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What A Man Does, That He Has. What Has He To Do With Hope Or Fear? In Himself Is His Might. Let Him Regard No Good As Solid But That Which Is In His Nature, And Which Must Grow Out Of Him As Long As He Exists. The Goods Of Fortune May Come And Go Like Summer Leaves; Let Him Scatter Them On Every Wind As The Momentary Signs Of His Infinite Productiveness.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

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What A Man Does,

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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What A Man Does, That He Has. What Has He To Do With Hope Or Fear? In Himself Is His Might. Let Him Regard No Good As Solid But That Which Is In His Nature, And Which Must Grow Out Of Him As Long As He Exists. The Goods Of Fortune May Come And Go Like Summer Leaves; Let Him Scatter Them On Every Wind As The Momentary Signs Of His Infinite Productiveness.

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Nature Paints The Best Part Of A Picture, Carves The Best Parts Of The Statue, Builds The Best Part Of The House, And Speaks The Best Part Of The Oration.

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.

There Is Nothing Capricious In Nature And The Implanting Of A Desire Indicates That Its Gratification Is In The Constitution Of The Creature That Feel It.

Nothing Will Supply The Want Of Sunshine To Peaches, And, To Make Knowledge Valuable, You Must Have The Cheerfulness Of Wisdom. Whenever You Are Sincerely Pleased You Are Nourished. The Joy Of The Spirit Indicates Its Strength. All Healthy, Things Are Sweet-tempered. Genius Works In Sport, And Goodness Smiles To The Last.

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

It Is A Fact Often Observed, That Men Have Written Good Verses Under The Inspiration Of Passion, Who Cannot Write Well Under Other Circumstances.

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

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.

I Look On That Man As Happy, Who, When There Is Question Of Success, Looks Into His Work For A Reply.

The Solar System Has No Anxiety About Its Reputation, And The Credit Of Truth And Honesty Is As Safe; Nor Have I Any Fear That A Skeptical Bias Can Be Given By Leaning Hard On The Sides Of Fate, Of Practical Power, Or Of Trade, Which The Doctrine Of Faith Cannot Down-weigh.

Give Me Insight Into Today And You May Have The Antique And Future Worlds.

Though We Love Goodness And Not Stealing, Yet Also We Love Freedom And Not Preaching.

If Thou Fill Thy Brain With Boston And New York, With Fashion And Covetousness, And Wilt Stimulate Thy Jaded Senses With Wine And French Coffee, Thou Shalt Find No Radiance Of Wisdom In The Lonely Waste Of The Pinewoods.

The South-wind Brings Life, Sunshine And Desire, And On Every Mount And Meadow Breathes Aromatic Fire; But Over The Dead He Has No Power, The Lost, The Lost, He Cannot Restore; And, Looking Over The Hills, I Mourn The Darling Who Shall Not Return.

Beauty Brings Its Own Fancy Price, For All That A Man Hath Will He Give For His Love.

We Must Leave Our Pets At Home, When We Go Into The Street, And Meet Men On Broad Grounds Of Good Meaning And Good Sense.

The Whole Of What We Know Is A System Of Compensation. Every Defect In One Manner Is Made Up In Another. Every Suffering Is Rewarded; Every Sacrifice Is Made Up; Every Debt Is Paid.

A Garden Has This Advantage, That It Makes It Indifferent Where You Live. A Well-laid Garden Makes The Face Of The Country Of No Account; Let That Be Low Or High, Grand Or Mean, You Have Made A Beautiful Abode Worthy Of Man.

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

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.

Art, In The Artist, Is Proportion, Or, A Habitual Respect To The Whole By An Eye Loving Beauty In Details. And The Wonder And Charm Of It Is The Sanity In Insanity Which It Denotes.

The Essence Of Friendship Is Entireness, A Total Magnanimity And Trust.

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

If We Must Accept Fate We Are Not Less Compelled To Affirm Liberty, The Significance Of The Individual, The Grandeur Of Duty, The Power Of Character.

