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You think me the child of circumstance I make my circumstance.

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
Self
Children
Make
Think
Thinking
Circumstance
Circumstances
Child
Power

More quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Every industrious man, in every lawful calling, is a useful man. And one principal reason why men are so often useless is that they neglect their own profession or calling, and divide and shift their attention among a multiplicity of objects and pursuits.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.
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I grieve that grief can teach me nothing, nor carry me one step into real nature.
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Man moves in all modes, by legs of horses, by wings of winds, by steam, by gas of balloon, by electricity, and stands on tiptoe threatening to hunt the eagle in his own element.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The world - this shadow of the soul, or other me - lies wide around. Its attractions are the keys which unlock my thoughts and make me acquainted with myself. I run eagerly into this resounding tumult... So much only of life as I know by experience... The true scholar grudges every opportunity of action past by, as a loss of power.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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We are always getting ready to live but never living.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Self reliance, the height and perfection of man, is reliance on God.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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That which dominates our imagination and our thoughts will determine our life and character.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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If man has good corn, or wood, or boards, or pigs to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles, or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad, hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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We are disgusted by gossip yet it is of importance to keep the angels in their proprieties.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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I believe that our own experience instructs us that the secret of Education lies in respecting the pupil.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Life loiters at the book's first page,-- Ah! could we turn the leaf.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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If men would avoid that general language and general manner in which they strive to hide all that is peculiar, and would say only what was uppermost in their own minds, after their own individual manner, every man would be interesting.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The flowering of civilization is the finished man, the man of sense, of grace, of accomplishment, of social power--the gentleman.
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.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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We live ruins amid ruins.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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What is excellent, As God lives, is permanent Hearts are dust, hearts' loves remain, Heart's love will meet thee again.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Earth endures Stars abide.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. It undergoes continual changes: it is barbarous, it is civilized, it is rich, it is scientific but this change is not amelioration. For every thing that is given, something else is taken. Society acquires new arts and loses old instincts.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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The masters painted for joy, and knew not that virtue had gone out of them. They could not paint the like in cold blood. The masters of English lyric wrote their songs so. It was a fine efflorescence of fine powers.
Ralph Waldo Emerson