All the great speakers were bad speakers at first.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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There is always a certain meanness in the argument of conservatism, joined with a certain superiority in its fact.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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The best university that can be recommended to a man of ideas is the gauntlet of the mobs.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Conversation is an art in which a person has all humanity for their competitors, for it is that which all are practising every day while they live.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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You shall have joy, or you shall have power, said God; you shall not have both.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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‘Tis very certain that each person carries in their eye the exact indication of their rank in the immense scale of humanity, and we are always learning to read it. A complete person should need no auxiliaries to their personal presence.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Every genuine work of art has as much reason for being as the earth and the sun.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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There is no knowledge that is not power.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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