Democracy becomes a government of bullies tempered by editors. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Surely nobody would be a charlatan, who could afford to be sincere. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Every actual State is corrupt. Good men must not obey the laws too well. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
There is a certain satisfaction in coming down to the lowest ground of politics, for we get rid of cant and hypocrisy. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The desire of gold is not for gold. It is not the love of much wheat, and wool and household stuff. It… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The antidote to this abuse of formal Government, is, the influence of private character, the growth of the Individual. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A bullet had found him, his blood ran out as he cried. No money could save him, so he laid down and… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Men are conservatives when they are least vigorous or when they are most luxurious-they are conservatives after dinner. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on governments which protect it, is the want of self-reliance. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
When the Master of the universe has points to carry in his government he impresses his will in the structure of minds. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Of all debts, men are least willing to pay their taxes; what a satire this is on government. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
I think the vice of our housekeeping is that it does not hold man sacred. The vice of government, the vice of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
We shall one day learn to supersede politics by education. What we call our root-and-branch reforms of slavery, war, gambling, intemperance, is… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The democrat is a young conservative; the conservative is an old democrat. The aristocrat is the democrat ripe, and gone to seed,--because… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Fear is cruel and mean. The political reigns of terror have been reigns of madness and malignity,--a total perversion of opinion;society is… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Let us make education brave and preventive. Politics is an afterwork, a poor patching. We are always a little late... We shall… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Government has come to be a trade, and is managed solely on commercial principles. A man plunges into politics to make his… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The tendencies of the times favor the idea of self-government, and leave the individual, for all code, to the rewards and penalties… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A man known to us only as a celebrity in politics or in trade, gains largely in our esteem if we discover… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Meantime the education of the general mind never stops. The reveries of the true and simple are prophetic. What the tender poeticyouth… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Although knaves win in every political struggle, although society seems to be delivered over from the hands of one set of criminals… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Hence, the less government we have, the better,--the fewer laws, and the less confided power. The antidote to this abuse of formalGovernment,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Wealth brings with it its own checks and balances. The basis of political economy is noninterference. The only safe rule is found… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The rage for road building is beneficent for America, where vast distance is so main a consideration in our domestic politics andtrade,… — 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
What a benefit would the American government, not yet relieved of its extreme need, render to itself, and to every city, village… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Society is an illusion to the young citizen. It lies before him in rigid repose, with certain names, men, and institutions, rootedlike… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Politics is a deleterious profession, like some poisonous handicrafts. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Man exists for his own sake and not to add a laborer to the State. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Washington, where an insignificant individual may trespass on a nation's time. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
There are men who, by their sympathetic attractions, carry nations with them, and lead the activity of the human race. — 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 we read becomes luminous with manifold allusion. -Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)” — 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 of a wafer or a drop of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea over land and comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
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
