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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

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
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birthplace of Henry David Thoreau
Thoreau
Henry D. Thoreau
Universal
Discourse
Silence
Refuge
Discourses
Every
Disappointment
Chagrin
Dull
Satiety
Acts
Indignity
Foolish
Balm
Welcome
Sequel
Silent
Sequels

More quotes by Henry David Thoreau

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Improve every opportunity to be melancholy.
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But, commonly, men are as much afraid of love as of hate.
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Spring-an experience in immortality.
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Cultivate poverty like a garden herb, like sage.
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It is not worth the while to let our imperfections disturb us always.
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There is always room and occasion enough for a true book on any subject as there is room for more light the brightest day and more rays will not interfere with the first.
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I am sorry to think that you do not get a man's most effective criticism until you provoke him. Severe truth is expressed with some bitterness.
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It is after we get home that we really go over the mountain, if ever.
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I have seen more men than usual, lately and, well as I was acquainted with one, I am surprised to find what vulgar fellows they are.
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The Oriental philosophy approaches easily loftier themes than the modern aspires to and no wonder if it sometimes prattle about them. It only assigns their due rank respectively to Action and Contemplation, or rather does full justice to the latter. Western philosophers have not conceived of the significance of Contemplation in their sense.
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Live free, child of the mist,- and with respect to knowledge we are allchildren of the mist.
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He may travel who can subsist on the wild fruits and game of the most cultivated country.
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It is not in vain that man speaks to man. This is the value of literature.
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Many a forenoon have I stolen away, preferring to spend thus the most valued part of the day for I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days, and spent them lavishly nor do I regret that I did not waste more of them in the workshop or the teacher's desk.
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Talk of mysteries! — Think of our life in nature, — daily to be shown matter, to come in contact with it, — rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! The solid earth! The actual world! The common sense! Contact! Contact! Who are we? Where are we?
Henry David Thoreau
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Here or nowhere is our heaven.
Henry David Thoreau
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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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When the State wishes to endow an academy or university, it grants it a tract of forest land: one saw represents an academy, a gang, a university.
Henry David Thoreau
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Don't be afraid that your life will end, be afraid that it will never begin!
Henry David Thoreau
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Nothing more strikingly betrays the credulity of mankind than medicine. Quackery is a thing universal, and universally successful. In this case it becomes literally true that no imposition is too great for the credulity of men.
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