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The Voyage Of The Best Ship Is A Zigzag Line Of A Hundred Tacks. See The Line From A Sufficient Distance, And It Straightens Itself To The Average Tendency. Your Genuine Action Will Explain Itself, And Will Explain Your Other Genuine Actions. Your Conformity Explains Nothing. Act Singly, And What You Have Already Done Singly Will Justify You Now. Greatness Appeals To The Future.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The Voyage Of The

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The Voyage Of The Best Ship Is A Zigzag Line Of A Hundred Tacks. See The Line From A Sufficient Distance, And It Straightens Itself To The Average Tendency. Your Genuine Action Will Explain Itself, And Will Explain Your Other Genuine Actions. Your Conformity Explains Nothing. Act Singly, And What You Have Already Done Singly Will Justify You Now. Greatness Appeals To The Future.

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We Prize Books, And They Prize Them Most Who Are Themselves Wise.

Shallow Men Believe In Luck.

Because The Soul Is Progressive, It Never Quite Repeats Itself, But In Every Act Attempts The Production Of A New And Fairer Whole.

I Find Nothing Healthful Or Exalting In The Smooth Conventions Of Society. I Do Not Like The Close Air Of Saloons. I Begin To Suspect Myself To Be A Prisoner, Though Treated With All This Courtesy And Luxury. I Pay A Destructive Tax In My Conformity.

There Is More Difference In The Quality Of Our Pleasures Than In The Amount.

Nothing Is More Simple Than Greatness; Indeed, To Be Simple Is To Be Great.

Who Hears Me, Who Understands Me, Becomes Mine, A Possession For All Time.

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

When Believers And Unbelievers Live In The Same Manner - I Distrust The Religion.

We Acquire The Strength We Have Overcome.

A Gentleman Makes No Noise; A Lady Is Serene.

I Know Nothing Which Life Has To Offer So Satisfying As The Profound Good Understanding, Which Can Subsist, After Much Exchange Ofgood Offices, Between Two Virtuous Men, Each Of Whom Is Sure Of Himself, And Sure Of His Friend. It Is A Happiness Which Postpones All Other Gratifications, And Makes Politics, And Commerce, And Churches, Cheap.

We Are Immersed In Beauty, But Our Eyes Have No Clear Vision.

Every Man Is An Impossibility Until He Is Born.

Live In The Sunshine.

It Is The Privilege Of Any Human Work Which Is Well Done To Invest The Doer With A Certain Haughtiness. He Can Well Afford Not To Conciliate, Whose Faithful Work Will Answer For Him.

Thought Is The Seed Of Action.

I Pack My Trunk, Embrace My Friends, Embark On The Sea And At Last Wake Up In Naples, And There Beside Me Is The Stern Fact, The Sad Self, Unrelenting, Identical, That I Fled From.

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

Every Calamity Is A Spur And A Valuable Hint.

The Man, Who Has Seen The Rising Moon Break Out Of The Clouds At Midnight, Has Been Present Like An Archangel At The Creation Of Light And Of The World.

In Every Situation Do The Thing You Fear. If You Do The Thing You Fear, The Death Of Fear Is Certain.

Each Is Liable To Panic, Which Is Exactly, The Terror Of Ignorance Surrendered To The Imagination. Knowledge Is The Encourager, Knowledge That Takes Fear Out Of The Heart, Knowledge And Use, Which Is Knowledge In Practice. They Can Conquer Who Believe They Can. It Is He Who Has Done The Deed Once Who Does Not Shrink From Attempting Again.

The Task Ahead Of Us Is Never As Great As The Power Behind Us.

We Are A Puny And Fickle Folk. Avarice, Hesitation, And Following Are Our Diseases.

To Go Into Solitude, A Man Needs To Retire As Much From His Chamber As From Society. I Am Not Solitary Whilst I Read And Write, Though Nobody Is With Me. But If A Man Would Be Alone, Let Him Look At The Stars.

A Friend May Be Nature's Most Magnificent Creation.

The Soul Knows No Persons.

Five Great Enemies Of Peace Inhabit Us: Avarice, Ambition, Envy, Anger And Pride.

What Goes On Around You... Compares Little With What Goes On Inside You.

