Ralph Waldo Emerson

Is not marriage an open question, when it is alleged, from the beginning of the world, that such as are in the institution wish to get out, and such as are out wish to get in?

Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.

Talent alone cannot make a writer. There must be a man behind the book; a personality which, by birth and quality, is pledged to the doctrines there set forth, and which exists to see and state things so, and not otherwise.

The people are to be taken in small doses.

Sow a thought and you reap an action; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.

Some natures are too good to be spoiled by praise.

If man had created man, he would be ashamed of his performance.

The public buys its opinions as it buys its meat, or takes in its milk, on the principle that it is cheaper to do this than to keep a cow. So it is, but the milk is more likely to be watered.

Look to make your course regular, that men may know beforehand what they may expect.

Be true to your own act and congratulate yourself if you have done something strange and extravagant to break the monotony of a decorous age.

Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss.

We sing in a church, why can we not dance there?

Capitalism has destroyed our belief in any effective power but that of self interest backed by force.

Never let formal education get in the way of your learning.

A supreme love, a motive that gives a sublime rhythm to a woman’s life, and exalts habit into partnership with the soul’s highest needs, is not to be had where and how she wills.

The essence of greatness is the perception that virtue is enough.

Stupidity is something you can only partly save people from.

Men have to do some awfully mean things to keep up their respectability.

This is the foundation of all. We are not to imagine or suppose, but to discover, what nature does or may be made to do.

The billiard table is better than the doctor.

Pity is for living, envy is for dead.