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Julie and I went to see the movie, "Saving Private Ryan," last Sunday. I've always liked Tom Hanks, and all of the reviews I'd read spoke highly of the realism of this Steven Spielberg film. But I took with me more than just a better understanding of war.

"Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year. No man has learned anything rightly, until he know that every day is Doomsday."

I'd have to go see the movie again to be sure of the quote. I made no effort to remember it, as I didn't realize at the time that it would unlock another literary door. All I know for sure is that someone quoted Emerson. I think it was the Captain, played by Tom Hanks, but I'm no more sure about that than I am that he was talking to Upham, the clerk typist they brought along as an interpreter (played by Jeremy Davies). None of those details really matter, though, because what transcends, for me, the movie itself is my subsequent discovery of the writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

I've devoted a considerable amount of time this week studying Emerson's work. I can't say that I totally understand it -- much of it goes right over my head -- and what I do understand I can't readily explain. But I can say that I like it.

"Who looks upon a river in a meditative hour, and is not reminded of the flux of all things? Throw a stone into the stream, and the circles that propagate themselves are the beautiful type of all influence. Man is conscious of a universal soul within or behind his individual life, wherein, as in a firmament, the natures of Justice, Truth, Love, Freedom, arise and shine. This universal soul, he calls Reason: it is not mine, or thine, or his, but we are its; we are its property and men. And the blue sky in which the private earth is buried, the sky with its eternal calm, and full of everlasting orbs, is the type of Reason. That which, intellectually considered, we call Reason, considered in relation to nature, we call Spirit. Spirit is the Creator. Spirit hath life in itself. And man in all ages and countries, embodies it in his language, as the FATHER." -- 1836: "quintessential Emerson"

Around 15 years ago, when I was working as a dispatcher for Special Escort taxi service, a driver named Charlie introduced me to Alan Watts. I instantly understood every word Charlie read as though they were my own, and Emerson explains this concept beautifully:

"A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility then most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else, to-morrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another." -- 1841: "Essays, First Series"

Easy for him to say. Emerson has many quotes attributed to him. Some, I've heard before but didn't know it was him: "Always do what you are afraid to do," "The only reward of virtue is virtue," "The reward of a thing well done is to have done it." I think my favorite, though, and most relevant to this column is: "The next thing to saying a good thing yourself, is to quote one."

I don't know if I want to sit through the almost 3 hour movie again, but I sure would like to know what that Emerson quote is -- perhaps I can get a copy of the book in braille . . . I'll let you know. In the meantime, though, if you happen to catch that line, please pass it on.