Ralph Waldo Emerson

We are rich only through what we give, and poor only through what we refuse.

A man of genius is privileged only as far as he is genius. His dullness is as insupportable as any other dullness.

In skating over thin ice, our safety is in our speed.

Of all debts men are least willing to pay the taxes. What a satire is this on government! Everywhere they think they get their moneys worth, except for these.

Every mind has a choice between truth and repose. Take which you please you can never have both.

Commit a crime, and the earth is made of glass.

Property is organized robbery.

Youth is unduly busy with pampering the outer person.

I am a child of the House of Commons. I was brought up in my fathers house to believe in democracy. Trust the peoplethat was his message.

Obscurity and competence: That is the life that is worth living.

Live your life, do your work, then take your hat.

There is always room for a person of force and they make room for many.

There is no wisdom in useless and hopeless sorrow, but there is something in it so like virtue, that he who is wholly without it cannot be loved.

Our most important task is to transform our consciousness so that violence is no longer an option for us in our personal lives, that understanding that a world of peace is possible only if we relate to each other as peaceful beings, one individual at a time.

One may discover a new side to his most intimate friend when for the first time he hears him speak in public. He will be stranger to him as he is more familiar to the audience. The longest intimacy could not foretell how he would behave then

Excessive literary production is a social offense.

Blessed is the influence of one true, loving human soul on another.

We are wiser than we know.

I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: “O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.” And God granted it.

In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.

Just write every day of your life. Read intensely. Then see what happens. Most of my friends who are put on that diet have very pleasant careers.