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Henry David Thoreau Quotes - Page 77

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The Man of Genius may at the same time be, indeed is commonly, an Artist, but the two are not to be confounded. The Man of Genius,referred to mankind, is an originator, an inspired or demonic man, who produces a perfect

The Man of Genius may at the same time be, indeed is commonly, an Artist, but the two are not to be confounded. The Man of Genius,referred to mankind, is an originator, an inspired or demonic man, who produces a perfect work in obedience to laws yet unexplored. The artist is he who detects and applies the law from observation of the works of Genius, whether of man or nature. The Artisan is he who merely applies the rules which others have detected. There has been no man of pure Genius, as there has been none wholly destitute of Genius.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Artist, Law
Henry David Thoreau (1975). “Early Essays and Miscellanies”, p.328, Princeton University Press

We are often struck by the force and precision of style to which hard-working men, unpracticed in writing, easily attain when required to make the effort. As if plainness and vigor and sincerity, the ornaments of style, were better learned on the farm and in the workshop than in the schools. The sentences written by such rude hands are nervous and tough, like hardened thongs, the sinews of the deer, or the roots of the pine.

Henry David Thoreau
School, Hard Work, Writing
Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Walden and Other Writings: (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.385, Modern Library

Though the hen should sit all day, she could lay only one egg, and, besides, would not have picked up materials for another.

Henry David Thoreau
Eggs, Hens, Chickens
Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Walden and Other Writings: (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.386, Modern Library

Nature is mythical and mystical always, and works with the license and extravagance of genius. She has her luxurious and florid style as well as art.

Henry David Thoreau
Art, Nature, Style
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.953, Delphi Classics

In society you will not find health, but in nature. Unless our feet at least stood in the midst of nature, all our faces would bepale and livid. Society is always diseased, and the best is the most so.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Feet, Society
Henry David Thoreau (1868). “Excursions”, p.39

How little do the most wonderful inventions of modern times detain us. They insult nature. Every machine, or particular application, seems a slight outrage against universal laws.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Law, Progress
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.236, Simon and Schuster

How meanly and grossly do we deal with nature!

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Deals
Henry David Thoreau (1992). “The Essays of Henry David Thoreau”, p.3, Rowman & Littlefield

Making a logging-road in the Maine woods is called "swamping" it, and they who do the work are called "swampers." I now perceivedthe fitness of the term. This was the most perfectly swamped of all the roads I ever saw. Nature must have coöperated with art here.

Henry David Thoreau
Art, Nature, Swamps
Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Walden and Other Writings: (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.586, Modern Library

For my own part, I commonly attend more to nature than to man, but any affecting human event may blind our eyes to natural objects. I was so absorbed in him as to be surprised whenever I detected the routine of the natural world surviving still, or met persons going about their affairs indifferent.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Eye, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.386, Penguin

Even Nature is observed to have her playful moods or aspects, of which man sometimes seems to be the sport.

Henry David Thoreau
Funny, Sports, Nature

In our most trivial walks, we are constantly, though unconsciously, steering like pilots by certain well-known beacons and headlands, and if we go beyond our usual course we still carry in our minds the bearing of some neighboring cape; and not till we are completely lost, or turned round,--for a man needs only to be turned round once with his eyes shut in this world to be lost,--do we appreciate the vastness and strangeness of nature.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Eye, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.103, Simon and Schuster

Nature has from the first expanded the minute blossoms of the forest only toward the heavens, above men's heads and unobserved bythem. We see only the flowers that are under our feet in the meadows.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Flower, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walking: Top Essays”, p.19, 谷月社

A tanned skin is something more than respectable, and perhaps olive is a fitter color than white for a man,--a denizen of the woods. "The pale white man!" I do not wonder that the African pitied him.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Men, Race
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walking: Top Essays”, p.11, 谷月社

When we walk, we naturally go to the fields and woods: what would become of us, if we walked only in a garden or a mall?

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Garden, Woods
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “Essays of Henry David Thoreau - Walking”, p.8, Editora Dracaena

The same soil is good for men and for trees. A man's health requires as many acres of meadow to his prospect as his farm does loads of muck.

Henry David Thoreau
Nature, Health, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2016). “Essays of Henry David Thoreau - Walking”, p.26, Editora Dracaena

However, our fates at least are social. Our courses do not diverge; but as the web of destiny is woven it is fulled, and we are cast more and more into the centre. Men naturally, though feebly, seek this alliance, and their actions faintly foretell it.

Henry David Thoreau
Fate, Destiny, Men
Henry David Thoreau (1980). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, Boston, [s.n.

The theories and speculations of men concern us more than their puny accomplishment. It is with a certain coldness and languor that we loiter about the actual and so-called practical.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Action, Theory
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.236, Simon and Schuster

A man must find his occasions in himself, it is true. The natural day is very calm, and will hardly reprove his indolence.

Henry David Thoreau
Men, Leisure, Action
Henry David Thoreau (1882). “Walden”, p.176

To act collectively is according to the spirit of our institutions.

Henry David Thoreau
Independence, Spirit, Action
Henry David Thoreau, David Gross (2007). “The Price of Freedom: Political Philosophy from Thoreau's Journals”, p.100, David M Gross

What a pity if we do not live this short time according to the laws of the long time,--the eternal laws!

Henry David Thoreau
Time, Law, Long
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.360, Penguin

It must be confessed that horses at present work too exclusively for men, rarely men for horses; and the brute degenerates in man's society.

Henry David Thoreau
Horse, Men, Humanity
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1027, Delphi Classics

Indeed, the life of cattle, like that of many men, is but a sort of locomotiveness; they move a side at a time, and man, by his machinery, is meeting the horse and the ox half-way.

Henry David Thoreau
Horse, Moving, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walking: Top Essays”, p.15, 谷月社

The forests are held cheap after the white pine has been culled out; and the explorers and hunters pray for rain only to clear theatmosphere of smoke.

Henry David Thoreau
Rain, White, Hunters
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “The Maine Woods (Annotated Edition)”, p.34, Jazzybee Verlag

It is a surprising and memorable, as well as valuable experience, to be lost in the woods any time.

Henry David Thoreau
Memorable, Woods, Forests
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “Walden; Or, Life in the Woods”, p.111, Courier Corporation

It is now many years that men have resorted to the forest for fuel and the materials of the arts: the New Englander and the New Hollander, the Parisian and the Celt, the farmer and Robin Hood, Goody Blake and Harry Gill; in most parts of the world, the prince and the peasant, the scholar and the savage, equally require still a few sticks from the forest to warm them and cook their food. Neither could I do without them.

Henry David Thoreau
Art, Men, Years
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “Walden; Or, Life in the Woods”, p.162, Courier Corporation

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