become hackneyed because they are useful, in the first instance; but they derive a new efficiency from the very fact that they are hackneyed. Their precise form grows to be an essential part of the idea they convey, and all that a writer effects by turning such a phrase backwards, or otherwise tampering with it, is to give us our triteness at secondhand; we are put to the trouble of translating 'tear and wear', only to arrive at our old friend 'wear and tear', hackneyed as ever.
- How beautiful is noble-sentiment; like gossamer-gauze beautiful and cheap, which will stand no tear and wear—CARLYLE.
- Bloated promises, which end in nothing or little.— EMERSON.
- The universities also are parcel of the ecclesiastical system.—EMERSON.
- Fox, Burke, Pitt, Erskine, Wilberforce, Sheridan, Romilly, or whatever national man, were by this means sent to Parliament.—EMERSON.
- And the stronger these are, the individual is so much weaker. —EMERSON.
- The faster the ball falls to the sun, the force to fly off is by so much augmented—EMERSON.
- The friction in nature is so enormous that we cannot spare any power. It is not question to express our thought, to elect our way, but to overcome resistances.—EMERSON.