The Affections Cannot Keep Their Youth Any More Than Men.

Pride Eradicates All Vices But Itself.

Magic And All That Is Ascribed To It Is A Deep Presentiment Of The Powers Of Science.

The Persons Who Constitute The Natural Aristocracy, Are Not Found In The Actual Aristocracy, Or, Only On Its Edge; As The Chemicalenergy Of The Spectrum Is Found To Be Greatest Just Outside Of The Spectrum.

The Force Of Character Is Cumulative.

Whatever You Do, You Need Courage. Whatever Course You Decide Upon, There Is Always Someone To Tell You That You Are Wrong.

The Man (or Woman) Who Can Make Hard Things Easy Is The Educator.

An Answer In Words Is Delusive; It Is Really No Answer To The Questions You Ask.

It Is Very Hard To Be Simple Enough To Be Good.

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.

The Crime Which Bankrupts Men And Nations Is That Of Turning Aside From One's Main Purpose To Serve A Job Here And There.

Whenever A Mind Is Simple And Receives An Old Wisdom, Old Things Pass Away,--means, Teachers, Texts, Temples Fall; It Lives Now, And Absorbs Past And Future Into Present Hour. All Things Are Made Sacred By Relation To It,--one As Much As Another.

Society Has Really No Graver Interest Than The Well-being Of The Literary Class.

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.

I Am Present At The Sowing Of The Seed Of The World. With A Geometry Of Sunbeams, The Soul Lays The Foundations Of Nature.

Luck Is Just Another Word For Tenacity Of Purpose.

Meantime The Education Of The General Mind Never Stops. The Reveries Of The True And Simple Are Prophetic. What The Tender Poeticyouth Dreams, And Prays, And Paints Today, But Shuns The Ridicule Of Saying Aloud, Shall Presently Be The Resolutions Of Public Bodies, Then Shall Be Carried As Grievance And Bill Of Rights Through Conflict And War, And Then Shall Be Triumphant Law And Establishment For A Hundred Years, Until It Gives Place, In Turn, To New Prayers And Pictures.

The State Is Our Neighbors; Our Neighbors Are The State.

The Sensual Man Conforms Thoughts To Things; The Poet Conforms Things To His Thoughts.

What Is Well Done, I Feel As If I Did; What Is Ill-done, I Reck Not Of.

The Artist Always Has The Masters In His Eyes.

Each Religious Sect Has Its Own Physiognomy. The Methodists Have Acquired A Face; The Quakers, A Face; The Nuns, A Face. An Englishman Will Pick Out A Dissenter By His Manners.

The Simplest Words,--we Do Not Know What They Mean Except When We Love And Aspire.

Men Have Looked Away From Themselves And At Things So Long That They Have Come To Esteem The Religious, Learned And Civil Institutions As Guards Of Property, And They Deprecate Assaults On These, Because They Feel Them To Be Assaults On Property. They Measure Their Esteem Of Each Other By What Each Has, And Not By What Each Is.

I Count Him A Great Man Who Inhabits A Higher Sphere Of Thought, Into Which Other Men Rise With Labor And Difficulty; He Has But To Open His Eyes To See Things In A True Light, And In Large Relations; Whilst They Must Make Painful Corrections, And Keep A Vigilant Eye On Many Sources Of Error.

Write It On Your Heart That Every Day Is The Best Day In The Year. He Is Rich Who Owns The Day, And No One Owns The Day Who Allows It To Be Invaded With Fret And Anxiety. Finish Every Day And Be Done With It. You Have Done What You Could. Some Blunders And Absurdities, No Doubt Crept In. Forget Them As Soon As You Can, Tomorrow Is A New Day; Begin It Well And Serenely, With Too High A Spirit To Be Cumbered With Your Old Nonsense. This New Day Is Too Dear, With Its Hopes And Invitations, To Waste A Moment On The Yesterdays.

