Background Image

...

Trust Thyself: Every Heart Vibrates To That Iron String. Accept The Place The Divine Providence Has Found For You, The Society Of Your Contemporaries, The Connection Of Events. Great Men Have Always Done So, And Confided Themselves Childlike To The Genius Of Their Age, Betraying Their Perception That The Absolutely Trustworthy Was Seated At Their Heart, Working Through Their Hands, Predominating In All Their Being.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Trust Thyself: Every Heart

Ralph Waldo Emerson

...

Trust Thyself: Every Heart Vibrates To That Iron String. Accept The Place The Divine Providence Has Found For You, The Society Of Your Contemporaries, The Connection Of Events. Great Men Have Always Done So, And Confided Themselves Childlike To The Genius Of Their Age, Betraying Their Perception That The Absolutely Trustworthy Was Seated At Their Heart, Working Through Their Hands, Predominating In All Their Being.

Views: 5586

Topic

More From Ralph Waldo Emerson

Never Lose An Opportunity To See Anything That Is Beautiful. It Is God's Handwriting A Wayside Sacrament. Welcome It In Every Fair Face, Every Fair Sky, Every Fair Flower.

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.

Is It So Bad, Then, To Be Misunderstood? Pythagoras Was Misunderstood, And Socrates, And Jesus, And Luther, And Copernicus, And Galileo, And Newton, And Every Pure And Wise Spirit That Ever Took Flesh. To Be Great Is To Be Misunderstood.

Beware Of Jokes From Which We Go Away Hollow And Ashamed.

Wise Cultivated, Genial Conversation Is The Last Flower Of Civilization, And The Best Result Which Life Has To Offer Us,--a Cup For Gods, Which Has No Repentance. Conversation Is Our Account Of Ourselves. All We Have, All We Can, All We Know, Is Brought Into Play, And As The Reproduction In Finer Form, Of All Our Havings.

Happiness Is A Perfume You Cannot Pour On Others Without Getting Some On Yourself.

One Idea Lights A Thousand Candles.

Don't Waste Yourself In Rejection, Nor Bark Against The Bad, But Chant The Beauty Of The Good.

Life Too Near Paralyses Art.

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

I Suffer Whenever I See That Common Sight Of A Parent Or Senior Imposing His Opinion And Way Of Thinking And Being On A Young Soul To Which They Are Totally Unfit. Cannot We Let People Be Themselves, And Enjoy Life In Their Own Way? You Are Trying To Make That Man Another You. One's Enough.

It Is Only When Mind And Character Slumber That The Dress Can Be Seen. If The Intellect Were Always Awake, And Every Noble Sentiment, The Man Might Go In Huckaback Or Mats, And His Dress Would Be Admired And Imitated.

Nature Never Sends A Great Man Into The Planet, Without Confiding The Secret To Another Soul.

It Is Very Certain That The Strong British Race Which Has Now Overrun Much Of This Continent, Must Also Overrun [texas], And Mexico And Oregon Also, And It Will In The Course Of Ages Be Of Small Import By What Particular Occasions And Methods It Was Done.

The French Woman Says, 'i Am A Woman And A Parisienne, And Nothing Foreign To Me Appears Altogether Human.'

Genius Always Finds Itself A Century Too Early.

It Is Dainty To Be Sick If You Have Leisure And Convenience For It.

When Friendships Are Real, They Are Not Glass Threads Or Frost-work , But The Solidest Thing We Know.

And What Greater Calamity Can Fall Upon A Nation Than The Loss Of Worship.

Unhappily, No Man Exists Who Has Not In His Own Person Become, To Some Amount, A Stockholder In The Sin, And So Made Himself Liable To A Share In The Expiation.

Thus Is Man Made Equal To Every Event. He Can Face Danger For The Right. A Poor, Tender, Painful Body, He Can Run Into Flame Or Bullets Or Pestilence, With Duty For His Guide.

What We Have Learned From Other Becomes Our Own Reflection.

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.

Every Man Is Not So Much A Workman In The World As He Is A Suggestion Of That He Should Be. Men Walk As Prophecies Of The Next Age.

Not From A Vain Or Shallow Thought His Awful Jove Young Phidias Brought.

Human Character Evermore Publishes Itself. The Most Fugitive Deed And Word, The Intimated Purpose, Express Character.

Deeds And Words

The Influence Of The Senses Have In Men Overpowered The Thought To The Degree That The Walls Of Time And Space Have Come To Look Solid, Real And Insurmountable. .. Yet Time And Space Are But Inverse Measures Of The Power Of The Mind. Man Is Capable Of Abolishing Them Both.

