Select Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson

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W. Scott, 1888 - 351 pages
 

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Page 340 - But to return to our own institute; besides these constant exercises at home, there is another opportunity of gaining experience to be won from pleasure itself abroad; in those vernal seasons of the year when the air is calm and pleasant, it were an injury and sullenness against nature, not to go out and see her riches, and partake in her rejoicing with heaven and earth.
Page 342 - And ever against eating cares Lap me in soft Lydian airs Married to immortal verse, Such as the meeting soul may pierce In notes, with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long drawn out, With wanton heed and giddy cunning, The melting voice through mazes running, Untwisting all the chains that tie The hidden soul of harmony; That Orpheus...
Page 123 - These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones ; they are for what they are ; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose ; it is perfect in every moment of its existence.
Page 327 - Character is higher than intellect. Thinking is the function. Living is the functionary. The stream retreats to its source. A great soul will be strong to live, as well as strong to think. Does he lack organ or medium to impart his truths?
Page 119 - A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.
Page 90 - Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on this planet. Then all things are at risk. It is as when a conflagration has broken out in a great city, and no man knows what is safe, or where it will end. There is not a piece of science but its flank may be- turned to-morrow; there is not any literary reputation, not the so-called eternal names of fame, that may not be revised and condemned.
Page 114 - Trust thyself : every heart vibrates to that iron string. Accept the place the divine Providence has found for you ; the society of your contemporaries, the connection of events. Great men have always done so and confided themselves childlike, to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the Eternal was stirring at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being.
Page 348 - Absolute rule; and hyacinthine locks Round from his parted forelock manly hung Clustering, but not beneath his shoulders broad...
Page 116 - I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when my genius calls me. I would write on the lintels of the door-post, Whim. I hope it is somewhat better than whim at last, but we cannot spend the day in explanation.
Page 174 - So every spirit, as it is most pure, And hath in it the more of heavenly light, So it the fairer body doth procure To habit in, and it more fairly dight, With cheerful grace and amiable sight. For, of the soul, the body form doth take, For soul is form, and doth the body make.

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