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The Poet Needs A Ground In Popular Tradition On Which He May Work, And Which, Again, May Restrain His Art Within The Due Temperance. It Holds Him To The People, Supplies A Foundation For His Edifice; And, In Furnishing So Much Work Done To His Hand, Leaves Him At Leisure, And In Full Strength For The Audacities Of His Imagination.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The Poet Needs A

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The Poet Needs A Ground In Popular Tradition On Which He May Work, And Which, Again, May Restrain His Art Within The Due Temperance. It Holds Him To The People, Supplies A Foundation For His Edifice; And, In Furnishing So Much Work Done To His Hand, Leaves Him At Leisure, And In Full Strength For The Audacities Of His Imagination.

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The Difference Between The Actual And The Ideal Force Of Man Is Happily Figured In By The Schoolmen, In Saying, That The Knowledgeof Man Is An Evening Knowledge, Vespertina Cognitio, But That Of God Is A Morning Knowledge, Matutina Cognitio.

When He Has Seen, That It Is Not His, Nor Any Man's, But It Is The Soul Which Made The World, And That It Is All Accessible To Him, He Will Know That He, As Its Minister, May Rightfully Hold All Things Subordinate And Answerable To It.

Sorrow Makes Us All Children Again - Destroys All Differences Of Intellect. The Wisest Know Nothing.

I Will Not Live Out Of Me I Will Not See With Others' Eyes My Good Is Good, My Evil Ill I Would Be Free.

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

We Owe To Genius Always The Same Debt, Of Lifting The Curtain From The Common, And Showing Us That Divinities Are Sitting Disguised In The Seeming Gang Of Gypsies And Peddlars.

In Talking With Scholars, I Observe That They Lost On Ruder Companions Those Years Of Boyhood Which Alone Could Give Imaginative Literature A Religious And Infinite Quality In Their Esteem.

Successful People Live Well, Laugh Often, And Love Much. They've Filled A Niche And Accomplished Tasks So As To Leave The World Better Than They Found It, While Looking For The Best In Others, And Giving The Best They Have.

Pay No Heed To The Average Photographer's Remarks Upon "flat" And "weak" Negatives. Probably He Is Flat, Weak, Stale, And Unprofitable; Your Negative May Be First-rate, And Probably Is If He Does Not Approve Of It.

There Is No Chance And Anarchy In The Universe. All Is System And Gradation. Every God Is There Sitting In His Sphere.

The World Proceeds From The Same Spirit As The Body Of Man. It Is A Remoter And Inferior Incarnation Of God, A Projection Of God In The Unconscious.

All Promise Outruns Performance.

Religion Is As Effectively Destroyed By Bigotry As By Indifference.

Tis The Good Reader That Makes The Good Book; A Good Head Cannot Read Amiss: In Every Book He Finds Passages Which Seem Confidences Or Asides Hidden From All Else And Unmistakeably Meant For His Ear.

The Mob Is Man Voluntarily Descending To The Nature Of The Beast. Its Fit Hour Of Activity Is Night. Its Actions Are Insane Like Its Whole Constitution. It Persecutes A Principle; It Would Whip A Right; It Would Tar And Feather Justice, By Inflicting Fire And Outrage Upon The Houses And Persons Of Those Who Have These. It Resembles The Prank Of Boys, Who Run With Fire-engines To Put Out The Ruddy Aurora Streaming To The Stars.

Every Moment Instructs, And Every Object; For Wisdom Is Infused Into Every Form. It Has Been Poured Into Us As Blood; It Convulsed Us As Pain; It Slid Into Us As Pleasure; It Enveloped Us In Dull, Melancholy Days, Or In Days Of Cheerful Labor; We Did Not Guess Its Essence Until After Long Time.

A Man Should Learn To Detect And Watch That Gleam Of Light Which Flashes Across His Mind From Within, More Than The Lustre Of The Firmament Of Bards And Sages. Yet He Dismisses Without Notice His Thought, Because It Is His. In Every Work Of Genius We Recognize Our Own Rejected Thoughts: They Come Back To Us With A Certain Alienated Majesty.

