The American Scholar

Explore 5 quotes from The American Scholar

This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

More information about this quote

Topic

Making the most

Author

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Source

The American Scholar

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1837 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar." Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard College. 31 Aug. 1837, First Parish in Cambridge, Cambridge, MA, USA.

Current Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar (1837)." The Portable Emerson, edited by Jeffrey S. Cramer. Penguin Classics, 2014.

If the single man plant himself indomitably on his instincts, and there abide, the huge world will come round to him.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The American Scholar

More information about this quote

Topic

Trusting oneself Believing in oneself

Speaker

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Source

The American Scholar

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1837 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar." Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard College. 31 Aug. 1837, First Parish in Cambridge, Cambridge, MA, USA.

Current Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar (1837)." The Portable Emerson, edited by Jeffrey S. Cramer. Penguin Classics, 2014.

I embrace the common, I explore and sit at the feet of the familiar, the low. Give me insight into to-day, and you may have the antique and future worlds. What would we really know the meaning of? The meal in the firkin; the milk in the pan; the ballad in the street; the news of the boat.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The American Scholar

More information about this quote

Topic

The little things Simple living Being present

Speaker

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Source

The American Scholar

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1837 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar." Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard College. 31 Aug. 1837, First Parish in Cambridge, Cambridge, MA, USA.

Current Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar (1837)." The Portable Emerson, edited by Jeffrey S. Cramer. Penguin Classics, 2014.

Character is higher than intellect.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The American Scholar

More information about this quote

Topic

Character

Speaker

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Source

The American Scholar

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1837 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar." Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard College. 31 Aug. 1837, First Parish in Cambridge, Cambridge, MA, USA.

Current Citation

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "The American Scholar (1837)." The Portable Emerson, edited by Jeffrey S. Cramer. Penguin Classics, 2014.

When we start deceiving ourselves into thinking not that we want something or need something, not that it is a pragmatic necessity for us to have it, but that it is a moral imperative that we have it, then is when we join the fashionable madmen, and then is when the thin whine of hysteria is heard in the land, and then is when we are in bad trouble.

Joan Didion

Buy Slouching Towards Bethlehem at Amazon Buy Slouching Towards Bethlehem at Amazon

More information about this quote

Topic

Consumerism

Author

Joan Didion

Source

The Insidious Ethic of Conscience The American Scholar

Medium

Essay

Language

English

Time

1965 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Didion, Joan. "The Insidious Ethic of Conscience." The American Scholar, 1965.

Current Citation

Didion, Joan. "On Morality." Slouching Towards Bethlehem. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1968.