He Knows What That Is Which He Can Do, Nor Does He Know Until He Has Tried.

Everything In Our World, Even A Drop Of Dew, Is A Microcosm Of The Universe.

The End Of The Human Race Will Be That It Will Eventually Die Of Civilization.

Although Knaves Win In Every Political Struggle, Although Society Seems To Be Delivered Over From The Hands Of One Set Of Criminals Into The Hands Of Another Set Of Criminals, As Fast As The Government Is Changed, And The March Of Civilization Is A Train Of Felonies, Yet, General Ends Are Somehow Answered.

Every Stoic Was A Stoic; But In Christendom Where Is The Christian?

Life Is A Search After Power.

Use What Language You Will, You Can Never Say Anything But What You Are.

Manners Are The Happy Ways Of Doing Things; Each Once A Stroke Of Genius Or Of Love, Now Repeated And Hardened Into Usage.

Let None Presume To Measure The Irregularities Of Michael Angelo Or Socrates By Village Scales.

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 World Globes Itself In A Drop Of Dew.

A Strenuous Soul Hates Cheap Success. It Is The Ardor Of The Assailant That Makes The Vigor Of The Defendant.

Society Is A Wave. The Wave Moves Onward, But The Water Of Which It Is Composed Does Not.

Preaching Is The Expression Of Moral Sentiments Applied To The Duties Of Life.

There Are Moods In Which We Court Suffering, In The Hope That Here, At Least, We Shall Find Reality, Sharp Peaks And Edges Of Truth. But It Turns Out To Be Scene-painting And Counterfeit. The Only Thing Grief Has Taught Me Is To Know How Shallow It Is.

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.

One Of Our Statesmen Said, "the Curse Of This Country Is Eloquent Men."

The Hero Sees That The Event Is Ancillary: It Must Follow Him.

The Whole Secret Of The Teacher's Force Lies In The Conviction That Men Are Convertible.

Consider What You Have In The Smallest Well-chosen Library-a Company Of The Wisest And Wittiest Men Which Can Be Plucked Out Of All Civilized Countries In A Thousand Years. The Men Themselves Were Then Hidden And Inaccessible. They Were Solitary, Impatient Of Interruption, And Fenced By Etiquette. But Now They Are Immortal, And The Thought They Did Not Reveal, Even To Their Bosom Friends, Is Here Written Out In Transparent Words Of Light To Us, Who Are Strangers Of Another Age.

Of Nature Itself Upon The Soul; The Sunrise, The Haze Of Autumn, The Winter Starlight Seem Interlocutors; The Prevailing Sense Is That Of An Exposition In Poetry; A High Discourse, The Voice Of The Speaker Seems To Breathe As Much From The Landscape As From His Own Breast; It Is Nature Communing With The Seer.

We Are Shut Up In School And College Recitation Rooms For Ten To Fifteen Years, And Come Out At Last With A Bellyful Of Words And Do Not Know A Thing. We Cannot Use Our Hands, Or Our Legs, Or Our Eyes, Or Our Arms. We Do Not Know An Edible Root In The Woods. We Cannot Tell Our Course By The Stars, Nor The Hour Of Day By The Sun. It Is Well If We Can Swim And Skate. We Are Afraid Of A Horse Or A Cow, Of A Dog, Of A Cat, Of A Spider. Far Better Was The Roman Rule To Teach A Boy Nothing That He Could Not Learn Standing.

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.

Do That Which You Fear To Do, And The Fear Will Die.

We Do Not Want Actions, But Men; Not A Chemical Drop Of Water, But Rain; The Spirit That Sheds And Showers Actions, Countless, Endless Actions.

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

Besides, Our Action On Each Other, Good As Well As Evil, Is So Incidental And At Random, That We Can Seldom Hear The Acknowledgments Of Any Person Who Would Thank Us For A Benefit, Without Some Shame And Humiliation. We Can Rarely Strike A Direct Stroke, But Must Be Content With An Oblique One; We Seldom Have The Satisfaction Of Yielding A Direct Benefit, Which Is Directly Received.

Music Takes Us Out Of The Actual And Whispers To Us Dim Secrets That Startles Out Wonder As To Who We Are, And For What, Whence, And Whereto.

