We fancy men are individuals; so are pumpkins; but every pumpkin in the field goes through every point of pumpkin history.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that while we may see ourselves as unique individuals, we share common experiences and histories, much like pumpkins in a field.
Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote reflects on the nature of individuality versus shared experiences. He uses the metaphor of pumpkins, implying that, despite the superficial differences among individuals, there exists a shared journey or history that connects us all. Just as every pumpkin grows through various stages in its lifecycle, people undergo similar experiences that shape their existence, highlighting the intersection of uniqueness and universality in human life.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion about the nature of identity and community.
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?
The Sunni militants that make up ISIS are not the underlying problem in Syria and Iraq, but rather they are a symptom of other deeper problems.
Now I can only pray that there may be a God -- and a heaven -- or something better.
It is the end. But of what? The end of France? No. The end of kings? Yes.
Remove Christ from the Scriptures and there is nothing left.
You are the light of the world. You are the _x000D_ consciousness that illuminates the world. Know yourself as that, and that's _x000D_ freedom, liberation, awakening, the end of suffering and madness. And it's _x000D_ happening right here.
For many people, Timbuktu has long represented the essence of remoteness: a mythical, faraway place located on the boundaries of our collective consciousness. But like many of the myths associated with colonialism, the reality is very different.
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