The exceptional life depends not on working harder, but on different, even opposite, actions from habit and the crowd. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Our spontaneous action is always the best. You cannot, with your best deliberation and heed, come so close to any question as… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Vigor is contagious, and whatever makes us either think or feel strongly adds to our power and enlarges our field of action. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The society of the energetic class, in their friendly and festive meetings, is full of courage, and of attempts, which intimidatethe pale… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The measure of action is the sentiment from which it proceeds. The greatest action may easily be one of the most private… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Prudence is the virtue of the senses. It is the science of appearances. It is the outmost action of the inward life. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
In a virtuous action, I properly am; in a virtuous act, I add to the world; I plant into deserts conquered from… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The gentleman is a man of truth, lord of his own actions, and expressing that lordship in his behavior, not in any… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Polarity, or action and reaction, we meet in every part of nature; in darkness and light; in heat and cold; in the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Thought is the seed of action; but action is as much its second form as thought is its first. It rises in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The ancestor of every action is thought; when we understand that we begin to comprehend that our world is governed by thought… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
In like manner the effect of every action is measured by the depth of the sentiment from which it proceeds. The great… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The German intellect wants the French sprightliness, the fine practical understanding of the English, and the American adventure; but it has a… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Therefore all just persons are satisfied with their own praise. They refuse to explain themselves, and are content that new actions should… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Men do what is called a good action, as some piece of courage or charity, much as they would pay a fine… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
How can we speak of the action of the mind under any divisions, as of its knowledge, of its ethics, of its… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Of course, he who has put forth his total strength in fit actions, has the richest return of wisdom. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Let us, if we must have great actions, make our own so. All action is of infinite elasticity, and the least admits… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
War educates the senses, calls into action the will, perfects the physical constitution, brings men into such swift and close collision in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
He who does a good deed is instantly ennobled. He who does a mean deed is by the action itself contracted. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Repose and cheerfulness are the badge of the gentleman - repose in energy. The Greek battle pieces are calm; the heroes, in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The end of being is to know; and if you say, the end of knowledge is action,-why, yes, but the end of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The world is full of judgment-days, and into every assembly that a man enters, in every action he attempts, he is gauged… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Action is with the scholar subordinate, but it is essential. Without it, he is not yet man. Without it, thought can never… — 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
All persons are puzzles until at last we find in some word or act the key to the man, to the woman;… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
There are men whose language is strong and defying enough, yet their eyes and their actions ask leave of other men to… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“When private men shall act with original views, the lustre will be transferred from the actions of kings to those of gentlemen.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Show me a man who has acted, and who has not been the victim and slave of his action. What they have… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Idealism sees the world in God. It beholds the whole circle of persons and things, of actions and events, of country and… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The energetic action of the times develops individualism, and the religious appear isolated. I esteem this a step in the right direction.… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
It is the dissenter, the theorist, the aspirant, who is quitting this ancient domain to embark on seas of adventure, who engages… — 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 Image
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 Image
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 Image
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 Image
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 Image
“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 Image
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 Image
A child reminds us that playtime is an essential part of our daily routine. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
No man can be criticised but by a greater than he. Do not, then, read the reviews. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
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 Image