It Is Commonly Said By Farmers, That A Good Pear Or Apple Costs No More Time Or Pains To Rear, Than A Poor One; So I Would Have No Work Of Art, No Speech, Or Action, Or Thought, Or Friend, But The Best.

Fame Is Proof That The People Are Gullible.

Every Great And Commanding Movement In The Annals Of The World Is Due To The Triumph Of Enthusiasm. Nothing Great Was Ever Achieved Without It

Enthusiasm For Life

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.

One Of The Illusions Of Life Is That The Present Hour Is Not The Critical Decisive Hour. Write It On Your Heart That Every Day Is The Best Day Of The Year. He Only Is Right Who Owns The Day, And No One Owns The Day Who Allows It To Be Invaded By Worry, Fret And Anxiety. Finish Every Day, And Be Done With It. You Have Done What You Could.

The Masters Painted For Joy, And Knew Not That Virtue Had Gone Out Of Them. They Could Not Paint The Like In Cold Blood. The Masters Of English Lyric Wrote Their Songs So. It Was A Fine Efflorescence Of Fine Powers.

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.

I Suppose An Entire Cabinet Of Shells Would Be An Expression Of The Whole Human Mind; A Flora Of The Whole Globe Would Be So Likewise, Or A History Of Beasts; Or A Painting Of All The Aspects Of The Clouds. Everything Is Significant.

The Soul Raised Over Passion Beholds Identity And Eternal Causation, Perceives The Self-existance Of Truth And Right, And Calms Itself With Knowing That All Things Go Well.

Words Are Finite Expressions Of The Infinite Mind.

Neither Is Life Long Enough For Friendship. That Is A Serious And Majestic Affair.

If You Follow The Suburban Fashion In Building A Sumptuous- Looking House For A Little Money, It Will Appear To All Eyes As A Cheap, Dear House.

All The Facts Of Nature Are Nouns Of The Intellect, And Make The Grammar Of The Eternal Language. Every Word Has A Double, Trebleor Centuple Use And Meaning.

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

A Man Must Be Clothed With Society, Or We Shall Feel A Certain Bareness And Poverty, As Of A Displaced And Unfurnished Member. He Is To Be Dressed In Arts And Institutions, As Well As In Body Garments. Now And Then A Man Exquisitely Made Can Live Alone, And Must; But Coop Up Most Men And You Undo Them.

Aristotle And Plato Are Reckoned The Respective Heads Of Two Schools. A Wise Man Will See That Aristotle Platonizes.

A Right Rule For A Club Would Be,-admit No Man Whose Presence Excludes Any One Topic.

The Pleasure Of Life Is According To The Man That Lives It, And Not According To The Work Or Place.

A Scholar Is A Candle Which The Love And Desire Of All Men Will Light.

A Nation, Like A Tree, Does Not Thrive Well Till It Is Engraffed With A Foreign Stock.

The Bhagavad-gita Is An Empire Of Thought And In Its Philosophical Teachings Krishna Has All The Attributes Of The Full-fledged Montheistic Deity And At The Same Time The Attributes Of The Upanisadic Absolute.

Society Never Advances. It Recedes As Fast On One Side As It Gains On The Other. It Undergoes Continual Changes: It Is Barbarous, It Is Civilized, It Is Rich, It Is Scientific; But This Change Is Not Amelioration. For Every Thing That Is Given, Something Else Is Taken. Society Acquires New Arts And Loses Old Instincts.

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.

The God Who Made New Hampshire Taunted The Lofty Land With Little Men.

Write It On Your Heart That Every Day Is The Best Day In The Year. No Man Has Learned Anything Rightly, Until He Knows That Every Day Is Doomsday.

Inspirational Life

In Strict Science, All Persons Underlie The Same Condition Of An Infinite Remoteness. Shall We Fear To Cool Our Love By Mining Forthe Metaphysical Foundation Of This Elysian Temple? Shall I Not Be As Real As The Things I See? If I Am, I Shall Not Fear To Know Them For What They Are.

In The Greek Cities, It Was Reckoned Profane, That Any Person Should Pretend A Property In A Work Of Art, Which Belonged To All Who Could Behold It.

Who Leaves The Pine-tree, Leaves His Friend, Unnerves His Strength, Invites His End.

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.

