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To Different Minds, The Same World Is A Hell, And A Heaven Depending On Whether They Compare It To Something Better And So Feel Disappointed And Bitter Or Something Worse And So Feel Relieved And Grateful.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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To Different Minds, The

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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To Different Minds, The Same World Is A Hell, And A Heaven Depending On Whether They Compare It To Something Better And So Feel Disappointed And Bitter Or Something Worse And So Feel Relieved And Grateful.

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More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

Difference Of Opinion Is The One Crime Which Kings Never Forgive.

A Poem Is Made Up Of Thoughts, Each Of Which Filled The Whole Sky Of The Poet In Its Turn.

Everything Intercepts Us From Ourselves.

There Is No Better Way To Exercise The Imagination Than The Study Of The Law.

The Pest Of Society Are The Egotist, They Are Dull And Bright, Sacred And Profane, Course And Fine. It Is A Disease That Like The Flu Falls On All Constitutions.

The Powers Of The Soul Are Commensurate With Its Needs.

Nothing Can Be Colder Than His Head, When The Lightnings Of His Imagination Are Playing In The Sky.

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

There Is No Prosperity, Trade, Art, City, Or Great Material Wealth Of Any Kind, But If You Trace It Home, You Will Find It Rooted In A Thought Of Some Individual Man.

The Affections Cannot Keep Their Youth Any More Than Men.

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

In The Fiji Islands, It Appears, Cannibalism Is Now Familiar. They Eat Thier Own Wives And Children. We Only Devour Widows' Houses, And Great Merchants Outwit And Absorb The Substance Of Small Ones, And Every Man Feeds On His Neighbor's Labor If He Can. It Is A Milder Form Of Cannibalism.

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

Men Seek To Be Great; They Would Have Offices, Wealth, Power, And Fame. They Think That To Be Great Is To Possess One Side Of Nature,--the Sweet, Without The Other Side,--the Bitter.

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

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.

There Is Always Safety In Valor.

Perception Is A Mirror Not A Fact. And What I Look On Is My State Of Mind, Reflected Outward.

I Think I Have Done Well, If I Have Acquired A New Word From A Good Author; And My Business With Him Is To Find My Own, Though Itwere Only To Melt Him Down Into An Epithet Or An Image For Daily Use.

Nature Hates Calculators.

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?

The Life Of Man Is The True Romance, Which When It Is Valiantly Conduced, Will Yield The Imagination A Higher Joy Than Any Fiction.

Proverbs, Words, And Grammar Inflections Convey The Public Sense With More Purity And Precision, Than The Wisest Individual.

But In Every Constitution Some Large Degree Of Animal Vigor Is Necessary As Material Foundation For The Higher Qualities Of The Art.

The Book Of Nature Is The Book Of Fate. She Turns The Gigantic Pages, Leaf After Leaf Never Returning One.

Therefore All Just Persons Are Satisfied With Their Own Praise. They Refuse To Explain Themselves, And Are Content That New Actions Should Do Them That Office. They Believe That We Communicate Without Speech, And Above Speech, And That No Right Action Of Ours Is Quite Unaffecting To Our Friends, At Whatever Distance; For The Influence Of Action Is Not To Be Measured By Miles.

Come Out Of The Azure. Love The Day. Do Not Leave The Sky Out Of Your Landscape.

When It's Dark Enough Men See Stars.

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

The Thing Done Avails, And Not What Is Said About It.

Common Sense Is As Rare As Genius.

Remarkable Trait In The American Character Is The Union, Not Very Infrequent, Of Yankee Cleverness With Spiritualism.

The Americans Have No Faith, They Rely On The Power Of A Dollar; They Are Deaf To Sentiment.

If You Take In A Lie, You Must Take In All That Belongs To It.

All The Thoughts Of A Turtle Are Turtle

The Astonishment Of Life Is The Absence Of Any Appearances Of Reconciliation Between The Theory And The Practice Of Life.

Heaven Walks Among Us Ordinarily Muffled In Such Triple Or Tenfold Disguises That The Wisest Are Deceived And No One Suspects The Days To Be Gods.

