Ralph Waldo Emerson

The rich mind lies in the sun and sleeps, and is Nature.

Men love to wonder and that is the seed of our science.

Big jobs usually go to the men who prove their ability to outgrow small ones.

We gain the strength of the temptation we resist.

The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.

Love of beauty is taste. The creation of beauty is art.

People care more about being thought to have taste than about being thought either good, clever or amiable.

In labouring to be concise, I become obscure.

Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable, and others extremely difficult.

Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it. Many will read the book before one thinks of quoting a passage. As soon as he has done this, that line will be quoted east and west.

True irreverence is disrespect for another man’s god.

Rare virtues are like rare plants or animals, things that have not been able to hold their own in the world. A virtue to be serviceable must, like gold, be alloyed with some commoner but more durable metal.

Great feelings will often take the aspect of error, and great faith the aspect of illusion.

Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans. It is lovely to be silly at the right moment.

At the entrance of a second person, hypocrisy begins.

In every man there is something wherein I may learn of him, and in that I am his pupil.

Sometimes too much to drink is barely enough.

There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right.

We must not inquire too curiously into motives… They are apt to become feeble in the utterance: the aroma is mixed with the grosser air. We must keep the germinating grain away from the light.

If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do.

The truth is, hardly any of us have ethical energy enough for more than one really inflexible point of honor.