Ralph Waldo Emerson

The angels are so enamoured of the language that is spoken in heaven, that they will not distort their lips with the hissing and unmusical dialects of men, but speak their own, whether there be any who understand it or not.

Finish each day before you begin the next, and interpose a solid wall of sleep between the two. This you cannot do without temperance.

Our spontaneous action is always the best. You cannot, with your best deliberation and heed, come so close to any question as your spontaneous glance shall bring you.

Every calamity is a spur and valuable hint.

Men who for truth and honor’s sake stand fast and suffer long. Brave men who work while others sleep. Who dare while others fly.They build a nation’s pillars deep. And lift them to the sky.

Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under his feet. Let him not peep or steal, or skulk up and down with the air of a charity-boy, a bastard, or an interloper.

My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.

Patience makes lighter What sorrow may not heal.

As the Sandwich Islander believes that the strength and valor of the enemy he kills passes into himself, so we gain the strength of the temptation we resist.

Justice though moving with tardy pace, has seldom failed to overtake the wicked in their flight.

I’m proof against that word failure. I’ve seen behind it. The only failure a man ought to fear is failure of cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.

Look to make your course regular, that men may know beforehand what they may expect.

Any 20 year-old who isn’t a liberal doesn’t have a heart, and any 40 year-old who isn’t a conservative doesn’t have a brain.

The traveler that resolutely follows a rough and winding path will sooner reach the end of his journey than he that is always changing his direction, and wastes the hour of daylight in looking for smoother ground and shorter passages.

Have wholesome, but not costly Food, and be rather cleanly than dainty in ordering it.

We are as much informed of a writer’s genius by what he selects as by what he originates.

I began to realize how important it was to be an enthusiast in life. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.

I have to live for others and not for myself: that’s middle-class morality.

No man is much regarded by the rest of the world. He that considers how little he dwells upon the condition of others, will learn how little the attention of others is attracted by himself. While we see multitudes passing before us, of whom perhaps not one appears to deserve our notice or excites our sympathy, we should remember, that we likewise are lost in the same throng, that the eye which happens to glance upon us is turned in a moment on him that follows us, and that the utmost which we can reasonably hope or fear is to fill a vacant hour with prattle, and be forgotten.

Man can climb to the highest summits, but he cannot dwell there long.

Surviving is important. Thriving is elegant.