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The Test Of Civilization Is The Power Of Drawing The Most Benefit Out Of Cities.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The Test Of Civilization

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The Test Of Civilization Is The Power Of Drawing The Most Benefit Out Of Cities.

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A Deep Man Believes That The Evil Eye Can Whither, The Heart's Blessing Can Heal, And That Love Can Overcome All Odds.

Savages Cling To A Local God Of One Tribe Or Town. The Broad Ethics Of Jesus Were Quickly Narrowed To Village Theologies, Which Preach An Election Or Favoritism.

By Virtue Of The Deity Thought Renews Itself Inexhaustibly Every Day And The Thing Whereon It Shines, Though It Were Dust And Sand, Is A New Subject With Countless Relations.

Two Sorts Of Writers Possess Genius: Those Who Think, And Those Who Cause Others To Think.

Each Particle Is A Microcosm, And Faithfully Renders The Likeness Of The World.

The Instinct Of The People Is Right.

Yet America Is A Poem In Our Eyes; Its Ample Geography Dazzles The Imagination, And It Will Not Wait Long For Metres.

But In Our Experience, Man Is Cheap And Friendship Wants Its Deep Sense. We Affect To Dwell With Our Friends In Their Absence, But We Do Not; When Deed, Word, Or Letter Comes Not, They Let Us Go.

Any Extraordinary Degree Of Beauty In Man Or Woman Involves A Moral Charm.

The Intellectual Life May Be Kept Clean And Healthful, If Man Will Live The Life Of Nature, And Not Import Into His Mind Difficulties Which Are None Of His.

Why Should We Fear To Be Crushed By Savage Elements, We Who Are Made Up Of The Same Elements?

I Have Never Met A Man Who Was Not My Superior In Some Particular.

Always Do What You Are Afraid To Do.

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.

Travel Is A Fools Paradise.

The Cardinal Virtue Of A Teacher [is] To Protect The Pupil From His Own Influence.

The Highest Virtue Is Always Against The Law.

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

Nature Is The Symbol Of Spirit.

The Aspect Of Nature Is Devout. Like The Figure Of Jesus, She Stands With Bended Head, And Hands Folded Upon The Breast. The Happiest Man Is He Who Learns From Nature The Lesson Of Worship.

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.

Come, See The North-wind's Masonry, Out Of An Unseen Quarry Evermore Furnished With Tile, The Fierce Artificer Curves His White Bastions With Projected Roof Round Every Windward Stake, Or Tree, Or Door. Speeding, The Myriad-handed, His Wild Work So Fanciful, So Savage, Naught Cares He For Number Or Proportion.

I Have Heard That Stiff People Lose Something Of Their Awkwardness Under High Ceilings, And In Spacious Halls. I Think, Sculptureand Painting Have An Effect To Teach Us Manners, And Abolish Hurry.

Tis A Short Sight To Limit Our Faith In Laws To Those Of Gravity, Of Chemistry, Of Botany, And So Forth.

Senators And Presidents Have Climbed So High With Pain Enough, Not Because They Think The Place Specially Agreeable, But As An Apology For Real Worth, And To Vindicate Their Manhood In Our Eyes. This Conspicuous Chair Is Their Compensation To Themselves For Being Of A Poor, Cold, Hard Nature.

Nature Hates Calculators.

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.

What Is A Weed? A Plant Whose Virtues Have Not Yet Been Discovered.[what Is A Sorrow? A Feeling Whose Benefits Have Not Yet Been Discovered]

Conservatism Is Affluent And Openhanded, But There Is A Cunning Juggle In Riches. I Observe That They Take Somewhat For Everythingthey Give. I Look Bigger, But Am Less; I Have More Clothes, But Am Nit So Warm; More Armor, But Less Courage; More Books, But Less Wit.

Fear God, And Where You Go Men Shall Think They Walk In Hallowed Cathedrals.

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.

If You Know You Are Right, Stay The Course Even Though The Whole World Seems To Be Against You And Everyone You Know Questions Your Judgment. When You Prevail--and You Eventually Will If You Stick To The Job--they Will All Tell You That They Knew All Along You Could Do It.

Spirit, That Made Those Heroes Dare To Die, And Leave Their Children Free, Bid Time And Nature Gently Spare The Shaft We Raise To Them And Thee.

Poetry Makes Its Own Pertinence, And A Single Stanza Outweighs A Book Of Prose.

There Is More In Every Person's Soul Than We Think.