The Ragged Cliff Has Thousand Faces In A Thousand Hours.

This Whole Business Of Trade Gives Me To Pause And Think, As It Constitutes False Relations Between Men; Inasmuch As I Am Prone Tocount Myself Relieved Of Any Responsibility To Behave Well And Nobly To That Person Who I Pay With Money, Whereas If I Had Not That Commodity, I Should Be Put On My Good Behavior In All Companies, And Man Would Be A Benefactor To Man, As Being Himself His Only Certificate That He Had A Right To Those Aids And Services Which Each Asked Of The Other.

The Search After The Great Men Is The Dream Of Youth, And The Most Serious Occupation Of Manhood.

What Is The Hardest Task In The World? To Think.

Under The Dominion Of An Idea, Which Possesses The Minds Of Multitudes, As Civil Freedom, Or The Religious Sentiment, The Power Ofpersons Are No Longer Subjects Of Calculation. A Nation Of Men Unanimously Bent On Freedom, Or Conquest, Can Easily Confound The Arithmetic Of Statists, And Achieve Extravagant Actions, Out Of All Proportion To Their Means; As, The Greeks, The Saracens, The Swiss, The Americans, And The French Have Done.

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.

The Same, The Same: Friend And Foe Are Of One Stuff; The Ploughman, The Plough, And The Furrow, Are Of One Stuff; And The Stuff Is Such, And So Much, That The Variations Of Form Are Unimportant.

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.

The American Who Has Been Confined, In His Own Country, To The Sight Of Buildings Designed After Foreign Models, Is Surprised On Entering York Minster Or St. Peter's At Rome, By The Feeling That These Structures Are Imitations Also,--faint Copies Of An Invisible Archetype.

The Field Cannot Be Well Seen From Within The Field. The Astronomer Must Have His Diameter Of The Earth's Orbit As A Base To Fix The Parallax Of Any Other Star

The End Of The Human Race Will Be That It Will Eventually Die Of Civilization.

Self-trust Is The First Secret Of Success, The Belief That If You Are Here The Authorities Of The Universe Put You Here, And For Cause, Or With Some Task Strictly Appointed You In Your Constitution, And So Long As You Work At That You Are Well And Successful

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

A Man Is Relieved And Gay When He Has Put His Heart Into His Work And Done His Best; But What He Has Said Or Done Otherwise Shall Give Him No Peace.

The Scholar Is That Man Who Must Take Up Into Himself All The Ability Of The Time, All The Contributions Of The Past, All The Hopes Of The Future. He Must Be An University Of Knowledges.

Enthusiasm Is The Engine Of Success.

Congratulations

If The Red Slayer Think He Slays, Or If The Slain Think He Is Slain, They Know Not Well The Subtle Ways, I Keep And Pass And Turn Again.

It Does Not To Dwell On Dreams And Forget To Live, But It Is Equally Foolish To Ignore The Past – Never Forget.

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.

Every Man's Task [his 'great Dream' And Impassioned Life-goal] Is His Life Preserver.

It Makes A Great Difference In The Force Of A Sentence, Whether A Man Be Behind It Or No.

If You Have Something To Say, You Will Be Given The Power To Say It.

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.

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

Infancy Conforms To Nobody; All Conform To It.

"though Many Painters And Sculptors Talk Glibly Of "going In For Photography," You Will Find That Very Few Of Them Can Ever Make A Picture By Photography; They Lack The Science, Technical Knowledge, And Above All The Practice. Most People Think They Can Play Tennis, Shoot, Write Novels, And Photograph As Well As Any Other Person - Until They Try."

If You Believe In Fate, Believe In It, At Least, For Your Good.

Nature Turns All Malfaisance To Good.

Character Is Higher Than Intellect. Thinking Is The Function; Living Is The Functionary.

The Only Sin Is Limitation. As Soon As You Once Come Up With A Man's Limitations, It Is All Over With Him. Has He Talents? Has Heenterprise? Has He Knowledge? It Boots Not. Infinitely Alluring And Attractive Was He To You Yesterday, A Great Hope, A Sea To Swim In; Now, You Have Found His Shores, Found It A Pond, And You Care Not If You Never See It Again.

Light Is The First Of Painters. There Is No Object So Foul That Intense Light Will Not Make It Beautiful.

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

We Honor The Rich Because They Have Externally The Freedom, Power, And Grace Which We Feel To Be Proper To Man, Proper To Us.

