[yesenadam]

Emerson's Essays, First and Second Series.

I came across it aged about 19. He speaks about 10,000 things I'd experienced but assumed couldn't be put into words. And he's always very inspirational. I read in him daily for 10 years or so, this and his other writings, and still never go long without, although by now it's in my blood. John Jay Chapman said it well:

It is nothing for any man sitting in his chair to be overcome with the sense of the immediacy of life, to feel the spur of courage, the victory of good over evil, the value, now and forever, of all great-hearted endeavor. Such moments come to us all. But for a man to sit in his chair and write what shall call up these forces in the bosoms of others – that is desert, that is greatness. To do this was the gift of Emerson. The whole earth is enriched by every moment of converse with him. The shows and shams of life become transparent, the lost kingdoms are brought back, the shutters of the spirit are opened, and provinces and realms of our own existence lie gleaming before us.