Background Image

...

The Poet A Moody Child And Wildly Wise Pursued The Game With Joyful Eyes, Which Chose, Like Meteors, Their Way, And Rived The Dark With Private Ray: They Overleapt The Horizon's Edge, Searched With Apollo's Privilege; Through Man, And Woman, And Sea, And Star, Saw The Dance Of Nature Forward Far; Through Worlds, And Races, And Terms, And Times, Saw Musical Order, And Pairing Rhymes. Olympian Bards Who Sung Divine Ideas Below, Which Always Find Us Young, And Always Keep Us So.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

The Poet A Moody

Ralph Waldo Emerson

...

The Poet A Moody Child And Wildly Wise Pursued The Game With Joyful Eyes, Which Chose, Like Meteors, Their Way, And Rived The Dark With Private Ray: They Overleapt The Horizon's Edge, Searched With Apollo's Privilege; Through Man, And Woman, And Sea, And Star, Saw The Dance Of Nature Forward Far; Through Worlds, And Races, And Terms, And Times, Saw Musical Order, And Pairing Rhymes. Olympian Bards Who Sung Divine Ideas Below, Which Always Find Us Young, And Always Keep Us So.

Views: 6

Topic

More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

All Loss, All Pain, Is Particular; The Universe Remains To The Heart Unhurt.

Cause And Effect Are Two Sides Of One Fact.

When Private Men Shall Act With Original Views, The Lustre Will Be Transferred From The Actions Of Kings To Those Of Gentlemen.

It The Proof Of High Culture To Say The Greatest Matters In The Simplest Way.

Great Works Of Art Have No More Affecting Lesson For Us Than This. They Teach Us To Abide By Our Own Spontaneous Expression With Good Humored Inflexibility Whether The Whole Cry Of Voices Is On The Other Side.

[t]omorrow Is A New Day. You Shall Begin It Well & Serenely, & With Too High A Spirit To Be Cumbered With Your Old Nonsense. This Day ... Is Too Dear With Its Hopes & Invitations To Waste A Moment On The Rotten Yesterdays.

Make Youself Necessary To Someone.

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.

When Nature Removes A Great Man, People Explore The Horizon For A Successor; But None Comes, And None Will. His Class Is Extinguished With Him. In Some Other And Quite Different Field, The Next Man Will Appear.

The Greatest Delight The Fields And Woods Minister Is The Suggestion Of An Occult Relation Between Man And The Vegetable. I Am Not Alone And Unacknowledged. They Nod To Me And I To Them.

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.

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

The Whole Of Heraldry And Of Chivalry Is In Courtesy. A Man Of Fine Manners Shall Pronounce Your Name With All The Ornament That Titles Of Nobility Could Ever Add.

Condense Some Daily Experience Into A Glowing Symbol And An Audience Is Electrified.

Get Health. No Labor, Effort Nor Exercise That Can Gain It Must Be Grudged.

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.

Every Evil To Which We Do Not Succumb Is A Benefactor.

The Horseman Serves The Horse, The Neat-herd Serves The Neat, The Merchant Serves The Purse, The Eater Serves His Meat; 'tis The Day Of The Chattel, Web To Weave, And Corn To Grind, Things Are In The Saddle, And Ride Mankind.

Universities Are Of Course Hostile To Geniuses.

I Know And See Too Well, When Not Voluntarily Blind, The Speedy Limits Opersons Called High And Worthy.

A Man Is The Prisoner Of His Power. A Topical Memory Makes Him An Almanac; A Talent For Debate, Disputant; Skill To Get Money Makes Him A Miser, That Is, A Beggar. Culture Reduces These Inflammations By Invoking The Aid Of Other Powers Against The Dominant Talent, And By Appealing To The Rank Of Powers. It Watches Success.

Your Genuine Action Will Explain Itself, And Will Explain Your Other Genuine Actions. Your Conformity Explains Nothing.

The True Poem Is The Poet's Mind.

Coal Is A Portable Climate.

