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Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes about Philosophy

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The civility of no race can be perfect whilst another race is degraded. It is a doctrine alike of the oldest and of the newest philosophy, that man is one, and that you cannot injure any member, without a sympathetic

The civility of no race can be perfect whilst another race is degraded. It is a doctrine alike of the oldest and of the newest philosophy, that man is one, and that you cannot injure any member, without a sympathetic injury to all the members

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Men, Race
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.1253, Delphi Classics

To the poet, to the philosopher, to the saint, all things are friendly and sacred, all events profitable, all days holy, all men divine.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Men, Friendly
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2012). “Self-Reliance and Other Essays”, p.5, Courier Corporation

The secret in education lies in respecting the student.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Education, Teacher, Philosophy

It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Inspirational, Graduation, Philosophy
'Essays' (1841) 'Self-Reliance'

Knowledge is the only elegance.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Philosophy, Knowledge
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2010). “The Later Lectures of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1843-1871”, p.146, University of Georgia Press

We learn geology the morning after the earthquake.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Morning, Philosophy
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.2366, Delphi Classics

Poetry must be as new as foam and as old as the rock.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Philosophy, Rocks
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ralph H. Orth, Glen M. Johnson (1994). “The Topical Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.184, University of Missouri Press

Live in the fields, and God will give you lectures on natural philosophy every day.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Giving, Tree
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edward Waldo Emerson, Waldo Emerson Forbes (1910). “Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1820-1872 [1876] Ed”

A mind might ponder its thought for an epoch, and not gain so much self-knowledge as the passion of love shall teach in a day.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Love, Educational, Philosophy

He who is in love is wise and is becoming wiser, sees newly every time he looks at the object beloved, drawing from it with his eyes and his mind those virtues which it possesses.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Love, Wise, Philosophy
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Richard Lee Grossman (2005). “A Year with Emerson: A Daybook”, p.140, David R. Godine Publisher

There is no way to success in art but to take off your coat, grind paint, and work like a digger on the railroad, all day and every day.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Philosophy, Work
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.353

Men are not philosophers, but are rather very foolish children, who, by reason of their partiality, see everything in the most absurd manner, and are the victims at all times of the nearest object. There is even no philosopher who is a philosopher at all times. Our experience, our perception is conditioned by the need to acquire in parts and in succession, that is, with every truth a certain falsehood.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Children, Philosophy, Knowledge
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1870). “The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.164, Рипол Классик

He in whom the love of repose predominates will accept the first creed, the first philosophy, the first political party he meets — most likely his father's. He gets rest, commodity, and reputation; but he shuts the door of truth.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Father, Philosophy, Party
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.1400, Delphi Classics

We lie in the lap of immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth and organ of its activity. When we discern justice, when we discern truth, we do nothing by ourselves, but allow a passage to its beams. If we ask whence this comes, if we seek to pry into the soul that causes, all philosophy is at fault. Its presence or its absence is all we can affirm.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Lying, Justice
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2008). “The Spiritual Emerson: Essential Works by Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.16, Penguin

Let none presume to measure the irregularities of Michael Angelo or Socrates by village scales.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Philosophy, History

The philosophy of waiting is sustained by all the oracles of the universe.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Waiting, Oracles
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1975). “Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks: 1848-1851”, p.15, Harvard University Press

Why should not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation to us, and not the history of theirs?

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Thinking, Tradition
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.7, Harvard University Press

A man is a god in ruins.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
God, Art, Philosophy
Nature ch. 8 (1836).

Plato is philosophy, and philosophy, Plato,--at once the glory and the shame of mankind, since neither Saxon nor Roman have availed to add any idea to his categories.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Plato, Philosophy, Philosophical
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2016). “Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson - Plato, or the philosopher”, p.2, Editora Dracaena

The astonishment of life is the absence of any appearances of reconciliation between the theory and the practice of life.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Practice, Astonishment
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.95

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Work, Philosophy
1841 Essays: First Series,'Self-Reliance'.

The new statement will comprise the skepticisms, as well as the faiths of society, and out of unbeliefs a creed shall be formed. For, skepticisms are not gratuitous or lawless, but are limitations of the affirmative statement, and the new philosophy must take them in, and make affirmations outside of them, just as much as must include the oldest beliefs.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Philosophical, Belief
Ralph Waldo Emerson (2016). “Selected Writings”, p.181, Simon and Schuster

We live ruins amid ruins.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Philosophy, History

It does not need that a poem should be long. Every word was once a poem.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Art, Philosophy, Long
Ralph Waldo Emerson, David Mikics (2012). “The Annotated Emerson”, p.209, Harvard University Press

A philosopher must be more than a philosopher.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Philosophy, Philosopher
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.25

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