Wherever Snow Falls, Or Water Flows, Or Birds Fly, Wherever Day And Night Meet In Twilight, Wherever The Blue Heaven Is Hung By Clouds, Or Sown With Stars, Wherever Are Forms With Transparent Boundaries, Wherever Are Outlets Into Celestial Space, Wherever Is Danger, And Awe, And Love, There Is Beauty, Plenteous As Rain, Shed For Thee, And Though Thou Shouldest Walk The World Over, Thou Shalt Not Be Able To Find A Condition Inopportune Or Ignoble.

To Speak Truly, Few Adult Persons Can See Nature. Most Persons Do Not See The Sun.

To The Body And Mind Which Have Been Cramped By Noxious Work Or Company, Nature Is Medicinal And Restores Their Tone. The Tradesman, The Attorney Comes Out Of The Din And Craft Of The Street And Sees The Sky And The Woods, And Is A Man Again. In Their Eternal Calm, He Finds Himself.

We Judge Others By Their Actions But We Judge Ourselves By Our Intensions.

Nature Is Good, But Intellect Is Better, As The Law-giver Is Before The Law-receiver.

A Friend May Well Be Reckoned The Masterpiece Of Nature.

Man's Actions Are The Picture Book Of His Creeds.

Character Teaches Above Our Wills.

Science Corrects The Old Creeds, Sweeps Away, With Every New Perception, Our Infantile Catechisms, And Necessitates A Faith Commensurate With The Grander Orbits And Universal Laws Which It Discloses Yet It Does Not Surprise The Moral Sentiment That Was Older And Awaited Expectant These Larger Insights.

Contemporary American Psychiatrist It Is A Happy Talent To Know How To Play.

Respect The Child. Be Not Too Much His Parent. Trespass Not On His Solitude.

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?

He That Despiseth Small Things Will Perish By Little And Little.

We Live By Our Imagination, Our Admirations, And Our Sentiments.

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.

Nature Is Saturated With Deity.

Happy The Man Who Never Puts On A Face, But Receives Every Visitor With That Countenance He Has On.

An Imaginative Book Renders Us Much More Service At First, By Stimulating Us Through Its Tropes, Than Afterward, When We Arrive Atthe Precise Sense Of The Author. I Think Nothing Is Of Any Value In Books, Excepting The Transcendental And Extraordinary.

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.

The World Exists, As I Understand It, To Teach The Science Of Liberty.

Why Should I Cumber Myself With Regrets That The Receiver Is Not Capacious? It Never Troubles The Sun That Some Of His Rays Fall Wide And Vain Into Ungrateful Space, And Only A Small Part On The Reflecting Planet. Let Your Greatness Educate The Crude And Cold Companion.

The True Philosopher And The True Poet Are One, And A Beauty, Which Is Truth, And A Truth, Which Is Beauty, Is The Aim Of Both.

It Does Not Hurt Weak Eyes To Look Into Beautiful Eyes Never So Long.

In Nature, All Is Useful, All Is Beautiful. It Is Therefore Beautiful, Because It Is Alive, Moving, Reproductive; It Is Thereforeuseful, Because It Is Symmetrical And Fair. Beauty Will Not Come At The Call Of A Legislature, Nor Will It Repeat In England Or America Its History In Greece. It Will Come, As Always, Unannounced, And Spring Up Between The Feet Of Brave And Earnest Men.

The World Looks Like A Multiplication-table, Or A Mathematical Equation, Which, Turn It How You Will, Balances Itself.

Mathematical Equations

The Days Are Made On A Loom Whereof The Warp And Woof Are Past And Future Time. They Are Majestically Dressed, As If Every God Brought A Thread To The Skyey Web.

We Over-estimate The Conscience Of Our Friend. His Goodness Seems Better Than Our Goodness, His Nature Finer, His Temptations Less. Everything That Is His,--his Name, His Form, His Dress, Books, And Instruments,--fancy Enhances. Our Own Thought Sounds New And Larger From His Mouth.

The Cruelest Foe Is A Masked Benefactor. The Wars Which Make History So Dreary Have Served The Cause Of Truth And Virtue.

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.

Love Is The Essence Of God.

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

If You Would Know What Nobody Knows, Read What Everybody Reads, Just One Year Afterwards.