It Is, In Both Cases, That A Spiritual Life Has Been Imparted To Nature; That The Solid Seeming Block Of Matter Has Been Pervadedand Dissolved By A Thought; That This Feeble Human Being Has Penetrated The Vast Masses Of Nature With An Informing Soul, And Recognised Itself In Their Harmony, That Is, Seized Their Law. In Physics, When This Is Attained, The Memory Disburthens Itself Of Its Cumbrous Catalogues Of Particulars, And Carries Centuries Of Observation In A Single Formula.

The Greatest Gift Is A Portion Of Thyself.

It Is The Ignorant And Childish Part Of Mankind That Is The Fighting Part. Idle And Vacant Minds Want Excitement

Drive Out Nature With A Fork, She Comes Running Back.

The Right Merchant Is One Who Has The Just Average Of Faculties We Call Common Sense; A Man Of A Strong Affinity For Facts, Who Makes Up His Decision On What He Has Seen. He Is Thoroughly Persuaded Of The Truths Of Arithmetic. There Is Always A Reason, In The Man, For His Good Or Bad Fortune In Making Money. Men Talk As If There Were Some Magic About This. He Knows That All Goes On The Old Road, Pound For Pound, Cent For Cent - For Every Effect A Perfect Cause - And That Good Luck Is Another Name For Tenacity Of Purpose.

Life Only Avails, Not The Having Lived.

Do Not Say Things. What You Are Stands Over You The While, And Thunders, So That I Cannot Hear What You Say To The Contrary.

Knowledge, Virtue, Power Are The Victories Of Man Over His Necessities, His March To The Dominion Of The World.

Other World? There Is No Other World; Here Or Nowhere Is The Whole Fact.

Society Is Always Taken By Surprise At Any New Example Of Common Sense.

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.

We Shall One Day Learn To Supersede Politics By Education. What We Call Our Root-and-branch Reforms Of Slavery, War, Gambling, Intemperance, Is Only Medicating The Symptoms. We Must Begin Higher Up, Namely, In Education.

God Will Not Make Himself Manifest To Cowards

It Does Not Need That A Poem Should Be Long. Every Word Was Once A Poem.

People Are Very Inclined To Set Moral Standards For Others.

Our Culture, Therefore, Must Not Omit The Arming Of The Man. Let Him Hear In Season, That He Is Born Into The State Of War, And That The Commonwealth And His Own Well-being Require That He Should Not Go Dancing In The Weeds Of Peace, But Warned, Self- Collected, And Neither Defying Nor Dreading The Thunder, Let Him Take Both Reputation And Life In His Hand, And, With Perfect Urbanity, Dare The Gibbet And The Mob By The Absolute Truth Of His Speech, And The Rectitude Of His Behaviour.

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

The Terrors Of The Child Are Quite Reasonable, And Add To His Loveliness; For His Utter Ignorance And Weakness, And His Enchanting Indignation On Such A Small Basis Of Capital Compel Every Bystander To Take His Part.

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

Native American

Every Day Brings A Ship, Every Ship Brings A Word; Well For Those Who Have No Fear, Looking Seaward Well Assured That The Word The Vessel Brings Is The Word They Wish To Hear.

The Hearing Ear Is Always Found Close To The Speaking Tongue; And No Genius Can Long Or Often Utter Anything Which Is Not Invited And Gladly Entertained By Men Around Him.

Man Was Born To Be Rich, Or To Inevitably Grow Rich, By The Use Of His Faculties: By The Union Of Thought With Nature.

There Is No True Orator Who Is Not A Hero.

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

Not In His Goals But In His Transitions, Man Is Great.

Greek Architecture Is The Flowering Of Geometry.

The Gift, To Be True, Must Be The Flowing Of The Giver Unto Me, Correspondent To My Flowing Unto Him.

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.

We Pray To Be Conventional. But The Wary Heaven Takes Care You Shall Not Be, If There Is Anything Good In You. Dante Was Very Badcompany, And Was Never Invited To Dinner.

There Are Moods In Which We Court Suffering, In The Hope That Here, At Least, We Shall Find Reality, Sharp Peaks And Edges Of Truth. But It Turns Out To Be Scene-painting And Counterfeit. The Only Thing Grief Has Taught Me Is To Know How Shallow It Is.

