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Henry David Thoreau Quotes - Page 101

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The traveler must be born again on the road, and earn a passport from the elements.

The traveler must be born again on the road, and earn a passport from the elements.

Henry David Thoreau
Elements, Born Again, Traveler
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.232, Delphi Classics

Who hears the fishes when they cry?

Henry David Thoreau
Lakes, Sea, Fishing
Henry David Thoreau (1873). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.44

Such a man has some right to fish, and I love to see nature carried out in him.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Lakes, Sea
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.309, Penguin

We waded so gently and reverently, or we pulled together so smoothly, that the fishes of thought were not scared from the stream, nor feared any angler on the bank, but came and went grandly, like the clouds which came and went on the western sky, and the mother-o'-pearl flocks which sometimes form and dissolve there.

Henry David Thoreau
Mother, Sea, Fishing
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walden (Diversion Classics)”, p.258, Diversion Books

I confess I was surprised to find that so many men spent their whole day, ay, their whole lives almost, a-fishing. It is remarkable what a serious business men make of getting their dinners, and how universally shiftlessness and a groveling taste take refuge in a merely ant-like industry. Better go without your dinner, I thought, than be thus everlastingly fishing for it like a cormorant. Of course, viewed from the shore, our pursuits in the country appear not a whit less frivolous.

Henry David Thoreau
Country, Men, Lakes
Henry David Thoreau (2008). “Cape Cod: Illustrated Edition of the American Classic”, p.165, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

You must walk sometimes perfectly free, not prying or inquisitive, not bent on seeing things. Throw away a whole day for a single expansion, a single inspiration of air. You must walk so gently as to hear the finest sounds, the faculties being in repose. Nature will bear the closest inspection. She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain.

Henry David Thoreau
Inspiration, Eye, Air

Compliments and flattery oftenest excite my contempt by the pretension they imply; for who is he that assumes to flatter me? To compliment often implies an assumption of superiority in the complimenter. It is, in fact, a subtle detraction.

Henry David Thoreau
Facts, Assuming, Assumption
Henry David Thoreau (1929). “Early spring in Massachusetts and Summer”

I have travelled a good deal in Concord.

Henry David Thoreau
Deals
'Walden' (1854) 'Economy'

I do not know at first what it is that harms me. The men and things of to-day are wont to be fairer and truer in to-morrow's memory.

Henry David Thoreau
Appreciation, Memories, Men

Did you ever hear of a man who had striven all his life faithfully and singly towards an object, and in no measure obtained it? If a man constantly aspires, is he not elevated? Did ever a man try heroism, magnanimity, truth, sincerity, and find that there was no advantage in them,--that it was a vain endeavor?

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Trying, Heroism
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.357, Penguin

While some men believe in the infinite, some ponds will be thought to be bottomless.

Henry David Thoreau
Believe, Men, Ponds
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.487, Delphi Classics

The church is a sort of hospital for men's souls, and as full of quackery as the hospital for their bodies. Those who are taken into it live like pensioners in their Retreat or Sailors' Snug Harbor, where you may see a row of religious cripples sitting outside in sunny weather.

Henry David Thoreau
Religious, Taken, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.97, Penguin

Decay and disease are often beautiful, like the pearly tear of the shellfish and the hectic glow of consumption.

Henry David Thoreau
Beautiful, Tears, Disease
Journal 11 June (1852)

A man's whole life is taxed for the least thing well done. It is its net result.

Henry David Thoreau
Life, Men, Effort
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.89, Delphi Classics

The very thrills of genius are disorganizing. The body is never quite acclimated to its atmosphere, but how often, succumbs and goes into a decline.

Henry David Thoreau
Atmosphere, Genius, Body
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.2006, Delphi Classics

Let a man take time enough for the most trivial deed, though it be but the paring of his nails. The buds swell imperceptibly, without hurry or confusion,--as if the short spring days were an eternity.

Henry David Thoreau
Spring, Men, Confusion
Henry David Thoreau, Jeffrey S. Cramer (2007). “I to Myself: An Annotated Selection from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau”, p.12, Yale University Press

In ancient days the Pythagoreans were used to change names with each other,--fancying that each would share the virtues they admired in the other.

Henry David Thoreau
Names, Ancient, Virtue

The earth I tread on is not a dead inert mass. It is a body, has a spirit; is organic and fluid to the influence of its spirit and to whatever particle of the spirit is in me.

Henry David Thoreau
Body, Earth, Spirit
Henry David Thoreau (1993). “A Year in Thoreau's Journal: 1851”, p.313, Penguin

Real power is measured by how much you can let things be.

Henry David Thoreau
Real, Real Power

However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names. It is not so bad as you are. It looks poorest when you are richest. The fault-finder will find faults even in paradise. Love your life, poor as it is. You may perhaps have some pleasant, thrilling, glorious hours, even in a poor-house.

Henry David Thoreau
Love You, Mean, Names
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “Walden”, p.232, Xist Publishing

We fritter away our energy and creativity . . . we get bogged down in the thick of thin things.

Henry David Thoreau
Creativity, Energy, Thick

The aim of the laborer should be, not to get his living, to get "a good job," but to perform well a certain work; and, even in a pecuniary sense, it would be economy for a town to pay its laborers so well that they would not feel that they were working for low ends, as for a livelihood merely, but for scientific, or even moral ends. Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it.

Henry David Thoreau
Jobs, Men, Pay
Henry David Thoreau, Nancy L. Rosenblum (1996). “Thoreau: Political Writings”, p.106, Cambridge University Press

And so the seasons went rolling on into summer, as one rambles into higher and higher grass.

Henry David Thoreau
Summer, Rolling, Grass
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.185, Simon and Schuster

There is ripe fruit over your head.

Henry David Thoreau
Over You, Fruit, Ripe Fruit
Henry David Thoreau, Ronald A. Bosco (2005). “Nature's Panorama: Thoreau on the Seasons”, p.23, Univ of Massachusetts Press

The life without men praise and regard as successful is but one kind. Why should we exaggerate any one kind at the expense of the others?

Henry David Thoreau
Success, Men, Kind
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.22, Graphic Arts Books

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