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Men Are Born To Write. The Gardener Saves Every Slip, And Seed, And Peach-stone: His Vocation Is To Be A Planter Of Plants. Not Less Does The Writer Attend His Affair. Whatever He Beholds Or Experiences, Comes To Him As A Model, And Sits For Its Picture. He Counts It All Nonsense That They Say, That Some Things Are Undescribable. He Believes That All That Can Be Thought Can Be Written, First Or Last; And He Would Report The Holy Ghost, Or Attempt It.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Men Are Born To

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Men Are Born To Write. The Gardener Saves Every Slip, And Seed, And Peach-stone: His Vocation Is To Be A Planter Of Plants. Not Less Does The Writer Attend His Affair. Whatever He Beholds Or Experiences, Comes To Him As A Model, And Sits For Its Picture. He Counts It All Nonsense That They Say, That Some Things Are Undescribable. He Believes That All That Can Be Thought Can Be Written, First Or Last; And He Would Report The Holy Ghost, Or Attempt It.

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More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

Character Is An Invincible Force, Which Acts By Presence And Without Means

All History Is Biography.

It Is Only As A Man Puts Off From Himself All External Support, And Stands Alone, That I See Him To Be Strong And To Prevail.

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.

I Please Myself With The Graces Of The Winter Scenery, And Believe That We Are As Much Touched By It As By The Genial Influences Of Summer.

The Maker Of A Sentence Launches Out Into The Infinite.

Creative Writing

When We Can't Piece Together The Puzzle Of Our Own Lives, Remember The Best View Of A Puzzle Is From Above. Let Him Help Put You Together.

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

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

Unhappily, No Man Exists Who Has Not In His Own Person Become, To Some Amount, A Stockholder In The Sin, And So Made Himself Liable To A Share In The Expiation.

A Sleeping Child Gives Me The Impression Of A Traveler In A Very Far Country.

Logic Is The Procession Or Proportionate Unfolding Of The Intuition; But Its Virtue Is As Silent Method; The Moment It Would Appear As Propositions, And Have A Separate Value, It Is Worthless.

Each Man Has An Aptitude Born With Him. Do Your Work.

The Religion Of England Is Part Of Good-breeding. When You See On The Continent The Well-dressed Englishman Come Into His Ambassador's Chapel And Put His Face For Silent Prayer Into His Smooth-brushed Hat, You Cannot Help Feeling How Much National Pride Prays With Him, And The Religion Of A Gentleman.

There Is No Architect Can Build As The Muse Can; She Is Skilful To Select Materials For Her Plan.

Since Everything In Nature Answers To A Moral Power, If Any Phenomenon Remains Brute And Dark, It Is That The Corresponding Faculty In The Observer Is Not Yet Active.

If We Must Accept Fate We Are Not Less Compelled To Affirm Liberty, The Significance Of The Individual, The Grandeur Of Duty, The Power Of Character.

Welcome Back My Friends To The Show That Never Ends. We're So Glad You Could Attend, Come Inside, Come Inside.

We Talk Of Choosing Our Friends, But Friends Are Self-elected.

Four Snakes Gliding Up And Down A Hollow For No Purpose That I Could See - Not To Eat, Not For Love, But Only Gliding.

In My Utter Impotence To Test The Authenticity Of The Report Of My Senses, To Know Whether The Impressions They Make On Me Correspond With Outlying Objects, What Difference Does It Make, Whether Orion Is Up There In Heaven, Or Some God Paints The Image In The Firmament Of The Soul?

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

I Look On Trade And Every Mechanical Craft As Education Also. But Let Me Discriminate What Is Precious Herein. There Is In Each Ofthese Works An Act Of Invention, An Intellectual Step, Or Short Series Of Steps Taken; That Act Or Step Is The Spiritual Act; All The Rest Is Mere Repetition Of The Same A Thousand Times.

Health Is The First Muse, And Sleep Is The Condition To Produce It.

We Do Not Yet Possess Ourselves, And We Know At The Same Time That We Are Much More.

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

Ne Te Quaesiveris Extra." (do Not Seek For Things Outside Of Yourself)

Obedience Alone Gives The Right To Command.

You Must Treat The Days Respectfully, You Must Be A Day Yourself, And Not Interrogate It Like A College Professor.

There Are Geniuses In Trade As Well As In War, Or The State, Or Letters; And The Reason Why This Or That Man Is Fortunate Is Not To Be Told. It Lies In The Man: That Is All Anybody Can Tell You About It.