Society Cannot Do Without Cultivated Men. As Soon As The First Wants Are Satisfied, The Higher Wants Become Imperative.

If The Aristocrat Is Only Valid In Fashionable Circles, And Not With Truckmen, He Will Never Be A Leader In Fashion; And If The Man Of The People Cannot Speak On Equal Terms With The Gentleman, So That The Gentleman Shall Perceive That He Is Already Really Of His Own Order, He Is Not To Be Feared.

We See God Face To Face Every Hour, And Know The Savor Of Nature.

Society Has Really No Graver Interest Than The Well-being Of The Literary Class.

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.

The Objection To Conforming To Usages That Have Become Dead To You Is, That It Scatters Your Force.

The Purpose Of Life Seems To Be To Acquaint A Man With Himself And Whatever Science Or Art Or Course Of Action He Engages In Reacts Upon And Illuminates The Recesses Of His Own Mind. Thus Friends Seem To Be Only Mirrors To Draw Out And Explain To Us Ourselves; And That Which Draws Us Nearer Our Fellow Man, Is, That The Deep Heart In One, Answers The Deep Heart In Another, - That We Find We Have (a Common Nature) - One Life Which Runs Through All Individuals, And Which Is Indeed Divine.

We Have A Great Deal More Kindness Than Is Ever Spoken. The Whole Human Family Is Bathed With An Element Of Love Like A Fine Ether. How Many Persons We Meet In Houses, Whom We Scarcely Speak To, Whom Yet We Honor And Who Honor Us! How Many We See In The Street, Or Sit With In Church, Whom Though Silently, We Warmly Rejoice To Be With! Read The Language Of These Wandering Eye-beams. The Heart Knoweth.

The True Scholar Grudges Every Opportunity Of Action Passed, By, As A Loss Of Power.

And Dazzling Memory Revive.refresh The Faded Tints, Recut The Aged Prints, And Write My Old Adventures, With The Pen Which, On The First Day, Drew Upon The Tablets Blue The Dancing Pleiads, And The Eternal Men.

The Landscape Belongs To The Person Who Looks At It..." -ralph Waldo Emerson

No Man Can Be Criticised But By A Greater Than He. Do Not, Then, Read The Reviews.

Our Moods Do Not Believe In Each Other. To-day I Am Full Of Thoughts, And Can Write What I Please. I See No Reason Why I Should Not Have The Same Thought, The Same Power Of Expression, To-morrow. What I Write, Whilst I Write It, Seems The Most Natural Thing In The World; But Yesterday I Saw A Dreary Vacuity In This Direction In Which Now I See So Much; And A Month Hence, I Doubt Not, I Shall Wonder Who He Was That Wrote So Many Continuous Pages. Alas For This Infirm Faith, This Will Not Strenuous, This Vast Ebb Of A Vast Flow! I Am God In Nature; I Am A Weed By The Wall.

The Disease With Which The Human Mind Now Labors Is Want Of Faith

Can Anybody Remember When The Times Were Not Hard And Money Not Scarce?

Every True Man Is A Cause, A Country, And An Age; Requires Infinite Spaces And Numbers And Time Fully To Accomplish His Design;--and Posterity Seem To Follow His Steps As A Train Of Clients.

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.

Build A Better Mousetrap And The World Will Beat A Path To Your Door.

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.

The Intellect Is Vagabond, And Our System Of Education Fosters Restlessness. Our Minds Travel When Our Bodies Are Forced To Stay At Home. We Imitate; And What Is Imitation But The Travelling Of The Mind?

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.

There Is No King Or Sovereign State That Can Fix A Hero's Rate; Each To All Is Venerable.

Where There Is No Vision A People Perish.

As Sunbeams Stream Through Liberal Space And Nothing Jostle Or Displace, So Waved The Pine-tree Through My Thought And Fanned The Dreams It Never Brought.

The Philanthropists Inquire Whether Transcendentalism Does Not Mean Sloth: They Had As Lief Hear That Their Friend Is Dead, As That He Is A Transcendentalist; For Then Is He Paralyzed, And Can Never Do Anything For Humanity.

