Quotes and sayings from Ralph Waldo Emerson

"To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded."

"Don’t be timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make, the better"

"We are always getting ready to live, but never living"

"For everything you have missed, you have gained something else; and for everything you gain, you lose something else. It is about your outlook towards life. You can either regret or rejoice"

"Every wall is a door."

"The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be"

"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm"

"Progress is the activity of today and the assurance of tomorrow"

"There is no knowledge that is not power"

"To fill the hour – that is happiness"

"Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself"

"To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment"

"The world makes way for the man who knows where he is going"

"Everything in the universe goes by indirection. There are no straight lines"

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could"

"Nothing is more simple than greatness; indeed, to be simple is to be great"

"There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance: that imitation is suicidal"

"Little minds have little worries, big minds have no time for worries"

"There’s nothing capricious in nature, and the implanting of a desire indicates that its gratification is in the constitution of the creature that feels it"

"Nothing can bring you peace but yourself"

"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us"

"Let not a man guard his dignity, but let his dignity guard him"