We Are Sure That, Though We Know Not How, Necessity Does Comport With Liberty, The Individual With The World, My Polarity With Thespirit Of The Times. The Riddle Of The Age Has For Each A Private Solution.

Poverty Consist In Feeling Poor.

With Thought, With The Ideal, Is Immortal Hilarity, The Rose Of Joy. Round It All The Muses Sing.

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

Men Who Know The Same Things Are Not Long The Best Company For Each Other.

In Daily Life What Distinguishes The Master Is The Using Those Materials He Has, Instead Of Looking About For What Are More Renowned, Or What Others Have Used Well.

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.

We Will Walk On Our Own Feet; We Will Work With Our Own Hands; We Will Speak Our Own Minds... A Nation Of Men Will For The First Time Exist, Because Each Believes Himself Inspired By The Divine Soul Which Also Inspires All Men.

The State Of Society Is One In Which The Members Have Suffered Amputation From The Trunk, And Strut About So Many Walking Monsters,—a Good Finger, A Neck, A Stomach, An Elbow, But Never A Man.

Manners Are The Happy Ways Of Doing Things; Each Once A Stroke Of Genius Or Of Love, Now Repeated And Hardened Into Usage.

Nature Is Upheld By Antagonism.

Universities Are Of Course Hostile To Geniuses.

Every Spirit Makes Its House, And We Can Give A Shrewd Guess From The House To The Inhabitant.

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

But Your Isolation Must Not Be Mechanical, But Spiritual, That Is, Must Be Elevation.

Men In All Ways Are Better Than They Seem.

Of Course You Will Insist On Modesty In The Children, And Respect To Their Teachers, But If The Boy Stops You In Your Speech, Cries Out That You Are Wrong And Sets You Right, Hug Him!

A Man Cannot Utter Two Or Three Sentences Without Disclosing To Intelligent Ears Precisely Where He Stands In Life And Thought, Whether In The Kingdom Of The Senses And The Understanding, Or In That Of Ideas And Imagination, Or In The Realm Of Intuitions And Duty.

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

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

Comfort And Joy

In These Divine Pleasures Permitted To Me Of Walks In The June Night Under Moon And Stars, I Can Put My Life As A Fact Before Me And Stand Aloof From Its Honor And Shame.

We Must Hold A Man Amenable To Reason For The Choice Of His Daily Craft Or Profession. It Is Not An Excuse Any Longer For His Deeds That They Are The Custom Of His Trade. What Business Has He With An Evil Trade?

The Never-ending Task Of Self Improvement.

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

In Spite Of Warnings, Change Rarely Occurs Until The Status Quo Becomes More Painful Than Change. People Seem Not To See That Their Opinion Of The World Is Also A Confession Of Their Character.

A Man Complained That On His Way Home To Dinner He Had Every Day To Pass Through That Long Field Of His Neighbor's. I Advised Him To Buy It, And It Would Never Seem Long Again.

I Think That The Heroism Which At This Day Would Make On Us The Impression Of Epaminondas And Phocion Must Be That Of A Domestic Conqueror. He Who Shall Bravely And Gracefully Subdue This Gorgon Of Convention And Fashion, And Show Men How To Lead A Clean, Handsome And Heroic Life Amid The Beggarly Elements Of Our Cities And Villages; Whoso Shall Teach Me How To Eat My Meat And Take My Repose And Deal With Men, Without Any Shame Following, Will Restore The Life Of Man To Splendor, And Make His Own Name Dear To All History.

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.

To Believe Your Own Thought, To Believe That What Is True For You In Your Private Heart Is True For All Men That Is Genius.

I Find The Englishman To Be Him Of All Men Who Stands Firmest In His Shoes. They Have In Themselves What They Value In Their Horses, Mettle And Bottom.

Truth Is Beautiful, Without Doubt; But So Are Lies.

