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If we were left solely to the wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance, uncorrected by the seasonal experience and the effectual complaints of the people, America would not long retain her rank among the nations.

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
Would
Guidance
Seasonal
People
Congress
Effectual
Among
Legislators
Nations
Retain
Experience
Rank
Left
Solely
America
Complaints
Uncorrected
Long
Wit
Wordy

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There is one thought for the field, another for the house. I would have my thoughts, like wild apples, to be food for walkers, and will not warrant them to be palatable if tasted in the house.
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I never was so rapid in my virtue but my vice kept up with me.
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The poet will write for his peers alone. He will remember only that he saw truth and beauty from his position, and expect the time when a vision as broad shall overlook the same field as freely.
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As in many countries precious metals belong to the crown, so here more precious natural objects of rare beauty should belong to the public.
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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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We are ashamed of our fear for we know that a righteous man would not suspect danger nor incur any. Wherever a man feels fear, there is an avenger.
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I am no more lonely than a single mullein or dandelion in a pasture, or a bean leaf, or sorrel, or a horse-fly, or a bumblebee. I am no more lonely than the Mill Brook, or a weathercock, or the north star, or the south wind, or an April shower, or a January thaw, or the first spider in a new house.
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Nothing can shock a brave man but dullness.
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Goodness is the only investment that never fails.
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The constant abrasion and decay of our lives makes the soil of our future growth.
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What would human life be without forests, those natural cities?
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It is not worth the while to let our imperfections disturb us always. The conscience really does not, and ought not to monopolizethe whole of our lives, any more than the heart or the head. It is as liable to disease as any other part.
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It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?
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Fishing has been styled 'a contemplative man's recreation,' ... and science is only a more contemplative man's recreation.
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Dreams are the touchstones of our character.
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The lover wants no partiality. He says, Be so kind as to be just.
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If a thousand men were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would ... [be] the definition of a peaceable revolution, if any such is possible.
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Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb nail.
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The Indian...stands free and unconstrained in Nature, is her inhabitant and not her guest, and wears her easily and gracefully. But the civilized man has the habits of the house. His house is a prison.
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Between whom there is hearty truth, there is love and in proportion to our truthfulness and confidence in one another, our lives are divine and miraculous, and answer to our ideal. . . . Friends do not live in harmony merely, as some say, but in melody.
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