Painting Seems To Be To The Eye What Dancing Is To The Limbs. When That Has Educated The Frame To Self-possession, To Nimbleness,to Grace, The Steps Of The Dancing-master Are Better Forgotten; So Painting Teaches Me The Splendor Of Color And The Expression Of Form, And As I See Many Pictures And Higher Genius In The Art, I See The Boundless Opulence Of The Pencil, The Indifferency In Which The Artist Stands Free To Choose Out Of The Possible Forms.

Skepticism Is Unbelief In Cause And Effect.

Cause And Effect

Begin And Proceed On A Settled Conviction That But Little Is Permitted To Any Man To Do Or To Know, And If He Complies With The First Grand Laws, He Shall Do Well.

There Is A Blessed Necessity By Which The Interest Of Men Is Always Driving Them To The Right; And, Again, Making All Crime Mean And Ugly.

When The Literary Class Betray A Destitution Of Faith, It Is Not Strange That Society Should Be Disheartened And Sensualized By Unbelief.

There Is A Remedy For Every Wrong And A Satisfaction For Every Soul.

Let Him Be Great, And Love Shall Follow Him.

He Cannot Be Happy And Strong Until He Too Lives With Nature In The Present, Above Time.

A Rush Of Thoughts Is The Only Conceivable Prosperity That Can Come To Us.

The Mind Does Not Create What It Perceives, Any More Than The Eye Creates The Rose.

Live, Let Live, And Help Live

I Have No Hostility To Nature, But A Child's Love To It. I Expand And Live In The Warm Day Like Corn And Melons.

A Nation Never Falls But By Suicide.

It Is Plain That There Is No Separate Essence Called Courage, No Cup Or Cell In The Brain, No Vessel In The Heart Containing Drops Or Atoms That Make Or Give This Virtue; But It Is The Right Or Healthy State Of Every Man, When He Is Free To Do That Which Is Constitutional To Him To Do.

All The Great Speakers Were Bad Speakers At First.

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

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.

If You Want A Friend You Need To Be A Friend.

Love Should Make Joy; But Our Benevolence Is Unhappy. Our Sunday-schools, And Churches, And Pauper-societies Are Yokes To The Neck. We Pain Ourselves To Please Nobody.

A Bullet Had Found Him, His Blood Ran Out As He Cried. No Money Could Save Him, So He Laid Down And Died. Ooh, What A Lucky Man He Was.

The Soul Of God Is Poured Into The World Through The Thoughts Of Men.

If The Whole Of History Is In One Man, It Is All To Be Explained From Individual Experience.

Every Natural Fact Is A Symbol Of Some Spiritual Fact.

The Democrat Is A Young Conservative; The Conservative Is An Old Democrat. The Aristocrat Is The Democrat Ripe, And Gone To Seed,--because Both Parties Stand On The One Ground Of The Supreme Value Of Property, Which One Endeavors To Get, And The Other To Keep.

Government Has Come To Be A Trade, And Is Managed Solely On Commercial Principles. A Man Plunges Into Politics To Make His Fortune, And Only Cares That The World Shall Last His Days.

For It Is Not Metres, But A Metre-making Argument That Makes A Poem.

God Hides Things By Putting Them Near Us.

The Finest Wits Have Their Sediment.

Think Me Not Unkind And Rude That I Walk Alone In Grove And Glen; I Go To The God Of The Wood To Fetch His Word To Men.

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.

But I Go With My Friend To The Shore Of Our Little River, And With One Stroke Of The Paddle, I Leave The Village Politics And Personalities, Yes, And The World Of Villages And Personalities Behind, And Pass Into A Delicate Realm Of Sunset And Moonlight, Too Bright Almost For Spotted Man To Enter Without Novitiate And Probation.

A Great Teacher Makes Hard Things Easy.

Every Rational Creature Has All Nature For His Dowry And Estate. It Is His, If He Will. He May Divest Himself Of It; He May Creepinto A Corner, And Abdicate His Kingdom, As Most Men Do, But He Is Entitled To The World By His Constitution.

Every Vice Is Only An Exaggeration Of A Necessary And Virtuous Function.

Exaggeration Is

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

Literature Is Eavesdropping.

The Moral Sense Is Always Supported By The Permanent Interest Of The Parties. Else, I Know Not How, In Our World, Any Good Would Ever Get Done.

The Foolish Man Wonders At The Unusual, But The Wise Man At The Usual.

Only So Much Of Life Do I Know As I Have Lived.

The Soul Is The Perceiver And The Revealer Of Truth.

