Ralph Waldo Emerson

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

There is nothing capricious in nature and the implanting of a desire indicates that its gratification is in the constitution of the creature that feel it.

If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.

Stay at home in your mind. Don’t recite other people’s opinions. I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.

You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.

Live, let live, and help live

Shallow men believe in luck. Strong men believe in cause and effect.

Our passions do not live apart in locked chambers but dress in their small wardrobe of notions, bring their provisions to a common table and mess together, feeding out of the common store according to their appetite.

Whether the flower looks better in the nosegay than in the meadow where it grew and we had to wet our feet to get it! Is the scholastic air any advantage?

It is the power of the mind to be unconquerable.

Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

If it is not beautiful for someone, it does not exist.

The first half of life consists of the capacity to enjoy without the chance; the last half consists of the chance without the capacity.

Dharma is what the Buddha taught. It is the way of understanding and love-how to understand, how to love, how to make understanding and love into real things.

The rich man is always sold to the institution which makes him rich. Absolutely speaking, the more money, the less virtue.

It is the privilege of any human work which is well done to invest the doer with a certain haughtiness. He can well afford not to conciliate, whose faithful work will answer for him.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

I am the captain of my soul.

One way of getting an idea of our fellow-countrymen’s miseries is to go and look at their pleasures.

If you try to please everybody, somebody’s not going to like it.

Treating your adversary with respect is giving him an advantage to which he is not entitled.