Ralph Waldo Emerson Quote

I read your piece on Plato. Holmes, when you strike at a king, you must kill him.


Said to a young Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who had written a piece critical of Plato in response to his earlier conversation with Emerson, as reported by Felix Frankfurter in Harlan Buddington Phillips, Felix Frankfurter Reminisces (1960), p. 59.


I read your piece on Plato. Holmes, when you strike at a king, you must kill him.

I read your piece on Plato. Holmes, when you strike at a king, you must kill him.

I read your piece on Plato. Holmes, when you strike at a king, you must kill him.

I read your piece on Plato. Holmes, when you strike at a king, you must kill him.