Quote

Society is commonly too cheap. We meet at very short intervals, not having had time to acquire any new value for each other. We meet at meals three times a day, and give each other a new taste of that old musty cheese that we are.

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
Translator
Writer
birthplace of Henry David Thoreau
Thoreau
Henry D. Thoreau
Three
Meet
Musty
Give
Short
Intervals
Giving
Taste
Commonly
Time
Value
Cheese
Friends
Cheap
Society
Meals
Values
Acquire
Times
Friendship

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All the events which make the annals of the nations are but the shadows of our private experiences.
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If you can speak what you will never hear, if you can write what you will never read, you have done rare things.
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It is remarkable how closely the history of the apple tree is connected with that of man.
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I thought, as I have my living to get, and have not eaten today, that I might go a- fishing. That's the true industry for poets. It is the only trade I have learned.
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Why the jailer does not leave open his prison doors,--why the judge does not dismiss his case,--why the preacher does not dismisshis congregation! It is because they do not obey the hint God gives them, nor accept the pardon which he freely offers to all.
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You must not blame me if I do talk to the clouds.
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Nowadays the host does not admit you to his hearth, but has got the mason to build one for yourself somewhere in his alley, and hospitality is the art of keeping you at the greatest distance.
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I have heard a good many pretend that they are going to die or that they have died, for aught that I know. Nonsense! I'll defy them to do it. They have n't got life enough in them.... Only half a dozen or so have died since the world began.
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Every oak tree started out as a couple of nuts who stood their ground.
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The best books are not read even by those who are called good readers. What does our Concord culture amount to? There is in this town, with a very few exceptions, no taste for the best or for very good books even in English literature, whose words all can read and spell.
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Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment
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The youth may build or plant or sail, only let him not be hindered from doing that which he tells me he would like to do.
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At death our friends and relatives either draw nearer to us and are found out, or depart farther from us and are forgotten. Friends are as often brought nearer together as separated by death.
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To meet the objections of some inveterate cavillers, I may as well state, that if I dined out occasionally, as I always had done,and I trust shall have opportunities to do again, it was frequently to the detriment of my domestic arrangements.
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If the tax-gatherer, or any other public officer, asks me, as one has done, But what shall I do? my answer is, If you really wish to do anything, resign your office. When the subject has refused allegiance, and the officer has resigned his office, then the revolution is accomplished.
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The man who is dissatisfied with himself, what can he do?
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