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Henry David Thoreau Quotes - Page 40

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Government never furthered any enterprise but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way.

Government never furthered any enterprise but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way.

Henry David Thoreau
Government, Liberty, Libertarian
Henry David Thoreau (1942). “Civil Disobedience”, p.3, Hayes Barton Press

We do not learn much from learned books, but from true, sincere, human books, from frank and honest biographies.

Henry David Thoreau
Book, Knowledge, Biographies
Henry David Thoreau (1999). “Uncommon Learning: Thoreau on Education”, p.52, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I had a classmate who fitted for college by the lamps of a lighthouse, which was more light, we think, than the University afforded.

Henry David Thoreau
Education, College, Thinking
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Cape Cod (Annotated Edition)”, p.137, Jazzybee Verlag

I have met with but one or two persons in the course of my life who have understood the art of Walking, that is, of taking walks,-who had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering.

Henry David Thoreau
Art, Two, Genius
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walking: Top Essays”, p.1, 谷月社

We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us, like the grass which confesses the influence of the slightest dew that falls on it; and did not spend our time in atoning for the neglect of past opportunities, which we call doing our duty.

Henry David Thoreau
Blessed, Fall, Past
Henry David Thoreau (1995). “Walden, Or, Life in the Woods”, p.203, Courier Corporation

Do what nobody else can do for you. Omit to do anything else.

Henry David Thoreau
Literature, Annoying, Can Do
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.363, Penguin

The better part of the man is soon ploughed into the soil for compost. By a seeming fate, commonly called necessity, they are employed, as it says in an old book, laying up treasures which moth and rust will corrupt and thieves break through and steal. It is a fool's life, as they will find when they get to the end of it, if not before.

Henry David Thoreau
Book, Fate, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2009). “Walden”, p.3, Cosimo, Inc.

I think of no news to tell you. It is a serene summer day here, all above the snow. The hens steal their nests, and I steal theireggs still, as formerly. This is what I do with the hands. Ah, labor,--it is a divine institution, and conversation with many men and hens.

Henry David Thoreau
Summer, Winter, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “Familiar Letters - The Writings of Henry David Thoreau”, p.44, Read Books Ltd

It is the greatest of all advantages to enjoy no advantage at all.

Henry David Thoreau
Literature, Advantage, Enjoy
Henry David Thoreau (2011). “The Journal of Henry David Thoreau, 1837-1861”, p.423, New York Review of Books

I am struck by the simplicity of light in the atmosphere in the autumn, as if the earth absorbed none, and out of this profusion of dazzling light came the autumnal tints.

Henry David Thoreau
Autumn, Light, Simplicity
Henry David Thoreau (1892). “Autumn: From the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau”

Don't be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so.

Henry David Thoreau
Life, Cheating, Ethics And Morals

Our whole life is startlingly moral. There is never an instant's truce between virtue and vice.

Henry David Thoreau
Life, Vices, Morality
Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Walden and Other Writings: (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.214, Modern Library

The volatile truth of our words should continually betray the inadequacy of the residual statement.

Henry David Thoreau
Truth, Betrayal, Our Words
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.190, Graphic Arts Books

Do not suffer your life to be taken by newspapers.

Henry David Thoreau
Life, Taken, Suffering
Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson (1865). “Letters to Various Persons”, p.56

I never dreamed of any enormity greater than I have committed. I never knew, and never shall know, a worse man than myself.

Henry David Thoreau
Dream, Men, Evil
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “Walden”, p.56, Xist Publishing

The hawk is aerial brother of the wave which he sails over and surveys, those his perfect air-inflated wings answering to the elemental unfledged pinions of the sea.

Henry David Thoreau
Brother, Air, Sea
Henry David Thoreau (2009). “Walden”, p.103, Cosimo, Inc.

In my walks, I would fain return to my senses. What business have I in the woods if I am thinking of something out of the woods?

Henry David Thoreau
Thinking, Return, Mindfulness
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walking: Top Essays”, p.2, 谷月社

A single gentle rain makes the grass many shades greener.

Henry David Thoreau
Rain, Shade, Walden Pond
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.324, Penguin

If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too.

Henry David Thoreau
Life, Wisdom, Men
Henry David Thoreau (1942). “Civil Disobedience”, p.7, Hayes Barton Press

There is danger that we lose sight of what our friend is absolutely, while considering what she is to us alone.

Henry David Thoreau
Friends, Sight, Sky
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1139, Delphi Classics

So easy is it, though many housekeepers doubt it, to establish new and better customs in the place of the old.

Henry David Thoreau
Change, Doubt, Tradition
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walden and Civil Disobedience”, p.103, Xist Publishing

Politics is the gizzard of society, full of grit and gravel, and the two political parties are its opposite halves - sometimes split into quarters - which grind on each other. Not only individuals but states have thus a confirmed dyspepsia.

Henry David Thoreau
Party, Opposites, Two
Henry David Thoreau, Nancy L. Rosenblum (1996). “Thoreau: Political Writings”, p.120, Cambridge University Press

The artist and his work are not to be separated. The most willfully foolish man cannot stand aloof from his folly, but the deed and the doer together make ever one sober fact.

Henry David Thoreau
Art, Men, Foolish Man
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.236, Delphi Classics

What is the use of going right over the old track again? There is an adder in the path which your own feet have worn. You must make tracks into the Unknown.

Henry David Thoreau
Travel, Feet, Track
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1872, Delphi Classics

Who cares what a man's style is, so it is intelligible,--as intelligible as his thought. Literally and really, the style is no more than the stylus, the pen he writes with; and it is not worth scraping and polishing, and gilding, unless it will write his thoughts the better for it. It is something for use, and not to look at. The question for us is, not whether Pope had a fine style, wrote with a peacock's feather, but whether he uttered useful thoughts.

Henry David Thoreau
Writing, Men, Style
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.272, Simon and Schuster

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