"Society gains nothing whilst a man, not..." - Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Society gains nothing whilst a man, not himself renovated, attempts to renovate things around him; he has become tediously good insome particular but negligent or narrow in the rest; and hypocrisy and vanity are often the disgusting result.
More by Ralph Waldo Emerson
More on Self Improvement
“We have duties to others, and duties to ourselves, and we cannot shirk either.”
“I play the guitar. I taught myself how to play the guitar, which was a bad decision... because I didn't know how to play it, so I was a shitty teacher. I would never have went to me.”
“Is your heart right? If your heart isn't right, fix it up today.”
More on Society
“A nation can survive its fools, even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within....for the traitor appears not to be a traitor...he rots the soul of a nation...he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist.”
“What greater or better gift can we offer the republic than to teach and instruct our youth?[Lat., Quod enim munus reiplicae afferre majus, meliusve possumus, quam si docemus atque erudimus juventutem?]”
“One would have thought that it was even more necessary to limit population than property; and that the limit should be fixed by calculating the chances of mortality in the children, and of sterility in married persons. The neglect of this subject, which in existing states is so common, is a never-failing cause of poverty among the citizens; and poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.”