The Greatest Gift Is A Portion Of Thyself.

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.

Whatever You Do, You Need Courage. Whatever Course You Decide Upon, There Is Always Someone To Tell You That You Are Wrong. There Are Always Difficulties Arising That Tempt You To Believe Your Critics Are Right. To Map Out A Course Of Action And Follow It To An End Requires Some Of The Same Courage That A Soldier Needs. Peace Has Its Victories, But It Takes Brave Men And Women To Win Them.

Common Sense Is Genius Dressed In Its Working Clothes.

I Am Ashamed To See What A Shallow Village Tale Our So-called History Is.

Man Exists For His Own Sake And Not To Add A Laborer To The State.

Shallow Men Believe In Luck. Strong Men Believe In Cause And Effect.

We Seldom See Anybody Who Is Not Uneasy Or Afraid To Live.

I Am A Willow Of The Wilderness, Loving The Wind That Bent Me.

My Hours Are Peaceful Centuries.

The Passive Master Lent His Hand, To The Vast Soul Which O'er Him Planned.

We Are Such Lovers Of Self-reliance, That We Excuse In A Man Many Sins, If He Will Show Us A Complete Satisfaction In His Position, Which Asks No Leave To Be, Of Mine, Or Any Man's Good Opinion.

What I Must Do Is All That Concerns Me, Not What The People Think.

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

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

The World Is Always Childish, And With Each New Gewgaw Of A Revolution Or New Constitution That It Finds, Thinks It Shall Never Cry Any More.

The Private Life Of One Man Shall Be A More Illustrious Monarchy,--more Formidable To Its Enemy, More Sweet And Serene In Its Influence To Its Friend, Than Any Kingdom In History. For A Man, Rightly Viewed, Comprehendeth The Particular Natures Of All Men.

Congratulate Yourself If You Have Done Something Strange, Extravagant And Broken The Monotony.

Conversation Is An Art In Which A Man Has All Mankind For His Competitors, For It Is That Which All Are Practising Every Day While They Live.

Life Is Comic Or Pitiful As Soon As The High Ends Of Being Fade Out Of Sight, And Man Becomes Near-sighted, And Can Only Attend Towhat Addresses The Senses.

But There Is No End To The Praise Of Books, To The Value Of The Library. Who Shall Estimate Their Influence On Our Population Where All The Millions Read And Write ? It Is The Joy Of Nations That Man Can Communicate All His Thoughts, Discoveries And Virtues To Records That May Last For Centuries.

Men Are Like Geneva Watches With Crystal Faces, Which Expose The Whole Movement.

He Decided To Give Up His Large Ambition Of Knowledge And Action For Any Narrow Craft Or Profession, Aiming At A Much More Comprehensive Calling, The Art Of Living.

Good Nature Is Stronger Than Tomahawks.

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.

Thanks To The Morning Light, Thanks To The Foaming Sea, To The Uplands Of New Hampshire, To The Green-haired Forest Free.

Men Love To Wonder, And That Is The Seed Of Science.

There Is No Strong Performance Without A Little Fanaticism In The Performer.

Genius Is Saying What Is In Your Heart, Because It's In Everyone's Heart.

We Stand Against Fate, As Children Stand Up Against The Wall In Their Father's House, And Notch Their Height From Year To Year. But When The Boy Grows To A Man, And Is Master Of The House, He Pulls Down That Wall And Builds It New And Bigger.

How Beautiful To Have The Church Always Open, So That Every Tired Wayfaring Man May Come In And Be Soothed By All That Art Can Suggest Of A Better World When He Is Weary With This.

Every Man Is Eloquent Once In His Life.

Public Speaking

Every Man Is As Lazy As He Dares To Be.

Our Expense Is Almost All For Conformity. It Is For Cake That We Run In Debt; 'tis Not The Intellect, Not The Heart, Not Beauty, Not Worship, That Costs So Much.

The Sentence Must Also Contain Its Own Apology For Being Spoken.

I Like The Silent Church Before The Service Begins, Better Than Any Preaching. How Far Off, How Cool, How Chaste The Persons Look,begirt Each One With A Precinct Or Sanctuary!

The Virtue In Most Request Is Conformity.

Blame Is Safer Than Praise

It Is Said That When Manners Are Licentious, A Revolution Is Always Near: The Virtue Of Woman Being The Main Girth And Bandage Ofsociety; Because A Man Will Not Lay Up An Estate For Children Any Longer Than Whilst He Believes Them To Be His Own.

