The true test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the crops - no, but the kind of man the country turns out.
Interpretation
True civilization is measured by the character and quality of its people, not by material statistics.
Ralph Waldo Emerson emphasizes that the real measure of a civilized society lies not in its population size, wealth, or agricultural success, but rather in the moral and ethical standards of its individuals. He suggests that it is the nature of the people within a society that defines its greatness and future potential.
In practice
In a speech on community values, one might say, 'As Ralph Waldo Emerson reminds us, the true test of civilization is the character of our people.'
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?
"I love mankind," he said, "but I find to my amazement that the more I love mankind as a whole, the less I love man in particular."
The four characteristics of humanism are curiosity, a free mind, belief in good taste, and belief in the human race.
Everything is vain and tortures the spirit instead of calming and satisfying it.
Nowhere in the world has the use of force alone resolved a conflict.
It don't matter if you believe in God Nick, he believes in you.
The main purpose of engaging in conversation can no longer be personal advancement or respectability. Instead, I'd like for us to use conversations to create equality, to open ourselves to strangers, and, most practically, to remake our working world.
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