For What Avail The Plough Or Sail, Or Land Or Life, If Freedom Fail?

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

The Etymologist Finds The Deadest Word To Have Been Once A Brilliant Picture.

Tobacco And Opium Have Broad Backs, And Will Cheerfully Carry The Load Of Armies, If You Choose To Make Them Pay High For Such Joy As They Give And Such Harm As They Do.

We Live Amid Surfaces, And The True Art Of Life Is To Skate Well On Them

I Hate To Be Defended In A Newspaper. As Long As All That Is Said Is Said Against Me, I Feel A Certain Assurance Of Success. But As Soon As Honeyed Words Of Praise Are Spoken For Me, I Feel As One That Lies Unprotected Before His Enemies.

There Is No Doctrine Of The Reason Which Will Bear To Be Taught By The Understanding.

Wisdom Is Infused Into Every Form.

We Thirst For Approbation, Yet Cannot Forgive The Approver.

We Are Symbols, And Inhabit Symbols.

It Is A Mischievous Notion That We Are Come Late Into Nature; That The World Was Finished A Long Time Ago. As The World Was Plastic And Fluid In The Hands Of God, So It Is Ever To So Much Of His Attributes As We Bring To It. To Ignorance And Sin, It Is Flint. They Adapt To Themselves To It As They May; But In Proportion As A Man Has Anything In Him Divine, The Firmament Flows Before Him And Takes His Signet And Form.

Nothing External To You Has Any Power Over You.

Englands Genius Filled All Measureof Heart And Soul, Of Strength And Pleasure,gave To The Mind Its Emperor,and Life Was Larger Than Before:nor Sequent Centuries Could Hitorbit And Sum Of Shakespeares Wit. The Men Who Lived With Him Becamepoets, For The Air Was Fame.

Circumstance Does Not Make The Man. Circumstance Reveals Man To Himself.

God Made Yeast, As Well As Dough, And Loves Fermentation Just As Dearly As He Loves Vegetation.

A Man Finds Room In The Few Square Inches Of The Face For The Traits Of All His Ancestors; For The Expression Of All His History, And His Wants.

A Bullet Had Found Him, His Blood Ran Out As He Cried. No Money Could Save Him, So He Laid Down And Died. Ooh, What A Lucky Man He Was.

I Confess Myself Utterly At A Loss In Suggesting Particular Reforms In Our Ways Of Teaching. No Discretion That Can Be Lodged With A School-committee, With The Overseers Or Visitors Of An Academy, Of A College, Can At All Avail To Reach These Difficulties And Perplexities, But They Solve Themselves When We Leave Institutions And Address Individuals.

Logic Is The Procession Or Proportionate Unfolding Of The Intuition; But Its Virtue Is As Silent Method; The Moment It Would Appear As Propositions, And Have A Separate Value, It Is Worthless.

Tomorrow Is A New Day; Begin It Well And Serenely And With Too High A Spirit To Be Encumbered With Your Old Nonsense.

Positive Thinking

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

There Is No Beautifier Of Complexion, Or Form, Or Behavior, Like The Wish To Scatter Joy And Not Pain Around Us.

Insist Upon Yourself. Be Original.

Funny Basketball

Besides The General Infusion Of Wit To Heighten Civility, The Direct Splendor Of Intellectual Power Is Ever Welcome In Fine Society, As The Costliest Addition To Its Rule And Its Credit.

Infancy Conforms To Nobody: All Conform To It, So That One Babe Commonly Makes Four Or Five Out Of The Adults Who Prattle And Play To It.

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

Only The Great Generalizations Survive. The Sharp Words Of The Declaration Of Independence, Lampooned Then And Since As 'glittering Generalities,' Have Turned Out Blazing Ubiquities That Will Burn Forever And Ever.

Sorrow Makes Us All Children Again.

The First Farmer Was The First Man, And All Historic Nobility Rests On Possession And Use Of Land.

If I Quake, What Matters It What I Quake At? Our Proper Vice Takes Form In One Or Another Shape, According To The Sex, Age, Or Temperament Of The Person, And, If We Are Capable Of Fear, Will Readily Find Terrors.

