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Providence Has A Wild, Rough, Incalculable Road To Its End, And It Is Of No Use To Try To Whitewash Its Huge, Mixed Instrumentalities, Or To Dress Up That Terrific Benefactor In A Clean Shirt And White Neckcloth Of A Student In Divinity.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Providence Has A Wild,

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Providence Has A Wild, Rough, Incalculable Road To Its End, And It Is Of No Use To Try To Whitewash Its Huge, Mixed Instrumentalities, Or To Dress Up That Terrific Benefactor In A Clean Shirt And White Neckcloth Of A Student In Divinity.

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More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

All Our Progress Is An Unfolding, Like The Vegetable Bud. You Have First An Instinct, Then An Opinion, Then A Knowledge, As The Plant Has Root, Bud, And Fruit. Trust The Instinct To The End, Though You Can Render No Reason. It Is Vain To Hurry It. By Trusting It To The End It Shall Ripen Into Truth, And You Shall Know Why You Believe.

The First Point Of Courtesy Must Always Be Truth.

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.

We Must Be Very Suspicious Of The Deceptions Of The Element Of Time. It Takes A Good Deal Of Time To Eat Or To Sleep, Or To Earn Ahundred Dollars, And A Very Little Time To Entertain A Hope And An Insight Which Becomes The Light Of Our Life.

A Chief Event Of Life Is The Day In Which We Have Encountered A Mind That Startled Us.

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

To Get Up Each Morning With The Resolve To Be Happy Is To Set Your Own Conditions To The Events Of Each Day. To Do This Is To Condition Circumstances Instead Of Being Conditioned By Them.

That Is Ever The Difference Between The Wise And The Unwise: The Latter Wonders At What Is Unusual; The Wise Man Wonders At The Usual.

There Can Be No Excess To Love, None To Knowledge, None To Beauty.

We Learn That God Is; That He Is In Me; And That All Things Are Shadows Of Him.

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

Best Masters For The Young Writer And Speaker Are The Fault- Finding Brothers And Sisters At Home Who Will Not Spare Him, But Willpick And Cavil, And Tell The Odious Truth.

A Friend, Therefore, Is A Sort Of Paradox In Nature. I Who Alone Am, I Who See Nothing In Nature Whose Existence I Can Affirm With Equal Evidence To My Own, Behold Now The Semblance Of My Being, In All Its Height, Variety, And Curiosity, Reiterated In A Foreign Form; So That A Friend May Well Be Reckoned The Masterpiece Of Nature.

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

Is The Acorn Better Than The Oak Which Is Its Fullness And Completion?

Our Poets Are Men Of Talents Who Sing, And Not The Children Of Music.

Coal Is A Portable Climate.

No Great Man Ever Complains Of Want Of Opportunity.

No Law Can Be Sacred To Me But That Of My Nature. Good And Bad Are But Names Very Readily Transferable To That Or This; The Only Right Is What Is After My Constitution; The Only Wrong Is What Is Against It.

Wisdom Has Its Root In Goodness, Not Goodness Its Root In Wisdom.

Great Conversation ... Requires An Absolute Running Of Two Souls Into One.

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

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

The First Farmer Was The First Man, And All Historic Nobility Rests On Possession And Use Of Land.

The Spirit Only Can Teach. Not Any Profane Man, Not Any Sensual, Not Any Liar, Not Any Slave Can Teach, But Only He Can Give, Whohas; He Only Can Create, Who Is. The Man On Whom The Soul Descends, Through Whom The Soul Speaks, Alone Can Teach. Courage, Piety, Love, Wisdom, Can Teach; And Every Man Can Open His Door To These Angels, And They Shall Bring Him The Gift Of Tongues. But The Man Who Aims To Speak As Books Enable, As Synods Use, As The Fashion Guides, And As Interest Commands, Babbles. Let Him Hush.

Talent Is Commonly Developed At The Expense Of Character.

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.

By Necessity, By Proclivity, And By Delight, We All Quote.

It Is The Same Among The Men And Women, As Among The Silent Trees; Always A Referred Existence, An Absence, Never A Presence And Satisfaction. Is It, That Beauty Can Never Be Grasped? In Persons And In Landscape Is Equally Inaccessible?

