Ralph Waldo Emerson

He presents me with what is always an acceptable gift who brings me news of a great thought before unknown. He enriches me without impoverishing himself.

If a man owns land, the land owns him.

Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.

Give me health and a day, and I will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous.

Some thoughts always find us young, and keep us so. Such a thought is the love of the universal and eternal beauty.

Oh man! There is no planet sun or star could hold you, if you but knew what you are.

The last book I read was the book I’ve been rereading most of my life, The Fountainhead.

Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.

I love books.

Books are the best of things if well used; if abused, among the worst. They are good for nothing but to inspire. I had better never see a book than be warped by its attraction clean out of my own orbit, and made a satellite instead of a system.

A multitude of books distracts the mind.

If you are going to get anywhere in life you have to read a lot of books.

Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.

The multitude of books is making us ignorant.

The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbours, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.

Never judge a book by its movie.

A truly good book teaches me better than to read it. I must soon lay it down, and commence living on its hint. What I began by reading, I must finish by acting.

Books that you carry to the fire, and hold readily in your hand, are most useful after all.

I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which has done real evil.

To read well, that is, to read true books in a true spirit, is a noble exercise, and one that will task the reader more than any other exercise which the customs of the day esteem. It requires a training such as the athletes underwent, the steady intention almost of the whole life to this object.

An autobiography is not about pictures; it’s about the stories; it’s about honesty and as much truth as you can tell without coming too close to other people’s privacy.