There Is One Other Reason For Dressing Well, Namely That Dogs Respect It, And Will Not Attack You In Good Clothes.

It Is Doubtless A Vice To Turn One's Eyes Inward Too Much, But I Am My Own Comedy And Tragedy.

If With Love Thy Heart Has Burned; If Thy Love Is Unreturned; Hide Thy Grief Within Thy Breast, Though It Tear Thee Unexpressed; For When Love Has Once Departed From The Eyes Of The False-hearted, And One By One Has Torn Off Quite The Bandages Of Purple Light; Though Thou Wert The Loveliest Form The Soul Had Ever Dressed, Thou Shalt Seem, In Each Reply, A Vixen To His Altered Eye; Thy Softest Pleadings Seem Too Bold, Thy Praying Lute Will Seem To Scold; Though Thou Kept The Straightest Road, Yet Thou Errest Far And Broad.

Want Is A Growing Giant Whom The Coat Of Have Was Never Large Enough To Cover.

Ability Without Honor Has No Value.

Power Dwells With Cheerfulness.

Positive Attitude

Anger Is That Powerful Internal Force That Blows Out The Light Of Reason.

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.

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

The Most Attractive Class Of People Are Those Who Are Powerful Obliquely, And Not By The Direct Stroke: Men Of Genius, But Not Yetaccredited: One Gets The Cheer Of Their Light, Without Paying Too Great A Tax.

The Field Cannot Be Seen From Within The Field.

The Highest Revelation Is That God Is In Every Man.

It Is God In You That Responds To God Without, Or Affirms His Own Words Trembling On The Lips Of Another.

The Eye Obeys Exactly The Action Of The Mind.

The Affections Cannot Keep Their Youth Any More Than Men.

Let A Man Behave In His Own House As A Guest.

Be An Opener Of Doors For Such As Come After Thee.

All Infractions Of Love And Equity In Our Social Relations Are Speedily Punished-by Fear...be Honest With A Man And You Have No Fear. Try To Deceive And The Relationship Deteriorates.

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.

Give All To Love: Obey Thy Heart; Friends, Kindred, Days, Estate, Good Fame, Plans, Credit, And The Muse,- Nothing Refuse.

Conversation Is Our Account Of Ourselves...conversation Is The Vent Of Character As Well As Thoughts...it Is The Laboratory Of The Student.

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

He Is A Good Man, Who Can Receive A Gift Well. We Are Either Glad Or Sorry At A Gift, And Both Emotions Are Unbecoming.

If You Have A Nation Of Men Who Have Risen To That Height Of Moral Cultivation That They Will Not Declare War Or Carry Arms, For They Have Not So Much Madness Left In Their Brains, You Have A Nation Of Lovers, Of Benefactors, Of True, Great, And Able Men.

That Which We Persist In Doing Becomes Easier To Do, Not That The Nature Of The Thing Has Changed But That Our Power To Do Has Increased.

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.

Power Educates The Potentate.

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

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

All Things Are Moral. That Soul, Which Within Us Is A Sentiment, Outside Of Us Is A Law. We Feel Its Inspiration; Out There In History We Can See Its Fatal Strength.

God Evidently Does Not Intend Us All To Be Rich, Or Powerful Or Great, But He Does Intend Us All To Be Friends.

On The Other Side, The Conservative Party, Composed Of The Most Moderate, Able, And Cultivated Part Of The Population, Is Timid, And Merely Defensive Of Property. It Vindicates No Right, It Aspires To No Real Good, It Brands No Crime, It Proposes No Generous Policy, It Does Not Build, Nor Write, Nor Cherish The Arts, Nor Foster Religion, Nor Establish Schools, Nor Encourage Science, Nor Emancipate The Slave, Nor Befriend The Poor, Or The Indian, Or The Immigrant.

A Farm Is A Good Thing, When It Begins And Ends With Itself, And Does Not Need A Salary, Or A Shop, To Eke It Out.

The Permanence Of All Books Is Fixed By No Effort Friendly Or Hostile, But By Their Own Specific Gravity, Or The Intrinsic Importance Of Their Contents To The Constant Mind Of Man.

We All Need Someone Who Can Help Us Do What We Already Can.

The Language Of The Street Is Always Strong.

A Man's Library Is A Sort Of Harem.