Blame Is Safer Than Praise

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.

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

There Is Always Safety In Valor.

A Low Self-love In The Parent Desires That His Child Should Repeat His Character And Fortune.

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.

The Secret Of Success In Education Is Respecting The Students.

Secret To Success

Doing Well Is The Result Of Doing Good. That's What Capitalism Is All About.

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

A Strenuous Soul Hates Cheap Success.

History Is Full, Down To This Day, Of The Imbecility Of Kings And Governors. They Are A Class Of Persons Much To Be Pitied, For They Know Not What They Should Do.

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.

One Definition Of Man Is An Intelligence Served By Organs.

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

We Fancy Men Are Individuals; So Are Pumpkins; But Every Pumpkin In The Field Goes Through Every Point Of Pumpkin History.

There Are Not In The World At Any One Time More Than A Dozen Persons Who Read And Understand Plato:-never Enough To Pay For An Edition Of His Works; Yet To Every Generation These Come Duly Down, For The Sake Of Those Few Persons, As If God Brought Them Written In His Hand.

Wise Men Are Not Wise At All Hours, And Will Speak Five Times From Their Taste Or Their Humor, To Once From Their Reason.

Always The Seer Is A Sayer. Somehow His Dream Is Told; Somehow He Publishes It With Solemn Joy: Sometimes With Pencil On Canvas, Sometimes With Chisel On Stone, Sometimes In Towers And Aisles Of Granite, His Soul's Worship Is Builded; Sometimes In Anthems Of Indefinite Music, But Clearest And Most Permanent, In Words.

Every Mind Has A New Compass, A New Direction Of Its Own, Differencing Its Genius And Aim From Every Other Mind.--we Call This Specialty The Bias Of Each Individual. And None Of Us Will Ever Accomplish Anything Excellent Or Commanding Except When He Listens To This Whisper Which Is Heard By Him Alone.

One Of The Illusions Of Life Is That The Present Hour Is Not The Critical, Decisive One.

Wit Makes Its Own Welcome, And Levels All Distinction. No Dignity, No Learning, No Force Of Character, Can Make Any Stand Against Good Wit. It Is Like Ice, On Which No Beauty Of Form, No Majesty Of Carriage, Can Plead Any Immunity; They Must Walk Gingerly, According To The Laws Of Ice, Or Down They Must Go, Dignity And All.

As The Sandwich Islander Believes That The Strength And Valor Of The Enemy He Kills Passes Into Himself, So We Gain The Strength Of The Temptation We Resist.

He That Rides His Hobby Gently Must Always Give Way To Him That Rides His Hobby Hard.

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.

Flowers So Strictly Belong To Youth, That We Adult Men Soon Come To Feel, That Their Beautiful Generations Concern Not Us: We Havehad Our Day; Now Let The Children Have Theirs. The Flowers Jilt Us, And We Are Old Bachelors With Our Ridiculous Tenderness.

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.

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

Let The Realist Not Mind Appearances. Let Him Delegate To Others The Costly Courtesies And Decorations Of Social Life. The Virtuesare Economists, But Some Of The Vices Are Also. Thus, Next To Humility, I Have Noticed That Pride Is A Pretty Good Husband. A Good Pride Is, As I Reckon It, Worth From Five Hundred To Fifteen Hundred A Year.

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 Books... Which Rank In Our Life With Parents And Lovers And Passionate Experiences.

Let A Man Then Know His Worth And Keep Things Under His Feet.

History Is The Action And Reaction Of These Two, Nature And Thought.

A Great Man Will Find A Great Subject, Or Which Is The Same Thing, Make Any Subject Great.

We Seek Our Friend Not Sacredly, But With An Adulterate Passion Which Would Appropriate Him To Ourselves.

Stay At Home In Your Mind. Don't Recite Other People's Opinions.

Nothing Is Quite Beautiful Alone; Nothing But Is Beautiful In The Whole. A Single Object Is Only So Far Beautiful As It Suggests This Universal Grace.

Even In The Mud And Scum Of Things, Something Always, Always Sings.

