Henry David Thoreau Quotes
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My life is like a stroll upon the beach, As near the ocean's edge as I can go.
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None can be an impartial or wise observer of human life but from the vantage ground of what we should call voluntary poverty.
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The eye may see for the hand, but not for the mind.
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I came into this world, not chiefly to make this a good place to live in, but to live in it, be it good or bad.
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Nature is full of genius, full of the divinity; so that not a snowflake escapes its fashioning hand.
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For many years I was self-appointed inspector of snowstorms and rainstorms, and did my duty faithfully, though I never received one cent for it.
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Where there is a lull of truth, an institution springs up. But the truth blows right on over it, nevertheless, and at length blows it down.
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The commonest and cheapest sounds, as the barking of a dog, produce the same effect on fresh and healthy ears that the rarest music does. It depends on your appetite for sound. Just as a crust is sweeter to a healthy appetite than confectionery to a pampered or diseased one.
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Great God, I ask thee for no meaner pelfThan that I may not disappoint myself,That in my action I may soar as highAs I can now discern with this clear eye.
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Whate'er we leave to God, God doesAnd blesses us.
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Money is not required to buy one necessity of the soul.
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Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.
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The life that I aspire to liveNo man proposeth me-No trade upon the streetWears its emblazonry.
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It is so rare to meet with a man out-doors who cherishes a worthy thought in his mind, which is independent of the labor of his hands.
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No man with a genius for legislation has appeared in America. They are rare in the history of the world. There are orators, politicians, and eloquent men, by the thousand; but the speaker has not yet opened his mouth to speak who is capable of settling the much-vexed questions of the day.
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And the cost of a thing it will be remembered as the amount of life it requires to be exchanged for it.
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Life consists with wildness. The most alive is the wildest. Not yet subdued to man, its presence refreshes him.
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Every poet has trembled on the verge of science.
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Dreams are the touchstones of our characters.
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This world is but canvas to our imaginations.
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In our science and philosophy, even, there is commonly no true and absolute account of things. The spirit of sect and bigotry has planted its hoof amid the stars. You have only to discuss the problem, whether the stars are inhabited or not, in order to discover it.
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It was his peculiar doctrine that a man has a perfect right to interfere by force with the slaveholder, in order to rescue the slave. I agree with him. They who are continually shocked by slavery have some right to be shocked by the violent death of the slaveholder, but no others.
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Those services which the community will most readily pay for it is most disagreeable to render. You are paid for being something less than a man.
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Gradually the village murmur subsided, and we seemed to be embarked on the placid current of our dreams, floating from past to future as silently as one awakes to fresh morning or evening thoughts.