Henry David Thoreau Quotes
A true account of the actual is the rarest poetry, for common sense always takes a hasty and superficial view.
The poet uses the results of science and philosophy, and generalizes their widest deductions.
The poet will maintain serenity in spite of all disappointments. He is expected to preserve an unconcerned and healthy outlook over the world, while he lives.
If it is necessary, omit one bridge over the river, go round a little there, and throw one arch at least over the darker gulf of ignorance which surrounds us.
We never exchange more than three words with a Friend in our lives on that level to which our thoughts and feelings almost habitually rise.
It is impossible to say all that we think, even to our truest Friend. We may bid him farewell forever sooner than complain, for our complaint is too well grounded to be uttered.
Nothing but great antiquity can make graveyards interesting to me. I have no friends there.
There are various, nay, incredible faiths; why should we be alarmed at any of them? What man believes, God believes.
God is alone,-but the devil, he is far from being alone; he sees a great deal of company; he is legion.
I trust that some may be as near and dear to Buddha, or Christ, or Swedenborg, who are without the pale of their churches.
Men have come to such a pass that they frequently starve, not for want of necessaries, but for want of luxuries.
The ancient philosophers, Chinese, Hindu, Persian, and Greek, were a class than which none has been poorer in outward riches, none so rich inward.
I cannot easily buy a blank-book to write thoughts in; they are commonly ruled for dollars and cents.
I think that the farmer displaces the Indian even because he redeems the meadow, and so makes himself stronger and in some respects more natural.
This life we live is a strange dream, and I don't believe at all any account men give of it.
Drive a nail home and clinch it so faithfully that you can wake up in the night and think of your work with satisfaction - a work at which you would not be ashamed to invoke the muse.
Summer passes into autumn in some unimaginable point of time, like the turning of a leaf.
While my friend was my friend, he flattered me, and I never heard the truth from him. When he became my enemy, he shot it to me on a poisoned arrow.
Especially the transcendental philosophy needs the leaven of humor to render it light and digestible.
I now first began to inhabit my house, I may say, when I began to use it for warmth as well as shelter.
If we respected only what is inevitable and has a right to be, music and poetry would resound along the streets.
Follow your genius closely enough, and it will not fail to show you a fresh prospect every hour.
I could not help being struck with the foolishness of that institution which treated me as if I were mere flesh and blood and bones, to be locked up.
At a certain season of our life we are accustomed to consider every spot as the possible site of a house.
As polishing expresses the vein in marble, and grain in wood, so music brings out what of heroic lurks anywhere. The hero is the sole patron of music.
Who that has heard a strain of music feared then lest he should speak extravagantly any more forever?
On every hand we observe a truly wise practice, in education, in morals, and in the arts of life, the embodied wisdom of many an ancient philosopher.
Ex oriente lux may still be the motto of scholars, for the Western world has not yet derived from the East all the light which itis destined to receive thence.
Men do not fail commonly for want of knowledge, but for want of prudence to give wisdom the preference.
One may almost doubt if the wisest man has learned anything of absolute value by living.
The constant abrasion and decay of our lives makes the soil of our future growth.
My actual life is a fact, in view of which I have no occasion to congratulate myself; but for my faith and aspiration I have respect. It is from these that I speak.
We must love our friend so much that she shall be associated with our purest and holiest thoughts alone.
Men commonly couple with their idea of marriage a slight degree at least of sensuality; but every lover, the world over, believesin its inconceivable purity.
I perceive that we inhabitants of New England live this mean life that we do because our vision does not penetrate the surface ofthings. We think that that is which appears to be.