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

A Great Man Scarcely Knows How He Dines, How He Dresses; But Without Railing Or Precision, His Living Is Natural And Poetic.

We Don't Grow Old. When We Cease To Grow, We Become Old.

Law Rules Throughout Existence, A Law Which Is Not Intelligent, But Intelligence.

For The World Is Not Painted, Or Adorned, But Is From The Beginning Beautiful; And God Has Not Made Some Beautiful Things, But Beauty Is The Creator Of The Universe.

The Gentleman Is A Man Of Truth.

I Have Heard That Whoever Loves Is In No Condition Old.

Faith And Love Are Apt To Be Spasmodic In The Best Minds: Men Live On The Brink Of Mysteries And Harmonies Into Which Yet They Never Enter, And With Their Hand On The Doorlatch They Die Outside.

The Value Of A Principle Is The Number Of Things It Will Explain.

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

A Great Man Is Always Willing To Be Little.

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

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.

As Every Pool Reflects The Image Of The Sun, So Every Thought And Thing Restores Us An Image And Creature Of The Supreme Good. Theuniverse Is Perforated By A Million Channels For His Activity. All Things Mount And Mount.

Wit Makes Its Own Welcome, And Levels All Distinctions.

Nothing Is Dead: Men Feign Themselves Dead, And Endure Mock Funerals And Mournful Obituaries, And There They Stand Looking Out Ofthe Window, Sound And Well, In Some New And Strange Disguise.

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

Men Over Forty Are No Judges Of A Book Written In A New Spirit.

The Soul Contains The Event That Shall Befall It, For The Event Is Only The Actualization Of Its Thoughts; And What We Pray To Ourselves For Is Always Granted.

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.

When A Man Thinks Happily, He Finds No Foot-track In The Field He Traverses. All Spontaneous Thought Is Irrespective Of All Else.

Before We Acquire Great Power We Must Acquire Wisdom To Use It Well.

Cut These Words And They Would Bleed; They Are Vascular And Alive.

Welcome Evermore To Gods And Men Is The Self-helping Man.

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.

Our Religion Vulgarly Stands On Numbers Of Believers. Whenever The Appeal Is Made--no Matter How Indirectly--to Numbers, Proclamation Is Then And There Made, That Religion Is Not. He That Finds God A Sweet, Enveloping Presence, Who Shall Dare To Come In?

All Life Is A Nap. The More Naps You Take The Better.

An Orchard, Good Tillage, Good Grounds, Seem A Fixture, Like A Gold Mine, Or A River, To A Citizen; But To A Large Farmer, Not Much More Fixed Than The State Of The Crop.

We Are By Nature Observers, And Thereby Learners. That Is Our Permanent State.

We Love Flattery, Even Though We Are Not Deceived By It, Because It Shows That We Are Of Importance Enough To Be Courted.

Speak What You Think Today In Hard Words And Tomorrow Speak What Tomorrow Thinks In Hard Words Again, Though It Contradict Every Thing You Said Today.

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.

Some Will Always Be Above Others. Destroy The Inequality Today, And It Will Appear Again Tomorrow.

Life Is Girt All Round With A Zodiac Of Sciences, The Contributions Of Men Who Have Perished To Add Their Point Of Light To Our Sky. ... These Road-makers On Every Hand Enrich Us. We Must Extend The Area Of Life And Multiply Our Relations. We Are As Much Gainers By Finding A Property In The Old Earth As By Acquiring A New Planet.

A Sympathetic Person Is Placed In The Dilemma Of A Swimmer Among Drowning Men, Who All Catch At Him, And If He Gives So Much As A Leg Or A Finger, They Will Drown Him.

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.

In Our Definitions, We Grope After The Spiritual By Describing It As Invisible. The True Meaning Of Spiritual Is Real; That Law Which Executes Itself, Which Works Without Means, And Which Cannot Be Conceived As Not Existing.

Power Is In Nature The Essential Measure Of Right.

Let The River Roll Which Way It Will, Cities Will Rise On Its Banks.

