Top 25 Quotes by Henry David Thoreau of 2776 - Page 46

My life is like a stroll upon the beach.

My life is like a stroll upon the beach.

Life, Beach, Life Is Like

Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Quotable Thoreau: An A to Z Glossary of Inspiring Quotations from Henry David Thoreau”, p.59, BookBaby

I am grateful for what I have. My thanksgiving is perpetual.

Henry David Thoreau

Gratitude, Grateful, I Am Grateful

Not by constraint or severity shall you have access to true wisdom, but by abandonment, and childlike mirth-fulness. If you would know aught, be gay before it.

Henry David Thoreau

Wisdom, Gay, Mirth

Henry David Thoreau, Odell Shepard (1961). “The Heart of Thoreau's Journals”, p.15, Courier Corporation

A hero's love is as delicate as a maiden's.

Henry David Thoreau

Hero, Love Is, Maidens

Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.113, Penguin

The inhabitants of the Cape generally do not complain of their "soil," but will tell you that it is good enough for them to dry their fish on.

Henry David Thoreau

Fishing, Capes, Complaining

Henry David Thoreau (1866). “Cape Cod”, p.206

We slander the hyena; man is the fiercest and cruelest animal.

Henry David Thoreau

Animal, Men, Humanity

Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.221, Simon and Schuster

In 1694 a law was passed "that every settler who deserted a town for fear of the Indians should forfeit all his rights therein." But now, at any rate, as I have frequently observed, a man may desert the fertile frontier territories of truth and justice, which are the State's best lands, for fear of far more insignificant foes, without forfeiting any of his civil rights therein. Nay, townships are granted to deserters, and the General Court, as I am sometimes inclined to regard it, is but a deserters' camp itself.

Henry David Thoreau

Men, Rights, Law

Henry David Thoreau (2014). “A Week On The Concord And Merrimack Rivers (Annotated Edition)”, p.92, Jazzybee Verlag

What is called common sense is excellent in its department, and as invaluable as the virtue of conformity in the army and navy,--for there must be subordination,--but uncommon sense, that sense which is common only to the wisest, is as much more excellent as it is more rare.

Henry David Thoreau

Army, Common Sense, Navy

Henry David Thoreau, Jeffrey S. Cramer (2007). “I to Myself: An Annotated Selection from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau”, p.13, Yale University Press

If common sense had been consulted, how many marriages would never have taken place; if uncommon or divine sense, how few marriages such as we witness would ever have taken place!

Henry David Thoreau

Marriage, Taken, Common Sense

Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.158, Jazzybee Verlag

Every sentence is the result of a long probation.

Henry David Thoreau

Long, Style, Results

Henry David Thoreau (1873). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.111

Carlyle must undoubtedly plead guilty to the charge of mannerism. He not only has his vein, but his peculiar manner of working it.He has a style which can be imitated, and sometimes is an imitator of himself.

Henry David Thoreau

Style, Veins, Peculiar

Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.276, Simon and Schuster

The higher the mountain on which you stand, the less change in the prospect from year to year, from age to age. Above a certain height there is no change.

Henry David Thoreau

Years, Perspective, Mountain

Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.167, Jazzybee Verlag

The natural historian is not a fisherman who prays for cloudy days and good luck merely; but as fishing has been styled "a contemplative man's recreation," introducing him profitably to woods and water, so the fruit of the naturalist's observations is not in new genera or species, but in new contemplations still, and science is only a more contemplative man's recreation.

Henry David Thoreau

Good Luck, Men, Fishing

Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.459, Simon and Schuster

The sea-shore is a sort of neutral ground, a most advantageous point from which to contemplate the world....There is naked Nature, inhumanly sincere, wasting no thought on man, nibbling at the cliffy shore where gulls wheel amid the spray.

Henry David Thoreau

Men, Sea, Water

Who ever saw his old clothes, - his old coat, actually worn out, resolved into its primitive elements, so that it was not a deed of charity to bestow it on some poor boy, by him perchance to be bestowed on some poorer still, or shall we say richer, who could do with less? I say, beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes.

Henry David Thoreau

Boys, Clothes, Environmental

Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.24, Graphic Arts Books

I think it will be found that he who speaks with most authority on a given subject is not ignorant of what has been said by his predecessors. He will take his place in a regular order, and substantially add his own knowledge to the knowledge of previous generations.

Henry David Thoreau

Thinking, Order, Ignorant

Henry David Thoreau (2006). “Thoreau and the Art of Life: Precepts and Principles”, p.77, Heron Dance Press

Be wary of technology; it is often merely an improved means to an unimproved end.

Henry David Thoreau

Mean, Technology, Ends

Some things are really necessaries of life in some circles, which in others are luxuries merely and in others still are entirely unknown.

Henry David Thoreau

Circles, Luxury, Stills

Henry David Thoreau (2004). “Walden and Other Writings”, p.118, Bantam Classics

Why should not a poet's cat be winged as well as his horse?

Henry David Thoreau

Horse, Cat, Poet

Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.141, Graphic Arts Books

We have heard of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. It is said that knowledge is power, and the like. Methinks there is equal need of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful Ignorance, what we will call Beautiful Knowledge, a knowledge useful in a higher sense: for 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? What we call knowledge is often our positive ignorance; ignorance our negative knowledge.

Henry David Thoreau

Beautiful, Ignorance, Negative

Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Walden and Other Writings: (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.669, Modern Library