We Are Afraid Of Truth, Afraid Of Fortune, Afraid Of Death, And Afraid Of Each Other.

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We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid
of each other. Our age yields no great and perfect persons. We want men
and women who shall renovate life and our social state but we see that
most natures are insolvent, cannot satisfy their own wants, have an
ambition out of all proportion to their practical force, and so do lean
and beg day and night continually. Our housekeeping is mendicant, our
arts, our occupations, our marriages, our religion we have not chosen
but society has chosen for us. We are parlor soldiers. The rugged battle
of fate, where strength is born, we shun.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays

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