When I read a good book, I wish my life were three thousand years long. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Life is a series of surprises and would not be worth taking or keeping if it were not. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Life loiters at the book's first page,-- Ah! could we turn the leaf. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Fate is nothing but the deeds committed in a prior state of existence. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The longer we live the more we must endure the elementary existence of men and women; and every brave heart must treat… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Let ideas establish their legitimate sway again in society, let life be fair and poetic, and the scholars will gladly be lovers,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
I will no longer confer, differ, refer, defer, prefer, or suffer. I renounce the whole tribe of fero. I embrace absolute life. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The best of life is conversation, and the greatest success is confidence, or perfect understanding between sincere people. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A ruddy drop of manly blood The surging sea outweighs; The world uncertain comes and goes, The lover rooted stays. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life: he is to furnish, watch,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Romeo, of dead, should be cut up into little stars to make the heavens fine. Life, with this pair, has no other… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A life in harmony with nature, the love of truth and virtue, will purge the eyes to understanding her text. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
All our progress is an unfolding, like a vegetable bud. You have first an instinct, then an opinion, then a knowledge as… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation;… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
We want men and women who shall renovate life and our social state but we see that most natures are insolvent, cannot… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Our day of dependence, our long apprenticeship to the learning of other lands, draws to a close. The millions, that around us… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“My life is for itself and not for a spectacle. I much prefer that it should be of a lower strain, so… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The private life of one man shall be a more illustrious monarchy,--more formidable to its enemy, more sweet and serene in its… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
In different hours, a man represents each of several of his ancestors, as if there were seven or eight of us rolled… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The worst feature of this double consciousness is, that the two lives, of the understanding and of the soul, which we lead,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“Beneath a necessity thus almighty, what is artificial in man's life seems insignificant. He seems to take his task so minutely from… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
If I have renounced the search of truth, if I have come into the port of some pretending dogmatism, some new church,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
As I walked in the woods I felt what I often feel that nothing can befall me in life, no calamity, no… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“What I must do, is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The delicious faces of children, the beauty of school-girls, "the sweet seriousness of sixteen," the lofty air of well-born, well-bred boys, the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
“Whilst I adore this ineffable life which is at my heart, it will not condescend to gossip with me, it will not… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Our culture, therefore, must not omit the arming of the man. Let him hear in season, that he is born into the… — 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