If Government Knew How, I Should Like To See It Check, Not Multiply, The Population. When It Reaches Its True Law Of Action, Every Man That Is Born Will Be Hailed As Essential.

That Which Befits Us, Embosomed In Beauty And Wonder As We Are, Is Cheerfulness, And Courage, And The Endeavor To Realize Our Aspirations. Shall Not The Heart Which Has Received So Much, Trust The Power By Which It Lives? May It Not Quit Other Leadings, And Listen To The Soul That Has Guided It So Gently, And Taught It So Much, Secure That The Future Will Be Worthy Of The Past?

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

Every Chair Should Be A Throne And Hold A King.

The Roses Under My Window Make No Reference To Former Roses Or Better Ones; They Are What They Are; They Exist With God Today. There Is No Time To Them. There Is Simply The Rose; It Is Perfect In Every Moment Of Its Existence.

But It Is A Cold, Lifeless Business When You Go To The Shops To Buy Something, Which Does Not Represent Your Life And Talent, But A Goldsmith's.

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.

A Mind Might Ponder Its Thought For An Epoch, And Not Gain So Much Self-knowledge As The Passion Of Love Shall Teach In A Day.

The Hero Is Suffered To Be Himself.

What Is Man Born For But To Be A Reformer, A Remaker Of What Man Has Made? A Renouncer Of Lies; A Restorer Of Truth And Good? Imitating That Great Nature Which Embossoms Us All, And Which Sleeps No Moment On An Old Past, But Every Hour Repairs Herself, Yielding Us Every Morning A New Day, With Every Breath A New Life?

Why Should We Grope Among The Dry Bones Of The Past, Or Put The Living Generation Into Masquerade Out Of Its Faded Wardrobe?

Be Silly. Be Honest. Be Kind.

Great Men, Great Nations, Have Not Been Boasters And Buffoons, But Perceivers Of The Terror Of Life, And Have Manned Themselves To Face It.

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.

Men Do Not Believe In The Power Of Education. We Do Not Think We Can Speak To Divine Sentiments In Man, And We Do Not Try. We Renounce All High Aims.

History - A Biography Of A Few Stout And Earnest Persons

We Have More Than We Use.

Use It Or Lose It

It Is So Wonderful To Our Neurologists That A Man Can See Without His Eyes, That It Does Not Occur To Them That Is Just As Wonderful That He Should See With Them; And 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.

A Wise Writer Will Feel That The Ends Of Study And Composition Are Best Answered By Announcing Undiscovered Regions Of Thought, And So Communicating, Through Hope, New Activity To The Torpid Spirit.

God Will Have Life To Be Real; We Will Be Damned, But It Shall Be Theatrical.

The Reason Why Any One Refuses His Assent To Your Opinion, Or His Aid To Your Benevolent Design, Is In You: He Refuses To Accept You As A Bringer Of Truth, Because, Though You Think You Have It, He Feels That You Have It Not. You Have Not Given Him The Authentic Sign.

Vanity Costs Money, Labor, Horses, Men, Women, Health And Peace, And Is Still Nothing At Last,--a Long Way Leading Nowhere.

As Much Wisdom May Be Expended On A Private Economy As On An Empire, And As Much Wisdom May Be Drawn From It.

God Never Jests With Us, And Will Not Compromise The End Of Nature, By Permitting Any Inconsequence In Its Procession.

Life Is Not So Short But That There Is Always Time Enough For Courtesy.

Bonaparte Knew But One Merit, And Rewarded In One And The Same Way The Good Soldier, The Good Astronomer, The Good Poet, The Good Player.

The Path Of Things Is Silent. Will They Suffer A Speaker To Go With Them?

I Have Sometimes Thought That, In Order To Be A Good Minister, It Was Necessary To Leave The Ministry. The Profession Is Antiquated. In An Altered Age, We Worship In The Dead Forms Of Our Forefathers.

There Is One Mind Common To All Individual Men. Every Man Is An Inlet To The Same And To All Of The Same. He That Is Once Admitted To The Right Of Reason Is Made A Freeman Of The Whole Estate. What Plato Has Thought, He May Think; What A Saint Has Felt, He May Feel; What At Any Time Has Befallen Any Man, He Can Understand. Who Hath Access To This Universal Mind Is A Party To All That Is Or Can Be Done, For This Is The Only And Sovereign Agent

Every Man's Reason Is Sufficient For His Guidance, If Used.

