The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons.
Interpretation
Boasting about one's integrity often reveals insecurities and hidden flaws.
In this quote, Ralph Waldo Emerson suggests that those who overly emphasize their honor or principles may actually be compensating for a lack of true integrity. Instead of gaining respect, their loud claims lead others to be skeptical and alert to their possible dishonesty, as symbolized by the act of counting spoons—monitoring what cannot be taken for granted.
In practice
This quote can be used during a discussion on integrity in leadership.
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?
Do not treat others as you yourself would not be treated.
I feel I have a lot to learn from English football and I am completely open to good influences in my way of thinking football. But I also have things to give them.
Man unquestionably has impressive powers... But after all our obedience and good works, we cannot be saved from the effects of our sins without the grace extended by the atonement of Jesus Christ... Man cannot earn his own salvation.
We ourselves cannot put any magic spells on this world. The world is its own magic.
Why does the past seem so magical, so fraught, so luminous? At the time it was just, ugh, another boring bloody day. But, to look back on, it's a day full of miracles and light and extraordinary events. Why is this? What process do we apply to the past, to give it this vividness? I don't know.
To live means to experience-through doing, feeling, thinking. Experience takes place in time, so time is the ultimate scarce resource we have. Over the years, the content of experience will determine the quality of life. Therefore one of the most essential decisions any of us can make is about how one's time is allocated or invested.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.