What Is It Men Love In Genius, But Its Infinite Hope, Which Degrades All It Has Done? Genius Counts All Its Miracles Poor And Short. Its Own Idea It Never Executed.

There Is No One Who Does Not Exaggerate. In Conversation, Men Are Encumbered With Personality, And Talk Too Much.

Exaggeration Is

Manners Have Been Somewhat Cynically Defined To Be A Contrivance Of Wise Men To Keep Fools At A Distance. Fashion Is Shrewd To Detect Those Who Do Not Belong To Her Train, And Seldom Wastes Her Attentions. Society Is Very Swift In Its Instincts, And If You Do Not Belong To It, Resists And Sneers At You, Or Quietly Drops You.

A Nation Never Falls But By Suicide.

Don't Set Out To Teach Theism From Your Natural History... You Spoil Both.

Science And Religion

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.

Our Civility, England Determines The Style Of, Inasmuch As England Is The Strongest Of The Family Of Existing Nations, And As We Are The Expansion Of That People. It Is That Of A Trading Nation; It Is A Shopkeeping Civility. The English Lord Is A Retired Shopkeeper, And Has The Prejudices And Timidities Of That Profession.

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.

Beauty Is An Outward Gift, Which Is Seldom Despised, Except By Those To Whom It Has Been Refused.

You've Got To Be Taught To Be Afraid Of People Whose Eyes Are Oddly Made And People Whose Skin Is A Different Shade.

Wherever There Is Power, There Is Age. Don't Be Deceived By Dimples And Curls. I Tell You That Babe Is A Thousand Years Old.

Let Not The Tie Be Mercenary, Though The Service Is Measured In Money. Make Yourself Necessary To Somebody. Do Not Make Life Hard To Any.

We Do Not Yet Trust The Unknown Powers Of Thought. Whence Came All These Tools, Inventions, Book Laws, Parties, Kingdoms? Out Of The Invisible World, Through A Few Brains. The Arts And Institutions Of Men Are Created Out Of Thought. The Powers That Make The Capitalist Are Metaphysical, The Force Of Method And Force Of Will Makes Trade, And Builds Towns.

If The Tongue Had Not Been Framed For Articulation, Man Would Still Be A Beast In The Forest.

Curiosity Is Lying In Wait For Every Secret.

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

A Man In A Cave Or In A Camp, A Nomad, Will Die With No More Estate Than The Wolf Or The Horse Leaves.

Give A Boy Address And Accomplishments And You Give Him The Mastery Of Palaces And Fortunes Where He Goes.

...as There Is No Screen Or Ceiling Between Our Heads And The Infinite Heavens, So Is There No Bar Or Wall In The Soul Where Man, The Effect, Ceases, And God, The Cause, Begins. The Walls Are Taken Away. We Lie Open On One Side To The Deeps Of Spiritual Nature, To The Attributes Of God. Justice We See And Know, Love, Freedom, Power. These Natures No Man Ever Got Above, But They Tower Over Us, And Most In The Moment When Our Interests Tempt Us To Wound Them.

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

That Which We Call Sin In Others Is Experiment For Us.

Coffee Is Good For Talent, But Genius Wants Prayer.

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

Revolutions Go Not Backward.

Let Not The Emphasis Of Hospitality Lie In Bed And Board; But Let Truth And Love And Honor And Courtesy Flow In All Thy Deeds.

The Less A Man Thinks Or Knows About His Virtues, The Better We Like Him.

Be Brave Enough To Do The Loving Thing.

Must We Always Talk For Victory, And Never Once For Truth, For Comfort, And Joy?

Comfort And Joy

The Most Indian Thing About The Indian Is Surely Not His Moccasins Or His Calumet, His Wampum Or His Stone Hatched, But Traits Of Character And Sagacity, Skill, Or Passion.

Native American

We Imperatively Require A Perception Of And A Homage To Beauty In Our Companions. Other Virtues Are In Request In The Field And Workyard, But A Certain Degree Of Taste Is Not To Be Spared In Those We Sit With.

The True Test Of Civilization Is Not The Census, Nor The Size Of Cities, Nor The Crops - No, But The Kind Of Man The Country Turns Out.

Culture Opens The Sense Of Beauty.

