Quote #231
Though love repine, and reason chafe, There came a voice without reply, - ''Tis man's perdition to be safe, When for the truth he ought to die.'
More from Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Obey the voice at eve obeyed at prime.
- For what avail the plough or sail, Or land or life, if freedom fail?
- It is time to be old, To take in sail: - The god of bounds, Who sets to seas a shore, Came to me in his fatal rounds, And said: 'No more!
- If the red slayer think he slays, Or if the slain think he is slain, They know not well the subtle ways I keep, and pass, and turn again.
- Daughters of Time, the hypocritic Days, Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes, And marching single in an endless file, Bring diadems and…
- Far or forgot to me is near; Shadow and sunlight are the same; The vanished gods to me appear; And one to me are shame and fame.
- For the prevision is allied Unto the thing so signified; Or say, the foresight that awaits Is the same Genius that creates.
- They reckon ill who leave me out; When me they fly, I am the wings; I am the doubter and the doubt; And I the hymn the Brahmin sings.