Behind Every Individual Closes Organization; Before Him Opens Liberty,--the Better, The Best. The First And Worse Races Are Dead.the Second And Imperfect Races Are Dying Out, Or Remain For The Maturing Of The Higher. In The Latest Race, In Man, Every Generosity, Every New Perception, The Love And Praise He Extorts From His Fellows, Are Certificates Of Advance Out Of Fate Into Freedom.

Great Country, Diminutive Minds. America Is Formless, Has No Terrible And No Beautiful Condensation.

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

All Men Are Poets At Heart. They Serve Nature For Bread, But Her Loveliness Overcomes Them Sometimes.

Let Me Admonish You, First Of All, To Go Alone; To Refuse The Good Models, Even Those Which Are Sacred In The Imagination Of Men, And Dare To Love God Without Mediator Or Veil.

Higher Than The Question Of Our Duration Is The Question Of Our Deserving. Immortality Will Come To Such As Are Fit For It, And He Would Be A Great Soul In Future Must Be A Great Soul Now.

A Man Must Be In Sympathy With Society Around Him, Or Else, Not Wish To Be In Sympathy With It. If Neither Of These Two, He Must Be Wretched.

Out Of Plato Come All Things That Are Still Written And Debated About Among Men Of Thought.

Whenever You Are Sincerely Pleased You Are Nourished.

Nature Never Sends A Great Man Into The Planet, Without Confiding The Secret To Another Soul.

Morality Is The Object Of Government.

It Is With A Good Book As It Is With Good Company.

I Do Not Wish To Please Him; I Wish That He Should Wish To Please Me.

All Science Is Transcendental Or Else Passes Away.

We Live Amid Surfaces, And The True Art Of Life Is To Skate Well On Them

The Sum Of Wisdom Is That Time Is Never Lost That Is Devoted To Work.

Evermore In The World Is This Marvelous Balance Of Beauty And Disgust, Magnificence And Rats.

Men Succeed When They Realize That Their Failures Are The Preparation For Their Victories.

We Live In A New And Exceptional Age. America Is Another Word For Opportunity. Our Whole History Appears Like A Last Effort Of The Divine Providence In Behalf Of The Human Race; And A Literal, Slavish Following Of Precedents, As By A Justice Of The Peace, Is Not For Those Who At This Hour Lead The American Civilization.

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

Nothing Is Arbitrary, Nothing Is Insulated In Beauty. It Depends Forever On The Necessary And The Useful. The Plumage Of The Bird, The Mimic Plumage Of The Insect, Has A Reason For Its Rich Colors In The Constitution Of The Animal. Fitness Is So Inseparable An Accompaniment Of Beauty, That It, Has Been Taken For It.

The Order Of Things Consents To Virtue.

Repose And Cheerfulness Is The Badge Of The Gentleman; Repose In Energy.

Sympathy Is A Supporting Atmosphere, And In It We Unfold Easily And Well.

That Man Is Idle Who Can Do Something Better.

Beside All The Moral Benefit Which We May Expect From The Farmer's Profession, When A Man Enters It Considerately, This Promised The Conquering Of The Soil, Plenty, And Beyond This, The Adorning Of The Country With Every Advantage And Ornament Which Labor, Ingenuity, And Affection For A Man's Home, Could Suggest.

There Is No Event Greater In Life Than The Appearance Of New Persons About Our Hearth, Except It Be The Progress Of The Characterwhich Draws Them.

There Is No Doctrine Of The Reason Which Will Bear To Be Taught By The Understanding.

Nature Paints The Best Part Of A Picture, Carves The Best Parts Of The Statue, Builds The Best Part Of The House, And Speaks The Best Part Of The Oration.

A Man's Wife Has More Power Over Him Than The State Has.

New Arts Destroy The Old.

Must We Always Talk For Victory, And Never Once For Truth, For Comfort, And Joy?

Comfort And Joy

Therefore Is Nature Ever The Ally Of Religion: Lends Her All Her Pomp And Riches To The Religious Sentiment.

Manners Are The Happy Ways Of Doing Things; Each One A Stroke Of Genius Or Of Love, Now Repeated And Hardened Into Usage, They Form At Last A Rich Varnish, With Which The Routine Of Life Is Washed, And Its Details Adorned. If They Are Superficial, So Are The Dew-drops Which Give Such A Depth To The Morning Meadows.

We Must Trust Infinitely To The Beneficent Necessity Which Shines Through All Laws. Human Nature Expresses Itself In Them As Characteristically As In Statues, Or Songs, Or Railroads, And An Abstract Of The Codes Of Nations Would Be An Abstract Of The Common Conscience.