Skepticism Is Unbelief In Cause And Effect.

Cause And Effect

The World Is A Divine Dream, From Which We May Presently Awake To The Glories And Certainties Of Day.

Do Not Shut Up The Young People Against Their Will In A Pew, And Force The Children To Ask Them Questions For An Hour Against Their Will.

Truth Is Beautiful Within And Without, Forevermore.

When Duty Whispers Low, Thou Must, The Youth Replies, I Can.

Pure By Impure Is Not Seen.

There Are Many Virtues In Books, But The Essential Value Is The Adding Of Knowledge To Our Stock By The Record Of New Facts, And, Better, By The Record Of Intuitions Which Distribute Facts, And Are The Formulas Which Supersede All Histories.

We Are Never Without A Pilot. When We Know Not How To Steer, And Dare Not Hoist A Sail, We Can Drift. The Current Knows The Way, Though We Do Not. The Ship Of Heaven Guides Itself, And Will Not Accept A Wooden Rudder.

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

Society Is Infested By Persons Who, Seeing That The Sentiments Please, Counterfeit The Expression Of Them. These We Call Sentimentalists - Talkers Who Mistake The Description For The Thing, Saying For Having.

The Energetic Action Of The Times Develops Individualism, And The Religious Appear Isolated. I Esteem This A Step In The Right Direction. Heaven Deals With Us On No Representative System. Souls Are Not Saved In Bundles.

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

A Beautiful Soul Always Dwells In A Beautiful World.

Dreams And Beasts Are Two Keys By Which We Find Out The Keys Of Our Own Nature.

Getting Old Is A Fascination Thing. The Older You Get, The Older You Want To Get.

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.

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.

To Be Able To Discern That What Is True Is True, And That What Is False Is False,--this Is The Mark And Character Of Intelligence.

I Am Thankful For Small Mercies. I Compared Notes With One Of My Friends Who Expect Everything Of The Universe, And Is Disappointed When Anything Is Less Than The Best, And I Found That I Begin At The Other Extreme, Expecting Nothing, And Am Always Full Of Thanks For Moderate Good. . . . If We Will Take The Good We Find, . . . We Shall Have Heaping Measures. . . .

A Sublime Hope Cheers Ever The Faithful Heart, That Elsewhere, In Other Regions Of The Universal Powers, Souls Are Now Acting, Enduring And Daring, Which Can Love Us, And Which We Can Love.

Take Egotism Out And You Would Castrate The Benefactors.

There Is Something Servile In The Habit Of Seeking After A Law Which We Must Obey.

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.

When Its Errands Are Noble And Adequate, A Steamboat Bridging The Atlantic Between Old And New England, And Arriving At Its Ports With The Punctuality Of A Planet, Is A Step Of Man Into Harmony With Nature.

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

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

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.

Would We Codify The Laws That Should Reign In Households, And Whose Daily Transgression Annoys And Mortifies Us, And Degrades Our Household Life, We Must Adorn Every Day With Sacrifices. Good Manners Are Made Up Of Petty Sacrifices.

The Poem Is A Confession Of Faith.

The Music That Can Deepest Reach And Cure All Ill Is Cordial Speech.

When It's Dark Enough Men See Stars.

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

Do Not Believe That Possibly You Can Escape The Reward Of Your Action.

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

Every Man Passes His Life In The Search After Friendship.

Nothing Can Be Preserved That Is Not Good.

The Prayer Of The Farmer Kneeling In His Field To Weed It, The Prayer Of The Rower Kneeling With The Stroke Of His Oar, Are True Prayers Heard Throughout Nature.

An Action Is The Perfection And Publication Of Thought. A Right Action Seems To Fill The Eye, And To Be Related To All Nature.

Pictures Must Not Be Too Picturesque.

I Will Not Hide My Tastes Or Aversions. I Will So Trust That What Is Deep Is Holy, That I Will Do Strongly Before The Sun And Moon Whatever Only Rejoices Me, And The Heart Appoints

I Believe That Our Own Experience Instructs Us That The Secret Of Education Lies In Respecting The Pupil. It Is Not For You To Choose What He Shall Know, What He Shall Do. It Is Chosen And Foreordained, And He Only Holds The Key To His Own Secret. By Your Tampering And Thwarting And Too Much Governing He May Be Hindered From His End And Kept Out Of His Own. Respect The Child. Wait And See The New Product Of Nature. Nature Loves Analogies, But Not Repetitions. Respect The Child. Be Not Too Much His Parent. Trespass Not On His Solitude.

