Ralph Waldo Quotes:

He had gone to the higher Sierras... [about Ralph Waldo Emerson's death]

- John Muir

topic: Gone, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

When [Ralph Waldo] Emerson visited Thoreau in jail and asked, 'What are you doing in there?' it was reported that Thoreau replied, 'What are you doing out there?'

- Howard Zinn

source: Howard Zinn (2015). “A People's History of the United States: 1492-Present”, p.156, Routledge

topic: Jail, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

A chief event of life is the day in which we have encountered a mind that startled us.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

topic: Life, Greatness, Mind, Ralph Waldo

The ancestor of every action is a thought. —Ralph Waldo Emerson

- David Allen

topic: Action, Waldo Emerson, Ancestor, Ralph Waldo, Ancestor Worship

Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course. The world would become religious overnight. We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead the stars come out every night, and we watch television.

- Paul Hawken

source: "You are Brilliant, and the Earth is Hiring". Paul Hawken's commencement speech at University of Portland in Oregon, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 2, 2014.

topic: Inspirational, Life, Religious, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Sandra Day O'Connor - once she said that there are - there were no public schools in America until the 18th century, and she overlooked my alma mater because we started - I say we - in 1635. And among the people who went there - and they're on - the walls in the auditorium, the names are: Ralph Waldo Emerson and Cotton Mather, Benjamin Franklin, except he split when he was 10 years old to go to work.

- Nat Hentoff

source: Source: thedailyhatch.org

topic: Wall, School, Years, Sandra Day O Connor, Waldo Emerson

I pretend no originality in observing that mass education was motivated in part by the perceived need to "educate them to keep them from our throats," to borrow Ralph Waldo Emerson's parody of elite fears that inspired early advocates of public mass education.

- Noam Chomsky

source: Source: www.publicanthropology.org

topic: Needs, Originality, Inspired, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

What a new face courage puts on everything. - Ralph Waldo Emerson To be seventy years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be forty years old.

- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

topic: Wisdom, Years, Hopeful, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

The landscape belongs to the person who looks at it..." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

topic: Nature, Looks, Landscape, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Prayer that craves a particular commodity, anything less than all good, is vicious.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

source: Ralph Waldo Emerson (1808). “Select Essays and Poems”, p.53

topic: Prayer, Commodity, Vicious, Dualism, Ralph Waldo

For character, to prepare for the inevitable I recommend selections from [Ralph Waldo] Emerson. His writings have done for me far more than all other reading.

- Rutherford B. Hayes

topic: Reading, Character, Writing, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Dreams require down payments. Dreams are free, but the journey isn't. There is a price to pay. First, you must pay the price of dealing with criticism from people who matter. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, 'Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong.' Second, you must pay the price of overcoming your fears. Failure, rejection, and looking foolish are common fears - but they are just feelings that can be conquered and removed from your thoughts. Finally, you must be willing to pay the price of hard work in order to realize your dream.

- John C. Maxwell

source: FaceBook post by John C. Maxwell from Jun 09, 2014

topic: Dream, Hard Work, Journey, Never Surrender, Decide Upon

I have not, in general, much belief in the ability of woman as a creative artist. Unwritten lyrics, as [Ralph Waldo] Emerson said once when we conversed on this subject, should be her forte.

- Fredrika Bremer

topic: Artist, Creative, Belief, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

In the morning a man walks with his whole body; in the evening, only with his legs.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

topic: Good Morning, Men, Monday Morning, Funny Good Morning, Morning After

Our high respect for a well-read man is praise enough for literature. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

topic: Reading, Men, Literature, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Dad said I would always be "high minded and low waged" from reading too much Ralph Waldo Emerson. Maybe he was right.

- Jim Harrison

topic: Dad, Reading, Too Much, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

I just got one last thing, I urge all of you, all of you, to enjoy your life, the precious moments you have. To spend each day with some laughter and some thought, to get you're emotions going.

- Jim Valvano

source: Arthur Ashe Courage Award Acceptance Address, delivered 3 March 1993

topic: Life, Basketball, Laughter, Enjoy Your Life, Precious Moments

When people are ready to, they change. They never do it before then, and sometimes they die before they get around to it. You can't make them change if they don't want to, just like when they do want to, you can't stop them.

- Andy Warhol

topic: Change, People, Want, Times Have Changed, Ready For Change

President Heber J. Grant often quoted the following statement, which is sometimes attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson: “That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do-not that the nature of the thing is changed, but that our power to do is increased.'

- Heber J. Grant

topic: President, Sometimes, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Beware of charisma . . . Representative Men; was Ralph Waldo Emerson's 1850 phrase for the great men in a democracy . . . Is there some common quality among these Representative Men who have been most successful as our leaders? I call it the need to be authentic-or, as our dictionaries tell us, conforming to fact and therefore worthy of trust, reliance or belief. While the charismatic has an uncanny outside source of strength, the authentic is strong because he is what he seems to be.

- Daniel J. Boorstin

topic: Strong, Successful, Men, Uncanny, Waldo Emerson

The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him. That remark in itself wouldn’t make any sense if quoted as it stands. The average man ought to be allowed a quotation of no less than three sentences, one to make his statement and two to explain what he meant. Ralph Waldo Emerson was about the only one who could stand having his utterances broken up into sentence quotations, and every once in a while even he doesn’t sound so sensible in short snatches.

- Robert Benchley

source: Robert Benchley (1951). “My ten years in a quandary and how they grew”

topic: Men, Average, Two, Waldo Emerson, Ralph Waldo