Ralph Waldo Emerson

I can reason down or deny everything, except this perpetual Belly: feed he must and will, and I cannot make him respectable.

Nothing can bring you peace but yourself; nothing, but the triumph of principles.

We judge of man’s wisdom by his hope.

Trust instinct to the end, even though you can give no reason.

When I was praised I lost my time, for instantly I turned around to look at the work I had thought slightly of, and that day I made nothing new.

Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.

Think with your whole body.

The wisdom of nations lies in their proverbs, which are brief and pithy. Collect and learn them; they are notable measures of directions for human life; you have much in little; they save time in speaking; and upon occasion may be the fullest and safest answer.

It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives. The act of dying is not of importance, it lasts so short a time.

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.

I never knew a writer yet who took the smallest pains with his style and was at the same time readable.

Sir, a man who cannot get to heaven in a green coat, will not find his way thither the sooner in a gray one.

Words are finite organs of the infinite mind. They cannot cover the dimensions of what is in truth. They break, chop, and impoverish it.

Ask for what you want and be prepared to get it!

In the stillness of the mind I saw myself as I am – unbound.

No man acquires property without acquiring with it a little arithmetic also.

I finished my first book seventy-six years ago. I offered it to every publisher on the English-speaking earth I had ever heard of. Their refusals were unanimous: and it did not get into print until, fifty years later; publishers would publish anything that had my name on it.

Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.

I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.

Wake up, lift your head, open your eyes, and dream. Gaze softly into your heart’s whispers. Notice the pull of your belly and that which makes you come alive. Let your soul speak, beckoning you to embark on that one voyage you can no longer let lie.

This is the comfort of the godly: the grave cannot hold them, and they live as soon as they die. For death is no more than turning us over from time to eternity.