A Man Often Pays Dear For A Small Frugality.

Women See Better Than Men. Men See Lazily, If They Do Not Expect To Act. Women See Quite Without Any Wish To Act.

What We Do Not Call Education Is More Precious Than That Which We Call So. We Form No Guess, At The Time Of Receiving A Thought, Of Its Comparative Value. And Education Often Wastes Its Effort In Attempts To Thwart And Balk This Natural Magnetism, Which Is Sure To Select What Belongs To It.

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.

Great Believers Are Always Reckoned Infidels, Impracticable, Fantastic, Atheistic, And Really Men Of No Account. The Spiritualist Finds Himself Driven To Express His Faith By A Series Of Skepticisms.

Love Is The Bright Foreigner, The Foreign Self.

Most Of The Classical Citations You Shall Hear Or Read In The Current Journals Or Speeches Were Not Drawn From The Originals, But From Previous Quotations In English Books.

The Etymologist Finds The Deadest Word To Have Been Once A Brilliant Picture. Language Is Fossil Poetry. As The Limestone Of The Continent Consists Of Infinite Masses Of The Shells Of Animalcules, So Language Is Made Up Of Images Or Tropes, Which Now, In Their Secondary Use, Have Long Ceased To Remind Us Of Their Poetic Origin.

The Greatest Discoveries Are Those That Shed Light Unto Ourselves.

No Doubt, To A Man Of Sense, Travel Offers Advantages. As Many Languages As He Has, As Many Friends, As Many Arts And Trades, So Many Times Is He A Man. A Foreign Country Is A Point Of Comparison, Wherefrom To Judge His Own.

I Like Man, But Not Men.

Who Looks Upon A River In A Meditative Hour And Is Not Reminded Of The Flux Of All Things?

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

Democracy Is Morose, And Runs To Anarchy.

A Man Makes Inferiors His Superiors By Heat; Self-control Is The Rule.

We Do Not Quite Forgive A Giver. The Hand That Feeds Us Is In Some Danger Of Being Bitten.

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.

In The True Mythology, Love Is An Immortal Child, And Beauty Leads Him As A Guide; Nor Can We Express A Deeper Sense Than When We Say, Beauty Is The Pilot Of The Young Soul.

In The History Of The Individual Is Always An Account Of His Condition, And He Knows Himself To Be A Party To His Present Estate.

When We Quarrel, How We Wish We Had Been Blameless.

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

Creative Force, Like A Musical Composer, Goes On Unweariedly Repeating A Simple Air Or Theme, Now High, Now Low, In Solo, In Chorus, Ten Thousand Times Reverberated, Till It Fills Earth And Heaven With The Chant.

Every Man Alone Is Sincere. At The Entrance Of A Second Person, Hypocrisy Begins. We Parry And Fend The Approach Of Our Fellow-man By Compliments, By Gossip, By Amusements, By Affairs. We Cover Up Our Thought From Him Under A Hundred Folds.

The Moral Sense Is Always Supported By The Permanent Interest Of The Parties. Else, I Know Not How, In Our World, Any Good Would Ever Get Done.

The World Exists For The Education Of Each Man.

The Piety Of The Hebrew Prophets Purges Their Grossness. The Circumcision Is An Example Of The Power Of Poetry To Raise The Low And Offensive.

A Man Is A Little Thing Whilst He Works By And For Himself, But, When He Gives Voice To The Rules Of Love And Justice, Is Godlike, His Word Is Current In All Countries; And All Men, Though His Enemies, Are Made His Friends And Obey It As Their Own.

It Is Not What Talents Or Genius A Man Has, But How He Is To His Talents, That Constitutes Friendship And Character. The Man Thatstands By Himself, The Universe Stands By Him Also.

Ne Te Quaesiveris Extra." (do Not Seek For Things Outside Of Yourself)

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.

Culture Opens The Sense Of Beauty.