Every Man Has A Choice Between Love Of Truth And Love Of Repose. Love Of Repose Brings Him A Solid Reputation And Peaceful Life; Love Of Truth Keeps Him In Suspense. A Man Who Loves Truth Respects The Highest Law Of His Being.

The Scholar May Lose Himself In Schools, In Words, And Become A Pedant; But When He Comprehends His Duties, He Above All Men Is Arealist, And Converses With Things.

Genius Detects Through The Fly, Through The Caterpillar, Through The Grub, Through The Egg, The Constant Individual; Through Countless Individuals The Fixed Species; Through Many Species The Genus; Through All Genera The Steadfast Type; Through All The Kingdoms Of Organized Life The Eternal Unity. Nature Is A Mutable Cloud Which Is Always And Never The Same.

Poetry Being ... When We Look From The Center Outward.

Many A Reformer Perishes In His Removal Of Rubbish,--and That Makes The Offensiveness Of The Class. They Are Partial; They Are Notequal To The Work They Pretend. They Lose Their Way; In The Assault On The Kingdom Of Darkness, They Expend All Their Energy On Some Accidental Evil, And Lose Their Sanity And Power Of Benefit.

Among Provocative, The Next Best Thing To Good Preaching Is Bad Preaching.

I Find That The Americans Have No Passions, They Have Appetites.

Whatever You Do, You Need Courage.

Nobody Can Bring You Peace But Yourself.

My Hours Are Peaceful Centuries.

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

A Friend Is Janus-faced: He Looks To The Past And The Future. He Is The Child Of All My Foregoing Hours, The Prophet Of Those To Come, And The Harbinger Of A Greater Friend.

So Shall We Come To Look At The World With New Eyes.

Men Of Character Are The Conscience Of The Society To Which They Belong.

A Few Years Ago, The Liberal Churches Complained That The Calvinistic Church Denied To Them The Name Of Christian. I Think The Complaint Was Confession; A Religious Church Would Not Complain.

Beside All The Small Reasons We Assign, There Is A Great Reason For The Existence Of Every Extant Fact; A Reason Which Lies Grandand Immovable, Often Unsuspected Behind It In Silence.

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.

For You, O Broker, There Is No Other Principle But Arithmetic. For Me, Commerce Is Of Trivial Import; Love, Faith, Truth Of Character, The Aspiration Of Man, These Are Sacred; Nor Can I Detach One Duty, Like You, From All Other Duties, And Concentrate My Forces Mechanically On The Payment Of Moneys.

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

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

The Health Of The Eye Demands A Horizon.

Every Man Passes His Life In The Search After Friendship.

When You Have Worn Out Yourshoes, The Strength Of The Shoe Leather Has Passed Into The Fiber Ofyour Body. I Measure Your Health By The Number Of Shoes And Hats Andclothes You Have Worn Out.

We Must Learn The Language Of Facts. The Most Wonderful Inspirations Die With Their Subject, If He Has No Hand To Paint Them To The Senses.

The Less Government We Have The Better.

Where Is He Who Seeing A Thousand Men Useless And Unhappy, And Making The Whole Region Forlorn By Their Inaction, And Conscious Himself Of Possessing The Faculty They Want, Does Not Hear His Call To Go And Be Their King?

Better Be A Nettle In The Side Of Your Friend Than His Echo.

We Are Made Aware That Magnitude Of Material Things Is Relative, And All Objects Shrink And Expand To Serve The Passion Of The Poet. Thus, In His Sonnets, The Lays Of Birds, The Scents And Dyes Of Flowers, He Finds To Be The Shadow Of His Beloved; Time, Which Keeps Her From Him, Is His Chest; The Suspicion She Has Awakened, Is Her Ornament

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.

The Pulpit And The Press Have Many Commonplaces Denouncing The Thirst For Wealth, But If Men Should Take These Moralists At Their Word, And Leave Off Aiming To Be Rich, The Moralists Would Rush To Rekindle At All Hazards This Love Of Power In The People, Lest Civilization Should Be Undone.

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.

Spartans, Stoics, Heroes, Saints And Gods Use Short And Positive Speech.

Is Not Marriage An Open Question, When It Is Alleged, From The Beginning Of The World, That Such As Are In The Institution Wish To Get Out, And Such As Are Out Wish To Get In?

