"The end and the means, the gamester and the game, β€” life is made up of the intermixture and reaction of these two amicable powers, whose marriage appears beforehand monstrous, as each denies and tends to abolish the other. We must reconcile the contradictions as we can, but their discord and their concord introduce wild absurdities into our thinking and speech. No sentence will hold the whole truth, and the only way in which we can be just, is by giving ourselves the lie; Speech is better than silence; silence is better than speech; β€” All things are in contact; every atom has a sphere of repulsion; β€” Things are, and are not, at the same time; β€” and the like. All the universe over, there is but one thing, this old Two-Face, creator-creature, mind-matter, right-wrong, of which any proposition may be affirmed or denied. Very fitly therefore I assert that every man is a partialist; that nature secures him as an instrument by self-conceit, preventing the tendencies to religion and science; and now further assert, that, each man's genius being nearly and affectionately explored, he is justified in his individuality, as his nature is found to be immense; and now I add that every man is a universalist also, and, as our earth, whilst it spins on its own axis, spins all the time around the sun through the celestial spaces, so the least of its rational children, the most dedicated to his private affair, works out, though as it were under a disguise, the universal problem. We fancy men are individuals; so are pumpkins; but every pumpkin in the field, goes through every point of pumpkin history. The rabid democrat, as soon as he is senator and rich man, has ripened beyond possibility of sincere radicalism, and unless he can resist the sun, he must be conservative the remainder of his days. Lord Eldon said in his old age that "if he were to begin life again, he would be damned but he would begin as agitator.""
β€” Essays (Emerson)

Quote Details

Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Literary works
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
English (Original)

Sources

Imported from EN Wikiquote

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Essays_(Emerson)

Revision History

No revisions have been submitted for this quote.

  1. Home
  2. /
  3. Literary works
  4. /
  5. Quote by Essays (Emerson)

Categories

Literary works

Essays (Emerson)

146 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Essays (Emerson) β†’

Related Quotes

"And what fastens attention, in the intercourse of life, like any passage betraying affection between two parties? Per…"
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"Heroism feels and never reasons and therefore is always right."
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"It was a high counsel that I once heard given to a young person, β€” "Always do what you are afraid to do.""
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"All our progress is an unfolding, like the vegetable bud. You have first an instinct, then an opinion, then a knowled…"
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"There is no great and no small To the Soul that maketh all; And where it cometh, all things are; And it cometh everyw…"
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
": (Epigraph)"
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"Every revolution was first a thought in one man's mind and when the same thought occurs in another man, it is the key…"
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"These hints, dropped as it were from sleep and night, let us use in broad day. The student is to read history activel…"
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"Time dissipates to shining ether the solid angularity of facts."
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
"The ancestor of every action is a thought."
β€” Essays (Emerson)
Literary Works
HomePopularAdd Quote
Add Quote
HomePopularWorksQuotesAuthorsCATEGORIES
RECENTLY ADDED

Young though he was, his radiant energy produced such an impression of absolute reliability that Hedgewar made him the first sarkaryavah, or general secretary, of the RSS.

- Gopal Mukund Huddar

Largely because of the influence of communists in London, Huddar's conversion into an enthusiastic supporter of the fight against fascism was quick and smooth. The ease with which he crossed from one worldview to another betrays the fact that he had not properly understood the world he had grown in.

- Gopal Mukund Huddar

Huddar would have been 101 now had he been alive. But then centenaries are not celebrated only to register how old so and so would have been and when. They are usually celebrated to explore how much poorer our lives are without them. Maharashtrian public life is poorer without him. It is poorer for not having made the effort to recall an extraordinary life.

- Gopal Mukund Huddar

I regret I was not there to listen to Balaji Huddar's speech [...] No matter how many times you listen to him, his speeches are so delightful that you feel like listening to them again and again.

- Gopal Mukund Huddar

By the time he came out of Franco's prison, Huddar had relinquished many of his old ideas. He displayed a worldview completely different from that of the RSS, even though he continued to remain deferential to Hedgewar and maintained a personal relationship with him.

- Gopal Mukund Huddar

CATEGORIES
Novelists From The United States29258Thema28471Academics From The United States273392000s American Films18689Person17672