Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Our chief want in life is somebody who shall make us do what we can.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Strong men greet war, tempest, hard times. They wish, as Pindar said, to tread the floors of hell, with necessities as hard as iron.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The moment we indulge our affections, the earth is metamorphosed, there is no winter and no night; all tragedies, allennuis,vanish, - all duties even.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
America is another name for opportunity.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
We are a puny and fickle folk. Avarice, hesitation, and following are our diseases.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Beauty without grace is the hook without the bait.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
A beautiful form is better than a beautiful face; it gives a higher pleasure than statues or pictures; it is the finest of the fine arts.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Every hero becomes a bore at last.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
This whole business of Trade gives me to pause and think, as it constitutes false relations between men; inasmuch as I am prone to count 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.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesman and philosophers and divines.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Half a man's wisdom goes with his courage.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
What a new face courage puts on everything!
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Every man has his own courage, and is betrayed because he seeks in himself the courage of other persons.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Every man finds a sanction for his simplest claims and deeds, in decisions of his own mind, which he calls Truth and Holiness.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Fate is nothing but the deeds committed in a prior state of existence.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The only way to have a friend is to be one.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
I hate the giving of the hand unless the whole man accompanies it.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
A hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is braver five minutes longer.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
To fill the hour - that is happiness.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
A man finds room in the few square inches of his face for the traits of all his ancestors; for the expression of all his history, and his wants.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The louder he talked of his honor the faster we counted our spoons.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
There are no days in life so memorable as those which vibrated to some stroke of the imagination.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
A good indignation brings out all one's powers.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
All our progress is an unfolding, like the vegetable bud, you have first an instinct, then an opinion, then a knowledge, as the plant has root, bud and fruit. Trust the instinct to the end, though you can render no reason.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
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.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
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.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
All mankind loves a lover.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The senses collect the surface facts of matter...It was sensation; when memory came, it was experience; when mind acted, it was knowledge; when mind acted on it as knowledge, it was thought.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
A sect or party is an elegant incognito devised to save a man from the vexation of thinking.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
All I have seen teaches me to trust the creator for all I have not seen.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Let us be silent, that we may hear the whispers of the gods.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Great men are they who see that spiritual is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The reward of a thing well done is to have done it.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Hitch your wagon to a star.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
Thoughts come into our minds by avenues which we never left open, and thoughts go out of our minds through avenues which we never voluntarily opened.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The revelation of thought takes men out of servitude into freedom.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The finest and noblest ground on which people can live is truth; the real with the real; a ground on which nothing is assumed.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The desire of gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
The sum of wisdom is that time is never lost that is devoted to work.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
It is the privilege of any human work which is well done to invest the doer with a certain haughtiness.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