The Best Bribe Which London Offers To-day To The Imagination, Is, That, In Such A Vast Variety Of People And Conditions, One Can Believe There Is Room For Persons Of Romantic Character To Exist, And That The Poet, The Mystic, And The Hero May Hope To Confront Their Counterparts.

Every Particular In Nature, A Leaf, A Drop, A Crystal, A Moment Of Time Is Related To The Whole, And Partakes Of The Perfection Of The Whole.

Our Faith Comes In Moments; Our Vice Is Habitual.

The Whole Course Of Things Goes To Teach Us Faith. We Need Only Obey. There Is Guidance For Each Of Us, And By Lowly Listening We Shall Hear The Right Word. . . . Place Yourself In The Middle Of The Stream Of Power And Wisdom Which Flows Into You As Life, Place Yourself In The Full Center Of That Flood, Then You Are Without Effort Impelled To Truth, To Right, And A Perfect Contentment.

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

We Begin With Friendships, And All Our Youth Is A Reconnoitering And Recruiting Of The Holy Fraternity They Shall Combine For Thesalvation Of Men. But So The Remoter Stars Seem A Nebula Of United Light, Yet There Is No Group Which A Telescope Will Not Resolve; And The Dearest Friends Are Separated By Impassable Gulfs.

A Little Consideration Of What Takes Place Around Us Every Day Would Show Us That A Higher Law Than That Of Our Will Regulates Events; That Our Painful Labors Are Unnecessary And Fruitless; That Only In Our Easy, Simple, Spontaneous Action Are We Strong . . . . Place Yourself In The Middle Of The Stream Of Power And Wisdom Which Animates All Whom It Floats, And You Are Without Effort Impelled To Truth, To Right, And A Perfect Contentment.

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

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.

It Is Always A Practical Difficulty With Clubs To Regulate The Laws Of Election So As To Exclude Peremptorily Every Social Nuisance. Nobody Wishes Bad Manners. We Must Have Loyalty And Character.

When He Is Pushed, Tormented, Defeated, He Has A Chance To Learn Something; He Has Been Put On His Wits, On His Manhood; He Has Gained Facts; Learns His Ignorance; Is Cured Of The Insanity Of Conceit; Has Got Moderation And Real Skill.

Wild Liberty Breeds Iron Conscience; Natures With Great Impulses Have Great Resources, And Return From Far.

The Visible Heavens And Earth Sympathize With Jesus.

He Is A Dull Observer Whose Experience Has Not Taught Him The Reality And Force Of Magic, As Well As Of Chemistry.

Slavery It Is That Makes Slavery; Freedom, Freedom. The Slavery Of Women Happened When The Men Were Slaves Of Kings.

The Force Of Character Is Cumulative.

Economy Does Not Consist In Saving The Coal, But In Using The Time While It Burns.

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.

My Own Mind Is The Direct Revelation Which I Have From God And Far Least Liable To Mistake In Telling His Will Of Any Revelation.

The Poet Alone Knows Astronomy, Chemistry, Vegetation, And Animation, For He Does Not Stop At These Facts, But Employs Them As Signs. He Knows Why The Plain, Or Meadow Of Space, Was Strown With These Flowers We Call Suns, And Moons, And Stars; Why The Deep Is Adorned With Animals, With Men, And Gods; For, In Every Word He Speaks He Rides On Them As The Horses Of Thought.

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

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

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

Throughout The Ages There Have Always Been Those Who Have Been Willing To Go Beyond The Norms And Reach For That Unknown And Distant Star.

The Field Cannot Be Seen From Within The Field.

Do Not Be Caught By The Sensational In Nature, As A Coarse Red-faced Sunset, A Garrulous Waterfall, Or A Fifteen Thousand Foot Mountain... Avoid Prettiness - The Word Looks Much Like Pettiness - And There Is But Little Difference Between Them.

A Man Is A Beggar Who Only Lives To The Useful, And, However He May Serve As A Pin Or Rivet In The Social Machine, Cannot Be Saidto Have Arrived At Self-possession.

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?

But To Most Of Us Society Shows Not Its Face And Eye, But Its Side And Back. To Stand In True Relations With Men In A False Age Isworth A Fit Of Insanity, Is It Not?

Genius Seems To Consist Merely In Trueness Of Sight, In Using Such Words As Show That The Man Was An Eye-witness, And Not A Repeater Of What Was Told.

