No change of circumstances can repair a defect of character.
Interpretation
Personal character is fundamental, and external circumstances cannot fix flaws within ourselves.
Ralph Waldo Emerson emphasizes that true character comes from within and that changing external circumstances will not mend inherent personal flaws. This quote serves as a reminder that self-improvement requires inner work rather than relying on outside conditions or situations to change for the better.
In practice
A motivational speaker might use this quote to highlight the importance of inner strength at a conference.
It is plain that there is no separate essence called courage, no cup or cell in the brain, no vessel in the heart containing drops or atoms that make or give this virtue; but it is the right or healthy state of every man, when he is free to do that which is constitutional to him to do.
Few people have any next, they live from hand to mouth without a plan, and are always at the end of their line.
Men cease to interest us when we find their limitations
Tis the good reader that makes the good book; a good head cannot read amiss: in every book he finds passages which seem confidences or asides hidden from all else and unmistakeably meant for his ear.
The world belongs to the energetic.
Hast thou named all the birds without a gun?
Industrial manβa sentient reciprocating engine having a fluctuating output, coupled to an iron wheel revolving with uniform velocity. And then we wonder why this should be the golden age of revolution and mental derangement.
I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier times, Nothing's equivalent to the New York state of mind
I found that things became a lot easier when I no longer expected to win. You abandon your masterpiece and sink into the real masterpiece.
I am a Black Feminist. I mean I recognize that my power as well as my primary oppressions come as a result of my blackness as well as my womaness, and therefore my struggles on both of these fronts are inseparable.
To accept civilization as it is practically means accepting decay.
Too many people take New York for granted. The primary reason is that history is not taught. That's outrageous in a city where the past is still visible.
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