Ralph Waldo Emerson

Coal is a portable climate. It carries the heat of the tropics to Labrador and the polar circle; and it is the means of transporting itself whithersoever it is wanted. Watt and Stephenson whispered in the ear of mankind their secret, that a half-ounce of coal will draw two tons a mile, and coal carries coal, by rail and by boat, to make Canada as warm as Calcutta, and with its comfort brings its industrial power.

Great geniuses have the shortest biographies.

Hitch your wagon to a star. Let us not fag in paltry works which serve our pot and bag alone.

A sage is the instructor of a hundred ages.

The adventitious beauty of poetry may be felt in the greater delight with a verse given in a happy quotation than in the poem.

The first thing a great person does, is make us realize the insignificance of circumstance.

You must not blame me if I do talk to the clouds.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Obviously, as you grow up, no one’s ever 100 percent proud of every decision that they’ve made, and that’s OK. I think as long as you learn from your mistakes and don’t make them over and over again, you’re on the right path.

Speak properly, and in as few words as you can, but always plainly; for the end of speech is not ostentation, but to be understood.

If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.

Fortune knocks at every man’s door once in a life, but in a good many cases the man is in a neighboring saloon and does not hear her.

You have to accept whatever comes, and the only important thing is that you meet it with the best you have to give.

We must annex those people. We can afflict them with our wise and beneficent government. We can introduce the novelty of thieves, all the way up from street-car pickpockets to municipal robbers and Government defaulters, and show them how amusing it is to arrest them and try them and then turn them loose – some for cash and some for political influence. We can make them ashamed of their simple and primitive justice. We can make that little bunch of sleepy islands the hottest corner on earth, and array it in the moral splendor of our high and holy civilization. Annexation is what the poor islanders need. Shall we to men benighted, the lamp of life deny?

It is nobler to be good, and it is nobler to teach others to be good – and less trouble!

He who distinguishes the true savor of his food can never be a glutton; he who does not cannot be otherwise.

A private Life is to be preferred; the Honor and Gain of publick Posts, bearing no proportion with the Comfort of it

The first of April is the day we remember what we are the other 364 days of the year.

The future is purchased by the present.

At 70 years old, if I could give my younger self one piece of advice, It would be to use the phrase ‘f**k off’ much more frequently.

The man who can make hard things easy is the educator.