It Happens To Us Once Or Twice In A Lifetime To Be Drunk With Some Book Which Probably Has Some Extraordinary Relative Power To Intoxicate Us And None Other; And Having Exhausted That Cup Of Enchantment We Go Groping In Libraries All Our Years Afterwards In The Hope Of Being In Paradise Again.

There Is Creative Reading As Well As Creative Writing.

We Change Whether We Like It Or Not.

Every Book Is Good To Read Which Sets The Reader In A Working Mood.

The Rain Has Spoiled The Farmer's Day; Shall Sorrow Put My Books Away? Thereby Are Two Days Lost.

Of Course, Money Will Do After Its Kind, And Will Steadily Work To Unspiritualize And Unchurch The People To Whom It Was Bequeathed.

Our Reliance On The Physician Is A Kind Of Despair Of Ourselves.

Man Sheds Grief As His Skin Sheds Rain.

The Glory Of The Farmer Is That, In The Division Of Labors, It Is His Part To Create. All Trade Rests At Last On His Primitive Activity. He Stands Close To Nature; He Obtains From The Earth The Bread And The Meat. The Food Which Was Not, He Causes To Be.

Division Of Labor

The People Know That They Need In Their Representative Much More Than Talent, Namely, The Power To Make His Talent Trusted.

Give The Slave The Least Elevation Of Religious Sentiment, And He Is Not Slave: You Are The Slave: He Not Only In His Humility Feels His Superiority, Feels That Much Deplored Condition Of His To Be A Fading Trifle, But He Makes You Feel It Too. He Is The Master.

The Meaning Of Good And Bad, Of Better And Worse, Is Simply Helping Or Hurting.

When The Spirit Is Not Master Of The World, Then It Is Its Dupe.

Work And Acquire, And Thou Hast Chained The Wheel Of Chance.

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.

You Need Not Fear To Handle The Truth Roughly. She Is No Invalid.

Let Him Go Where He Will, He Can Only Find So Much Beauty Or Worth As He Carries.

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

The Axioms Of Physics Translate The Laws Of Ethics. Thus, "the Whole Is Greater Than Its Part;" "reaction Is Equal To Action;" "the Smallest Weight May Be Made To Lift The Greatest, The Difference Of Weight Being Compensated By Time;" And Many The Like Propositions, Which Have An Ethical As Well As Physical Sense. These Propositions Have A Much More Extensive And Universal Sense When Applied To Human Life, Than When Confined To Technical Use.

A Man Of Thought Must Feel The Thought That Is Parent Of The Universe: That The Masses Of Nature Do Undulate And Flow.

Do Not Be Too Timid And Squeamish About Your Actions.

Will And Determination

The Conscious Utterance Of Thought, By Speech Or Action, To Any End, Is Art.

The Only Joy In His Being Mine, Is That The Not Mine Is Mine.

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

The Gentleman Is A Man Of Truth.

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

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

Tobacco, Coffee, Alcohol, Hashish, Prussic Acid, Strychnine, Are Weak Dilutions; The Surest Poison Is Time. This Cup Which Nature Puts To Our Lips, Has A Wonderful Virtue, Surpassing That Of Any Other Draught. It Opens The Senses, Adds Power, Fills Us With Exalted Dreams, Which We Call Hope, Love, Ambition, Science; Especially It Creates A Craving For Larger Draughts Of Itself.

The Sun Shines And Warms And Lights Us And We Have No Curiosity To Know Why This Is So; But We Ask The Reason Of All Evil, Of Pain, And Hunger, And Mosquitoes And Silly People.

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.

An Individual Has A Healthy Personality To The Exact Degree To Which They Have The Propensity To Look For The Good In Every Situation.

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

I Will Not Hide My Tastes Or Aversions. If You Are True, But Not In The Same Truth With Me, Cleave To Your Companions; I Will Seek My Own.