Women Stand Related To Beautiful Nature Around Us, And The Enamoured Youth Mixes Their Form With Moon And Stars, With Woods And Waters, And The Pomp Of Summer. They Heal Us Of Awkwardness By Their Words And Looks. We Observe Their Intellectual Influence On The Most Serious Student. They Refine And Clear His Mind: Teach Him To Put A Pleasing Method Into What Is Dry And Difficult.

It Is In Rugged Crises, In Unbearable Endurance, And In Aims Which Put Sympathy Out Of The Question, That The Angel Is Shown.

The Good Rain, Like A Bad Preacher, Does Not Know When To Leave Off.

Do Not Fear To Put Novels Into The Hands Of Young People As An Occasional Holiday Experiment, But Above All, Good Poetry In All Kinds,--epic, Tragedy, Lyric. If We Can Touch The Imagination, We Serve Them; They Will Never Forget It.

Moderation In All Things, Especially Moderation.

Moderation In All Things

Whilst We Want Cities As The Centres Where The Best Things Are Found, Cities Degrade Us By Magnifying Trifles.

How Much Finer Things Are In Composition Than Alone.

Every Man Is A Borrower And A Mimic, Life Is Theatrical And Literature A Quotation.

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

The Buddhist, Who Thanks No Man, Who Says "do Not Flatter Your Benefactors," But Who, In His Conviction That Every Good Deed Can By No Possibility Escape Its Reward, Will Not Deceive The Benefactor By Pretending That He Has Done More Than He Should, Is A Transcendentalist.

Columbus Discovered No Isle Or Key So Lonely As Himself.

If, At Any Time, It Comes Into My Head, That A Present Is Due From Me To Somebody, I Am Puzzled What To Give, Until The Opportunity Is Gone.

No Book Was Ever Written Down By Any But Itself.

Our Statute Is A Currency Which We Stamp With Our Own Portrait.

We Must Be Courteous To A Man As We Are To A Picture, Which We Are Willing To Give The Advantage Of A Good Light.

In The Woods, Too, A Man Casts Off His Years, As The Snake His Slough, And At What Period Soever Of Life, Is Always A Child. In The Woods Is Perpetual Youth. Within These Plantations Of God A Decorum And Sanctity Reign, A Perennial Festival Is Dressed, And The Guest Sees Not How He Should Tire Of Them In A Thousand Years. In The Woods We Return To Reason And Faith.

But I Cannot Recite, Even Thus Rudely, Laws Of The Intellect, Without Remembering That Lofty And Sequestered Class Of Men Who Have Been Its Prophets And Oracles, The High-priesthood Of The Pure Reason, The Trismegisti, The Expounders Of The Principles Of Thought From Age To Age.

Truth Is Handsomer Than The Affectation Of Love. Your Goodness Must Have Some Edge To It, Else It Is None.

I Cannot Go To The Houses Of My Nearest Relatives, Because I Do Not Wish To Be Alone. Society Exists By Chemical Affinity, And Not Otherwise.

Standing On The Bare Ground,--my Head Bathed By The Blithe Air And Uplifted Into Infinite Space,--all Mean Egotism Vanishes. I Become A Transparent Eyeball; I Am Nothing; I See All; The Currents Of The Universal Being Circulate Through Me; I Am Part Or Parcel Of God.

Higher Than The Question Of Our Duration Is The Question Of Our Deserving. Immortality Will Come To Such As Are Fit For It, And He Would Be A Great Soul In Future Must Be A Great Soul Now.

Character Teaches Above Our Wills.

The Best Conversation Is Rare. Society Seems To Have Agreed To Treat Fictions As Realities, And Realities As Fictions; And The Simple Lover Of Truth, Especially If On Very High Grounds, As A Religious Or Intellectual Seeker, Finds Himself A Stranger And Alien.

The World Globes Itself In A Drop Of Dew.

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.

No Love Can Be Bound By Oath Or Covenant To Secure It Against A Higher Love.

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

The Love That You Withhold Is The Pain That You Carry.

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