The soul is the perceiver and revealer of truth. We know truth when we see it, let skeptic and scoffer say what they choose. Foolish people ask you, when you have spoken what they do not wish to hear, 'How do you know it is truth, and not an error of your own?' We know truth when we see it, from opinion, as we know when we are awake that we are awake.
Interpretation
The essence of truth is recognized by the soul, independent of skepticism or doubt.
Ralph Waldo Emerson emphasizes the intrinsic ability of the soul to perceive and reveal truth, suggesting that knowledge of truth is inherently understood, much like the clarity of being awake. He highlights the challenges posed by skepticism, noting that while some may question the validity of one's truth, the true understanding of truth is a personal and internal experience that transcends mere opinion.
In practice
This quote can be used during a philosophical discussion about the nature of truth and perception.
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?
Men, as well as women, are much oftener led by their hearts than by their understandings.
Anything that just costs money is cheap.
Existence is larger than any model that is not itself the exact size of existence (which has no size).
Everybody wants to enjoy heaven after they die, but they don't want to be heavenly-minded while they live.
It was a silence that heard itself, awful and beautiful.
All natural disasters are comforting because they reaffirm our impotence, in which, otherwise, we might stop believing. At times it is strangely sedative to know the extent of your own powerlessness.
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