O Lord! Unhappy is the man whom man can make unhappy.
Interpretation
Happiness should come from within, not from external circumstances or the opinions of others.
This quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson emphasizes the idea that true unhappiness stems from allowing others to control our emotions. It suggests that a person who lets external factors determine their happiness is vulnerable to the whims of others, and therefore lacks true inner strength and independence.
In practice
In a motivational speech about self-esteem, one might quote this to encourage people to find their happiness internally.
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?
We should keep in mind that it is easy to concoct stories explaining the past or to become confident about dubious scenarios of the future. We should view both explanations and prophecies with skepticism.
Say the truth even if it may be bitter.
I have nothing new to teach the world. Truth and Non-violence are as old as the hills. All I have done is to try experiments in both on as vast a scale as I could.
She was fluent in four languages and yet her fists against the rusted hood were the fullest articulation of her defeat.
Follow your passion, weβre often told. But how do you find your passion? Let me put it another way: what is it that breaks your heart about the world? Itβs there that you begin to find what moves you. If you want to find your passion, surrender to your heartbreak. Your heartbreak points towards a truer north β and itβs the difficult journey towards it that is, in the truest sense, no mere passing idyllic infatuation, but enduring, tempestuous passion.
A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.
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