The writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson {Edited by, Brooks Atkinson, 1940.} Intellect Go, speed the stars of thought On to their shining goals— The sower scatters broad his seed; The wheat thou strew’st be souls.” Essays: First Series (pg. 294) “…Every man, in the degree in which he has wit and culture, finds curiosity inflamed concerning the modes of living and thinking of other men, and especially of those classes whose mind have not been subdues by the drill of school education." Essays: First Series (pg. 295) “This instinctive action never ceases in a healthy mind, but becomes richer and more frequent in its informations through all states of culture. At last comes the era of reflection, when we not only observe, but take pains to observe; when we of set purpose sit down to consider an abstract truth; when we keep the mind’s eye open whilst we converse, whilst we read, whilst we act, intend to learn the secret law of some class of facts. What is the hardest task in the world? To think. I would put myself in the attitude to look in the eye an abstract truth, and I cannot. I blench and withdraw on this side and on that. I seem to know what he meant who said, No man can see God face to face and live. For example, a man explores the basis of civil government. Let him intend his mind without respite, without rest, in one direction. His best heed long time avails him nothing. Yet thoughts are fitting before him. We all but apprehend, we dimly forebode the truth. We say I will walk abroad, and the truth will take form and clearness to me. We go forth, but cannot find it. It seems as if we needed only stillness and composed attitude of the library to seize the thought. But we come in, and are as far from it as at first. Then, in a moment, and unannounced, the truth appears… “ Essays: First Series (pg. 296) "We are all wise. The difference between persons is not wisdom but in art. I knew, in anacademical club, a person who always deferred to me; who, seeing my whim for writing, fancied that my experiences has somewhat superior; whilst I saw that his experiences were as good as mine…” Essays: First Series (pg. 297) "It is long ere we discover how rich we are. Our history, we are sure, is quite tame: we have nothing to write, nothing to infer. But our wiser years still run back to the despised recollections of our childhood, and always we are fishing up some wonderful article out of that pond; until by and by we begin to suspect that the biography of the one foolish person we know is, in reality, nothing less than the miniature paraphrase of the hundred volumes of the Universal history."
Posted on: Sun, 04 Aug 2013 19:01:14 +0000
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