In what piece of work by Ralph Waldo Emerson can one find the following quote?
Nothing can work damage to me except myself; the damage that I sustain I carry about with me and never am a real sufferer except by my own fault.
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Sign up to join this communityIn Emerson's Essays: First Series (1841), he wrote this phrase but attributed it to Saint Bernard (not the dog):
The gain is apparent; the tax is certain. But there is no tax on the knowledge that the compensation exists and that it is not desirable to dig up treasure. Herein I rejoice with a serene eternal peace. I contract the boundaries of possible mischief. I learn the wisdom of St. Bernard,--"Nothing can work me damage except myself; the harm that I sustain I carry about with me, and never am a real sufferer but by my own fault."
-- Emerson (source)
I wasn't able to find out where St. Bernard said this. It's not in his collected letters, but it has been attributed to him by others as well as Emerson.