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I have seen how the foundations of the world are laid, and I have not the least doubt that it will stand a good while.

Henry David Thoreau

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Henry David Thoreau
Age: 44 †
Born: 1817
Born: July 12
Died: 1862
Died: May 6
Abolitionist
Author
Autobiographer
Diarist
Ecologist
Environmentalist
Essayist
Naturalist
Philosopher
Poet
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Writer
birthplace of Henry David Thoreau
Thoreau
Henry D. Thoreau
World
Laid
Foundation
Stand
Doubt
Least
Seen
Literature
Good
Foundations

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Nature, even when she is scant and thin outwardly, satisfies us still by the assurance of a certain generosity at the roots.
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For my part, I could easily do without the post-office. I think that there are very few important communications made through it.
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Yet some can be patriotic who have no self-respect, and sacrifice the greater to the less. They love the soil which makes their graves, but have no sympathy with the spirit which may still animate their clay. Patriotism is a maggot in their heads.
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As for doing good that is one of the professions which is full. Moreover I have tried it fairly and, strange as it may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my constitution.
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I know of no redeeming qualities in myself but a sincere love for some things, and when I am reproved I fall back on to this ground.
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Alas! the culture of an Irishman is an enterprise to be undertaken with a sort of moral bog hoe.
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A broad margin of leisure is as beautiful in a man's life as in a book.
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You know about a person who deeply interests you more than you can be told. A look, a gesture, an act, which to everybody else is insignificant tells you more about that one than words can.
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Surely the writer is to address a world of laborers, and such therefore must be his own discipline.
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Why should not our whole life and its scenery be actually thus fair and distinct? All our lives want a suitable background. They should at least, like the life of the anchorite, be as impressive to behold as objects in a desert, a broken shaft or crumbling mound against a limitless horizon.
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No mortal is alert enough to be present at the first dawn of spring.
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Talk about slavery! It is not the peculiar institution of the South. It exists wherever men are bought and sold, wherever a man allows himself to be made a mere thing or a tool, and surrenders his inalienable rights of reason and conscience. Indeed, this slavery is more complete than that which enslaves the body alone.
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Let nothing come between you and the light.
Henry David Thoreau
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The laboring man has not leisure for a true integrity day by day.
Henry David Thoreau
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Wherever a man goes, men will pursue him and paw him with their dirty institutions, and, if they can, constrain him to belong to their desperate odd-fellow society.
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The bluebird carries the sky on his back.
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The monster is never just there where we think he is. What is truly monstrous is our cowardice and sloth.
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Two thousand summers have imparted to the monuments of Grecian literature, as to her marbles, only a maturer golden and autumnal tint, for they have carried their own serene and celestial atmosphere into all lands to protect them against the corrosion of time.
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In the summer we lay up a stock of experiences for the winter, as the squirrel of nuts?something for conversation in winter evenings.
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We worship not the Graces, nor the Parcae, but Fashion. She spins and weaves and cuts with full authority. The head monkey at Paris puts on a traveler's cap, and all the monkeys in America do the same.
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