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

To A Dull Mind All Of Nature Is Leaden. To The Illumined Mind The Whole World Burns And Sparkles With Light.

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.

If A Teacher Have Any Opinion Which He Wishes To Conceal, His Pupils Will Become As Fully Indoctrinated Into That As Into Any Which He Publishes.

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

Art And Power Will Go On As They Have Done,--will Make Day Out Of Night, Time Out Of Space, And Space Out Of Time.

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

We May Be Partial, But Fate Is Not.

The History Of The Genesis Or The Old Mythology Repeats Itself In The Experience Of Every Child. He Too Is A Demon Or God Thrown Into A Particular Chaos, Where He Strives Ever To Lead Things From Disorder Into Order.

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

The Civility Of The World Has Reached That Pitch That Their More Moral Genius Is Becoming Indispensable, And The Quality Of This Race Is To Be Honored For Itself.

The Manly Part Is To Do With Might And Main What You Can Do.

But Whoso Is Heroic Will Always Find Crises To Try His Edge.

It Is The Property Of The Religious Spirit To Be The Most Refining Of All Influences. No External Advantages, No Culture Of The Tastes, No Habit Of Command, No Association With The Elegant, Or Even Depth Of Affection, Can Bestow That Delicacy And That Grandeur Of Bearing Which Belong Only To The Mind Accustomed To Celestial Conversation,--all Else Is But Gilt And Cosmetics, Beside This, As Expressed In Every Look And Gesture.

The Other Terror That Scares Us From Self-trust Is Our Consistency; A Reverence For Our Past Act Or Word, Because The Eyes Of Others Have No Other Data For Computing Our Orbit Than Our Past Acts, And We Are Loath To Disappoint Them.

A Child Convinced Against His Will Is Of The Same Opinion Still. The Reward For A Thing Well Done, Is To Have Done It.

Most People, Who Have Quit Smoking, Have Had At Least One Unsuccessful Try In The Past. It Is Not Important How Many Times You Try To Quit. The Only Important Thing Is, That Eventually You Stay Quit

Everything Runs To Excess; Every Good Quality Is Noxious If Unmixed.

Let Us Make Education Brave And Preventive. Politics Is An Afterwork, A Poor Patching. We Are Always A Little Late... We Shall One Day Learn To Supercede Politics By Education... We Must Begin Higher Up, Namely In Education.

He That Can Heroically Endure Adversity Will Bear Prosperity With Equal Greatest Of The Soul; For The Mind That Cannot Be Dejected By The Former Is Not Likely To Be Transported Without The Latter.

Genius Is The Power To Labor Better And More Availably. Deserve Thy Genius: Exalt It.

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

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.

Every Man Takes Care That His Neighbor Shall Not Cheat Him. But A Day Comes When He Begins To Care That He Does Not Cheat His Neighbor. Then All Goes Well. He Has Changed His Market Cart Into A Chariot Of The Sun.

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

There Are Eyes, To Be Sure, That Give No More Admission Into The Man Than Blueberries.

Age, Like Woman, Requires Fit Surroundings.

The Church Seems To Totter To Its Fall, Almost All Life Extinct. On This Occasion, Any Complaisance Would Be Criminal Which Told You, Whose Hope And Commission It Is To Preach The Faith Of Christ, That The Faith Of Christ Is Preached.

The Voyage Of The Best Ship Is A Zigzag Line Of A Hundred Tacks. See The Line From A Sufficient Distance, And It Straightens Itself To The Average Tendency. Your Genuine Action Will Explain Itself, And Will Explain Your Other Genuine Actions. Your Conformity Explains Nothing. Act Singly, And What You Have Already Done Singly Will Justify You Now. Greatness Appeals To The Future.

The World Of Men Show Like A Comedy Without Laughter: Populations, Interests, Government, History; 't Is All Toy Figures In A Toyhouse.

The Word Liberty In The Mouth Of Mr. Webster Sounds Like The Word Love In The Mouth Of A Courtesan.

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