Wealth (Primary source)
In Wealth, Emerson argues that true wealth is not merely material accumulation, but the ability to create and contribute. It stems from aligning oneself with natural laws and serving others, leading to a flourishing and abundant life beyond mere possessions.
“Wealth brings with it its own checks and balances. The basis of political economy is non-interference. The only safe rule is found in the self-adjusting meter of demand and supply. Do not legislate. Meddle, and you snap the sinews with your sumptuary laws. Give no bounties: make equal laws: secure life and property, and you need not give alms. Open the doors of opportunity to talent and virtue, and they will do themselves justice, and property will not be in bad hands. In a free and just commonwealth, property rushes from the idle and imbecile, to the industrious, brave, and persevering.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“The only way to have a friend is to be one.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“The law of nature is, do the thing, and you shall have the power: but they who do not the thing have not the power.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary sourceMore quotes by Ralph Waldo Emerson →
“If you know that this life is all that you have, wouldn’t you make the most of it?”
— Ayn Rand Disputed“Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life of equal simplicity, and I may say innocence, with Nature herself.”
— Henry David Thoreau Primary source“The life of man is a self-evolving circle, which, from a ring imperceptibly small, rushes on all sides outwards to new and larger circles, and would embrace at last the universal sphere.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“But I have found out that though the ways in which I can make myself useful are few, yet the work open to me is endless.”
— Helen Keller Primary source