Wealth is in applications of mind to nature; and the art of getting rich consists not in industry, much less in saving, but in a better order, in timeliness, in being at the right spot.
Interpretation
Wealth is achieved through thoughtful engagement with the world and seizing opportunities rather than through hard work alone.
Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote highlights that true wealth comes not merely from industriousness or frugality, but rather from the intelligent application of our thoughts to nature and the timely exploitation of opportunities. It implies that having a clear vision and being strategically present at the right moments is crucial for success in acquiring wealth.
In practice
In a motivational speech about entrepreneurship, one could use this quote to highlight the importance of recognizing opportunities.
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?
A ball player has to be kept hungry to become a big leaguer. That's why no boy from a rich family has ever made the big leagues.
I wasn't brought up as a society girl to go to balls and be a debutante and marry the social set and money and go to parties. No one in my family lived like that. And I never wanted to live like that. I was brought up to believe in work. I always wanted a career. Always.
I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what's next.
I feel that I had been rescued from the gutter by America. One day I was under the gutter, chased by police, thinking dogs were going to get me. I laid there listening to the dogs and the gutter. The next day, there I am standing on the Olympic platform, and you hear the anthem. I was proud.
Even a poor man can receive honors.
Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It's quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure.
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