Almost All People Descend To Meet. All Association Must Be A Compromise, And, What Is Worst, The Very Flower And Aroma Of The Flower Of Each Of The Beautiful Natures Disappears As They Approach Each Other.

I Have Thought A Sufficient Measure Of Civilization Is The Influence Of Good Women.

He Thought It Happier To Be Dead, To Die For Beauty, Than Live For Bread

My Companion Assumes To Know My Mood And Habit Of Thought, And We Go On From Explanation To Explanation, Until All Is Said That Words Can, And We Leave Matters Just As They Were At First, Because Of That Vicious Assumption.

Lose Yourself In Nature And Find Peace

In Different Hours, A Man Represents Each Of Several Of His Ancestors, As If There Were Seven Or Eight Of Us Rolled Up In Each Man's Skin, - Seven Or Eight Ancestors At Least, And They Constitute The Variety Of Notes For That New Piece Of Music Which His Life Is.

When The Night Is Darkest, The Stars Come Out.

If Two Or Three Persons Should Come With A High Spiritual Aim And With Great Powers, The World Would Fall Into Their Hands Like A Ripe Peach.

A True Man Belongs To No Other Time Or Place, But Is The Center Of Things.

Plato Says That The Punishment Which The Wise Suffer Who Refuse To Take Part In The Government, Is, To Live Under The Government Of Worse Men; And The Like Regret Is Suggested To All The Auditors, As The Penalty Of Abstaining To Speak,--that They Shall Hear Worse Orators Than Themselves.

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

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

Classics Which At Home Are Drowsily Read Have A Strange Charm In A Country Inn, Or In The Transom Of A Merchant Brig.

The Forest Waves, The Morning Breaks, The Pastures Sleep, Ripple The Lakes, Leaves Twinkle, Flowers Like Persons Be And Life Pulsates In Rock Or Tree.

Nature Turns All Malfaisance To Good.

Only The Great Generalizations Survive. The Sharp Words Of The Declaration Of Independence, Lampooned Then And Since As 'glittering Generalities,' Have Turned Out Blazing Ubiquities That Will Burn Forever And Ever.

The Most Advanced Nations Are Always Those Who Navigate The Most.

To Be Is To Live With God.

There Is A Power In Love To Divine Another's Destiny Better Than That Other Can, And By Heroic Encouragements, Hold Him To His Task. What Has Friendship So Signal As Its Sublime Attraction To Whatever Virtue Is In Us?

Wherever There Is Failure, There Is Some Giddiness, Some Superstition About Luck, Some Step Omitted, Which, Nature Never Pardons.

It Is Time To Be Old To Take In Sail.

Wherever We Go, Whatever We Do, Self Is The Sole Subject We Study And Learn.

But If A Man Would Be Alone, Let Him Look At The Stars. The Rays That Come From Those Heavenly Worlds, Will Separate Between Him And Vulgar Things.

The Hero Is He Who Is Immovably Centered.

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.

America Is Another Name For Opportunity.

Heroism Feels And Never Reasons, And Therefore Is Always Right.

The Beautiful Is Never Plentiful.

Nobody Trips Over Mountains. It Is The Small Pebble That Causes You To Stumble. Pass All The Pebbles In Your Path And You Will Find You Have Crossed The Mountain. The Mind Does Not Create What It Perceives, Anymore Than The Eye Creates The Rose.

Railroad Iron Is A Magician's Rod, In Its Power To Evoke The Sleeping Energies Of Land And Water.

The Longest Wave Is Quickly Lost In The Sea.

The Refining Influence Is The Study Of Art, Which Is The Science Of Beauty; And I Find That Every Man Values Every Scrap Of Knowledge In Art, Every Observation Of His Own In It, Every Hint He Has Caught From Another. For The Laws Of Beauty Are The Beauty Of Beauty, And Give The Mind The Same Or A Higher Joy Than The Sight Of It Gives The Senses. The Study Of Art Is Of High Value To The Growth Of The Intellect.

A Man Should Give Us A Sense Of Mass.

