Quote#Speech
Only the great generalizations survive. The sharp words of the…
Quote byRalph Waldo Emerson · 1803–1882
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: From a lecture on Books given in the Fraternity Course in Boston in 1864; the quoted phrase 'glittering generalities' had been used by Rufus Choate to describe the declaration of the rights of man in the Preamble to the Constitution.
English (original)
Only the great generalizations survive. The sharp words of the Declaration of Independence, lampooned then and since as 'glittering generalities,' have turned out blazing ubiquities that will burn forever and ever.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
More from Ralph Waldo Emerson
Literature is the effort of man to indemnify himself for the wrongs of his condition.
Self-reliance, the height and perfection of man, is reliance on God.
I fancy I need more than another to speak (rather than write), with such a formidable tendency to the lapidary style. I build my house of boulders.
He who is in love is wise and is becoming wiser, sees newly every time he looks at the object beloved, drawing from it with his eyes and his mind those virtues which it possesses.
Yet a man may love a paradox, without losing either his wit or his honesty.
Slowly, slowly the Avenger comes, but comes surely.