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

Beauty Is The Mark God Sets On Virtue. Every Natural Action Is Graceful; Every Heroic Act Is Also Decent, And Causes The Place And The Bystanders To Shine.

Every Really Able Man, In Whatever Direction He Works - A Man Of Large Affairs, An Inventor, A Statesman, An Orator, A Poet, A Painter - If You Talk Sincerely With Him, Considers His Work, However Much Admired, As Far Short Of What It Should Be. What Is This Better, This Flying Ideal, But The Perpetual Promise Of His Creator?

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.

As Men's Prayers Are A Disease Of The Will, So Are Their Creeds A Disease Of The Intellect.

Man Sheds Grief As His Skin Sheds Rain.

Men Talk As If Victory Were Something Fortunate. Work Is Victory.

The Wave Of Evil Washes All Our Institutions Alike.

Old & New Put Their Stamp To Everything In Nature. The Snowflake That Is Now Falling Is Marked By Both. The Present Moment Gives The Motion & The Color Of The Flake: Antiquity, Its Form & Properties. All Things Wear A Luster Which Is The Gift Of The Present & A Tarnish Of Time.

There Is Never A Beginning, There Is Never An End, To The Inexplicable Continuity Of This Web Of God, But Always Circular Power Returning Into Itself.

No Man Ever Prayed Heartily Without Learning Something.

Up And Away For Life! Be Fleet!- The Frost-king Ties My Fumbling Feet, Sings In My Ears, My Hands Are Stones, Curdles The Blood To The Marble Bones, Tugs At The Heart-strings, Numbs The Sense, And Hems In Life With Narrowing Fence. Well, In This Broad Bed Lie And Sleep,- The Punctual Stars Will Vigil Keep,- Embalmed By Purifying Cold; The Winds Shall Sing Their Dead-march Old, The Snow Is No Ignoble Shroud, The Moon Thy Mourner, And The Cloud.

Every Man Alone Is Sincere. At The Entrance Of A Second Person, Hypocrisy Begins. We Parry And Fend The Approach Of Our Fellow-man By Compliments, By Gossip, By Amusements, By Affairs. We Cover Up Our Thought From Him Under A Hundred Folds.

I Quote Another Man's Saying; Unluckily, That Other Withdraws Himself In The Same Way, And Quotes Me.

We Acquire The Strength We Have Overcome.

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

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

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.

This Whole Business Of Trade Gives Me To Pause And Think, As It Constitutes False Relations Between Men; Inasmuch As I Am Prone Tocount Myself Relieved Of Any Responsibility To Behave Well And Nobly To That Person Who I Pay With Money, Whereas If I Had Not That Commodity, I Should Be Put On My Good Behavior In All Companies, And Man Would Be A Benefactor To Man, As Being Himself His Only Certificate That He Had A Right To Those Aids And Services Which Each Asked Of The Other.

Teaching Is The Perpetual End And Office Of All Things. Teaching, Instruction Is The Main Design That Shines Through The Sky And Earth.

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

The Foundation Of Culture, As Of Character, Is At Last The Moral Sentiment.

If I Quake, What Matters It What I Quake At? Our Proper Vice Takes Form In One Or Another Shape, According To The Sex, Age, Or Temperament Of The Person, And, If We Are Capable Of Fear, Will Readily Find Terrors.

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

Plant Your Dreams And Miracles Will Grow.

The Light By Which We See In This World Comes Out From The Soul Of The Observer. Wherever Any Noble Sentiment Dwelt, It Made The Faces And Houses Around To Shine. Nay, The Powers Of This Busy Brain Are Miraculous And Illimitable.

It Must Be That When God Speaketh, He Should Communicate, Not One Thing, But All Things; Should Fill The World With His Voice; Should Scatter Forth Light, Nature, Time, Souls, From The Centre Of The Present Thought; And New Date And New Create The Whole.whenever A Mind Is Simple And Receives A Divine Wisdom, Old Things Pass Away, - Means, Teachers, Texts, Temples Fall; It Lives Now, And Absorbs Past And Future Into The Present Hour. All Things Are Made Sacred By Relation To It,-one As Much As Another. All Things Are Disolved To Ther Center By Thier Cause.