I Hear Therefore With Joy Whatever Is Beginning To Be Said Of The Dignity And Necessity Of Labor To Every Citizen. There Is Virtue Yet In The Hoe And The Spade, For Learned As Well As For Unlearned Hands. And Labor Is Everywhere Welcome; Always We Are Invited To Work; Only Be This Limitation Observed, That A Man Shall Not For The Sake Of Wider Activity Sacrifice Any Opinion To The Popular Judgments And Modes Of Action.

Let Us Unlearn Our Wisdom Of The World. Let Us Lie Low In The Lord's Power, And Learn That Truth Alone Makes Rich And Great.

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

A Man Builds A Fine House; And Now He Has A Master, And A Task For Life.

It Is Noticed, That The Consideration Of The Great Periods And Spaces Of Astronomy Induces A Dignity Of Mind, And An Indifferenceto Death.

The World Is His Who Has Money To Go Over It.

Power Educates The Potentate.

How Often We Must Remember The Art Of The Surgeon, Which, In Replacing The Broken Bone, Contents Itself With Releasing The Parts From False Position; They Fly Into Place By The Action Of The Muscles. On This Art Of Nature All Our Arts Rely.

In Good Company, The Individuals Merge Their Egotism Into A Social Soul Exactly Co-extensive With The Several Consciousnesses There Present.

The Experience Of Each New Age Requires A New Confession, And The World Seems Always Waiting For Its Poet

An Individual Man Is A Fruit Which It Cost All The Foregoing Ages To Form And Ripen. He Is Strong, Not To Do, But To Live; Not In His Arms, But In His Heart; Not As An Agent, But As A Fact.

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

Circles, Like The Soul, Are Neverending And Turn Round And Round Without A Stop.

To Help The Young Soul, To Add Energy, Inspire Hope, And Blow The Coals Into A Useful Flame; To Redeem Defeat By New Thought And Firm Action, This, Though Not Easy, Is The Work Of Divine Men.

For Beauty Is God's Handwriting...a Nd, Thank God For It As A Cup Of His Blessing.

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

That Which We Call Character Is A Reserved Force Which Acts Directly By Presence, And Without Means. It Is Conceived Of As A Certain Undemonstrable Force, A Familiar Or Genius, By Whose Impulses The Man Is Guided, But Whose Counsels He Cannot Impart.

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

We Are Not Free To Use Today, Or To Promise Tomorrow, Because We Are Already Mortgaged To Yesterday.

Genius, Even, As It Is The Greatest Good, Is He Greatest Harm.

Nothing Is Great But The Inexhaustible Wealth Of Nature.

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

Only That Mind Draws Me Which I Cannot Read.

What A New Face Courage Puts On Everything!

The Reason Why Men Do Not Obey Us, Is Because They See The Mud At The Bottom Of Our Eye.

Men Achieve A Certain Greatness Unawares When Working To Another Aim.

There Is A Principle Which Is The Basis Of Things, Which All Speech Aims To Say, And All Action To Evolve, A Simple, Quiet, Undescribed, Undescribable Presence, Dwelling Very Peacefully In Us, Our Rightful Lord: We Are Not To Do, But To Let Do; Not To Work, But To Be Worked Upon.

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

I Cannot Forgive A Scholar His Homeless Despondency.

Imagination Is A Very High Sort Of Seeing.

In Like Manner The Effect Of Every Action Is Measured By The Depth Of The Sentiment From Which It Proceeds. The Great Man Knew Not That He Was Great. It Took A Century Or Two For That Fact To Appear. What He Did, He Did, He Did Because He Must; It Was The Most Natural Thing In The World, And Grew Out Of The Circumstances Of The Moment.

Only A Biker Knows Why A Dog Sticks His Head Out Of A Car Window.

This Is My Wish For You: Comfort On Difficult Days, Smiles When Sadness Intrudes, Rainbows To Follow The Clouds, Laughter To Kiss Your Lips, Sunsets To Warm Your Heart, Hugs When Spirits Sag, Beauty For Your Eyes To See, Friendships To Brighten Your Being, Faith So That You Can Believe, Confidence For When You Doubt, Courage To Know Yourself, Patience To Accept The Truth, Love To Complete Your Life.

