Quotes from Ralph Waldo Emerson

Patience and fortitude conquer all things.

So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man. When Duty whispers low, Thou must, The youth replies, I can.

I find the Englishman to be him of all men who stands firmest in his shoes.

If a man has good corn, or wood, or boards, or pigs to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles, or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad, hardbeaten road to his house, though it be in the woods.

The shoemaker makes a good shoe because he makes nothing else.

When a man is pushed, tormented, defeated, he has a chance to learn something; he has been put on his wits; on his manhood; he has gained the facts; learned his ignorance; is cured of the insanity of conceit; has got moderation and real skill.

A believer, a mind whose faith is consciousness, is never disturbed because other persons do not yet see the fact which he sees.

AH I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen.

The glory of friendship is not the outstretched hand, nor the kindly smile, nor the joy of companionship; it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to one when he discovers that someone else believes in him and is willing to trust him.

Play out the game, act well your part, and if the gods have blundered, we will not.

We are very near to greatness: one step and we are safe; can we not take the leap?

We aim above the mark to hit the mark. Every act hath some falsehood or exaggeration in it.

Take egotism out, and you would castrate the benefactor.

To fill the hour, and leave no crevice ... that is happiness.

A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best.

Right Now Is the Time to Be Kind You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.

I hate the giving of the hand unless the whole man accompanies it.

A man finds room in a few square inches of his face for the traits of all his ancestors; for the expression of all his history, and his wants.

Every hero becomes a bore at last.

Man is physically as well as metaphysically a thing of shreds and patches, borrowed unequally from good and bad ancestors, and a misfit from the start.

The cultivated man, wise to know and bold to perform, is the end to which nature works.

Whosoever would be a man must be a non-conformist.

The louder he talked of his honour, the faster we counted our spoons.

Outside, among your fellows, among strangers, you must preserve appearances, 100 things you cannot do; but inside, the terrible freedom!