Quote

The uses of travel are occasional, and short but the best fruit it finds, when it finds it, is conversation and this is a main function of life.

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
Conversation
Short
Occasional
Uses
Use
Finds
Best
Main
Life
Fruit
Function
Travel

More quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson

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That which we call character is a reserved force which acts directly by presence, and without means. It is conceived of as a certain undemonstrable force, a familiar or genius, by whose impulses the man is guided, but whose counsels he cannot impart.
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Say, what other metre is it Than the meeting of the eyes? Nature poureth into nature Through the channels of that feature Riding on the ray of sight, Fleeter far than whirlwinds go, Or for service, or delight, Hearts to hearts their meaning show.
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People who wash much have a high mind about it, and talk down to those who wash little.
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The German intellect wants the French sprightliness, the fine practical understanding of the English, and the American adventure but it has a certain probity, which never rests in a superficial performance, but asks steadily, To what end? A German public asks for a controlling sincerity.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Many times the reading of a book has made the future of a man.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The learned and the studious of thought have no monopoly of wisdom. Their violence of direction in some degree disqualifies them to think truly.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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We don't grow old. When we cease to grow, we become old.
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The whole of what we know is a system of compensation. Every defect in one manner is made up in another. Every suffering is rewarded every sacrifice is made up every debt is paid.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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A beautiful woman is a practical poet.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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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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I will not live out of me I will not see with others' eyes My good is good, my evil ill I would be free.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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If you criticize a fine genius, the odds are that you are out of your reckoning, and, instead of the poet, are censuring your owncaricature of him.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Every fact is related on one side to sensation, and, on the other, to morals. The game of thought is, on the appearance of one of these two sides, to find the other: given the upper, to find the under side.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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How much finer things are in composition than alone.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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We never touch but at points.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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An orchard, good tillage, good grounds, seem a fixture, like a gold mine, or a river, to a citizen but to a large farmer, not much more fixed than the state of the crop.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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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
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The characteristic of genuine heroism is its persistency. All men have wandering impulses, fits and starts of generosity. But when you have resolved to be great, abide by yourself, and do not weakly try to reconcile yourself with the world. The heroic cannot be the common, nor the common the heroic.
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A beautiful behavior is better than a beautiful form it gives a higher pleasure than statues or pictures it is the finest of fine arts.
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Greatness once and forever has down with opinion.
Ralph Waldo Emerson