Stand Guard At The Portal Of Your Mind.

Walking Has The Best Value As Gymnastics Of The Mind.

Nature Has Made Up Her Mind That What Cannot Defend Itself Shall Not Be Defended.

Love Is The Essence Of God.

What Is There Of The Divine In A Load Of Brick? What ... In A Barber Shop? ... Much. All.

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

Youth Is Everywhere In Place.

But A Public Oration Is An Escapade, A Non-committal, An Apology, A Gag, And Not A Communication, Not A Speech, Not A Man.

If I Am The Devil's Child, I Will Live Then, By The Devil.

The Leaves Are Falling, Falling As From Way Off, As Though Far Gardens Withered In The Skies; They Are Falling With Denying Gestures. And In The Nights The Heavy Earth Is Falling From All The Stars Down Into Loneliness. We All Are Falling. This Hand Falls. And Look At Others: It Is In Them All. And Yet There Is One Who Holds This Falling Endlessly Gently In His Hands.

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

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

All Men, In The Abstract, Are Just And Good; What Hinders Them, In The Particular, Is, The Momentary Predominance Of The Finite And Individual Over The General Truth. The Condition Of Our Incarnation In A Private Self, Seems To Be, A Perpetual Tendency To Prefer The Private Law, To Obey The Private Impulse, To The Exclusion Of The Law Of The Universal Being.

A Creative Economy Is The Fuel Of Magnificence.

Society Is A Hospital Of Incurables.

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

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

To Laugh Often And Much ... This Is To Have Succeeded. Probably Not From Emerson: Here's The Full Quotation And The Story.

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

More Than The Diamond Koh-i-noor, Which Glitters Among Their Crown Jewels, They Prize The Dull Pebble Which Is Wiser Than A Man, Whose Poles Turn Themselves To The Poles Of The World, And Whose Axis Is Parallel To The Axis Of The World. Now, Their Toys Are Steam And Galvanism.

A Garden Is Like Those Pernicious Machineries Which Catch A Man's Coat-skirt Or His Hand, And Draw In His Arm, His Leg , And His Whole Body To Irresistible Destruction.

Some Natures Are Too Good To Be Spoiled By Praise.

To Believe Your Own Thought, To Believe That What Is True For You In Your Private Heart, Is True For All Men - That Is Genius... Whoso Would Be A Man Must Be A Nonconformist... What I Must Do, Is All That Concerns Me; Not What The People Think... Nothing Can Bring You Peace But Yourself; Nothing, But The Triumph Of Principles.

Morality Is The Object Of Government.

The Essence Of Greatness Is The Perception That Virtue Is Enough.

Among Provocatives, The Next Best Thing To Good Preaching Is Bad Preaching. I Have Even More Thoughts During Or Enduring It Than At Other Times.

Fate Is Unpenetrated Causes.

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

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

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.

Common Sense Is Genius Dressed In Its Working Clothes.

The Possibility Of Interpretation Lies In The Identity Of The Observer With The Observed. Each Material Thing Has Its Celestial Side; Has Its Translation, Through Humanity, Into The Spiritual And Necessary Sphere, Where It Plays A Part As Indestructible As Any Other.

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

Conversation Is The Laboratory And Workshop Of The Student.

No Man Acquires Property Without Acquiring With It A Little Arithmetic Also.

The Way Of Providence Is A Little Rude. The Habit Of Snake And Spider, The Snap Of The Tiger And Other Leapers And Bloody Jumpers, The Crackle Of The Bones Of His Prey In The Coil Of The Anaconda-these Are In The System, And Our Habits Are Like Theirs.

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

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

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

The Teaching Of Politics Is That The Government, Which Was Set For Protection And Comfort Of All Good Citizens, Becomes The Principal Obstruction And Nuisance With Which We Have To Contend... The Cheat And Bully And Malefactor We Meet Everywhere Is The Government.

What You Set Your Heart Upon, Surely Shall Be Yours.

