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There is a time when a man distinguishes the idea of felicity from the idea of wealth it is the beginning of wisdom.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Ralph Waldo Emerson
Age: 78 †
Born: 1803
Born: May 25
Died: 1882
Died: April 27
Biographer
Diarist
Essayist
Philosopher
Poet
Writer
Boston
Massachusetts
R. W. Emerson
Waldo Emerson
Wisdom
Idea
Ideas
Men
Time
Distinguishes
Felicity
Beginning
Wealth

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Thought is the blossom language the bud action the fruit behind it.
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A man is a god in ruins.
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Public opinion, I am sorry to say, will bear a great deal of nonsense. There is scarcely any absurdity so gross, whether in religion, politics, science or manners, which it will not bear.
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The civility of no race can be perfect whilst another race is degraded. It is a doctrine alike of the oldest and of the newest philosophy, that man is one, and that you cannot injure any member, without a sympathetic injury to all the members
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Governments have their origin in the moral identity of men.
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Look out into the July night, and see the broad belt of silver flame which flashes up the half of heaven, fresh and delicate as the bonfires of the meadow-flies. Yet the powers of numbers cannot compute its enormous age,—lasting as space and time,—embosomed in time and space.
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When a man does not write his poetry, it escapes by other vents through him.
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We know that madness belongs to love,--what power to paint a vile object in hues of heaven.
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The squirrel hoards nuts and the bee gathers honey, without knowing what they do, and they are thus provided for without selfishness or disgrace.
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Art, in the artist, is proportion, or, a habitual respect to the whole by an eye loving beauty in details. And the wonder and charm of it is the sanity in insanity which it denotes.
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The advantage of riches remains with him who procured them, not with the heir.
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Any work looks wonderful to me except the one which I can do.
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Ah Fate, cannot a man Be wise without a beard? East, West, from Beer to Dan, Say, was it never heard That wisdom might in youth be gotten, Or wit be ripe before 't was rotten?
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I have thought a sufficient measure of civilization is the influence of good women.
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A man is the prisoner of his power. A topical memory makes him an almanac a talent for debate, disputant skill to get money makes him a miser, that is, a beggar. Culture reduces these inflammations by invoking the aid of other powers against the dominant talent, and by appealing to the rank of powers. It watches success.
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The reason why the world lacks unity, and lies broken and in heaps, is, because man is disunited with himself.
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What we have learned from other becomes our own reflection.
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There is a principle which is the basis of things, which all speech aims to say, and all action to evolve, a simple, quiet, undescribed, undescribable presence, dwelling very peacefully in us, our rightful lord: we are not to do, but to let do not to work, but to be worked upon.
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