There Is No Better Way To Exercise The Imagination Than The Study Of The Law.

The Ocean Is A Large Drop; A Drop Is A Small Ocean.

We Want Men And Women Who Shall Renovate Life And Our Social State But We See That Most Natures Are Insolvent, Cannot Satisfy Their Own Wants, Have An Ambition Out Of All Proportion To Their Practical Force, And So Do Lean And Beg Day And Night Continually.

We Can Only Obey Our Own Polarity.

The Only Sin Is Limitation. As Soon As You Once Come Up With A Man's Limitations, It Is All Over With Him. Has He Talents? Has Heenterprise? Has He Knowledge? It Boots Not. Infinitely Alluring And Attractive Was He To You Yesterday, A Great Hope, A Sea To Swim In; Now, You Have Found His Shores, Found It A Pond, And You Care Not If You Never See It Again.

The Force Of Character Is Cumulative.

The Imagination And The Senses Cannot Be Gratified At The Same Time.

Every Natural Power Exhilarates; A True Talent Delights The Possessor First.

All Minds Quote. Old And New Make The Warp And Woof Of Every Moment. There Is No Thread That Is Not A Twist Of These Two Strands. By Necessity, By Proclivity, And By Delight, We All Quote. We Quote Not Only Books And Proverbs, But Arts, Sciences, Religion, Customs, And Laws; Nay, We Quote Temples And Houses, Tables And Chairs, By Imitation.

The Desire Of Gold Is Not For Gold. It Is Not The Love Of Much Wheat, And Wool And Household Stuff. It Is The Means Of Freedom And Benefit.

God Screens Us Evermore From Premature Ideas.

The Truth, The Hope, Of Any Time Must Be Sought In The Minorities. Michael Angelo Was The Conscience Of Italy. We Grow Free With His Name, And Find It Ornamental Now, But In His Own Day His Friends Were Few.

Let Me Never Fall Into The Vulgar Mistake Of Dreaming That I Am Persecuted Whenever I Am Contradicted.

O, When I Am Safe In My Sylvan Home, I Mock At The Pride Of Greece And Rome; And When I Am Stretch'd Beneath The Pines When The Evening Star So Holy Shines, I Laugh At The Lore And Pride Of Man, At The Sophist's Schools, And The Learned Clan; For What Are They All In Their High Conceit, When Man In The Bush With God May Meet?

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

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.

The Reverence For The Deeds Of Our Ancestors Is A Treacherous Sentiment. Their Merit Was Not To Reverence The Old, But To Honor The Present Moment; And We Falsely Make Them Excuses Of The Very Habit Which They Hated And Defied.

If You Have Something To Say, You Will Be Given The Power To Say It.

I Thought As I Rode In The Cold Pleasant Light Of Sunday Morning How Silent & Passive Nature Offers, Every Morn, Her Wealth To Man; She Is Immensely Rich, He Is Welcome To Her Entire Goods, Which He Speaks No Word, Only Leaves Over Doors Ajar, Hall, Store Room, & Cellar. He May Do As He Will: If He Takes Her Hint & Uses Her Goods, She Speaks No Word; If He Blunders & Starves, She Says Nothing.

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

The Primary Wisdom Is Intuition.

The Evils Of Popular Government Appear Greater Than They Are; There Is Compensation For Them In Spirit And Energy It Awakens.

There Is No Den In The Wide World To Hide A Rogue.

Right Is More Beautiful Than Private Affection, And Is Compatible With Universal Wisdom.

But What Help From These Fineries Or Pedantries? What Help From Thought? Life Is Not Dialectics. We, I Think, In These Times, Have Had Lessons Enough Of The Futility Of Criticism.

I Honor Health As The First Muse, And Sleep As The Condition Of Health. Sleep Benefits Mainly By The Sound Health It Produces; Incidentally Also By Dreams, Into Whose Farrago A Divine Lesson Is Sometimes Slipped.

People Are Timid And Apologetic; They Are No Longer Upright; They Dare Not Say "i Think," "i Am," But Quote Some Saint Or Sage. They Are Ashamed Before The Blade Of Grass Or The Blowing Rose. These Roses Under My Window Make No Reference To Former Roses Or To Better Ones; They Are For What They Are; They Exist With God To-day.

We Find In Life Exactly What We Put Into It

Many Of The Historical Proverbs Have A Doubtful Paternity.

