"[I]f there is no cause and effect, there is no power, no first cause, no God...the central work of whose (R.W. Emerson's) life was to be uncovering and making available those sources of power that exist in people and in the world."
p. 45

'With the sad hopelessness of age twenty, he [Emerson] complained that "the dreams of my childhood are all fading away and giving place to some very sober and very disgusting views of a quiet mediocrity of talents and condition."'
p. 46

'"[W]e put up with time and chance because it costs too great an effort to subdue them to our wills..."'
p. 51

"No matter what else existed, Emerson knew he existed."
p. 51

'"Religion is nothing if it is not everything, if existence is not filled with it, if we do not incessantly maintain in the soul this belief...