There is in nature a parallel unity which corresponds to the unity in the mind and makes it available. This methodizing mind meets no resistance in its attempts. The scattered blocks, with which it strives to form a symmetrical structure, fit. This design following after finds with joy that like design went before. Not only man puts things in a row, but things belong in a row.
A man passes for that he is worth. What he is engraves itself on his face, on his form, on his fortunes, in letters of light. Concealment avails him nothing; boasting nothing. There is confession in the glances of our eyes; in our smiles; in salutations; and the grasp of hands.
All poets have signalized their consciousness of rare moments when they were superior to themselves, -when a light, a freedom, a power came to them which lifted them to performances far better than they could reach at other times.
Therefore we value the poet. All the argument and all the wisdom is not in the encyclopedia, or the treatise on metaphysics, or the Body of Divinity, but in the sonnet or the play.
When God lets loose a great thinker on this planet, then all things are at risk. There is not a piece of science but its flank may be turned to-morrow; nor any literary reputation or the so-called eternal names of fame that many not be refused and condemned.
I have just been conversing with one man, to whom no weight of adverse experience will make it for a moment appear impossible that thousands of human beings might exercise towards each other the grandest and simplest sentiments, as well as a knot of friends, or a pair of lovers.
The prayer of the farmer kneeling in his field to weed it, the prayer of the rower kneeling with the stroke of his oar, are true prayers heard throughout nature.
Let him be great, and love shall follow him. Nothing is more deeply punished than the neglect of the affinities by which alone society should be formed, and the insane levity of choosing associates by others eyes.
Cowardice shuts the eyes till the sky is not larger than a calf-skin: shuts the eyes so that we cannot see the horse that is running away with us; worse, shuts the eyes of the mind and chills the heart.