He is the rich man in whom the people are rich, and he is the poor man in whom the people are… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
It never was in the power of any man or any community to call the arts into being. They come to serve… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Art is a jealous mistress, and if a man has a genius for painting, poetry, music, architecture or philosophy, he makes a… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The virtue of art lies in detachment, in sequestering one object from the embarrassing variety. Until one thing comes out from theconnection… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The highest praise we can attribute to any writer, painter, sculptor, builder, is, that he actually possessed the thought or feeling with… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
All men are in some degree impressed by the face of the world; some men even to delight. This love of beauty… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Is all literature eavesdropping, and all art Chinese imitation? our life a custom, and our body borrowed, like a beggar’s dinner, from… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
In eloquence, the great triumphs of the art are when the orator is lifted above himself; when consciously he makes himself the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. It undergoes continual changes: it is… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
You cannot hide any secret. If the artist succor his flagging spirits by opium or wine, his work will characterize itself as… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Speak as you think, be what you are, pay your debts of all kinds. I prefer to be owned as sound and… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Our country, customs, laws, our ambitions, and our notions of fit and fair-all these we never made; we found them ready-made; we… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“One man thinks justice consists in paying debts, and has no measure in his abhorrence of another who is very remiss in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“It is the best of humanity, I think, that goes out to walk. In happy hours all affairs may be wisely postponed… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Each work of art excludes the world, concentrates attention on itself. For the time it is the only thing worth doing -to… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Whatever events in progress shall disgust men with cities, and infuse into them the passion for country life, and country pleasures, will… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
I look on Sculpture as history. I do not think the Apollo and the Jove impossible in flesh and blood. Every trait… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
In the Greek cities, it was reckoned profane, that any person should pretend a property in a work of art, which belonged… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
He decided to give up his large ambition of knowledge and action for any narrow craft or profession, aiming at a much… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The art of sculpture is long ago perished to any real effect... it is the game of a rude and youthful people,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
In our fine arts, not imitation, but creation is the aim... The details, the prose of nature, he should omit, and give… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Again, the great number of cultivated men keep each other up to a high standard. The habit of meeting well-read and knowing… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
No man can quite emancipate himself from his age and country, or produce a model in which the education, the religion, the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
If you would learn to write, it is in the street you must learn it. Both for the vehicle and for the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
What art can paint or gild any object in after life with the glow which nature gives to the first baubles of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
What is the foundation of that interest all men feel in Greek history, letters, art, and poetry, in all its periods, from… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“In happy hours, nature appears to us one with art; art perfected, -- the work of genius. And the individual, in whom… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
There is no luck in literary reputation. They who make up the final verdict upon every book are not the partial and… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The paid wealth which hundreds in the community acquire in trade, or by the incessant expansions of our population and arts, enchants… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“It is not metres, but a metre-making argument that makes a poem,—a thought so passionate and alive that like the spirit of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of our science, and such is the mechanical determination of our age, and… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“I have no churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the globe, for the purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so that… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The poet needs a ground in popular tradition on which he may work, and which, again, may restrain his art within the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The city is always recruited from the country. The men in cities who are the centres of energy, the driving-wheels of trade,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The history of mankind interests us only as it exhibits a steady gain of truth and right, in the incessant conflict which it records… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
If we will not interfere with our thought, but will act entirely, or see how the thing stands in God, we know the particular… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
If there is any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age of Revolution; when the old and the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
A man cannot speak but he judges himself. With his will or against his will he draws his portrait to the eye of his… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
Consideration is the soil in which wisdom may be expected to grow, and strength be given to every up-springing plant of duty. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
“There is then creative reading as well as creative writing. When the mind is braced by labor and invention, the page of whatever book… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
Another success is the post-office, with its educating energy augmented by cheapness and guarded by a certain religious sentimentin mankind; so that the power… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
A child reminds us that playtime is an essential part of our daily routine. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
No man can be criticised but by a greater than he. Do not, then, read the reviews. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
Coal lay in ledges under the ground since the Flood, until a laborer with pick and windlass brings it to the surface. We may… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
In a library we are surrounded by many hundreds of dear friends, but they are imprisoned by an enchanter in these paper and leathern… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
The compensations of calamity are made apparent to the understanding also, after long intervals of time. A fever, a mutilation, a cruel disappointment, a… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
