There are books. . . which take rank in your life with parents and lovers and passionate experiences, so medicinal, so stringent, so revolutionary, so authoritative.
Source: Society and Solitude, Books, 1870.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson, (May 25 1803-1882), US philosopher, poet, essayist; He was the main spokesman of his time for moral optimism and belief in the individual: Self-Reliance, 1844.