When I Behold A Rich Landscape, It Is Less To My Purpose To Recite Correctly The Order And Superposition Of The Strata, Than To Know Why All Thought Of Multitude Is Lost In A Tranquil Sense Of Unity.

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

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

If We Live Truly, We Shall See Truly. It Is As Easy For The Strong Man To Be Strong, As It Is For The Weak To Be Weak.

Fame Is Proof That The People Are Gullible.

My Life Is For Itself And Not For A Spectacle.

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

Practice Makes Perfect - The Sooner You Start, The Sooner You Will Be A Happy Nonsmoker

Music Is The Poor Man's Parnassus.

Beware When The Great God Lets Loose A Thinker On This Planet.

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.

If The Individuals Who Compose The Purest Circles Of Aristocracy In Europe, The Guarded Blood Of Centuries, Should Pass In Review,in Such Manner As That We Could, At Leisure, And Critically Inspect Their Behavior, We Might Find No Gentleman, And No Lady; For, Although Excellent Specimens Of Courtesy And High-breeding Would Gratify Us In The Assemblage, In The Particulars, We Should Detect Offence. Because, Elegance Comes Of No Breeding, But Of Birth.

Men Have Sometimes Exchanged Names With Their Friends, As If They Would Signify That In Their Friend Each Loved His Own Soul.

The Advantage Of Riches Remains With Him Who Procured Them, Not With The Heir.

Work And Thou Canst Escape The Reward; Whether The Work Be Fine Or Course, Planting Corn Or Writing Epics, So Only It Be Honest Work, Done To Thine Own Approbation, It Shall Earn A Reward To The Senses As Well As To The Thought.

At Times The Whole World Seems To Be In Conspiracy To Importune You With Emphatic Trifles.

Universities Are Of Course Hostile To Geniuses, Which, Seeing And Using Ways Of Their Own, Discredit The Routine: As Churches And Monasteries Persecute Youthful Saints.

Our Fear Of Death Is Like Our Fear That Summer Will Be Short, But When We Have Had Our Swing Of Pleasure, Our Fill Of Fruit, And Our Swelter Of Heat, We Say We Have Had Our Day.

Criticism Should Not Be Querulous And Wasting, All Knife And Root-puller, But Guiding, Instructive, Inspiring, A South Wind, Not An East Wind.

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.

Everything In Nature Contains All The Powers Of Nature. Everything Is Made Of One Hidden Stuff.

We Do Not Live An Equal Life, But One Of Contrasts And Patchwork; Now A Little Joy, Then A Sorrow, Now A Sin, Then A Generous Or Brave Action.

Nature Is A Tropical Swamp In Sunshine, On Whose Purlieus We Hear The Song Of Summer Birds, And See Prismatic Dewdrops, - But Her Interiors Are Terrific, Full Of Hydras And Crocodiles.

There Are Many Eyes That Can Detect And Honor The Prudent And Household Virtues; There Are Many That Can Discern Genius On His Starry Track, Though The Mob Is Incapable; But When That Love Which Is All-suffering, All-abstaining, All-aspiring, Which Has Vowed To Itself, That It Will Be A Wretch And Also A Fool In This World, Sooner Than Soil Its White Hands By Any Compliances, Comes Into Our Streets And Houses,--only The Pure And Aspiring Can Know Its Face, And The Only Compliment They Can Pay It, Is To Own It.

A Work Of Art Is An Abstract Or Epitome Of The World. It Is The Result Or Expression Of Nature, In Miniature. For, Although The Works Of Nature Are Innumerable And All Different, The Result Or The Expression Of Them All Is Similar And Single.

There Is Not A Piece Of Science, But Its Flank May Be Turned Tomorrow.

Do Not You See That Every Misfortune Is Misconduct; That Every Honour Is Desert; That Every Effort Is An Insolence Of Your Own?...you Carry Your Fortune In Your Own Hand.

Wherever A Man Commits A Crime, God Finds A Witness. Every Secret Crime Has Its Reporter.

Nature And Literature Are Subjective Phenomena; Every Evil And Every Good Thing Is A Shadow Which We Cast

I Cannot Remember The Books I've Read Any More Than The Meals I Have Eaten; Even So, They Have Made Me.

Sorrow Makes Us All Children Again.

You See, It's All Clear, We Were Meant To Be Here From The Beginning.

Were Meant To Be

Each Man, If He Attempts To Join Himself To Others, Is On All Sides Cramped And Diminished Of His Proportion; And The Stricter Theunion, The Smaller And The More Pitiful He Is. But Leave Him Alone, To Recognize In Every Hour And Place The Secret Soul, He Will Go Up And Down Doing The Works Of A True Member, And, To The Astonishment Of All, The Work Will Be Done With Concert, Though No Man Spoke.

