Quotes About Individuality

Me celebro y me canto a mí mismo. Y lo que yo diga ahora de mí, lo digo de ti, porque lo que yo tengo lo tienes tú y cada átomo de mi cuerpo es tuyo también.

The greatest poet does not moralize or make applications of morals... he knows the soul. The soul has that measureless pride which consists in never acknowledging any lessons but its own.

One's-Self I Sing One's-self I sing, a simple separate person, Yet utter the word Democratic, the word En-Masse. Of physiology from top to toe I sing, Not physiognomy alone nor brain alone is worthy for the Muse, I say the Form complete is worthier far, The Female equally with the Male I sing. Of Life immense in passion, pulse, and power, Cheerful, for freest action form'd under the laws divine, The Modern Man I sing.

He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher. -from Song of Myself

Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man hearty and clean, Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be less familiar than the rest.

What is commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest, is Me, Me going in for my chances, spending for vast returns, Adorning myself to bestow myself on the first that will take me, Not asking the sky to come down to my good will, Scattering it freely forever.

You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me, You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

I exist as I am. That is enough

What is a man anyhow? what am I? what are you?

I exist as I am, that is enough, If no other in the world be aware I sit content, And if each and all be aware I sit content.

In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barley-corn less, And the good or bad I say of myself I say of them.

Come I am determin'd to unbare this broad breast of mine, I have long enough stifled and choked; Emblematic and capricious blades I leave you, now you serve me not, I will say what I have to say by itself, I will sound myself and comrades only, I will never again utter a call only their call, I will raise with it immortal reverberations through the States, I will give an example to lovers to take permanent shape and will through the States

The boy I love, the same becomes a man not through derived power but in his own right, Wicked, rather than virtuous out of conformity or fear, Fond of his sweetheart, relishing well his steak, Unrequited love or a slight cutting him worse than a wound cuts, First rate to ride, to fight, to hit the bull's eye, to sail a skiff, to sing a song or play on the banjo, Preferring scars and faces pitted with smallpox over all latherers and those that keep out the sun.

Among the men and women, the multitude, I perceive one picking me out by secret and divine signs, Acknowledging none else—not parent, wife, husband, brother, child, any nearer than I am; Some are baffled—But that one is not—that one knows me. Ah, lover and perfect equal! I meant that you should discover me so, by my faint indirections; And I, when I meet you, mean to discover you by the like in you.

I dote on myself...there is that lot of me, and all so luscious. Each moment and whatever happens thrills me with joy.

I will leave all and come and make the hymns of you, None has understood you, but I understand you, None has done justice to you, you have not done justice to yourself, None but has found you imperfect, I only find no imperfection in you, None but would subordinate you, I only am he who will never consent to subordinate you, I only am he who places over you no master, owner, better, God, beyond what waits intrinsically in yourself.

not I, not anyone else can travel that road for you, you must travel for yourself.

Every existence has its idiom, every thing and idiom and tongue.

I find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.

I resist any thing better than my own diversity, Breathe the air but leave plenty after me, And am not stuck up, and am in my place.

All I mark as my own you shall offset it with your own, Else it were time lost listening to me.

Clear and sweet is my soul . . . . and clear and sweet is all that is not my soul. Lack

while they discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself. Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man hearty and clean, Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be less familiar than the rest.

I know perfectly well my own egotism, And know my omnivorous words, and cannot say any less, And would fetch you whoever you are flush with myself.