Ralph Waldo Emerson

In art, the hand can never execute anything higher than the heart can imagine.

If you believe in fate, believe in it, at least, for your good.

Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great.

For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.

Today is a king in disguise.

When Nature has work to be done, she creates a genius to do it.

Girls, like men, want to be petted, pitied, and made much of, when they are diffident, in low spirits, or in unrequited love. These are services which the weak cannot render to the strong and which the strong will not render to the weak, except when there is also a difference of sex.

Know that the amount of criticism you receive may correlate somewhat to the amount of publicity you receive.

I talk democracy to these men and women. I tell them that they have the vote, and that theirs is the kingdom and the power and the glory. I say to them You are supreme: exercise your power. They say, That’s right: tell us what to do; and I tell them. I say Exercise our vote intelligently by voting for me. And they do. That’s democracy; and a splendid thing it is too for putting the right men in the right place.

I am easily satisfied with the very best.

As for doing good; that is one of the professions which is full. Moreover I have tried it fairly and, strange as it may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my constitution.

The good rain, like a bad preacher, does not know when to leave off.

Sculpture and painting have the effect of teaching us manners and abolishing hurry.

I hate women because they always know where things are.

The first wealth is health.

That’s what a man wants in a wife, mostly; he wants to make sure one fool tells him he’s wise.

The envious man grows lean at the success of his neighbor.

One gains universal applause who mingles the useful with the agreeable, at once delighting and instructing the reader.

I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him.

The idea of perfection always gives one a chance to talk without knowing facts.

To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.