When We Have Broken Our God Of Tradition, And Ceased From Our God Of Rhetoric, Then May God Fire The Heart With His Presence.

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.

Eloquence Must Be Grounded On The Plainest Narrative.

There Is One Mind Common To All Individual Men. Every Man Is An Inlet To The Same And To All Of The Same.

I Like A Man Who Likes To See A Fine Barn As Well As A Good Tragedy.

The True Ship Is The Ship Builder.

The Genius Is A Genius By The First Look He Casts On Any Object. Is His Eye Creative? Does He Not Rest In Angles And Colors, But Beholds The Design,--he Will Presently Undervalue The Actual Object.

Christianity Taught The Capacity, The Element, To Love The All-perfect Without A Stingy Bargain For Personal Happiness. It Taught That To Love Him Was Happiness;--to Love Him In Others' Virtues.

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.

An Institution Is The Lengthened Shadow Of One Man.

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.

In The Highest Civilization, The Book Is Still The Highest Delight. He Who Has Once Known Its Satisfactions Is Provided With A Resource Against Calamity.

The Soul Is No Traveller; The Wise Man Stays At Home, And When His Necessities, His Duties, On Any Occasion Call Him From His House, Or Into Foreign Lands, He Is At Home Still, And Shall Make Men Sensible By The Expression Of His Countenance, That He Goes The Missionary Of Wisdom And Virtue, And Visits Cities And Men Like A Sovereign, And Not Like An Interloper Or A Valet.

The Best Lightning Rod For Your Protection Is Your Own Spine.

Necessity Does Everything Well. In Our Condition Of Universal Dependence, It Seems Heroic To Let The Petitioner Be The Judge Of His Necessity, And To Give All That Is Asked, Though At Great Inconvenience.

Look Out! Behind You!

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.

Traveling Is A Fool's Paradise. Our First Journeys Discover To Us The Indifference Of Places.

When Good Is Near You, When You Have Life In Yourself, It Is Not By Any Known Or Accustomed Way; You Shall Not Discern The Foot-prints Of Any Other; You Shall Not See The Face Of Man; You Shall Not Hear Any Name; The Way, The Thought, The Good, Shall Be Wholly Strange And New. It Shall Exclude Example And Experience.

When We Have Arrived At The Question, The Answer Is Already Near.

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

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

There Is No One Who Does Not Exaggerate!

Exaggeration Is

A Moment Is A Concentrated Eternity.

If I Should Go Out Of Church Whenever I Hear A False Statement I Could Never Stay There Five Minutes. But Why Come Out? The Streetis As False As The Church, And When I Get To My House, Or To My Manners, Or To My Speech, I Have Not Got Away From The Lie.

No Facts Are To Me Sacred; None Are Profane; I Simply Experiment, An Endless Seeker, With No Past At My Back.

The Exercise Of All The Senses Is As Intense Pleasure, As Anyone Will Find, Who Recovers The Use Of One After Being Deprived Of It.

People Disparage Knowing And The Intellectual Life, And Urge Doing. I Am Content With Knowing, If Only I Could Know.

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.

The Office Of The Scholar Is To Cheer, To Raise, And To Guide Men By Showing Them Facts Amidst Appearances.

For He That Feeds Men Serveth Few; He Serves All Who Dares Be True.

There Comes A Period Of The Imagination To Each--a Later Youth--the Power Of Beauty, The Power Of Looks, Of Poetry.

There Are Always Two Parties; The Establishment And The Movement.

We Love Force And We Care Very Little How It Is Exhibited.

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

We Are All Wise For Other People, None For Himself.

Evil Is Merely Privative, Not Absolute: It Is Like Cold, Which Is The Privation Of Beat.

The Flowers Talk When The Wind Blows Over Them.

A Good Intention Clothes Itself With Sudden Power. When A God Wishes To Ride, Any Chip Or Pebble Will Bud And Shoot Out Winged Feet, And Serve Him For A Horse.

