Exaggeration is in the course of things. Nature sends no creature, no man into the world, without adding a small excess of his proper quality. Given the planet, it is still necessary to add the impulse; so, to every creature nature added a little violence of direction in its proper path, a shove to put it on its way; in every instance, a slight generosity, a drop too much.
Ralph Waldo EmersonLet not the author eat up the man, so that he shall be all balcony and no house.
Ralph Waldo EmersonMeek young men grow up in libraries, believing it their duty to accept the views which Cicero, which Locke, which Bacon, have given, forgetful that Cicero, Locke, and Bacon were only young men in libraries, when they wrote these books.
Ralph Waldo EmersonEloquence is the power to translate a truth into language perfectly intelligible to the person to whom you speak.
Ralph Waldo Emerson