One Of The Benefits Of A College Education Is To Show The Boy Its Little Avail.

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

Hence, Instead Of Man Thinking, We Have The Bookworm. Hence, The Book-learned Class, Who Value Books, As Such; Not As Related To Nature And The Human Constitution, But As Making A Sort Of Third Estate With The World And The Soul. Hence, The Restorers Of Readings, The Emendators, The Bibliomaniacs Of All Degrees.

Prayer As A Means To Effect A Private End Is Theft And Meanness.

The Shoemaker Makes A Good Shoe Because He Makes Nothing Else.

Friendship, Like The Immortality Of The Soul, Is Too Good To Be Believed.

Could Shakespeare Give A Theory Of Shakespeare?

Every Promise Of The Soul Has Innumerable Fulfillments; Each Of Its Joys Ripens Into A New Want.

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

The Question Is Whether [suicide] Is The Way Out, Or The Way In.

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.

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.

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

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

The Imitator Dooms Himself To Hopeless Mediocrity. The Inventor Did It Because It Was Natural To Him, And So In Him It Has A Charm. In The Imitator Something Else Is Natural, And He Bereaves Himself Of His Own Beauty, To Come Short Of Another Man's.

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.

The Sun Is The Sole Inconsumable Fireand God Is The Sole Inexhaustible Giver.

To The Birds And Trees He Talks: Caesar Of His Leafy Rome, There The Poet Is At Home.

The Two Terrors That Discourage Creativity And Creative Living Are Fear Of Public Opinion And Undue Reverence For One's Own Consistency.

No Matter What Your Work, Let It Be Your Own. No Matter What Your Occupation, Let What You Are Doing Be Organic. Let It Be In Your Bones. In This Way, You Will Open The Door By Which The Affluence Of Heaven And Earth Shall Stream Into You.

If We Follow The Truth, It Will Bring Us Out Safe At Last.

To Be A Man Is To Be A Nonconformist.

God Hid The Whole World In Thy Heart.

Nature Cannot Be Surprised In Undress. Beauty Breaks In Everywhere.

The University Must Be Retrospective. The Gale That Gives Direction To The Vanes On All Its Towers Blows Out Of Antiquity.

Where Dwells The Religion? Tell Me First Where Dwells Electricity, Or Motion, Or Thought Or Gesture. They Do Not Dwell Or Stay Atall. Electricity Cannot Be Made Fast, Mortared Up And Ended, Like London Monument, Or The Tower, So That You Shall Know Where To Find It, And Keep It Fixed, As The English Do With Their Things, Forevermore; It Is Passing, Glancing, Gesticular; It Is A Traveller, A Newness, A Surprise, A Secret Which Perplexes Them, And Puts Them Out.

Much Of The Wisdom Of The World Is Not Wisdom, And The Most Illuminated Class Of Men Are No Doubt Superior To Literary Fame, And Are Not Writers.

Live In The Sunshine, Swim The Sea, Drink The Wild Air.

He Who Travels In Search Of Something Which He Has Not Got, Travels Away From Himself And Grows Old Even In Youth Among Old Things.

When A Man Speaks The Truth In The Spirit Of Truth, His Eye Is As Clear As The Heavens. When He Has Base Ends, And Speaks Falsely, The Eye Is Muddy, And Sometimes Asquint.

Discontent Is Want Of Self-reliance; It Is Infirmity Of Will.

The Reward Of Commercial Civilization Is The Ability To Consume A Never-ending Array Of Products.there Are Limits Beyond Which Commodities Cannot Be Multiplied Without Preventing Their Consumers From Affirming Themselves Through The Exercise Of Their Personal Freedom.when Market Dependence Reaches A Certain Threshold It Deprives People Of Their Power To Live Creatively And To Act Autonomously. And Precisely Because This New Impotence Is So Deeply Experienced, It Is Expressed With Difficulty.

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.

You Will Think Me Very Pedantic, Gentlemen, But Holiday Though It May Be, I Have Not The Smallest Interest In Any Holiday, Except As It Celebrates Real And Not Pretended Joys.

There Is Virtue Yet In The Hoe And The Spade, For Learned As Well As For Unlearned Hands. And Labor Is Everywhere Welcome; Alwayswe Are Invited To Work.

American Mind A Wilderness Of Opportunities.