We Pass For What We Are.

Nature Does Not Cocker Us: We Are Children, Not Pets: She Is Not Fond: Everything Is Dealt To Us Without Fear Or Favor, After Severe Universal Laws.

The Craft Of The Merchant Is This Bringing A Thing Where It Abounds To Where It Is Costly.

We Might As Easily Reprove The East Wind, Or The Frost, As A Political Party, Whose Members, For The Most Part, Could Give No Account Of Their Position, But Stand For The Defence Of Those Interests In Which They Find Themselves.

A Man Should Carry Nature In His Head.

The World - This Shadow Of The Soul, Or Other Me - Lies Wide Around. Its Attractions Are The Keys Which Unlock My Thoughts And Make Me Acquainted With Myself. I Run Eagerly Into This Resounding Tumult... So Much Only Of Life As I Know By Experience... The True Scholar Grudges Every Opportunity Of Action Past By, As A Loss Of Power.

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

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

The Ornaments Of Our Homes Are The Friends That Visit It

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

Great Thoughts Ensure Musical Expression.

Musical Expression

A Weed Is A Plant Whose Virtue Is Not Yet Known.

All Things With Which We Deal Preach To Us. What Is A Farm But A Mute Gospel? The Chaff And The Wheat, Weeds And Plants, Blight, Rain, Insects, Sun,--it Is A Sacred Emblem From The First Furrow Of Spring To The Last Stack Which The Snow Of Winter Overtakes In The Fields.

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.

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

Speech Is Better Than Silence; Silence Is Better Than Speech.

The Wonder Is That We Can See These Trees And Not Wonder More.

Society Always Consists In The Greatest Part, Of Young And Foolish Persons.

Women, More Than All, Are The Element And Kingdom Of Illusion. Being Fascinated, They Fascinate.

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

My Son, A Perfect Little Boy Of Five Years And Three Months, Had Ended His Earthly Life. You Can Never Sympathize With Me; You Can Never Know How Much Of Me Such A Young Child Can Take Away. A Few Weeks Ago I Accounted Myself A Very Rich Man, And Now The Poorest Of All.

Man Begins Life Helpless. The Babe Is In Paroxysms Of Fear The Moment Its Nurse Leaves It Alone, And It Comes So Slowly To Any Power Of Self-protection That Mothers Say The Salvation Of The Life And Health Of A Young Child Is A Perpetual Miracle.

God Screens Us Evermore From Premature Ideas.

Life Is Too Short To Waste . . . 'twill Soon Be Dark; Up! Mind Thine Own Aim, And God Speed The Mark!

Our Spontaneous Action Is Always The Best. You Cannot, With Your Best Deliberation And Heed, Come So Close To Any Question As Your Spontaneous Glance Shall Bring You.

When Nature Has Work To Be Done, She Creates A Genius To Do It.

A Beautiful Woman Is A Practical Poet.

There Is Health In Table Talk And Nursery Play. We Must Wear Old Shoes And Have Aunts And Cousins.

I'm Happier. I Guess I Made Up My Mind To Be That Way.

Men Are Respectable Only As They Respect.

Every Man Is An Impossibility Until He Is Born.

I Do Then With My Friends As I Do With My Books. I Would Have Them Where I Can Find Them, But I Seldom Use Them.

A Healthy Soul Stands United With The Just And The True, As The Magnet Arranges Itself With The Pole, So That He Stands To All Beholders Like A Transparent Object Betwixt Them And The Sun, And Whoso Journeys Towards The Sun, Journeys Towards That Person. He Is Thus The Medium Of The Highest Influence To All Who Are Not On The Same Level.

It Never Was In The Power Of Any Man Or Any Community To Call The Arts Into Being. They Come To Serve His Actual Wants, Never To Please His Fancy.

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

'tis A Good Rule In Every Journey To Provide Some Piece Of Liberal Study To Rescue The Hours Which Bad Weather, Bad Company, And Taverns Steal From The Best Economist.

I Didn't Find My Friends; The Good Lord Gave Them To Me.

The Sanity Of Society Is A Balance Of A Thousand Insanity's.