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

There Is Ever A Slight Suspicion Of The Burlesque About Earnest Good Men.

Some Of The Sweetest Hours In Life, In Retrospect Will Be Found To Have Been Spent With Books.

The Shot Heard Round The World.

Revolutionary War

Augusta National

April And Spring

Politics Is A Deleterious Profession, Like Some Poisonous Handicrafts.

The Public Values The Invention More Than The Inventor Does. The Inventor Knows There Is Much More And Better Where This Came From.

It Seems To Be A Rule Of Wisdom Never To Rely On Memory Alone.

There Is No Event Greater In Life Than The Appearance Of New Persons About Our Hearth, Except It Be The Progress Of The Characterwhich Draws Them.

Shallow Men Believe In Luck.

Language Is A City To The Building Of Which Every Human Being Brought A Stone.

Language And Power

The Only Gift Is A Portion Of Thyself . . . The Poet Brings His Poem; The Shepherd His Lamb. . . .

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.

Do You Want To Be A Power In The World? Then Be Yourself. Be True To The Highest Within Your Soul And Then Allow Yourself To Be Governed By No Customs Or Conventionaliti Es Or Arbitrary Man-made Rules That Are Not Founded On Principle.

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

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.

Besides, Our Action On Each Other, Good As Well As Evil, Is So Incidental And At Random, That We Can Seldom Hear The Acknowledgments Of Any Person Who Would Thank Us For A Benefit, Without Some Shame And Humiliation. We Can Rarely Strike A Direct Stroke, But Must Be Content With An Oblique One; We Seldom Have The Satisfaction Of Yielding A Direct Benefit, Which Is Directly Received.

Let Me Never Fall Into The Vulgar Mistake Of Dreaming That I Am Persecuted Whenever I Am Contradicted.

But Only That Soul Can Be My Friend Which I Encounter On The Line Of My Own March, That Soul To Which I Do Not Decline, And Which Does Not Decline Me, But, Native Of The Same Celestial Latitude, Repeats In Its Own All My Experience.

This One Fact The World Hates; That The Soul Becomes; For That Forever Degrades The Past, Turns All Riches To Poverty, All Reputation To A Shame, Confounds The Saint With The Rogue, Shoves Jesus And Judas Equally Aside.

Only So Much Of Life Do I Know As I Have Lived.

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

Nature Never Wears A Mean Appearance. Neither Does The Wisest Man Extort Her Secret, And Lose His Curiosity By Finding Out All Her Perfection.

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 Way To Write Is To Throw Your Body At The Mark When Your Arrows Are Spent.

Many A Profound Genius, I Suppose, Who Fills The World With Fame Of His Exploding Renowned Errors, Is Yet Everyday Posed And Baffled By Trivial Questions At His Own Supper Table.

For The World Was Built In Order Around The Atoms March In Tune; Rhyme The Pipe, And Time The Warder, The Sun Obeys Them, And The Moon.

He In Whom The Love Of Repose Predominates Will Accept The First Creed, The First Philosophy, The First Political Party He Meets — Most Likely His Father's. He Gets Rest, Commodity, And Reputation; But He Shuts The Door Of Truth.

The Religion Which Is To Guide And Fulfill The Present And Coming Ages, Whatever Else It Be, Must Be Intellectual. The Scientific Mind Must Have A Faith Which Is Science.

My Garden Is A Forest Ledge Which Older Forest S Bound; The Banks Slope Down To The Blue Lake-edge, Then Plunge To Depths Profound!

Vivacity, Leadership, Must Be Had, And We Are Not Allowed To Be Nice In Choosing. We Must Fetch The Pump With Dirty Water, If Clean Cannot Be Had.

He Who Has A Thousand Friends Has Not A Friend To Spare, While He Who Has One Enemy Shall Meet Him Everywhere.

We Sell The Thrones Of Angels For A Short And Turbulent Pleasure.

Progress Is The Activity Of Today And The Assurance Of Tomorrow

Who Does Not Sometimes Envy The Good And The Brave, Who Are No More To Suffer From The Tumults Of The Natural World, And Await With Curious Complacency The Speedy Term Of His Own Conversation With Finite Nature?