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

I Remember An Answer Which When Quite Young I Was Prompted To Make A Valued Adviser Who Was Wont To Importune Me With The Dear Old Doctrines Of The Church. On My Saying, What Have I To Do With The Sacredness Of Traditions, If I Live Wholly From Within? My Friend Suggested, - "but These Impulses May Be From Below, Not From Above." I Replied, 'they Do Not Seem To Me To Be Such; But If I Am The Devil's Child, I Will Live Then From The Devil.'

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.

Crime And Punishment Grow Out Of One Stem. Punishment Is A Fruit That Unsuspected Ripens Within The Flower Of The Pleasure Which Concealed It.

Do Your Work, But Do Your Thing.

Funny Basketball

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.

America Means Opportunity, Freedom, Power.

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

The Moment Our Discourse Rises Above The Ground-line Of Familiar Facts, And Is Inflamed With Passion Or Exalted Thought, It Clothes Itself In Images. A Man Conversing In Earnest, If He Watch His Intellectual Processes, Will Find That Always A Material Image, More Or Less Luminous, Arises In His Mind, Contemporaneous With Every Thought, Which Furnishes The Vestment Of The Thought.... This Imagery Is Spontaneous. It Is The Blending Of Experience With The Present Action Of The Mind. It Is Proper Creation.

A Man Cannot Speak But He Judges Himself

Happy Will That House Be In Which The Relations Are Formed From Character; After The Highest, And Not After The Lowest Order; The House In Which Character Marries, And Not Confusion And A Miscellany Of Unavowable Motives.

The Invariable Mark Of Wisdom Is To See The Miraculous In The Common.

The Charming Landscape Which I Saw This Morning Is Indubitably Made Up Of Some Twenty Or Thirty Farms. Miller Owns This Field, Locke That, And Manning The Woodland Beyond. But None Of Them Owns The Landscape. There Is Property In The Horizon Which No Man Has But He Whose Eye Can Integrate All Parts, That Is, The Poet. This Is The Best Part Of These Men's Farms, Yet To This Their Warranty-deeds Give No Title.

Every Reform Was Once A Private Opinion.

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.

Happy Will The House Be In Which The Relationships Are Formed From Character.

Sleep Lingers All Our Lifetime About Our Eyes, As Night Hovers All Day In The Boughs Of The Fir-tree.

If You Visit Your Friend, Why Need You Apologize For Not Having Visited Him, And Waste His Time And Deface Your Own Act? Visit Him Now.

Cupid Is A Casuist, A Mystic, And A Cabalist,-- Can Your Lurking Thought Surprise, And Interpret Your Device, . . . . All Things Wait For And Divine Him,-- How Shall I Dare To Malign Him?

Out Of Love And Hatred, Out Of Earnings And Borrowings And Leadings And Losses; Out Of Sickness And Pain; Out Of Wooing And Worshipping; Out Of Traveling And Voting And Watching And Caring; Out Of Disgrace And Contempt, Comes Our Tuition In The Serene And Beautiful Laws.

Live, Let Live, And Help Live

For This Present, Hard Is The Fortune Of The Bard, Born Out Of Time; All His Accomplishment, From Nature's Utmost Treasure Spent, Booteth Not Him.

Your Work Should Be In Praise Of What You Love.

I Am The Lover Of Uncontained And Immortal Beauty. In The Wilderness, I Find Something More Dear And Connate Than In Streets Or Villages. In The Tranquil Landscape, And Especially In The Distant Line Of The Horizon, Man Beholds Somewhat As Beautiful As His Own Nature.

You Cannot Make A Cheap Palace.

All Promise Outruns Performance.

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 Greatest Discoveries Are Those That Shed Light Unto Ourselves.

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

I Shun Father And Mother And Wife And Brother, When My Genius Calls Me.

All I Know Is Reception; I Am And I Have: But I Do Not Get, And When I Fancied I Had Gotten Anything, I Found I Did Not.

Why Should We Grope Among The Dry Bones Of The Past? The Sun Shines Today Also.

I Like Man, But Not Men.

Each Man Has His Own Vocation. The Talent Is The Call. There Is One Direction In Which All Space Is Open To Him. He Has Faculties Silently Inviting Him Thither To Endless Exertion. He Is Like A Ship In The River; He Runs Against Obstructions On Every Side But One; On That Side All Obstruction Is Taken Away, And He Sweeps Serenely Over A Deepening Channel Into An Infinite Sea.