How Silent, How Spacious, What Room For All, Yet Without Place To Insert An Atom--in Graceful Succession, In Equal Fullness, In Balanced Beauty, The Dance Of The Hours Goes Forward Still. Like An Odor Of Incense, Like A Strain Of Music, Like A Sleep, It Is Inexact And Boundless. It Will Not Be Dissected, Nor Unraveled, Nor Shown.

Our Books Approach Very Slowly The Things We Most Wish To Know.

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

The Machine Unmakes The Man. Now That The Machine Is So Perfect, The Engineer Is Nobody.

In Self-trust All The Virtues Are Comprehended.

Every Chair Should Be A Throne And Hold A King.

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?

No Book Was Ever Written Down By Any But Itself.

We Find Delight In The Beauty And Happiness Of Children That Makes The Heart Too Big For The Body.

Nature Is A Rag-merchant, Who Works Up Every Shred And Ort And End Into New Creations; Like A Good Chemist, Whom I Found, The Other Day, In His Laboratory, Converting His Old Shirts Into Pure White Sugar.

The Soul Is The Perceiver And Revealer Of Truth. We Know Truth When We See It, Let Skeptic And Scoffer Say What They Choose. Foolish People Ask You, When You Have Spoken What They Do Not Wish To Hear, 'how Do You Know It Is Truth, And Not An Error Of Your Own?' We Know Truth When We See It, From Opinion, As We Know When We Are Awake That We Are Awake.

Philosophically Considered, The Universe Is Composed Of Nature And The Soul.

This Immediate Dependence Of Language Upon Nature, This Conversion Of An Outward Phenomenon Into A Type Of Somewhat In Human Life,never Loses Its Power To Affect Us. It Is This Which Gives That Piquancy To The Conversation Of A Strong-natured Farmer Or Backwoodsman, Which All Men Relish.

The Dice Of God Are Always Loaded.

I Wiped Away The Weeds And Foam, I Fetched My Sea-borne Treasures Home.

Some Men At The Approach Of A Dispute Neigh Like Horses. Unless There Be An Argument, They Think Nothing Is Doing. Some Talkers Excel In The Precision With Which They Formulate Their Thoughts, So That You Get From Them Somewhat To Remember; Others Lay Criticism Asleep By A Charm. Especially Women Use Words That Are Not Words,--as Steps In A Dance Are Not Steps,--but Reproduce The Genius Of That They Speak Of; As The Sound Of Some Bells Makes Us Think Of The Bell Merely, Whilst The Church Chimes In The Distance Bring The Church And Its Serious Memories Before Us.

The Tempered Light Of The Woods Is Like A Perpetual Morning.

A Man Must Keep An Eye On His Servants, If He Would Not Have Them Rule Him.

The Only Person You Are Destined To Become Is The Person You Decide To Be.

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

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.

We Dress Our Garden, Eat Our Dinners, Discuss The Household With Our Wives, And These Things Make No Impression, Are Forgotten Next Week; But In The Solitude To Which Every Man Is Always Returning, He Has A Sanity And Revelations, Which In His Passage Into New Worlds He Will Carry With Him. Never Mind The Ridicule, Never Mind The Defeat: Up Again, Old Heart! — It Seems To Say, — There Is Victory Yet For All Justice; And The True Romance Which The World Exists To Realize, Will Be The Transformation Of Genius Into Practical Power.

Progress Is The Activity Of Today And The Assurance Of Tomorrow

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

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

We Say Love Is Blind, And The Figure Of Cupid Is Drawn With A Bandage Around His Eyes. Blind - Yes, Because He Does Not See What He Does Not Like; But The Sharpest-sighted Hunter In The Universe Is Love For Finding What He Seeks, And Only That.

The President Proclaims War, And Those Senators Who Dissent Are Not Those Who Know Better, But Those Who Can Afford To...democracy Becomes A Government Of Bullies Tempered By Editors.

We Mark With Light In The Memory The Few Interviews We Have Had With Souls That Made Our Souls Wiser, That Spoke What We Thought, That Told Us What We Knew, That Gave Us Leave To Be What We Inly Are.