Nor Sequent Centuries Could Hitorbit And Sum Of Shakespeare's Wit.

In Science We Have To Consider Two Things: Power And Circumstance.

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

For What Avail The Plough Or Sail, Or Land Or Life, If Freedom Fail?

To Different Minds, The Same World Is A Hell, And A Heaven Depending On Whether They Compare It To Something Better And So Feel Disappointed And Bitter Or Something Worse And So Feel Relieved And Grateful.

The Rule For Hospitality And Irish "help," Is, To Have The Same Dinner Every Day Throughout The Year. At Last, Mrs. O'shaughnessylearns To Cook It To A Nicety, The Host Learns To Carve It, And The Guests Are Well Served.

The Things Taught In Schools & Colleges Are Not An Education But The Means Of Education.

Do You See That Kitten Chasing So Prettily Her Own Tail? If You Could Look With Her Eyes, You Might See Her Surrounded With Hundreds Of Figures Performing Complex Dramas, With Tragic And Comic Issues, Long Conversations, Many Characters, Many Ups And Downs Of Fate.

Can Anything Be So Elegant As To Have Few Wants, And To Serve Them One's Self?

Never Lose An Opportunity Of Seeing Anything Beautiful, For Beauty Is God's Handwriting.

Do Not Be Too Timid And Squeamish About Your Actions.

Will And Determination

Though We Love Goodness And Not Stealing, Yet Also We Love Freedom And Not Preaching.

The Hero Is Not Fed On Sweets, Daily His Own Heart He Eats; Chambers Of The Great Are Jails, And Head-winds Right For Royal Sails.

Character Repudiates Intellect, Yet Excites It; And Character Passes Into Thought, Is Published So, And Then Is Ashamed Before Newflashes Of Moral Worth.

Eloquence Must Be Grounded On The Plainest Narrative. Afterwards, It May Warm Itself Until It Exhales Symbols Of Every Kind And Color, Speaks Only Through The Most Poetic Forms; But First And Last, It Must Still Be At Bottom A Biblical Statement Of Fact.

When He Is Pushed, Tormented, Defeated, He Has A Chance To Learn Something; ... He Learns His Ignorance, Is Cured Of The Insanity Of Conceit; Has Got Moderation And Real Skill.

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

Happy Is The Hearing Man; Unhappy The Speaking Man.

Each Man Has His Own Vocation; His Talent Is His Call. There Is One Direction In Which All Space Is Open To Him.

Prudence Is The Virtue Of The Senses. It Is The Science Of Appearances. It Is The Outmost Action Of The Inward Life.

As The Traveler Who Has Lost His Way, Throws His Reins On His Horse's Neck, And Trusts To The Instinct Of The Animal To Find His Road, So Must We Do With The Divine Animal Who Carries Us Through This World

The Frenchman Invented The Ruffle; The Englishman Added The Shirt.

Light Is The First Of Painters. There Is No Object So Foul That Intense Light Will Not Make It Beautiful.

Beware When The Great God Lets Loose A Thinker On This Planet.

Nature Is A Mutable Cloud Which Is Always And Never The Same.

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.

Every Man Is Entitled To Be Valued By His Best Moment.

In The Learned Journal, In The Influential Newspaper, I Discern No Form; Only Some Irresponsible Shadow; Oftener Some Monied Corporation, Or Some Dangler, Who Hopes, In The Mask And Robes Of His Paragraph, To Pass For Somebody. But Through Every Clause And Part Of Speech Of The Right Book I Meet The Eyes Of The Most Determined Men; His Force And Terror Inundate Every Word: The Commas And Dashes Are Alive; So That The Writing Is Athletic And Nimble,--can Go Far And Live Long.

Life Is A Series Of Surprises And Would Not Be Worth Taking Or Keeping If It Were Not.

The Great Man Is Not Convulsible Or Tormentable; Events Pass Over Him Without Much Impression.

Coal Is A Portable Climate. It Carries The Heat Of The Tropics To Labrador And The Polar Circle; And It Is The Means Of Transporting Itself Whithersoever It Is Wanted. Watt And Stephenson Whispered In The Ear Of Mankind Their Secret, That A Half-ounce Of Coal Will Draw Two Tons A Mile, And Coal Carries Coal, By Rail And By Boat, To Make Canada As Warm As Calcutta, And With Its Comfort Brings Its Industrial Power.

People Forget That It Is The Eye Which Makes The Horizon, And The Rounding Mind's Eye Which Makes This Or That Man A Type Or Representative Of Humanity With The Name Of Hero Or Saint.