Health Is The Condition Of Wisdom, And The Sign Is Cheerfulness, - An Open And Noble Temper.

What We Commonly Call Man, The Eating, Drinking, Planting, Counting Man, Does Not, As We Know Him, Represent Himself, But Misrepresents Himself. Him We Do Not Respect, But The Soul, Whose Organ He Is, Would He Let It Appear Through His Action, Would Make Our Knees Bend.

No Man Can Quite Emancipate Himself From His Age And Country, Or Produce A Model In Which The Education, The Religion, The Politics, Usages, And Arts, Of His Times Shall Have No Share.

The Wise Man, The True Friend, The Finished Character, We Seek Everywhere, And Only Find In Fragments.

What Your Heart Thinks Is Great, Is Great. The Soul's Emphasis Is Always Right.

This Day Is All That Is Good And Fair. It Is Too Dear, With Its Hopes And Invitations, To Waste A Moment On The Yesterdays.

In Nature Nothing Can Be Given. All Things Are Sold.

A New Person Is To Me A Great Event, And Hinders Me From Sleep. I Have Often Had Fine Fancies About Persons Which Have Given Me Delicious Hours; But The Joy Ends In The Day; It Yields No Fruit.

As Soon As There Is Life There Is Danger.

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

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.

An Orator Or Author Is Never Successful Till He Has Learned To Make His Words Smaller Than His Ideas.

Things Admit Of Being Used As Symbols, Because Nature Is A Symbol, In The Whole, And In Every Part.

The Mind, Once Stretched By A New Idea, Never Returns To Its Original Dimensions.

His Heart Was As Great As The World, But There Was No Room In It To Hold The Memory Of A Wrong.

Education Should Be As Broad As Man.

Though We Travel The World Over To Find The Beautiful, We Must Carry It With Us, Or We Find It Not. The Best Of Beauty Is A Finer Charm Than Skill In Surfaces, In Outlines, Or Rules Of Art Can Ever Teach, Namely, A Radiation From The Work Of Art Of Human Character, — A Wonderful Expression Through Stone, Or Canvas, Or Musical Sound, Of The Deepest And Simplest Attributes Of Our Nature, And Therefore Most Intelligible At Last To Those Souls Which Have These Attributes.

The Sea Is Masculine, The Type Of Active Strength. Look, What Egg-shells Are Drifting All Over It, Each One, Like Ours, Filled With Men In Ecstasies Of Terror, Alternating With Cockney Conceit, As The Sea Is Rough Or Smooth. Is This Sad-colored Circle An Eternal Cemetery?

A Divine Person Is The Prophecy Of The Mind; A Friend Is The Hope Of The Heart.

Go, Speed The Stars Of Thought On To Their Shining Goals; - The Sower Scatters Broad His Seed, The Wheat Thou Strew'st Be Souls.

All History Is Biography.

The Word Unto The Prophet Spoken Was Writ On Tablets Yet Unbroken: The Word By Seers Or Sibyls Told, In Groves Of Oak Or Fanes Of Gold, Still Floats Upon The Morning Wind, Still Whispers To The Willing Mind.

Consider What You Have In The Smallest Well-chosen Library-a Company Of The Wisest And Wittiest Men Which Can Be Plucked Out Of All Civilized Countries In A Thousand Years. The Men Themselves Were Then Hidden And Inaccessible. They Were Solitary, Impatient Of Interruption, And Fenced By Etiquette. But Now They Are Immortal, And The Thought They Did Not Reveal, Even To Their Bosom Friends, Is Here Written Out In Transparent Words Of Light To Us, Who Are Strangers Of Another Age.

The Worst Of Charity Is That The Lives You Are Asked To Preserve Are Not Worth Preserving.

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

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.

Men Are Not Philosophers, But Are Rather Very Foolish Children, Who, By Reason Of Their Partiality, See Everything In The Most Absurd Manner, And Are The Victims At All Times Of The Nearest Object. There Is Even No Philosopher Who Is A Philosopher At All Times. Our Experience, Our Perception Is Conditioned By The Need To Acquire In Parts And In Succession, That Is, With Every Truth A Certain Falsehood.

