The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.

When self control is lacking in small things, the ability to apply it to matters of importance withers away. Every day in which one does not at least deny himself some trifle is badly spent and a threat to the day following.

I have been casting shadows all my life without caring about how deeply they stain my soul.

Not joy is the mother of dissipation, but joylessness.

Is not wounded vanity the mother of all tragedies?

I am interested only in the relations of a people to the rearing of the individual man, and among the Greeks the conditions were unusually favourable for the development of the individual; not by any means owing to the goodness of the people, but because of the struggles of their evil instincts.With the help of favourable measures great individuals might be reared who would be both different from and higher than those who heretofore have owed their existence to mere chance. Here we may still be hopeful: in the rearing of exceptional men.

Emerson is a person who lives instinctively on ambrosia - and leaves everything indigestible on his plate.