If We Suddenly Plant Our Foot, And Say, - I Will Neither Eat Nor Drink Nor Wear Nor Touch Any Food Or Fabric Which I Do Not Know To Be Innocent, Or Deal With Any Person Whose Whole Manner Of Life Is Not Clear And Rational, We Shall Stand Still. Whose Is So? Not Mine; Not Thine; Not His. But I Think We Must Clear Ourselves Each One By The Interrogation, Whether We Have Earned Our Bread To-day By The Hearty Contribution Of Our Energies To The Common Benefit? And We Must Not Cease To Tend To The Correction Of These Flagrant Wrongs, By Laying One Stone Aright Every Day.

Thought Is The Seed Of Action; But Action Is As Much Its Second Form As Thought Is Its First. It Rises In Thought, To The End That It May Be Uttered And Acted. Always In Proportion To The Depth Of Its Sense Does It Knock Importunately At The Gates Of The Soul, To Be Spoken, To Be Done.

English History Is Aristocracy With The Doors Open. Who Has Courage And Faculty, Let Him Come In.

English History

The Imitator Dooms Himself To Hopeless Mediocrity.

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

The Days Come And Go But They Say Nothing, And If We Do Not Use The Gifts They Bring, They Carry Them As Silently Away.

I Find It More Credible, Since It Is Anterior Information, That One Man Should Know Heaven, As The Chinese Say, Than That So Many Men Should Know The World.

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.

You Cannot Make A Cheap Palace.

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

As Long As A Man Stands In His Own Way, Everything Seems To Be In His Way.

Nothing Is At Last Sacred But The Integrity Of Your Own Mind.

Tis The Privilege Of Art Thus To Play Its Cheerful Part, Man On Earth To Acclimate And Bend The Exile To His Fate.

Make Your Own Bible. Select And Collect All The Words And Sentences That In All Your Readings Have Been To You Like The Blast Of A Trumpet.

Do Not Be Caught By The Sensational In Nature, As A Coarse Red-faced Sunset, A Garrulous Waterfall, Or A Fifteen Thousand Foot Mountain... Avoid Prettiness - The Word Looks Much Like Pettiness - And There Is But Little Difference Between Them.

Moderation In All Things, Especially Moderation.

Moderation In All Things

It Is True That The Discerning Intellect Of The World Is Always Much In Advance Of The Creative, So That There Are Competent Judges Of The Best Book, And Few Writers Of The Best Books.

I Think No Virtue Goes With Size.

If A Man Can Write A Better Book, Preach A Better Sermon, Or Make A Better Mousetrap Than His Neighbor, Though He Build His House In The Woods, The World Will Make A Beaten Path To His Door.

The South-wind Brings Life, Sunshine And Desire, And On Every Mount And Meadow Breathes Aromatic Fire; But Over The Dead He Has No Power, The Lost, The Lost, He Cannot Restore; And, Looking Over The Hills, I Mourn The Darling Who Shall Not Return.

Two May Talk And One May Hear, But Three Cannot Take Part In A Conversation Of The Most Sincere And Searching Sort.

A Man Should Not Go Where He Cannot Carry His Whole Sphere Or Society With Him,mnot Bodily, The Whole Circle Of His Friends, But Atmospherically. He Should Preserve In A New Company The Same Attitude Of Mind And Reality Of Relation, Which His Daily Associates Draw Him To, Else He Is Shorn Of His Best Beams, And Will Be An Orphan In The Merriest Club.

The Secret Of Genius Is To Suffer No Fiction To Exist For Us; To Realize All That We Know; In The High Refinement Of Modern Life,in Arts, In Sciences, In Books, In Men, To Exact Good Faith, Reality, And A Purpose; And First, Last, Midst, And Without End, To Honor Every Truth By Use.

Time Is Indeed The Theater And Seat Of Illusions; Nothing Is So Ductile And Elastic. The Mind Stretches An Hour To A Century, And Dwarfs An Age To An Hour.

Concentration Is The Secret Of Srength.

Every Man Beholds His Human Condition With A Degree Of Melancholy. As A Ship Aground Is Battered By The Waves, So Man, Imprisonedin Mortal Life, Lies Open To The Mercy Of Coming Events.

In Good Writing, Words Become One With Things.

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

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.

Fear Is A Great Instructor.

