I like the quote I found on wordsmith: “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world.” “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson I am wondering what Emerson meant with the word "suffrage". Today it means the right to vote, but that, then, doesn't make much sense in this sentence. Anyone?

Suffrage used to mean 'prayer(s)', especially 'intercessory prayer(s)', as in "the suffrage of the Saints". Could be that.

So the suffragettes never suffered then, it meant they were praying for some rights? Jee, what an eye opener. I always thougth it referred to suffering.

They probably suffered from the lack of ability to vote.
Just a guess, however, on my part.

I too liked the Emerson quote; it sounds like Ayn Rand.

During Emerson's time "suffrage" also meant "approval" or "being on the side of".
At least that was another use of the word in the 19th Century.

Thanks all. To jenny jenny, Your definition seems to make the most sense in Emerson's quote. But how do you find older uses of words? By their use in older texts? Old dictionaries? Curious. nicole

But how do you find older uses of words?

By using an unabridged dictionary like the OED (Oxford English Dictionary).

..and sometimes Google[Books] will turn up old usages that OED missed!

Well--I figured Onelook might have a listing for this in Webster's 1828, and it did, but now *I have a question re: what it gives:
suffrage
SUF'FRAGE, n.[L. suffragium.]


1. A vote; a voice given in deciding a controverted question, or in the choice of a man for an office or trust. Nothing can be more grateful to a good man than to be elevated to office by the unbiased suffrages of free enlightened citizens.

Lactantius and St. Austin confirm by their suffrages the observation made by heathen writers.

2. United voice of persons in public prayer.

3. Aid; assistance; A Latinism. [Not in use.]
suffrage

Nothing can be more grateful to a good man than to be elevated to office What does this mean?

Oh--oops; welcome, Nicole!