Henry David Thoreau Quotes
As in geology, so in social institutions, we may discover the causes of all past changes in the present invariable order of society.
He is the best sailor who can steer within fewest points of the wind and exact a motive power out of the greatest obstacles.
A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone.
Age is no better, hardly so well, qualified for an instructor as youth, for it has not profited so much as it has lost.
Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life of equal simplicity, and I may say innocence, with Nature herself.
If we would aim at perfection in any thing, simplicity must not be overlooked.
The fate of the country... does not depend on what kind of paper you drop into the ballot-box once a year, but on what kind of man you drop from your chamber into the street every morning.
It is better to have your head in the clouds, and know where you are... than to breathe the clearer atmosphere below them, and think that you are in paradise.
To know that we know what we know and that we do not know what we do not know that is true knowledge.
All men want, not something to do with, but something to do, or rather something to be.
Under a government which imprisons any unjustly the true place for a just man is also a prison.
If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.
True friendship can afford true knowledge. It does not depend on darkness and ignorance.
How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.
The youth gets together this material to build a bridge to the moon or perchance a palace or temple on earth and at length the middle-aged man concludes to build a woodshed with them.
If a man does not keep pace with his companions perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears however measured or far away.
that he live in all respects so compactly and preparedly that, if an enemy take the town, he can, like the old philosopher, walk out the gate empty-handed without anxiety.
What is human warfare but just this an effort to make the laws of God and nature take sides with one party.
There is danger that we lose sight of what our friend is absolutely, while considering what she is to us alone.
We now no longer camp as for a night, but have settled down on earth and forgotten heaven
The silence rings—it is musical & thrills me. A night in which the silence was audible—I hear the unspeakable.
The man I meet with is not often so instructive as the silence he breaks.
It is remarkable how closely the history of the apple tree is connected with that of man.
Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resigns his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward.
No doubt you can get more in your market for a quart of milk than for a quart of blood, but that is not the market that heroes carry their blood to.
The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.
What recommends commerce to me is its enterprise and bravery. It does not clasp its hands and pray to Jupiter.
What is most of our boasted so-called knowledge but a conceit that we know something, which robs us of the advantage of our actual ignorance?
Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other's eyes for an instant?
A man thinking or working will always be alone, let him be where he will.
Write while the heat is in you. The writer who postpones the recording of his thoughts uses an iron which has cooled to burn a hole with. He cannot inflame the minds of his audience.
Misfortunes occur only when a man is false.... Events circumstances etc. have their origin in ourselves. They spring from seeds which we have sown.
A government which deliberately enacts injustice, and persists in it, will at length ever become the laughing-stock of the world.
It is remarkable how long men will believe in the bottomlessness of a pond without taking the trouble to sound it.
Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind.