Almost Every Man We Meet Requires Some Civility; Requires To Be Humored; - He Has Some Fame, Some Talent, Some Whim Of Religion Or Philanthropy In His Head That Is Not To Be Questioned, And Which Spoils All Conversation With Him. But A Friend Is A Sane Man Who Exercises Not My Ingenuity, But Me.

The Soul Knows No Persons.

If We Live Truly, We Shall See Truly.

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

Education Should Be As Broad As Man.

We Lie In The Lap Of Immense Intelligence.

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

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

Guard Well Your Spare Moments. They Are Like Uncut Diamonds. Discard Them And Their Value Will Never Be Known. Improve Them And They Will Become The Brightest Gems In A Useful Life.

The German Intellect Wants The French Sprightliness, The Fine Practical Understanding Of The English, And The American Adventure; But It Has A Certain Probity, Which Never Rests In A Superficial Performance, But Asks Steadily, To What End? A German Public Asks For A Controlling Sincerity.

Life Is In Short Cycles Or Periods; We Are Quickly Tired, But We Have Rapid Rallies. A Man Is Spent By His Work, Starved, Prostrate; He Will Not Lift His Hand To Save His Life; He Can Never Think More. He Sinks Into Deep Sleep And Wakes With Renewed Youth, With Hope, Courage, Fertile In Resources, And Keen For Daring Adventure.

Meet Your Failure Nobly, And It Will Not Differ From Success.

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

But The Best Read Naturalist Who Lends An Entire And Devout Attention To Truth, Will See That There Remains Much To Learn Of His Relation To The World, And That It Is Not To Be Learned By Any Addition Or Subtraction Or Other Comparison Of Known Quantities, But Is Arrived At By Untaught Sallies Of The Spirit, By A Continual Self-recovery, And By Entire Humility.

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

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

Sanity Is Very Rare; Every Man Almost And Every Woman Has A Dash Of Madness.

Gold And Iron Are Good To Buy Iron And Gold.

Many Might Go To Heaven With Half The Labor They Go To Hell.

Activity Is Contagious.

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.

Don't Be A Cynic And Disconsolate Preacher. Don't Bewail And Moan. Omit The Negative Propositions. Challenge Us With Incessant Affirmatives.

As Soon As The Man Is At One With God, He Will Not Beg. He Will Then See Prayer In All Action.

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 Each Thorn, There's A Rosebud... For Each Twilight - A Dawn... For Each Trial - The Strength To Carry On, For Each Storm Cloud - A Rainbow... For Each Shadow - The Sun... For Each Parting - Sweet Memories When Sorrow Is Done.

There Comes A Time In Each Man's Education In Which He Comes To The Conclusion That Envy Is Ignorance, Imitation Is Suicide, And Society In In Conspiracy Against Each One Of Its Members.

If A Man Sits Down To Think, He Is Immediately Asked If He Has A Headache.

There Is A Genius Of A Nation, Which Is Not To Be Found In The Numerical Citizens, But Which Characterizes The Society.

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

Luckily For Us, Now That Steam Has Narrowed The Atlantic To A Strait, The Nervous, Rocky West Is Intruding A New And Continental Element Into The National Mind, As We Shall Yet Have An American Genius.

Our Thinking Is A Pious Reception.

Calmness Is Always Godlike.

Isolation Must Precede True Society.

We Swim, Day By Day, On A River Of Delusions, And Are Effectually Amused With Houses And Towns In The Air, Of Which The Men Aboutus Are Dupes. But Life Is A Sincerity.

Go Oft To The House Of Thy Friend, For Weeds Choke The Unused Path.

As The Farmer Casts Into The Ground The Finest Ears Of His Grain, The Time Will Come When We Too Shall Hold Nothing Back, But Shall Eagerly Convert More Than We Now Possess Into Means And Powers, When We Shall Be Willing To Sow The Sun And The Moon For Seeds.

I Am Primarily Engaged To Myself To Be A Public Servant Of All The Gods, To Demonstrate To All Men That There Is Intelligence Andgood Will At The Heart Of All Things, And Even Higher And Yet Higher Leadings. These Are My Engagements; How Can Your Law Further Or Hinder Me In What I Shall Do To Men?

For Every Seeing Soul, There Are Two Absorbing Facts - I, And The Abyss.

