At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with emphatic trifles.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that the world often imposes trivial distractions upon us, which can obstruct our focus and clarity.
Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote reflects the idea that in our lives, we often encounter numerous trivialities and distractions that can feel overwhelming and burdensome. It implies that these 'emphatic trifles' can conspire against our ability to engage with more significant, meaningful aspects of life, thereby urging us to maintain perspective and resist the allure of the insignificant.
In practice
During a motivational speech, to emphasize the need to prioritize what truly matters.
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?
Death is not an ending, but a symbol of movement along the path upon which we are all traveling. As it may be painful to lose contact with the physical aspect of one we love, the Spirit can never be lost. We have been and always will be a part of each other.
The wisest man would be the one richest in contradictions, who has, as it were, antennae for all types of men---as well as his great moments of grand harmony---a rare accident even in us! A sort of planetary motion---
War is the unfolding of miscalculations.
Land is a very broad as well as a complex issue, and it has to be handled very delicately because around land, there is quite a lot of emotion.
If you break your finger, that's on you, right? But if you get a chronic illness, if you get a serious illness or life-threatening illness, that's something I think we should all share the cost in because we all face the same unknowns and the same risks.
There are two infinities that confuse me: the one in my soul devours me; the one around me will crush me
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