Ralph Waldo Emerson’s diary, 1843

I am greatly pleased with the merchants. In rail car and hotel it is common to meet only the successful class, and so we have favorable speci- mens: but these…

Nature. Nature asked, "Whether troop and baggage be two things ; whether the world is all troop or all baggage, or whether there be any troop that shall not one day…

As we go along the street, the eyes of all the passengers either ask, ask, continually of all they meet, or else assert, assert to all. Only rarely do we meet a…

Yesterday I read an old file of Aunt Mary's letters, and felt how she still gains by all com- parison with later friends. Never any gave higher counsels, as…

Walked with Ellery. In the landscape felt the magic of color; the world is all opal, and those ethereal tints the mountains wear have the finest effects of music on…

Criticism. It is for the novelist to make no character act absurdly, but only absurdly as seen by the others.' . . .