Man Is A Stream Whose Source Is Hidden. Our Being Is Descending Into Us From We Know Not Whence. The Most Exact Calculator Has Noprescience That Somewhat Incalculable May Not Balk The Very Next Moment. I Am Constrained Every Moment To Acknowledge A Higher Origin For Events Than The Will I Call Mine.

We Pass For What We Are.

In The Death Of My Son, Now More Than Two Years Ago, I Seem To Have Lost A Beautiful Estate,--no More. I Cannot Get It Nearer To Me.

A Cheerful Intelligent Face Is The End Of Culture, And Success Enough. For It Indicates The Purpose Of Nature And Wisdom Attained.

Virtues Are, In The Popular Estimate, Rather The Exception Than The Rule. There Is The Man And His Virtues.

The World Belongs To The Energetic.

Words Are Alive. Cut Them And They Bleed.

Generalization Is Always A New Influx Of Divinity Into The Mind. Hence The Thrill That Attends It.

One Lesson We Learn Early, That In Spite Of Seeming Difference, Men Are All Of One Pattern. We Readily Assume This With Our Mates, And Are Disappointed And Angry If We Find That We Are Premature, And That Their Watches Are Slower Than Ours. In Fact, The Only Sin Which We Never Forgive In Each Other Is Difference Of Opinion.

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

The Civilized Man Has Built A Coach, But Has Lost The Use Of His Feet.

Manners Are The Happy Ways Of Doing Things.

Nobody Is Glad In The Gladness Of Another, And Our System Is One Of War, Of An Injurious Superiority. Every Child Of The Saxon Race Is Educated To Wish To Be First. It Is Our System; And A Man Comes To Measure His Greatness By The Regrets, Envies, And Hatreds Of His Competitors.

Astronomy To The Selfish Becomes Astrology.

Anatomy And Physiology

In This Distribution Of Functions, The Scholar Is The Delegated Intellect. In The Right State, He Is, Man Thinking. In The Degenerate State, When The Victim Of Society, He Tends To Become A Mere Thinker, Or, Still Worse, The Parrot Of Other Men's Thinking.

As Picture Teaches The Colouring, So Sculpture The Anatomy Of Form.

A Man Should Give Us A Sense Of Mass.

These Times Of Ours Are Series And Full Of Calamity, But All Times Are Essentially Alike. As Soon As There Is Life There Is Danger.

The Senses Collect The Surface Facts Of Matter... It Was Sensation; When Memory Came, It Was Experience; When Mind Acted, It Was Knowledge; When Mind Acted On It As Knowledge, It Was Thought.

The Spirit Of Our American Radicalism Is Destructive And Aimless; It Is Not Loving; It Has No Ulterior And Divine Ends; But Is Destructive Only Out Of Hatred And Selfishness.

The World Still Wants Its Poet-priest, A Reconciler, Who Shall Not Trifle With Shakspeare The Player, Nor Shall Grope In Graves With Swedenborg The Mourner; But Who Shall See, Speak, And Act, With Equal Inspiration. For Knowledge Will Brighten The Sunshine; Right Is More Beautiful Than Private Affection; And Love Is Compatible With Universal Wisdom.

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.

The Crime Which Bankrupts Men And States Is Job-work-declining From Your Main Design, To Serve A Turn Here And There. Nothing Is Beneath You, If It Is In The Direction Of Your Life, Nothing Is Great Or Desirable If It Is Off From That. I Think We Are Entitled Here To Draw A Straight Line And Say That Society Can Never Prosper But Must Always Be Bankrupts, Until Every Man Does That Which He Was Created To Do.

If You Maintain A Dead Church, Contribute To A Dead Bible-society, Vote With A Great Party Either For The Government Or Against It, Spread Your Table Like Base Housekeepers, - Under All These Screens I Have Diffuculty To Detect The Precise Man You Are: And Of Course So Much Force Is Withdrawn From Your Proper Life. But Do Your Work And I Shall Know You. Do Your Work, And You Shall Reinforce Yourself. A Man Must Consider What A Blind-man's Bluff Is This Game Of Conformity. If I Know Your Sect I Anticipate Your Argument.

It Is One Of The Most Beautiful Compensations Of This Life That No Person Can Sincerely Try To Help Another Without Helping Him Or Herself. Serve And You Shall Be Served. If You Love And Serve People, You Cannot, By Any Hiding Or Stratagem, Escape The Remuneration.

The Eyes Of Men Converse As Much As Their Tongues, With The Advantage That The Ocular Dialect Needs No Dictionary, But Is Understood All The World Over.

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