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Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes - Page 135

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For splendor, there must somewhere be rigid economy. That the head of the house may go brave, the members must be plainly clad, and the town must save that the State may spend.

For splendor, there must somewhere be rigid economy. That the head of the house may go brave, the members must be plainly clad, and the town must save that the State may spend.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Government, House, Brave
Ralph Waldo Emerson (191?). “Essays”

The highest end of government is the culture of men.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Men, Culture, Ends
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2014). “The Portable Emerson”, p.188, Penguin

Hence, the less government we have, the better,--the fewer laws, and the less confided power. The antidote to this abuse of formalGovernment, is, the influence of private character, the growth of the Individual; the appearance of the principal to supersede the proxy; the appearance of the wise man, of whom the existing government, is, it must be owned, but a shabby imitation.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Wise, Character, Men
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.1505, Delphi Classics

Miracle comes to the miraculous, not to the arithmetician.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Miracle, Miraculous
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1860). “The Conduct of Life”, p.209

Nature is upheld by antagonism.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Antagonism
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.452

Though your views are in straight antagonism to theirs, assume an identity of sentiment, assume that you are saying precisely thatwhich all think, and in the flow of wit and love roll out your paradoxes in solid column, with not the infirmity of a doubt.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Thinking, Views, Doubt
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2016). “Essays”, p.170, Open Road Media

The eyes of men converse as much as their tongues, with the advantage that the ocular dialect needs no dictionary, but is understood all the world over.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Eye, Men, Needs
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.410

As we refine, our checks become finer. If we rise to spiritual culture, the antagonism takes a spiritual form.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Spiritual, Culture, Checks
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2008). “The Spiritual Emerson: Essential Works by Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.83, Penguin

But there are higher secrets of culture, which are not for the apprentices, but for proficients. These are lessons only for the brave. We must know our friends under ugly masks. The calamities are our friends.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Hard Times, Brave, Secret
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1866). “The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Comprising His Essays, Lectures, Poems, and Orations”, p.377

No institution will be better than the institutor.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Institutions
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1851). “Essays, lectures and orations”, p.211

I think all men know better than they do; know that the institutions we so volubly commend are go-carts and baubles; but they darenot trust their presentiments.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Men, Thinking, Institutions
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1850). “Representative Men: Seven Lectures”, p.153

You cannot institute, without peril of charlatanism.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Institutions, Peril, Institute
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2009). “The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.444, Modern Library

We are adapted to infinity. We are hard to please, and love nothing which ends: and in nature is no end; but every thing, at the end of one use, is lifted into a superior, and the ascent of these things climbs into daemonic and celestial natures.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
And Love, Use, Ascent
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.1583, Delphi Classics

But a compassion for that which is not and cannot be useful and lovely, is degrading and futile.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Compassion, Lovely, Degrading

The best nations are those most widely related; and navigation, as effecting a world-wide mixture, is the most potent advancer ofnations.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Race, World, Mixtures
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1866). “The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Comprising His Essays, Lectures, Poems, and Orations”, p.22

Fashion, though in a strange way, represents all manly virtue. It is virtue gone to seed: it is a kind of posthumous honor. It does not often caress the great, but the children of the great: it is a hall of the Past.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Fashion, Children, Past
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1870). “The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.481, Рипол Классик

Wise men read very sharply all your private history in your look and gait and behavior. The whole economy of nature is bent on expression. The tell-tale body is all tongues. Men are like Geneva watches with crystal faces which expose the whole movement.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Wise, Men, Expression
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.409

There will always be in society certain persons who are mercuries of its approbation, and whose glance will at any time determinefor the curious their standing in the world. These are the chamberlains of the lesser gods. Accept their coldness as an omen of grace with the loftier deities, and allow them all their privilege.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Grace, World, Mercury
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2015). “Emerson's Essays: Top Essays”, p.86, 谷月社

How much better when the whole land is a garden, and the people have grown up in the bowers of a paradise.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Garden, Land, People
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1870). “The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.200, Рипол Классик

The world globes itself in a drop of dew.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Dew, World, Globes
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2004). “A Dream Too Wild: Emerson Meditations for Every Day of the Year”, Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations

Each particle is a microcosm, and faithfully renders the likeness of the world.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
World, Microcosm, Particles
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Robert Ernest Spiller, Alfred Riggs Ferguson, Joseph Slater, Jean Ferguson Carr (1971). “The Collected Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Nature, addresses, and lectures”, p.27, Harvard University Press

Cities give not the human senses room enough. We go out daily and nightly to feed the eyes on the horizon, and require so much scope, just as we need water for our bath.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Eye, Cities, Giving
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1983). “Essays and Lectures”, p.542, Library of America

Beware of too much good staying in your hand. It will fast corrupt and worm worms. Pay it away quickly in some sort.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Hands, Pay, Too Much
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1808). “Select Essays and Poems”, p.17

The vulgar call good fortune that which really is produced by the calculations of genius.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Luck, Genius, Fortune
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1866). “The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Comprising His Essays, Lectures, Poems, and Orations”, p.216

Life is very narrow. Bring any club or company of intelligent men together again after ten years, and if the presence of some penetrating and calming genius could dispose them to frankness, what a confession of insanities would come up!

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Intelligent, Men, Years
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.387

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