Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes About Talent
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Blessed are those who have no talent!
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A forte always makes a foible.
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Each man has his own vocation; his talent is his call. There is one direction in which all space is open to him.
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The best political economy is the care and culture of men; for, in these crises, all are ruined except such as are proper individuals, capable of thought, and of new choice and the application of their talent to new labor.
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We postpone our literary work until we have more ripeness and skill to write, and we one day discover that our literary talent wasa youthful effervescence which we have now lost.
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Every person has his or her own vocation-talent is the call.
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The only sin is limitation. As soon as you once come up with a man's limitations, it is all over with him. Has he talents? has heenterprise? has he knowledge? It boots not. Infinitely alluring and attractive was he to you yesterday, a great hope, a sea to swim in; now, you have found his shores, found it a pond, and you care not if you never see it again.
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Each man has his own vocation. The talent is the call. There is one direction in which all space is open to him. He has faculties silently inviting him thither to endless exertion. He is like a ship in the river; he runs against obstructions on every side but one; on that side all obstruction is taken away, and he sweeps serenely over a deepening channel into an infinite sea.
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A man is like a bit of Labrador spar, which has no lustre as you turn it in your hand until you come to a particular angle; then it shows deep and beautiful colors. There is no adaptation or universal applicability in men, but each has his special Talent, and the mastery of Successful men consists in adroitly keeping themselves where and when that turn shall be oftenest to be practiced.
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To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men that is genius.
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If the colleges were better, if they had the power of imparting valuable thought, creative principles, truths which become powers, thoughts which become talents, - if they could cause that a mind not profound should become profound, - we should all rush to their gates: instead of contriving inducements to draw students, you would need to set police at the gates to keep order in the in-rushing multitude.
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Genius always finds itself a century too early.
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Our poets are men of talents who sing, and not the children of music.
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Nature and books belong to the eyes that see them. It depends on the mood of the man, whether he shall see the sunset or the fine poem. There are always sunsets, and there is always genius; but only a few hours so serene that we can relish nature or criticism. The more or less depends on structure or temperament. Temperament is the iron wire on which the beads are strung. Of what use is fortune or talent to a cold and defective store?
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And what is Genius but finer love, a love impersonal, a love of the flower and perfection of things, and a desire to draw a new picture or copy of the same? It looks to the cause and life: it proceeds from within outward, whilst Talent goes from without inward.
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Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can offer with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation, but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession.
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It is the delight of vulgar talent to dazzle and to bind the beholder. But true genius seeks to defend us from itself. True geniuswill not impoverish, but will liberate, and add new sense. If a wise man should appear in our village, he would create, in those who conversed with him, a new consciousness of wealth, by opening their eyes to unobserved advantages; he would establish a sense of immovable equality, calm us with assurances that we could not be cheated; as every one would discern the checks and guarantees of condition.
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Many a profound genius, I suppose, who fills the world with fame of his exploding renowned errors, is yet everyday posed and baffled by trivial questions at his own supper table.
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There is, in all great poets, a wisdom of humanity which is superior to any talents they exercise.
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A man must thank his defects, and stand in some terror of his talents. A transcendent talent draws so largely on his forces as tolame him; a defect pays him revenues on the other side.
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Contemporary American psychiatrist It is a happy talent to know how to play.
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Genius is power, talent is applicability.
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Talent may frolic and juggle; genius realizes and adds.
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The people know that they need in their representative much more than talent, namely, the power to make his talent trusted.
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The difference between talent and genius is in the direction of the current: in genius, it is from within outward; in talent from without inward.
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We have feudal governments in a commercial age. It would be but an easy extension of our commercial system, to pay a private emperor a fee for services, as we pay an architect, an engineer, or a lawyer. If any man has talent for righting wrong, for administering difficult affairs, for counselling poor farmers how to turn their estates to good husbandry, for combining a hundred private enterprises to a general benefit, let him in the county- town, or in Court-street, put up his sign-board, Mr. Smith, Governor, Mr. Johnson, Working king.
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But it is a cold, lifeless business when you go to the shops to buy something, which does not represent your life and talent, but a goldsmith's.
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Every man has a vocation. The talent is the call.
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Our people are slow to learn the wisdom of sending character instead of talent to Congress. Again and again they have sent a man of great acuteness, a fine scholar, a fine forensic orator, and some master of the brawls has crunched him up in his hands like a bit of paper.
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Great geniuses have the shortest biographies.
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