Henry Stanley Haskins Was Not A Bodybuilder

I saw these two quotes appear nearly side by side today from two different sources unbeknownst to each other.

"What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."

"You are born weak and die weak, what you are in between those two periods of time is up to you."

The first quote was attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson and came from a composer/musician. It’s also often attributed to Henry David Thoreau, Oliver Wendell Holmes, William Morrow, and Albert Jay Nock. It appears though that it most likely belonged to a somewhat questionable securities trader name Henry S. Haskins.The quote first appears in the book “Meditations in Wall Street” which was initially a work of an unnamed writer, published by William Morrow with introduction by Nock, hence their early credits. The Library of Congress now attributes Henry Stanley Haskins as the author.

The second quote, unattributed, was posted by a youthful cousin of mine who is into bodybuilding. As far as I can tell the second quote lives a happy, unaltered and average life as a motivational blurb reposted across weightlifting forums, fitness blogs, and social media platforms.

Now, I don’t think I’m going too far afield by guessing that our Transcendentalist version and our "little mouse" version share some moral and muscular fiber. Though I gave a little effort in tracking the connection I lost interest in where, when or by whom the phrase was transmuted. I mostly enjoy the image of Emerson, Thoreau and Holmes, hanging out in their den and chewing the fat about their Harvard days, doing continental lifts and Saxon side bends while Henry Haskins, from the future, stands by scolding them into doing one more rep, shouting “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us, you maggots!!!” And then from the musty couch barely visible in the shadowy corner Hemingway lights a cigar, scrapes a clod of dried dirt off his boot with the edge of the Chippendale coffee table and without looking up mutters “Weak."

Noah Keesecker

Noah Keesecker is a composer and multimedia artist who creates works that are equally at home in the concert hall as they are in the dance club. He is made of video, installations, literature, science, interactive performance art, animation, ping pong, sawdust, synthesizers, and bicycle grease. He is driven by an insatiable curiosity, a mercurial imagination, and an enterprising spirit, all aimed at the goal of forging sound and sight with physical, tactile, interactive and object-oriented approaches to music. Among his grants and awards are a 2008 McKnight Composer Fellowship, Jerome Composer Commissioning Grant and a Jerome Club 416 commission from the Cedar Cultural Center.

Outside of the studio, Noah is Director of Artist Development at Springboard for the Arts, where he takes a strategic, energetic, and very human approach to building Springboard’s professional practices curriculum for creatives of all stripes. He serves on the board of directors for Minnesota Citizens for the Arts, one of the premier arts advocacy organizations in the country, and on the advisory committee for Slam Academy, a digital arts music lab in downtown Minneapolis.

Noah lives in Minneapolis with a cat, a dog, and a librarian, and is currently building his first boat, albeit a small one.