Our Health Is Our Sound Relation To External Objects; Our Sympathy With External Being.

The Babe In Arms Is A Channel Through Which The Energies We Call Fate, Love, And Reason Visibly Stream.

We Fetch Fire And Water, Run About All Day Among The Shops And Markets, And Get Our Clothes And Shoes Made And Mended, And Are Thevictims Of These Details, And Once In A Fortnight We Arrive Perhaps At A Rational Moment.

Writing Should Be The Settlement Of Dew On The Leaf.

There Is This To Be Said In Favor Of Drinking, That It Takes The Drunkard First Out Of Society, Then Out Of The World.

You Cannot Do A Kindness Too Soon, For You Never Know How Soon It Will Be Too Late.

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

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.

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

Spoons And Skimmers You Can Be Undistinguishably Together; But Vases And Statues Require Each A Pedestal For Itself.

Action Is With The Scholar Subordinate, But It Is Essential. Without It, He Is Not Yet Man. Without It, Thought Can Never Ripen Into Truth.

But Every Jet Of Chaos Which Threatens To Exterminate Us Is Convertible By Intellect Into Wholesome Force. Fate Is Unpenetrated Causes.

The Only Method To Possess A Buddy Is Always To Be One.

Body Cannot Teach Wisdom; God Only.

All Conservatives Are Such From Personal Defects. They Have Been Effiminated By Position Of Nature, Born Halt And Blind, Through Luxury Of Their Parents, And Can Only, Like Invalids, Act On The Defensive.

Times Of Heroism Are Generally Times Of Terror, But The Day Never Shines In Which This Element May Not Work.

The History Of Mankind Interests Us Only As It Exhibits A Steady Gain Of Truth And Right, In The Incessant Conflict Which It Records Between The Material And The Moral Nature.

We Are Born Believing. A Man Bears Beliefs As A Tree Bears Apples.

Conservatism Stands On Man's Confessed Limitations; Reform On His Indisputable Infinitude; Conservatism On Circumstance; Liberalism On Power; One Goes To Make An Adroit Member Of The Social Frame; The Other To Postpone All Things To The Man Himself.

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.

Our Life Is An Apprenticeship To The Truth That Around Every Circle Another Can Be Drawn; That There Is No End In Nature, But Every End Is A Beginning, And Under Every Deep A Lower Deep Opens.

Every Ship Is A Romantic Object, Except That We Sail In.

If We Meet No Gods, It Is Because We Harbor None.

The Simplest Words,--we Do Not Know What They Mean Except When We Love And Aspire.

The Good Spirit Never Cared For The Colleges, And Though All Men And Boys Were Now Drilled In Greek, Latin, And Mathematics, It Had Quite Left These Shells High On The Beach, And Was Creating And Feeding Other Matters [science] At Other Ends Of The World.

No Power Of Genius Has Ever Yet Had The Smallest Success In Explaining Existence. The Perfect Enigma Remains.

The Corruption Of Man Is Followed By The Corruption Of Language.

We Want But Two Or Three Friends, But These We Cannot Do Without, And They Serve Us In Every Thought We Think.

Accept The Place The Divine Providence Has Found For You, The Society Of Your Contemporaries, The Connection Of Events.

There Is A Class Of Persons To Whom By All Spiritual Affinity I Am Bought And Sold; For Them I Will Go To Prison, If Need Be; But Your Miscellaneous Popular Charities; The Education At College Of Fools; The Building Of Meeting-houses To The Vain End To Which Many Now Stand; Alms To Sots; And The Thousandfold Relief Societies; - Though I Confess With Shame I Sometimes Succumb And Give The Dollar, It Is A Wicked Dollar Which By And By I Shall Have The Manhood To Withhold.

A Great Man Is Always Willing To Be Little.

