The influence of the senses have in men overpowered the thought to the degree that the walls of time and space have come to look solid, real and insurmountable. .. Yet time and space are but inverse measures of the power of the mind. Man is capable of abolishing them both.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes that our perception limits our understanding of time and space, which can be transcended by the power of the mind.
Ralph Waldo Emerson asserts that human senses can dominate thought so intensely that we come to regard time and space as concrete barriers. However, he suggests that these notions are merely reflections of our mental capabilities, implying that the mind has the potential to transcend these limitations. This invites us to reconsider our relationship with reality and the bounds we perceive in our existence.
In practice
In a discussion about the limitations of human understanding in a philosophy class.
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?
If you begin by saying, 'Thou shalt not lie,' there is no longer any possibility of political action.
The western mindset erroneously equates a political system of multi-party democracy with high-quality institutions... the two are not synonymous.
There is nothing more natural than to consider everything as starting from oneself, chosen as the center of the world; one finds oneself thus capable of condemning the world without even wanting to hear its deceitful chatter.
Culture is the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group from another.
The rich get richer and the poor get - children.
We have long become overgrown with calluses; we no longer hear people being killed. ("X")
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