Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes About Apology

• My life is not an apology, but a life. It is for itself and not for a spectacle. I much prefer that it should be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering and unsteady.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Apology, Self Reliance, Life Is

  Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ronald A. Bosco, Joel Myerson (2015). “Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.131, Harvard University Press

• Money, which represents the prose of life, and which is hardly spoken of in parlors without an apology, is, in its effects and laws, as beautiful as roses.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Life, Beautiful, Money

  Essays, Second Series "Nominalist and Realist" (1844)

• Rings and jewels are not gifts, but apologies for gifts. The only gift is a portion of thyself. Thou must bleed for me. Therefore the poet brings his poem; the shepherd, his lamb; the farmer, corn; the miner, a stone; the painter, his picture; the girl, a handkerchief of her own sewing.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Life, Positive, Girl

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (191?). “Society and solitude, Letters and social aims”

• Rings and other jewels are not gifts, but apologies for gifts. The only gift is a portion of thyself.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Apology, Jewels, Portions

  "Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson".

• Men do what is called a good action, as some piece of courage or charity, much as they would pay a fine in expiation of daily non-appearance on parade. Their works are done as an apology or extenuation of their living in the world. I do not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is not an apology, but a life.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Apology, Men, Wish

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2009). “Essays: Easyread Super Large 18pt Edition”, p.48, ReadHowYouWant.com

• No sensible person ever made an apology.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Apology, Made, Sensible

• My life is not an apology, but a life.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Apology, Life Is

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1851). “Essays, lectures and orations”, p.24

• The sentence must also contain its own apology for being spoken.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Apology, Sentences

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1964). “The Early Lectures of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.163, Harvard University Press

• There is no country in which so absolute a homage is paid to wealth. In America there is a touch of shame when a man exhibits theevidences of large property, as if after all it needed apology. But the Englishman has pure pride in his wealth, and esteems it a final certificate. A coarse logic rules throughout all English souls: if you have merit, can you not show it by your good clothes and coach and horses?

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Country, Horse, Apology

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2012). “The Selected Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.268, Graphic Arts Books

• Senators and presidents have climbed so high with pain enough, not because they think the place specially agreeable, but as an apology for real worth, and to vindicate their manhood in our eyes. This conspicuous chair is their compensation to themselves for being of a poor, cold, hard nature.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Pain, Real, Ambition

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2009). “The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.387, Modern Library

• But a public oration is an escapade, a non-committal, an apology, a gag, and not a communication, not a speech, not a man.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Communication, Apology, Men

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1851). “Essays, lectures and orations”, p.71

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