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Henry David Thoreau Quotes about Communication

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We communicate like the burrows of foxes, in silence and darkness, under ground. We are undermined by faith and love.

We communicate like the burrows of foxes, in silence and darkness, under ground. We are undermined by faith and love.

Henry David Thoreau
Faith, Communication, Silence
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1644, Delphi Classics

Knowledge is to be acquired only by a corresponding experience. How can we know what we are told merely? Each man can interpret another's experience only by his own.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Knowledge, Men
Michael Benjamin Berger, Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Thoreau's Late Career and The Dispersion of Seeds: The Saunterer's Synoptic Vision”, p.83, Camden House

We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Texas, Important
Walden ch. 1 (1854)

Our manners have been corrupted by communication with the saints.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Atheism, Saint
Henry David Thoreau (2004). “Walden: 150th Anniversary Illustrated Edition of the American Classic”, p.75, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

What means the fact--which is so common, so universal--that some soul that has lost all hope for itself can inspire in another listening soul an infinite confidence in it, even while it is expressing its despair?

Henry David Thoreau
Hope, Communication, Mean
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.40, Jazzybee Verlag

For my part, I could easily do without the post-office. I think that there are very few important communications made through it.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Thinking, Office
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.203, Penguin

Perhaps the facts most astounding and most real are never communicated by man to man.

Henry David Thoreau
Real, Communication, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.272, Penguin

I have found it a singular luxury to talk across the pond to a companion on the opposite side.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Opposites, Luxury
Henry David Thoreau (1882). “Walden”, p.220

There are some things which a man never speaks of, which are much finer kept silent about. To the highest communications we only lend a silent ear.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Men, Silence
Henry David Thoreau (2000). “Walden and Other Writings: (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.416, Modern Library

It is impossible to say all that we think, even to our truest Friend. We may bid him farewell forever sooner than complain, for our complaint is too well grounded to be uttered.

Henry David Thoreau
Friendship, Truth, Communication
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.119, Penguin

It is not in vain that man speaks to man. This is the value of literature.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Men, Literature
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.356, Penguin

Our manners have been corrupted by communication with the saints. Our hymn-books resound with a melodious cursing of God and enduring Him forever. One would say that even the prophets and redeemers had rather consoled the fears than confirmed the hopes of man. There is nowhere recorded a simple and irrepressible satisfaction with the gift of life, any memorable praise of God.

Henry David Thoreau
Book, Communication, Memorable
Henry David Thoreau (2004). “Walden: 150th Anniversary Illustrated Edition of the American Classic”, p.75, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

One inconvenience I sometimes experienced in so small a house, the difficulty of getting to a sufficient distance from my guest when we began to utter the big thoughts in big words. You want room for your thoughts to get into sailing trim and run a course or two before they make their port. The bullet of your thought must have overcome its lateral and ricochet motion and fallen into its last and steady course before it reaches the ear of the hearer, else it may plow out again through the side of his head.

Henry David Thoreau
Running, Distance, Communication
Henry David Thoreau (2009). “Walden”, p.91, Cosimo, Inc.

Love is the profoundest of secrets. Divulged, even to the beloved, it is no longer Love. As if it were merely I that loved you. When love ceases, then it is divulged.

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Love Is, Secret
Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.159, Jazzybee Verlag

The gods cannot misunderstand, man cannot explain.

Henry David Thoreau
God, Communication, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1644, Delphi Classics

Letter-writing too often degenerates into a communicating of facts, and not of truths; of other men's deeds and not our thoughts.What are the convulsions of a planet, compared with the emotions of the soul? or the rising of a thousand suns, if that is not enlightened by a ray?

Henry David Thoreau
Communication, Writing, Men
Henry David Thoreau (2012). “Thoreau's Book of Quotations”, p.56, Courier Corporation

If I am to be a thoroughfare, I prefer that it be of the mountain brooks, the Parnassian streams, and not the town sewers. There is inspiration, that gossip which comes to the ear of the attentive mind from the courts of heaven. There is the profane and stale revelation of the barroom and the police court. The same ear is fitted to receive both communications. Only the character of the hearer determines to which it shall be open, and to which closed.

Henry David Thoreau
Inspirational, Communication, Character
Henry David Thoreau, Barry Andrews (2005). “True Harvest: Readings from Henry David Thoreau for Every Day of the Year”, p.137, Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations

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