Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes
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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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Nor sequent centuries could hit Orbit and sum of Shakespeare's wit.
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Pass in, pass in, the angels say, In to the upper doors; Nor count compartments of the floors, But mount to Paradise By the stairway of surprise.
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Nature abhors the old, and old age seems the only disease; all others run into this one.
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The first wealth is health.
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The sky is the daily bread of the eyes.
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Do not yet see, that, if the single man plant himself indomitably on his instincts, and there abide, the huge world will come round to him.
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A friend is a person with whom I may be sincere. Before him I may think aloud.
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The condition which high friendship demands is ability to do without it.
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All that Shakespeare says of the king, yonder slip of a boy that reads in the corner feels to be true of himself.
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Self-trust is the first secret of success.
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Every violation of truth is not only a sort of suicide in the liar, but is a stab at the health of human society.
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There are two classes of poets - the poets by education and practice, these we respect; and poets by nature, these we love.
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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.
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I think no virtue goes with size; The reason of all cowardice Is, that men are overgrown, And, to be valiant, must come down To the titmouse dimension.
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History must be this or it is nothing. Every law which the state enacts indicates a fact in human nature; that is all. We must in ourselves see the necessary reason of every fact, - see how it could and must be.
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When a whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and purity of its heart.
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For what avail the plough or sail, Or land or life, if freedom fail?
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The young men were born with knives in their brain, a tendency to introversion, self-dissection, anatomizing of motives.
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Those who are esteemed umpires of taste are often persons who have acquired some knowledge of admired pictures or sculptures, and have an inclination for whatever is elegant; but if you inquire whether they are beautiful souls, and whether their own acts are like fair pictures, you learn that they are selfish and sensual.
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There is always a certain meanness in the argument of conservatism, joined with a certain superiority in its fact.
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Hast thou named all the birds without a gun; Loved the wood-rose, and left it on its stalk.
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I like a church, I like a cowl, I love a prophet of the soul, And on my heart monastic aisles Fall like sweet strains or pensive smiles; Yet not for all his faith can see, Would I that cowled churchman be. Why should the vest on him allure, Which I could not on me endure?
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The music that can deepest reach, And cure all ill, is cordial speech.