Ralph Waldo Emerson’s diary, 1837

It occurred last night in groping after the ele- ments of that pleasure we derive from literary compositions, that it is like the pleasure which the Prince Le Boo…

Received, day before yesterday, a letter from Thomas Carlyle, dated 5 November: — as ever a cordial influence.' Strong he is, upright, noble and sweet, and makes…

Can you not show the man of genius that always genius is situated in the world as it is with him ?

Always a fresh swarm is alighting in the places of power to suck suddenly all its sweets. And with such guides Rehoboam's young men would discard ever the wise, and…

This evening the heavens afford us the most remarkable spectacle of Aurora Borealis. A deep red plume in the East and West streaming almost from the horizon to the…

In these Lectures which from week to week I read, each on a topic which is a main interest of man, and may be made an object of exclusive interest, I seem to vie…

Life tends to be picturesque. I think O'Con- nell's South Sea Islands the best book we have published in this country this long while.

I have finished, on Thursday evening last, my course of twelve Lectures on the Philosophy of History. I read the first on the 8 December, 1836. The audience…

My baby's lovely drama still goes forward, though he catches sad colds, and wheezes and grieves. Yet again he sputters and spurs, and puts on his little important…

How much benefit in the common well-mean- ing private person. I was at Wayland to-day and could not help feeling and expressing a gratitude to that worthy R. Heard,…

Warm and welcome blows the south wind at last, and the sun and moon shine again to raise the desponding hearts of the people in these black times. Yet our idle,…

Margaret Fuller left us yesterday morning. Among many things that make her visit valu- able and memorable, this is not the least, that she gave me five or six…

It is curious to observe how strangely ex- perience becomes thought ; or life, truth. The conversion is hourly going on. Will and ne- cessity, or if you please,…

I see with joy the visits of heat and moisture to my trees, and please myself with this new property. I strangely mix myself with nature, and the Universal God…

The Sabbath reminds me of an advantage which education may give, namely, a normal piety, a certain levitical education which only rarely devout genius could…

It ought to have been more distinctly stated in " Nature " than it is, that life is our inexhaust- ible treasury for thought.

Two babies, Willie and Wallie,' and excellent cousins they prove. Willie conscious of senior- ity in all the dignity of twenty-two months; Wallie six and a…

The man of strong understanding always acts unfavorably upon the man of reason, discon- certs, and makes him less than he is.

You may regret calamities if you can thereby help the sufferer, but ifyou cannot, mind yourown business. Then instantly you are comforted. Then instantly the evil…

" My dear sir, clear your mind of cant," said Dr. Johnson. Wordsworth, whom I read last night, is garrulous and weak often, but quite free from cant. I think I…

Yesterday I attended in Boston Hedge's Club.'' Eleven persons were present, Messrs. Francis, Stetson, Ripley, Hedge, Brownson, Alcott, Bartol, Putnam, Dwight,…

Almost one month lost to study by bodily weakness and disease.

Yesterday I went to the Athenaeum and looked through journals and books — for wit, for excite- ment, to wake in me the muse. In vain, and in vain. And am I yet to…

A letter from Carlyle to-day rejoiced me.

If the All-wise would give me light, I should write for the Cambridge men a theory of the Scholar's oiEce.' It is not all books which it be- hooves him to know,…

Punishment grows out of the same stem as crime, like the hedysarum nudicaulis.'

A man should behave himself as a guest of nature but not as a drone.

Clarendon alone among the English authors (though I think I see the love of Clarendon in Burke) has successfully transplanted the Italian superlative style.

It is very hard to be simple enough to be good.

I find, in town, the Phi Beta Kappa Oration, of which 500 copies were printed, all sold, in just one month.

The event of death is always astounding ; ourphilosophy never reaches, never possesses it ; we are always at the beginning of our catechism; always the definition…

Last night I wrote to Carlyle to inform him of the new edition of his history ;'' and to Mr. Landor I sent Nature and the Oration (Phi Beta Kappa) by Charles…

Fuller/ at Providence, explained to me his plans, "That he was to keep the school five years — income so much, outlay so much ; then he should be able to go to…

Yesterday William Channing and John S. Dwight came here, and found me just ready to go to Lowell to read the first Lecture of my Course. As they seemed to be…

This morning I sent to Dr. Walker a critical notice ofCarlyle, but I doubt it will return tome.

The self-subsistent shakes like a reed before a sneering paragraph in the newspaper, or even at a difference of opinion, concerning something to be done, expressed…

What is that society which unites the most advantages to the culture of each ? The poor but educated family. The eager blushing boys discharging as they can their…

..." The fury with which the slaveholder and the slavetrader defend every inch of their plunder, of their bloody deck and howling auc- tion, only serves as a Trump…

What is culture ? The chief end of man.

Lidian says, it is wicked to go to church Sundays.'

Waldo walks alone.

Truth is our element and life, yet if a man fasten his attention upon a single aspect of truth, and apply himself to that alone for a long time, the truth itself…