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Henry David Thoreau Quotes - Page 69

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Ice is an interesting subject for contemplation. They told me that they had some in the ice-houses at Fresh Pond five years old which was as good as ever. Why is it that a bucket of water soon becomes putrid, but frozen

Ice is an interesting subject for contemplation. They told me that they had some in the ice-houses at Fresh Pond five years old which was as good as ever. Why is it that a bucket of water soon becomes putrid, but frozen remains sweet forever? It is commonly said that this is the difference between the affections and the intellect.

Henry David Thoreau
Sweet, Years, Ice
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.315, Penguin

When I consider that the noble animals have been exterminated here - the cougar, panther, lynx, wolverine, wolf, bear, moose, deer, the beaver, the turkey, etc, etc - I cannot but feel as I lived in a tamed, and, as it were, emasculated country.

Henry David Thoreau
Funny, Country, Animal

I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name,--if ten honest men only,--ay, if one HONESTman, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done forever.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Names, Abolition Of Slavery
Henry David Thoreau (1942). “Civil Disobedience”, p.10, Hayes Barton Press

We are conscious of an animal in us, which awakens in proportion as our higher nature slumbers. It is reptile and sensual, and perhaps cannot be wholly expelled; like the worms which, even in life and health, occupy our bodies. Possibly we may withdraw from it, but never change its nature. I fear that it may enjoy a certain health of its own; that we may be well, yet not pure.

Henry David Thoreau
Health, Animal, Sensual
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “Walden”, p.157, Xist Publishing

How does it become a man to behave towards the American government today? I answer, that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Usa, Political
Henry David Thoreau (2009). “Civil Disobedience: Resistance to Civil Government”, p.8, The Floating Press

Despair and postponement are cowardice and defeat. Men were born to succeed, not to fail.

Henry David Thoreau
Procrastination, Men, Despair
Henry David Thoreau, Odell Shepard (1961). “The Heart of Thoreau's Journals”, p.109, Courier Corporation

There is such a thing as caste, even in the West; but it is comparatively faint; it is conservatism here. It says, forsake not your calling, outrage no institution, use no violence, rend no bonds; the State is thy parent. Its virtue or manhood is wholly filial.

Henry David Thoreau
Parent, India, Use
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.99, Xist Publishing

What recommends commerce to me is its enterprise and bravery. It does not clasp its hands and pray to Jupiter.

Henry David Thoreau
Hands, Bravery, Jupiter
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.77, Graphic Arts Books

The newspaper is a Bible which we read every morning and every afternoon, standing and sitting, riding and walking. It is a Biblewhich every man carries in his pocket, which lies on every table and counter, and which the mail, and thousands of missionaries, are continually dispersing. It is, in short, the only book which America has printed, and which America reads. So wide is its influence.

Henry David Thoreau
Bible, Morning, Lying

My excuse for not lecturing against the use of tobacco is, that I never chewed it; that is a penalty which reformed tobacco-chewers have to pay; though there are things enough I have chewed which I could lecture against.

Henry David Thoreau
Reform, Use, Pay
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.54, Graphic Arts Books

I long ago lost a hound, a bay horse, and a turtle-dove, and am still on their trail. Many are the travellers I have spoken concerning them, describing their tracks and what calls they answered to. I have met one or two who had heard the hound, and the tramp of the horse, and even seen the dove disappear behind a cloud, and they seemed as anxious to recover them as if they had lost them themselves.

Henry David Thoreau
Horse, Clouds, Turtles
Henry David Thoreau (1995). “Walden, Or, Life in the Woods”, p.10, Courier Corporation

Long as I have lived, and many blasphemers as I have heard and seen, I have never yet heard or witnessed any direct and consciousblasphemy or irreverence; but of indirect and habitual, enough. Where is the man who is guilty of direct and personal insolence to Him that made him?