Sleep Is Not, Death Is Not; Who Seem To Die Live. House You Were Born In, Friends Of Your Spring-time, Old Man And Young Maid, Day's Toil And It's Guerdon, They Are All Vanishing, Fleeing To Fables, Cannot Be Moored

Will Is The Measure Of Power. To A Great Genius There Must Be A Great Will. If The Thought Is Not A Lamp To The Will, Does Not Proceed To An Act, The Wise Are Imbecile. He Alone Is Strong And Happy Who Has A Will. The Rest Are Herds. He Uses; They Are Used. He Is Of The Maker; They Are Of The Made. Will Is Always Miraculous, Being The Presence Of God To Men. When It Appears In A Man He Is A Hero, And All Metaphysics Are At Fault.

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

Black And White

All Inquiry Into Antiquity, All Curiosity Respecting The Pyramids, The Excavated Cities, Stonehenge, The Ohio Circles, Mexico, Memphis,--is The Desire To Do Away This Wild, Savage, And Preposterous There And Then, And Introduce In Its Place The Here And Now.

That You Are Fair Or Wise Is Vain, Or Strong, Or Rich, Or Generous; You Must Have Also The Untaught Strain That Sheds Beauty On The Rose.

It Is One Of The Biggest Blessing That You Can Be Stupid With Your True Friends And Behave Like You Shame To Do Elsewhere

The Line Of Beauty Is The Line Of Perfect Economy.

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.

The Genius Of Life Is Friendly To The Noble, And, In The Dark, Brings Them Friends From Far.

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.

Who Is He That Shall Control Me? Why May Not I Act And Speak And Write And Think With Entire Freedom? What Am I To The Universe, Or, The Unvierse, What Is It To Me? Who Hath Forged The Chains Of Wrong And Right, Of Opinion And Custom? And Must I Wear Them?

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.

The Vulgar Call Good Fortune That Which Really Is Produced By The Calculations Of Genius.

Is It Not Manifest That Our Academic Institutions Should Have A Wider Scope; That They Should Not Be Timid And Keep The Ruts Of The Last Generation, But That Wise Men Thinking For Themselves And Heartily Seeking The Good Of Mankind, And Counting The Cost Of Innovation, Should Dare To Arouse The Young To A Just And Heroic Life; That The Moral Nature Should Be Addressed In The School-room, And Children Should Be Treated As The High-born Candidates Of Truth And Virtue?

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

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

We May Climb Into The Thin And Cold Realm Of Pure Geometry And Lifeless Science, Or Sink Into That Of Sensation. Between These Extremes Is The Equator Of Life, Of Thought, Or Spirit, Or Poetry,--a Narrow Belt.

A Party Is Perpetually Corrupted By Personality.

We Cannot Let Our Angels Go; We Do Not See That They Only Go Out That Archangels May Come In.

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

A Friend Is The Hope Of The Heart.

Souls Are Not Saved In Bundles.

He Is The Rich Man In Whom The People Are Rich, And He Is The Poor Man In Whom The People Are Poor; And How To Give Access To Themasterpieces Of Art And Nature, Is The Problem Of Civilization.

Whenever You Are Sincerely Pleased You Are Nourished.

It Depends Little On The Object, Much On The Mood, In Art.

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.

Every Heroic Act Measures Itself By Its Contempt Of Some External Good. But It Finds Its Own Success At Last, And Then The Prudent Also Extol.

Books Take Their Place According To Their Specific Gravity As Surely As Potatoes In A Tub.

The Human Heart Concerns Us More Than The Poring Into Microscopes, And Is Larger Than Can Be Measured By The Pompous Figures Of The Astronomer.

We Learn Geology The Morning After The Earthquake.

To Make Knowledge Valuable, You Must Have The Cheerfulness Of Wisdom.

When You Have Worn Out Your Shoes, The Strength Of The Show Fiber Has Passed Into Your Body.

And Of Poetry, The Success Is Not Attained When It Lulls And Satisfies, But When It Astonishes And Fires Us With New Endeavours After The Unattainable.

The Reason Why All Men Honor Love Is Because It Looks Up, And Not Down; Aspires And Not Despairs.

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

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