Not For Nothing One Face, One Character, One Fact Makes Much Impression On Him, And Another None.

The Quality Of The Thought Differences The Egyptian And The Roman, The Austrian And The American.

Surely Nobody Would Be A Charlatan, Who Could Afford To Be Sincere.

We Infer The Spirit Of The Nation In Great Measure From The Language, Which Is A Sort Of Monument, To Which Each Forcible Individual In A Course Of Many Hundred Years Has Contributed A Stone.

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

Wealth Brings With It Its Own Checks And Balances. The Basis Of Political Economy Is Noninterference. The Only Safe Rule Is Found In The Self-adjusting Meter Of Demand And Supply. Open The Doors Of Opportunity To Talent And Virtue And They Will Do Themselves Justice, And Property Will Not Be In Bad Hands. In A Free And Just Commonwealth, Property Rushes From The Idle And Imbecile To The Industrious, Brave And Persevering.

A New Degree Of Intellectual Power Seems Cheap At Any Price.

Every Discourse Is An Approximate Answer: But It Is Of Small Consequence, That We Do Not Get It Into Verbs And Nouns, Whilst It Abides For Contemplation Forever.

Belief And Love,--a Believing Love Will Relieve Us Of A Vast Load Of Care. O My Brothers, God Exists. There Is A Soul At The Centre Of Nature, And Over The Will Of Every Man, So That None Of Us Can Wrong The Universe.

Some Men, At The Approach Of A Dispute, Neigh Like Horses.

The Arts And Inventions Of Each Period Are Only Its Costume, And Do Not Invigorate Men.

Infancy Is The Perpetual Messiah, Which Comes Into The Arms Of Fallen Men, And Pleads With Them To Return To Paradise.

A Part Of Fate Is The Freedom Of Man. Forever Wells Up The Impulse Of Choosing And Acting In His Soul.

The State Must Follow, And Not Lead, The Character And Progress Of The Citizen.

A Man Should Learn To Detect And Watch That Gleam Of Light Which Flashes Across His Mind From Within, More Than The Luster Of The Firmament Of Bards And Sages

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

Men Cease To Interest Us When We Find Their Limitations. The Only Sin Is Limitation. As Soon As You Once Come Up With A Man's Limitations, It Is All Over With Him.

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.

The Only True Gifts Are A Portion Of Yourself.

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

When A Man Lives With God, His Voice Shall Be As Sweet As The Murmur Of The Brook And Rustle Of The Corn.

Who Loses A Day Loses Life.

Nature, As We Know Her, Is No Saint.... She Comes Eating And Drinking And Sinning.

All History Is A Record Of The Power Of Minorities, And Of Minorities Of One.

Wit Makes Its Own Welcome, And Levels All Distinctions. No Dignity, No Learning, No Force Of Character, Can Make Any Stand Against Good Wit.

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

If I Made Laws For Shakers Or A School, I Should Gazette Every Saturday All The Words They Were Wont To Use In Reporting Religious Experience, As "spiritual Life," "god," "soul," "cross," Etc., And If They Could Not Find New Ones Next Week, They Might Remain Silent.

But Lest I Should Mislead Any When I Have My Own Head And Obey My Whims, Let Me Remind The Reader That I Am Only An Experimenter.do Not Set The Least Value On What I Do, Or The Least Discredit On What I Do Not, As If I Pretended To Settle Any Thing As True Or False. I Unsettle All Things. No Facts Are To Me Sacred; None Are Profane; I Simply Experiment, An Endless Seeker With No Past At My Back.

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.

God Builds His Temple In The Heart On The Ruins Of Churches And Religions.

A State Of War Or Anarchy, In Which Law Has Little Force, Is So Far Valuable, That It Puts Every Man On Trial. The Man Of Principle Is Known As Such, And Even In The Fury Of Faction Is Respected.

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

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.

Philanthropic And Religious Bodies Do Not Commonly Make Their Executive Officers Out Of Saints.

In The Morning A Man Walks With His Whole Body; In The Evening, Only With His Legs.

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