All That Adam Had, All That Caesar Could, You Have And Can Do.... Build, Therefore, Your Own World.

Good Writing Is A Kind Of Skating Which Carries Off The Performer Where He Would Not Go.

It Is One Of The Blessings Of Old Friends That You Can Afford To Be Stupid With Them.

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.

Freedom Is Not The Right To Do As You Please, But The Liberty To Do As You Should.

In Every Society Some Men Are Born To Rule, And Some To Advise.

Behind Us, As We Go, All Things Assume Pleasing Forms, As Clouds Do Far Off. Not Only Things Familiar And Stale, But Even The Tragic And Terrible, Are Comely, As They Take Their Place In The Pictures Of Memory.

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

The Sky Is The Ultimate Art Gallery Just Above Us.

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

The Wave Of Evil Washes All Our Institutions Alike.

True Wit Never Made Us Laugh.

The Poor Are Only They Who Feel Poor.

There Is Always A Best Way Of Doing Everything.

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.

Life Too Near Paralyses Art.

Genius Is The Naturalist Or Geographer Of The Supersensible Regions, And Draws Their Map; And, By Acquainting Us With New Fields Of Activity, Cools Our Affection For The Old. These Are At Once Accepted As The Reality, Of Which The World We Have Conversed With Is The Show.

Fear, Craft And Avarice Cannot Rear A State.

There Is A Time In Every Man's Education When He Arrives At The Conviction That Envy Is Ignorance; That Imitation Is Suicide.

Pride Eradicates All Vices But Itself.

Government Exists To Defend The Weak And The Poor And The Injured Party; The Rich And The Strong Can Better Take Care Of Themselves.

Is Not Prayer Also A Study Of Truth,--a Sally Of The Soul Into The Unfound Infinite? No Man Ever Prayed Heartily, Without Learningsomething. But When A Faithful Thinker, Resolute To Detach Every Object From Personal Relations, And See It In The Light Of Thought, Shall, At The Same Time, Kindle Science With The Fire Of The Holiest Affections, Then Will God Go Forth Anew Into Creation.

The World Is Filled With The Proverbs And Acts And Winkings Of A Base Prudence, Which Is A Devotion To Matter, As If We Possessedno Other Faculties Than The Palate, The Nose, The Touch, The Eye And Ear; A Prudence Which Adores The Rule Of Three, Which Never Subscribes, Which Never Gives, Which Seldom Lends, And Asks But One Question Of Any Project,--will It Bake Bread?

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

There Is A Tendency In Things To Right Themselves, And The War Or Revolution Or Bankruptcy That Shatters Rotten System, Allows Things To Take A New And Natural Order.

Poetry Teaches The Enormous Force Of A Few Words, And, In Proportion To The Inspiration, Checks Loquacity.

Always Maintain Your Common Sense And Artful Skills, And Funnel It All Into Plain Enough Dealings.

Wisdom Will Never Let Us Stand With Any Man On An Unfriendly Footing. We Refuse Sympathy And Intimacy With People, As If We Waited For Some Better Sympathy Or Intimacy To Come. But Whence And When: Tomorrow Will Be Like Today. Life Wastes Itself While We Are Preparing To Live.

Imagination Is A Very High Sort Of Seeing, Which Does Not Come By Study, But By The Intellect Being Where And What It Sees, By Sharing The Path, Or Circuits Of Things Through Forms, And So Making Them Translucid To Others.

I Am Grown By Sympathy A Little Eager And Sentimental, But Leave Me Alone, And I Should Relish Every Hour And What It Brought Me, The Pot-luck Of The Day, As Heartily As The Oldest Gossip In The Bar-room.

We Cannot Overstate Our Debt To The Past, But The Moment Has The Supreme Claim.

No Orator Can Top The One Who Can Give Good Nicknames.

The Indian Who Was Laid Under A Curse, That The Wind Should Not Blow On Him, Nor Water Flow To Him, Nor Fire Burn Him, Is A Type Of Us All. The Dearest Events Are Summer-rain, And We The Para Coats That Shed Every Drop. Nothing Is Left Us Now But Death. We Look To That With A Grim Satisfaction, Saying, There At Least Is Reality That Will Not Dodge Us.

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