All Goes To Show That The Soul In Man Is Not An Organ, But Animates And Exercises All The Organs; Is Not A Function, Like The Power Of Memory, Of Calculation, Of Comparison, But Uses These As Hands And Feet; Is Not A Faculty, But A Light, Is Not The Intellect Or The Will, But The Master Of The Intellect And The Will; Is The Background Of Our Being, In Which They Lie,--an Immensity Not Possessed And That Cannot Be Possessed.

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.

Great Believers Are Always Reckoned Infidels, Impracticable, Fantastic, Atheistic, And Really Men Of No Account. The Spiritualist Finds Himself Driven To Express His Faith By A Series Of Skepticisms.

What You Do Thunders Above Your Head So Loudly, I Cannot Hear The Words You Speak.

Words You Speak

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

Yourself A Newborn Bard Of The Holy Ghost, Cast Behind You All Conformity, And Acquaint Men At First Hand With Deity.

The Secret Of Poetry Is Never Explained,— Is Always New. We Have Not Got Farther Than Mere Wonder At The Delicacy Of The Touch, And The Eternity It Inherits. In Every House A Child That In Mere Play Utters Oracles, And Knows Not That They Are Such. 't Is As Easy As Breath. 't Is Like This Gravity, Which Holds The Universe Together, And None Knows What It Is.

I Am Ashamed To Think How Easily We Capitulate To Badges And Names, To Large Societies And Dead Institutions.

Style Is Only The Frame To Hold Your Thoughts. It Is Like The Sash Of A Window; If Heavy, It Will Obscure The Light.

My Doom And My Strength Is To Be Solitary.

Man Sheds Grief As His Skin Sheds Rain.

A Man's Growth Is Seen In The Successive Choirs Of His Friends.

Rings And Other Jewels Are Not Gifts, But Apologies For Gifts. The Only Gift Is A Portion Of Thyself.

Passion, Though A Bad Regulator, Is A Powerful Spring. Any Absorbing Passion Has The Effect To Deliver From The Little Coils And Cares Of Every Day: 'tis The Heat Which Sets Our Human Atoms Spinning, Overcomes The Friction Of Crossing Thresholds, And First Addresses In Society, And Gives Us A Good Start And Speed, Easy To Continue, When Once It Is Begun.

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

A Man In The View Of Absolute Goodness, Adores, With Total Humility. Every Step Downward, Is A Step Upward. The Man Who Renounceshimself, Comes To Himself.

The Learned And The Studious Of Thought Have No Monopoly Of Wisdom. Their Violence Of Direction In Some Degree Disqualifies Them To Think Truly.

The Have A Good Friend Is One Of The Greatest Delights Of Life.

Do Your Thing, And I Shall Know You.

The Greatest Difficulty Is That Men Do Not Think Enough Of Themselves, Do Not Consider What It Is That They Are Sacrificing When They Follow In A Herd, Or When They Cater For Their Establishment.

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.

Women See Better Than Men. Men See Lazily, If They Do Not Expect To Act. Women See Quite Without Any Wish To Act.

The Soul Knows Only The Soul; The Web Of Events Is The Flowing Robe In Which She Is Clothed.

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

The Attraction And Superiority Of California Are In Its Days. It Has Better Days & More Of Them, Than Any Other Country.

The Child Realizes To Every Man His Own Earliest Remembrance, And So Supplies A Defect In Our Education, Or Enables Us To Live Over The Unconscious History With A Sympathy So Tender As To Be Almost Personal Experience.

My Hours Are Peaceful Centuries.

There Is A Time When A Man Distinguishes The Idea Of Felicity From The Idea Of Wealth; It Is The Beginning Of Wisdom.

Lose Yourself In Nature And Find Peace

Health, South Wind, Books, Old Trees, A Boat, A Friend.

The Essence Of Friendship Is Entireness, A Total Magnanimity And Trust.

Good Poetry Could Not Have Been Otherwise Written Than It Is. The First Time You Hear It, It Sounds Rather As If Copied Out Of Some Invisible Tablet In The Eternal Mind Than As If Arbitrarily Composed By The Poet.

The Universal Soul Is The Alone Creator Of The Useful And The Beautiful; Therefore To Make Anything Useful Or Beautiful, The Individual Must Be Submitted To The Universal Mind.

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John Taylor Gatto

Arthur Schopenhauer

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