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But genius looks forward: the eyes of men are set in his forehead, not in his hindhead: man hopes: genius creates.

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
Genius
Eyes
Eye
Looks
Forehead
Men
Foreheads
Hopes
Creates
Forward

More quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson

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To clothe the fiery thought In simple words succeeds, For still the craft of genius is To mask a king in weeds.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Man is physical as well as metaphysical, a thing of shreds and patches, borrowed unequally from good and bad ancestors, and a misfit from the start.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Any relation to the land, the habit of tilling it, or mining it, or even hunting on it, generates the feeling of patriotism. He who keeps shop on it, or he who merely uses it as a support to his desk and ledger, or to his manufactory, values it less.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Although this garrulity of advising is born with us, I confess that life is rather a subject of wonder, than of didactics. So muchfate, so much irresistible dictation from temperament and unknown inspiration enter into it, that we doubt we can say anything out of our own experience whereby to help each other.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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For everything you have missed, you have gained something else, and for everything you gain, you lose something else.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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To help the young soul, to add energy, inspire hope, and blow the coals into a useful flame to redeem defeat by new thought and firm action, this, though not easy, is the work of divine men.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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There can be no high civility without a deep morality, though it may not always call itself by that name.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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As many languages as he has, as many friends, as many arts and trades, so many times is he a man.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Be a gift and a benediction.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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A low self-love in the parent desires that his child should repeat his character and fortune.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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A healthy soul stands united with the Just and the True, as the magnet arranges itself with the pole, so that he stands to all beholders like a transparent object betwixt them and the sun, and whoso journeys towards the sun, journeys towards that person. He is thus the medium of the highest influence to all who are not on the same level.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The Gods we worship write their names on our faces be sure of that. And a man will worship something ... That which dominates will determine his life and character. Therefore it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshipping we are becoming.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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We must not tamper with the organic motion of the soul.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The poorest experience is rich enough for all the purposes of expressing thought
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Treat your friend as a spectacle.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Well, the world has a million writers. One would think, then, that good thought would be as familiar as air and water, and the gifts of each new hour would exclude the last. Yet we can count all our good books nay, I remember any beautiful verse for twenty years.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The populace drags down the gods to their own level.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Language is the archives of history.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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By the irresistible maturing of the general mind, the Christian traditions have lost their hold.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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He needs no library, for he has not done thinking no church, for he is himself a prophet no statute book, for he hath the Lawgiver no money, for he is value itself no road, for he is at home where he is.
Ralph Waldo Emerson