Quote

To educate the wise man, the State exists and with the appearance of the wise man, the State expires. The appearance of charactermakes the state unnecessary. The wise man is the State.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
State
States
Expires
Government
Unnecessary
Educate
Men
Appearance
Exists
Wise
Wisdom

More quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Image
In this distribution of functions, the scholar is the delegated intellect. In the right state, he is, Man Thinking. In the degenerate state, when the victim of society, he tends to become a mere thinker, or, still worse, the parrot of other men's thinking.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
We are as much informed of a writer's genius by what he selects as by what he originates.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
Convert life into truth.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
Books are the best of things, well used abused, among the worst...They are for nothing but to inspire.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
We want a state of things in which crime will not pay, a state of things which allows every man the largest liberty compatible with the liberty of every other man.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
The measure of mental health is the disposition to find good everywhere.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
If you tax too high, the revenue will yield nothing.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
All minds quote. Old and new make the warp and woof of every moment. There is no thread that is not a twist of these two strands. By necessity, by proclivity, and by delight, we all quote. We quote not only books and proverbs, but arts, sciences, religion, customs, and laws nay, we quote temples and houses, tables and chairs, by imitation.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
Music is the poor man's Parnassus.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
Beauty through my senses stole I yielded myself to the perfect whole.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
I always seem to suffer some loss of faith on entering cities.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
One of our statesmen said, The curse of this country is eloquent men.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
We can only obey our own polarity.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
We resent all criticism which denies us anything that lies in our line of advance.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
There is no man of Nature's worth In the circle of the earth.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
Other men are lenses through which we read our own minds. Each man seeks those of different quality from his own, and such as are good of their kind that is, he seeks other men, and the rest.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
It is the quality of the moment, not the number of days, or events, or of actors, that imports.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
That is ever the difference between the wise and the unwise: the latter wonders at what is unusual the wise man wonders at the usual.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
We are too civil to books. For a few golden sentences we will turn over and actually read a volume of four or five hundred pages.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Image
So each man, like each plant, has his parasites. A strong, astringent, bilious nature has more truculent enemies than the slugs and moths that fret my leaves. Such a one has curculios, borers, knife-worms a swindler ate him first, then a client, then a quack, then smooth, plausible gentlemen, bitter and selfish as Moloch.
Ralph Waldo Emerson