Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Volume 1); With Annotations (Paperback)

Book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1909. Excerpt: ... JOURNAL XIV THE WIDE WORLD, NO. 13 "Bonus vir tempore tan turn a Deo differt." Seneca. "Nor fetch my precepts from the Cynic's tub." Canterbury, February 17, 1824. "La nature," says Pascal, "confond les pyrrhoniens, et la raison confond les dogmatistes." And Sir J. Mackintosh calls the sentence the sublimest of human composition. It is fortunate and happy, but a sublimity not difficult to gain, as it did not occur to Pascal when he first revolved the subject, but is the last generalization at which he arrives. And it is easier to build up one subject into a cone with a broad base of examples narrowing up into a formula expressing a general truth, than to detach subtle facts from subjects partially known. . . . PRAISE "Please to praise me " is the ill disguised request of almost all literary men. All men are cheered by applause and vexed by censure: ..." Nihil est quod credere de se Non possit." Juvenal. But literary men alone cannot do without it. The reason is obvious. Other men toil for gold and get gold for their toil, but scholars cannot get gold, and appetite in them craves another food. They are no more insatiable for their proper reward than are the pursuers of Mammon for theirs. But why are the askers of praise ridiculous, and not the askers of silver? (Minor negatur.) In education it seems to be safer to praise than to censure abundantly. For myself, I have ever been elated to an active mind by flattery and depressed by dispraise. Perhaps a Muse that soared on a stronger wing would scorn to be so slightly disheartened. I like the lines -- "Praise is the salt that seasons right in man And whets the appetite of moral good." Young. It is noticeable how much a man is judged of by the praise he gives. It is best not to be too inflammable, not to be lavish of your praise on light...