The Art Of Sculpture Is Long Ago Perished To Any Real Effect... It Is The Game Of A Rude And Youthful People, And Not The Manly Labour Of A Wise And Spiritual Nation.

Friendship Requires More Time Than Poor Busy Men Can Usually Command.

Hence, The Less Government We Have, The Better,--the Fewer Laws, And The Less Confided Power. The Antidote To This Abuse Of Formalgovernment, Is, The Influence Of Private Character, The Growth Of The Individual; The Appearance Of The Principal To Supersede The Proxy; The Appearance Of The Wise Man, Of Whom The Existing Government, Is, It Must Be Owned, But A Shabby Imitation.

In Excited Conversation We Have Glimpses Of The Universe, Hints Of Power Native To The Soul, Far-darting Lights And Shadows Of An Andes Landscape, Such As We Can Hardly Attain In Lone Meditation. Here Are Oracles Sometimes Profusely Given, To Which The Memory Goes Back In Barren Hours.

Eloquence Is The Appropriate Organ Of The Highest Personal Energy.

The Worthless And Offensive Members Of Society, Whose Existence Is A Social Pest, Invariably Think Themselves The Most Ill-used People Alive, And Never Get Over Their Astonishment At The Ingratitude And Selfishness Of Their Contemporaries.

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

The Poet's Habit Of Living Should Be Set On A Key So Low That The Common Influences Should Delight Him.

Nature Is An Endless Combination And Repetition Of A Very Few Laws. She Hums The Old Well-known Air Through Innumerable Variations.

The Student Is To Read History Actively And Not Passively; To Esteem His Own Life The Text, And Books The Commentary. Thus Compelled, The Muse Of History Will Utter Oracles As Never To Those Who Do Not Respect Themselves.

Far Or Forgot To Me Is Near; Shadow And Sunlight Are The Same; The Vanished Gods To Me Appear; And One To Me Are Shame And Fame.they Reckon Ill Who Leave Me Out; When Me They Fly, I Am The Wings; I Am The Doubter And The Doubt, And I The Hymn The Brahmin Sings.

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.

But, If A Man Would Be Alone, Let Him Look At The Stars. The Rays That Come From These Heavenly Worlds, Will Separate Between Him And What He Touches. One Might Think The Atmosphere Was Made Transparent With This Design, To Give Man, In The Heavenly Bodies, The Perpetual Presence Of The Sublime... But Every Night Come Out These Envoys Of Beauty, And Light The Universe With Their Admonishing Smile.

Words Are Finite Organs Of The Infinite Mind. They Cannot Cover The Dimensions Of What Is In Truth. They Break, Chop, And Impoverish It.

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

The Wave Of Evil Washes All Our Institutions Alike.

We Ascribe Beauty To That Which Is Simple; Which Has No Superfluous Parts; Which Exactly Answers Its End; Which Stands Related To All Things; Which Is The Mean Of Many Extremes.

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

The Soul Refuses Limits And Always Affirms An Optimism, Never A Pessimism.

Democracy Is Morose, And Runs To Anarchy, But In The State, And In The Schools, It Is Indispensable To Resist The Consolidation Ofall Men Into A Few Men.

Democracy Is Morose, And Runs To Anarchy.

Power Obeys Reality, And Not Appearances; Power Is According To Quality, And Not Quantity.

To A Physician, Each Man, Each Woman, Is An Amplification Of One Organ.

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

Shakespeare Carries Us To Such A Lofty Strain Of Intelligent Activity, As To Suggest A Wealth Which Beggars His Own; And We Then Feel That The Splendid Works Which He Has Created, And Which In Other Hours We Extol As A Sort Of Self-existent Poetry, Take No Stronger Hold Of Real Nature Than The Shadow Of A Passing Traveller On The Rock. The Inspiration Which Uttered Itself In Hamlet And Lear Could Utter Things As Good From Day To Day, For Ever.

Every Great Man Is Unique.

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

In A Tavern Everybody Puts On Airs Except The Landlord.

Human Condition

The Only Prudence In Life Is Concentration.

Focus And Concentration

Fine Manners Need The Support Of Fine Manners In Others.

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

The Wings Of Time Are Black And White, Pied With Morning And With Night.

Black And White

In Private Places, Among Sordid Objects, An Act Of Truth Or Heroism Seems At Once To Draw To Itself The Sky As Its Temple, The Sun As Its Cradle. Nature Stretches Out Her Arms To Embrace Man, Only Let His Thoughts Be Of Equal Greatness.

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