Quotes from Ralph Waldo Emerson

Every revolution was first a thought in one man's mind.

Far or forgot to me is nearShadow and sunlight are the sameThe vanished gods to me appearAnd one to me are shame and fame.They reckon ill who leave me outWhen me they fly, I am the wingsI am the doubter and the doubt,And I the hymn the Brahmin sings.

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could some blunders and absurdities have crept in forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

Go often to the house of thy friend, for weeds choke the unused path.

Great men are they who see that the spiritual is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world.

Happiness is a perfume which you cannot pour on someone without getting some on yourself.

Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others with out getting a few drops on yourself.

He is great who confers the most benefits.

He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day who allows it to be invated by worry, fret and anxiety.

He who has a thousand friendsHas not a friend to spare,While he who has one enemyShall meet him everywhere.

Heaven always bears some proportion to earth. The god of the cannibal will be a cannibal, of the crusades a crusader, and of the merchants a merchant.

Here is the world, sound as a nut, perfect, not the smallest piece of chaos left, never a stitch nor an end, not a mark of haste, or botching, or second thought; but the theory of the world is a thing of shreds and patches.

Life is eating us up. We shall be fables presently. Keep cool it will be all one a hundred years hence.

Love is the essence of God.

Men cease to interest us when we find their limitations. The only sin is limitation. As soon as you once come up with a man's limitations, it is all over with him.

Most of the shadows of this life are caused by standing in one's own sunshine

My evening visitors, if they cannot see the clock, should find the time in my face.

No one can cheat you out of ultimate success but yourself.

One man's justice is another's injustice one man's beauty another's ugliness one man's wisdom another's folly.

Only those books come down which deserve to last . All the gilt edges, vellum and morocco, all the presentation copies to all the libraries will not preserve a book in circulation beyond its intrinsic date.

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character.

People wish to be settled. It is only as far as they are unsettled that there is any hope for them.

Proverbs are the literature of reason, or the statements of absolute truth, without qualification. Like the sacred books of each nation, they are the sanctuary of its intuitions.

Real friendship is shown in times of trouble prosperity is full of friends.