Far off, men swell, bully, and threaten; bring them hand to hand, and they are feeble folk.
Interpretation
People often appear bold and threatening from a distance, but up close, they can be quite weak and timid.
Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote reflects on the nature of human behavior, suggesting that individuals who seem powerful and aggressive when separated by distance often lose their bravado when confronted directly. This highlights the disparity between perceived strength and true character, revealing that many who posture boldly may lack substance and courage when faced with real interactions.
In practice
In a motivational speech discussing the true nature of courage.
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?
I try to very hard to avoid a situation where I would be eating cat or dog; I've managed to gracefully avoid that. It's hypocritical of me and an arbitrary line, but one that I have managed to avoid crossing.
EXISTENCE, n. A transient, horrible, fantastic dream,/ Wherein is nothing yet all things do seem:/ From which we're wakened by a friendly nudge/ Of our bedfellow Death, and cry: "O fudge!"
So when that Angel of the darker Drink, at last shall find you by the river-brink,_x000D_ _x000D_ And, offering his Cup, invite your Soul forth to your Lips to quaff-you shall not shrink.
I have treated many hundreds of patients. Among those in the second half of life - that is to say, over 35 - there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life.
We may say that on the first Good Friday afternoon was completed that great act by which light conquered darkness and goodness conquered sin. That is the wonder of our Saviour's crucifixion.
Strangely enough, they have a mind to till the soil, and the love of possessions is a disease in them.
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