Emmerson Quotes & Sayings

The Shah "had traveled to Europe and had been fascinated by the march of progress he observed there. But, once back in Terhan, this fascination had not been translated into sustained Persian modernization, but rather dissipated in the Shah's intense but short-lived passion for the latest novelties. "He is continually taking up and pushing some new scheme or invention which, when the caprice has been gratified, is neglected or allowed to expire". — Charles Emmerson

Apparently, a week Japan was laughable; but a strong Japan was immediately transformed into the prime example of a "Yellow Peril". Might Japan forever be stuck in a kind of no man's land between East and West, not allowed to assimilate into the international order of the Western nations as an equal, forever grouped with the countries of the East among which she felt herself superior, and respected fully by neither group? — Charles Emmerson

That popular fable of the sot who was picked up dead drunk in the street, carried to the duke's house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke's bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like the duke, and assured that he had been insane, owes its popularity to the fact, that it symbolizes so well the state of man, who is in the world a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason, and finds himself a true prince. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

But life. It rushes by and then you think you'll see people... You think you'll do things and have time for this and time for that... And there is never time. This is what I have learned, Anna, I have learned that there is never as much time as you think there is. -
(Ottmar) — Miranda Emmerson

The key 'subtle influences' were enumerated as: the rise of the city over the countryside, the loss of Britons' maritime skills, the growth of refinement and luxury, the absence of literary taste, the decline of the physical form of Britons, the decay of the country's religious life, excessive taxation, false systems of education and, finally, the inability of the British to defend their empire. — Charles Emmerson

The secret of fortune is joy in our hands. Welcome evermore to gods and men is the self-helping man. For him all doors are flung wide. Him all tongues greet, all honors crown, all eyes follow with desire. Our love goes out to him and embraces him because he did not need it. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

A temporary coalition of anger against the old regime was no basis for a stable government. — Charles Emmerson

Among Europe's Great Powers only Austria-Hungary remained without a colonial empire. — Charles Emmerson

The overall result was drift punctuated by protest. — Charles Emmerson

How do you explain to a child who likes everyone in the world that adult life consists to a great extent of cutting people away? — Miranda Emmerson

Circumstances could change quickly at the outer edges of the world, bound as they were to the global economy, yet distant from its heart. — Charles Emmerson

I feel as if I'm disappearing. I wake, I work, I eat, I sleep. No family, no great career. I could disappear tomorrow, like Iolanthe — Miranda Emmerson

Constantinople had been changing for sometime before the Young Turks got hold of it. It would continue to change long after they had gone. — Charles Emmerson

A chief event of life is the day in which we have encountered a mind that startled us. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

I feel like I could disappear because I'm not real to other people. — Miranda Emmerson

value of monarchy as a conciliatory, if waning, force in European politics. — Charles Emmerson

a world fair celebrated the progress of the nations of the world. It did not investigate its underpinnings. — Charles Emmerson

External powers, rather than providing a helping hand, preferred to wield the carving knife. — Charles Emmerson

My uncle read me Omar Khayyam. In Arabic. Not Turkish or even English. I tried so hard to understand it. I would ask him what it all meant but he always said the pleasure was in the finding out... the discovery. He said you can keep some poems by you your whole life and they will only reveal parts of themselves to you when you are ready to hear them. (Ottmar) — Miranda Emmerson

She honestly could not tell if she loved London or loathed it. For she could not decide for herself what London was at all. — Miranda Emmerson

Seek the Babe with Brother One
Honour the Brother with his Blade of Souls
Worship the Mother with her Shield of Stars
Remember the Knight with Demons Dead
Respect them all - for all are One — Peter M. Emmerson

Prayer that craves a particular commodity - anything less than all good, is vicious. Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view. It is the soliloquy of a beholding and jubilant soul. It is the spirit of God pronouncing his works good. But prayer as a means to effect a private end is theft and meanness. It supposes dualism and not unity in nature and consciousness. As soon as the man is at one with God, he will not beg. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

The objection to conforming to usages that have become dead to you is, that it scatters your force. It loses your time and blurs the impression of your character. If you maintain a dead church, contribute to a dead Bible-society, vote with a great party either for the government or against it, spread your table like base housekeepers, under all these screens I have difficulty to detect the precise man you are.And, of course, so much force is withdrawn from your proper life. But do your work, and I shall know you. Do your work, and you shall reinforce yourself. A man must consider what a blindman's-buff is this game of conformity. If I know your sect, I anticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

His Majesty has done absolutely nothing but waste his time darling around eating sweets, contributing to the boy's adolescent chubiness, and to the sense of the country's political drift. Rather than being encouraged to govern, the Shah's courtiers preferred to encourage him in his idleness. — Charles Emmerson

As anywhere else, political instability provided an opportunity for local scores to be settled, for personal grievances to be aired, for heroes to be acclaimed and discarded, giving full reign to the fickle fortunes of war. — Charles Emmerson

She became fascinated by the statue of Edith Cavell and would stand at the base of it in the freezing cold of a December morning, looking up: -
Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness for anyone-. Sometimes those words made her cry. The tears would come uncontrollably and they would not stop. And in those moments Anna found forgiveness and it made her free. But they were only moments. Forgiveness is a hard thing to hang on to. — Miranda Emmerson

All men plume themselves on the improvement of society, and no man improves. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

It (urban peacekeeping) was quite a task, requiring a permanent balancing act between communities, each with their own interests, festivals, traditions and historical rivalries imported from the wide-open spaces of the countryside into close quarters. — Charles Emmerson

The city (of Vienna) had an unerring tradition of celebrating some of it's greatest composers after it had around them to die in poverty. — Charles Emmerson

Nationalist (forces around the world) could now more readily communicate and share their grievances, viewing themselves as similar groups, engaged in a common struggle for greater autonomy against control exerted from London or Paris. — Charles Emmerson

When private men shall act with original views, the lustre will be transferred from the actions of kings to those of gentlemen. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Newspapers provided a common culture of aspiration. — Charles Emmerson

New York presented a paradox. While foreigners thought of New York has the symbol of America, many Americans viewed the city with some suspicion as the country's most foreign. — Charles Emmerson