“Le symptôme invariable de la science humaine est de voir du miraculeux dans les choses vulgaires.”
Essai sur la nature ('), 1836
Ralph Waldo Emerson, né le 25 mai 1803 à Boston et mort le 27 avril 1882 à Concord , est un essayiste, philosophe et poète américain, chef de file du mouvement transcendantaliste américain du début du XIXe siècle. Wikipedia
“Le symptôme invariable de la science humaine est de voir du miraculeux dans les choses vulgaires.”
Essai sur la nature ('), 1836
“Qu’est-ce qu’une herbe? Une plante dont les vertus n’ont pas encore été découvertes […].”
La Destinée de la République (Fortune of the Republic), 1878
Solitude et Société ('), 1870
“The reward of a thing well done is to have done it.”
New England Reformers
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Essays, First Series
“I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.”
1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), Self-Reliance
Source: Self-Reliance and Other Essays
Contexte: But now we are a mob. Man does not stand in awe of man, nor is his genius admonished to stay at home, to put itself in communication with the internal ocean, but it goes abroad to beg a cup of water of the urns of other men. We must go alone. I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.
1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), Self-Reliance
Contexte: A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.
1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), Self-Reliance
Contexte: I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The sentiment they instil is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost, — and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment.
“This world belongs to the energetic.”
Resources
1870s, Society and Solitude (1870), Books, Letters and Social Aims http://www.rwe.org/comm/index.php?option=com_content&task=category§ionid=5&id=74&Itemid=149 (1876)
1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), Compensation
Contexte: Every excess causes a defect; every defect an excess. Every sweet hath its sour; every evil its good. Every faculty which is a receiver of pleasure has an equal penalty put on its abuse. It is to answer for its moderation with its life. For every grain of wit there is a grain of folly. For every thing you have missed, you have gained something else; and for every thing you gain, you lose something. If riches increase, they are increased that use them. If the gatherer gathers too much, nature takes out of the man what she puts into his chest; swells the estate, but kills the owner. Nature hates monopolies and exceptions.
1830s, The American Scholar http://www.emersoncentral.com/amscholar.htm (1837)
Contexte: Character is higher than intellect... A great soul will be strong to live, as well as strong to think.
“Don't waste yourself in rejection, nor bark against the bad, but chant the beauty of the good.”
Success
1870s, Society and Solitude (1870)
“Thou art to me a delicious torment.”
Friendship
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Essays, First Series
Civilization
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
“There are many things of which a wise man might wish to be ignorant.”
Demonology
1880s, Lectures and Biographical Sketches (1883)
Progress of Culture Phi Beta Kappa Address (July 18, 1867)
1870s, Society and Solitude (1870), Books, Letters and Social Aims http://www.rwe.org/comm/index.php?option=com_content&task=category§ionid=5&id=74&Itemid=149 (1876)
“Ne te quaesiveris extra." (Do not seek for things outside of yourself)”
Source: Self-Reliance and Other Essays