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The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Ralph Waldo Emerson
Age: 78 †
Born: 1803
Born: May 25
Died: 1882
Died: April 27
Biographer
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Essayist
Philosopher
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Boston
Massachusetts
R. W. Emerson
Waldo Emerson
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More quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson
All things are moral. That soul, which within us is a sentiment, outside of us is a law. We feel its inspiration out there in history we can see its fatal strength.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The experience of each new age requires a new confession, and the world seems always waiting for its poet
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Only a biker knows why a dog sticks his head out of a car window.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
As soon as a child has left the room his strewn toys become affecting.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
But there are higher secrets of culture, which are not for the apprentices, but for proficients. These are lessons only for the brave. We must know our friends under ugly masks. The calamities are our friends.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
To the body and mind which have been cramped by noxious work or company, nature is medicinal and restores their tone. The tradesman, the attorney comes out of the din and craft of the street and sees the sky and the woods, and is a man again. In their eternal calm, he finds himself.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
When the gods come among men, they are not known.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Want is a growing giant whom the coat of have was never large enough to cover.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The influence of fine scenery, the presence of mountains, appeases our irritations and elevates our friendships.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The worst of charity is that the lives you are asked to preserve are not worth preserving.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
I wish that life should not be cheap, but sacred. I wish the days to be as centuries, loaded, fragrant.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Let us stun and astonish the intruding rabble of men and books and institutions by a simple declaration of the divine fact. Bid the invaders take the shoes from off their feet, for God is here within.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
All the mistakes I make arise from forsaking my own station and trying to see the object from another person's point of view.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Be a football to Time and Chance, the more kicks, the better, so that you inspect the whole game and know its utmost law.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
We are ashamed of our thoughts and often see them brought forth by others.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Our books approach very slowly the things we most wish to know.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Among the map makers of each generation are the risk takers, those who see the opportunities, seize the moment and expand man's vision of the future
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Tis a short sight to limit our faith in laws to those of gravity, of chemistry, of botany, and so forth.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Those who cannot tell what they desire or expect, still sigh and struggle with indefinite thoughts and vast wishes.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
