“If you really want to judge the character of a man, look not at his great performances. Watch a man do his most common actions.”

“The coward is an object to be pitied.”

“Calm and silent and steady work, and no newspaper humbug, no name-making, you must always remember.”

“One link in a chain explains the infinite chain.”

“Compared to the coward that never made the attempt, he is a hero.”

“The objection to conforming to usages that have become dead to you is, that it scatters your force.”

“Railroad iron is a magician's rod, in its power to evoke the sleeping energies of land and water.”

“In the morning a man walks with his whole body; in the evening, only with his legs. RALPH WALDO EMERSON, Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks Greek architecture is the perfect flowering of geometry.”