There Is In Nature A Parallel Unity Which Corresponds To The Unity In The Mind And Makes It Available. This Methodizing Mind Meets No Resistance In Its Attempts. The Scattered Blocks, With Which It Strives To Form A Symmetrical Structure, Fit. This Design Following After Finds With Joy That Like Design Went Before. Not Only Man Puts Things In A Row, But Things Belong In A Row.

Looking At God Instantly Reduces Our Disposition To Dissent From Our Brother.

The Only Reward Of Virtue Is Virtue.

The Torpid Artist Seeks Inspiration At Any Cost, By Virtue Or By Vice, By Friend Or By Fiend, By Prayer Or By Wine.

Keep Your Friendships In Repair.

We Walk Alone In The World.

To Finish The Moment, To Find The Journey's End In Every Step Of The Road, To Live The Greatest Number Of Good Hours, Is Wisdom.

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.

Truth Has Already Ceased To Be Itself If Polemically Said.

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.

Do Not Spill Thy Soul In Running Hither And Yon, Grieving Over The Mistakes And The Vices Of Others. The One Person Whom It Is Most Necessary To Reform Is Yourself.

The House Is A Castle Which The King Cannot Enter.

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.

Wherever There Is Power There Is Age.

God Hid The Whole World In Thy Heart.

A Fly Is As Untamable As A Hyena.

A Right Rule For A Club Would Be, Admit No Man Whose Presence Excludes Any One Topic. It Requires People Who Are Not Surprised Andshocked, Who Do And Let Do, And Let Be, Who Sink Trifles, And Know Solid Values, And Who Take A Great Deal For Granted.

It Is True That Genius Takes Its Rise Out Of The Mountains Of Rectitude; That All Beauty And Power Which Men Covet Are Somehow Born Out Of That Alpine District; That Any Extraordinary Degree Of Beauty In Man Or Woman Involves A Moral Charm.

True Wit Never Made Us Laugh.

[gratitude Is] The Cheerfulness Of Wisdom.

It In Every Fair Face, Every Fair Sky, Every Fair Flower.

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

If The Gatherer Gathers Too-much, Nature Takes Out Of The Man What She Puts Into His Chest; Swells The Estate, But Kills The Owner. Nature Hates, Monopolies And Exceptions.

Only That Mind Draws Me Which I Cannot Read.

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

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

Those Who Stay Away From The Election Think That One Vote Will Do No Good. 'tis But One Step More To Think One Vote Will Do No Harm.

Is It Not Better To Intimate Our Astonishment As We Pass Through This World If It Be Only For A Moment Ere We Are Swallowed Up In The Yeast Of The Abyss? I Will Lift Up My Hands And Say Kosmos.

Every Known Fact In Natural Science Was Divined By The Presentiment Of Somebody, Before It Was Actually Verified.

Native American

And I Myself, In Rome, Heard It Said Openly In The Streets, "if There Is A Hell, Then Rome Is Built On It." Martin Luther, Against The Roman Papacy, An Institution Of The Devil London Is The Epitome Of Our Times, And The Rome Of To-day.

Every Time You Wink The Stars Move.

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

The First Steps In Agriculture, Astronomy, Zoology, (those First Steps Which The Farmer, The Hunter, And The Sailor Take,) Teach That Nature's Dice Are Always Loaded; That In Her Heaps And Rubbish Are Concealed Sure And Useful Results.

The City Is Always Recruited From The Country. The Men In Cities Who Are The Centres Of Energy, The Driving-wheels Of Trade, Politics Or Practical Arts, And The Women Of Beauty And Genius, Are The Children Or Grandchildren Of Farmers, And Are Spending The Energies Which Their Fathers' Hardy, Silent Life Accumulated In Frosty Furrows In Poverty, Necessity And Darkness.

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

He Who Should Inspire And Lead His Race Must Be Defended From Travelling With The Souls Of Other Men, From Living, Breathing, Reading, And Writing In The Daily, Time-worn Yoke Of Their Opinions.

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.

A Gothic Cathedral Affirms That It Was Done By Us And Not Done By Us.

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.

Lovers Should Guard Their Strangeness. If They Forgive Too Much, All Slides Into Confusion And Meanness.

The Goitre Of Egotism Is So Frequent Among Notable Persons, That We Must Infer Some Strong Necessity In Nature Which It Subserves;such As We See In The Sexual Attraction.

This Ennui, For Which We Saxons Had No Name,--this Word Of France, Has Got A Terrific Significance. It Shortens Life, And Bereaves The Day Of Its Light.

The Ocean Is A Large Drop; A Drop Is A Small Ocean.

Trending Author

Category