God Will Not Have His Work Made Manifest By Cowards

Cities Force Growth And Make Men Talkative And Entertaining, But They Make Them Artificial. What Possesses Interest For Us Is Thenatural Of Each, His Constitutional Excellence. This Is Forever A Surprise, Engaging And Lovely; We Cannot Be Satiated With Knowing It, And About It; And It Is This Which The Conversation With Nature Cherishes And Guards.

The Craft With Which The World Is Made Runs Also Into The Mind And Character Of Men. No Man Is Quite Sane; Each Has A Vein Of Folly In His Composition, A Slight Determination Of Blood To The Head, To Make Sure Of Holding Him Hard To Some One Point Which Nature Has Taken To Heart.

Moller, In His Essay On Architecture, Taught That The Building Which Was Fitted Accurately To Answer Its End Would Turn Out To Be Beautiful, Though Beauty Had Not Been Intended. I Find The Like Unity In Human Structures Rather Virulent And Pervasive.

Among The Multitude Of Scholars And Authors, We Feel No Hallowing Presence; We Are Sensible Of A Knack And Skill Rather Than Of Inspiration; They Have A Light, And Know Not Whence It Comes, And Call It Their Own; Their Talent Is Some Exaggerated Faculty, Some Overgrown Member, So That Their Strength Is A Disease.

An Eye Can Threaten Like A Loaded And Levelled Gun, Or It Can Insult Like Hissing Or Kicking; Or, In Its Altered Mood, By Beams Of Kindness, It Can Make The Heart Dance For Joy. ... One Of The Most Wonderful Things In Nature Is A Glance Of The Eye; It Transcends Speech; It Is The Bodily Symbol Of Identity.

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?

Not Always Can Flowers, Pearls, Poetry, Protestations, Nor Even Home In Another Heart, Content The Awful Soul That Dwells In Clay.

God Is Our Name For The Last Generalization To Which We Can Arrive.

Walking Has The Best Value As Gymnastics Of The Mind.

In Spite Of Virtue And The Muse, Nemesis Will Have Her Dues, And All Our Struggles And Our Toils Tighter Wind The Giant Coils.

It Is Hard To Mesmerize Ourselves, To Whip Our Own Top; But Through Sympathy We Are Capable Of Energy And Endurance. Concert Fires People To A Certain Fury Of Performance They Can Rarely Reach Alone.

Wise Men Are Not Wise At All Times.

The Power Of A Man Increases Steadily By Continuing In One Direction.

Spring Still Makes Spring In The Mind When Sixty Years Are Told: Love Wakes Anew This Throbbing Heart, And We Are Never Old Over The Winter Glaciers I See The Summer Glow And Through The Wind-piled Snowdrift The Warm Rosebuds Below.

If You Would Learn To Write, It Is In The Street You Must Learn It. Both For The Vehicle And For The Aims Of Fine Arts, You Must Frequent The Public Square. The People, And Not The College, Is The Writer's Home. A Scholar Is A Candle Which The Love And Desire Of All Men Will Light.

The Creation Of A Thousand Forests Is In One Acorn.

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

Fate, Then, Is A Name For Facts Not Yet Passed Under The Fire Of Thought; For Causes Which Are Unpenetrated.

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

The Whole Constitution Of Property On Its Present Tenures, Is Injurious, And Its Influence On Persons Deteriorating And Degrading.

One Of The Most Wonderful Things In Nature Is A Glance Of The Eye; It Transcends Speech; It Is The Bodily Symbol Of Identity.

Whoso Would Be A Man, Must Be A Nonconformist. He Who Would Gather Immortal Palms Must Not Be Hindered By The Name Of Goodness, But Must Explore It If It Be Goodness. Nothing Is At Last Sacred But The Integrity Of Your Own Mind. Absolve You To Yourself, And You Shall Have The Suffrage Of The World.

Truth, And Goodness, And Beauty, Are But Different Faces Of The Same All

Different Faces

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.

The Flowering Of Civilization Is The Finished Man, The Man Of Sense, Of Grace, Of Accomplishment, Of Social Power--the Gentleman.

Trending Author

Theodore Dalrymple

Category