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Long, Irreverence
Henry David Thoreau (2017). “Journeys, Adventures & Life in Harmony with Nature – 6 Book Collection (Illustrated): Including Walden, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, The Maine Woods, Cape Cod, A Yankee in Canada & Canoeing in the Wilderness - North American Highlands Series”, p.49, e-artnow

Many a forenoon have I stolen away, preferring to spend thus the most valued part of the day; for I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days, and spent them lavishly; nor do I regret that I did not waste more of them in the workshop or the teacher's desk.

Henry David Thoreau
Summer, Teacher, Regret
Henry David Thoreau (2009). “Walden”, p.125, Cosimo, Inc.

I want the flower and fruit of a man; that some fragrance be wafted over from him to me, and some ripeness flavor our intercourse.

Henry David Thoreau
Flower, Men, Flavor
Henry David Thoreau (1882). “Walden”, p.122

Any man will go considerably out of his way to pick up a silver dollar; but here are golden words, which the wisest men of antiquity have uttered, and whose worth the wise of every succeeding age have assured us of; and yet we learn to read only as far as Easy Reading, the primers and classbooks, and when we leave school, the Little Reading, and story books, which are for boys and beginners; and our reading, our conversation and thinking, are all on a very low level, worthy only of pygmies and manikins.

Henry David Thoreau
Wise, Book, Reading
Henry David Thoreau (1882). “Walden”, p.168

Hence it will not do for the Landlord to possess too fine a nature.... He must have no idiosyncracies, no particular bents or tendencies to this or that, but a general, uniform, and healthy development, such as his portly person indicates, offering himself equally on all sides to men.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Offering, Healthy
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Selected Essays of Henry David Thoreau”, p.49, Simon and Schuster

I did not go to Boston, for with regard to that place I sympathize with one of my neighbors, an old man, who has not been there since the last war, when he was compelled to go. No, I have a real genius for staying at home.

Henry David Thoreau
Real, War, Home
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.194, Jazzybee Verlag

East of my bean-field, across the road, lived Cato Ingraham, slave of Duncan Ingraham, Esquire, gentleman, of Concord village, whobuilt his slave a house, and gave him permission to live in Walden Woods;MCato, not Uticensis, but Concordiensis. Some say that he was a Guinea Negro. There are a few who remember his little patch among the walnuts, which he let grow up till he should be old and need them; but a younger and whiter speculator got them at last. He too, however, occupies an equally narrow house at present.

Henry David Thoreau
Growing Up, House, Gentleman

There is not one kind of food for all men. You must and you will feed those faculties which you exercise. The laborer whose body is weary does not require the same food with the scholar whose brain is weary.

Henry David Thoreau
Food, Exercise, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.132, Jazzybee Verlag

You must ascend a mountain to learn your relation to matter, and so to your own body, for it is at home there, though you are not.

Henry David Thoreau
Home, Mountain, Body
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.375, Penguin

What is man but a mass of thawing clay?

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Clay, Body
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “The Maine Woods”, p.6, Graphic Arts Books

Who knows what the human body would expand and flow out to under a more genial heaven?

Henry David Thoreau
Heaven, Body, Flow
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience: Top American Literary”, p.189, 谷月社

If you would feel the full force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount Washington, or at the Highland Light, inTruro.

Henry David Thoreau
Light, Tempest, Force
Henry David Thoreau (1866). “Cape Cod”, p.146

In the planting of the seeds of most trees, the best gardeners do no more than follow Nature, though they may not know it.

Henry David Thoreau
Tree, May, Gardener
Henry David Thoreau (2011). “The Natural History Essays”, p.85, Gibbs Smith

The Musketaquid, or Grass-ground River, though probably as old as the Nile or Euphrates, did not begin to have a place in civilized history until the fame of its grassy meadows and fish attracted settlers out of England in 1635, when it received the other but kindred name of CONCORD from the first plantation on its banks, which appears to have commenced in a spirit of peace and harmony. It will be Grass-ground River as long as grass grows and water runs here; it will be Concord River only while men lead peacable lives on its banks.

Henry David Thoreau
Running, Men, Names
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “The Illustrated "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers"”, p.5, Princeton University Press

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