The good judge is not he who does hair-splitting justice to every allegation, but who, aiming at substantial justice, rules something intelligible of the guidance of suitors.
Ralph Waldo EmersonPretension may sit still, but cannot act. Pretension never feigned an act of real greatness. Pretension never wrote an Iliad, nordrove back Xerxes, nor christianized the world, nor abolished slavery.
Ralph Waldo EmersonHeaven always bears some proportion to earth. The god of the cannibal will be a cannibal, of the crusades a crusader, and of the merchants a merchant.
Ralph Waldo EmersonThe secret of culture is to learn, that a few great points steadily reappear, alike in the poverty of the obscurest farm, and in the miscellany of metropolitan life, and that these few are alone to be regarded,--the escape from all false ties; courage to be what we are; and love what is simple and beautiful; independence and cheerful relation, these are the essentials,--these, and the wish to serve,--to add somewhat to the well-being of men.
Ralph Waldo Emerson