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Most men, it seems to me, do not care for Nature and would sell their share in all her beauty, as long as they may live, for a stated sum - many for a glass of rum. Thank God, men cannot as yet fly, and lay waste the sky as well as the earth!

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
May
Waste
Conservation
Live
Share
Glass
Wells
Beauty
Glasses
Well
Nature
Sell
Many
Cannot
Thank
Long
Seems
Sells
Would
Earth
Lays
Rum
Men
Care
Sky
Stated

More quotes by Henry David Thoreau

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Shams and delusions are esteemed for soundest truths, while reality is fabulous. If men would steadily observe realities only, and not allow themselves to be deluded, life ... would be like a fairy tale and the Arabian Nights' Entertainments.
Henry David Thoreau
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Do not read the newspapers.
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For eighteen hundred years, though perchance I have no right to say it, the New Testament has been written yet where is the legislator who has wisdom and practical talent enough to avail himself of the light which it sheds on the science of legislation?
Henry David Thoreau
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People seldom hit what they do not aim at.
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We must love our friend so much that she shall be associated with our purest and holiest thoughts alone.
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It is the stars as not yet known to science that I would know, the stars which the lonely traveler knows.
Henry David Thoreau
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The ocean is a wilderness reaching round the globe, wilder than a Bengal jungle, and fuller of monsters, washing the very wharves of our cities and the gardens of our sea-side residences.
Henry David Thoreau
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This world is a place of business. What an infinite bustle! I am awaked almost every night by the panting of the locomotive. It interrupts my dreams. There is no sabbath. It would be glorious to see mankind at leisure for once. It is nothing but work, work, work.
Henry David Thoreau
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God is alone,-but the devil, he is far from being alone he sees a great deal of company he is legion.
Henry David Thoreau
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It is desirable that a man be clad so simply that he can lay his hands on himself in the dark, and that he live in all respects so compactly and preparedly, that, if an enemy take the town, he can, like the old philosopher, walk out the gate empty-handed without anxiety.
Henry David Thoreau
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Our own country furnishes antiquities as ancient and durable, and as useful, as any rocks at least as well covered with lichens,and a soil which, if it is virgin, is but virgin mould, the very dust of nature. What if we cannot read Rome or Greece, Etruria or Carthage, or Egypt or Babylon, on these are our cliffs bare?
Henry David Thoreau
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It is childish to rest in the discovery of mere coincidences, or of partial and extraneous laws.
Henry David Thoreau
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I have been breaking silence these twenty-three years and have hardly made a rent in it.
Henry David Thoreau
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Can there be any greater reproach than an idle learning? Learn to split wood, at least.
Henry David Thoreau
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It has been so written, for the most part, that the times it describes are with remarkable propriety called dark ages. They are dark, as one has observed, because we are so in the dark about them.
Henry David Thoreau
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The fire is the main comfort of the camp, whether in summer or winter
Henry David Thoreau
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As if you could kill time without injuring eternity.
Henry David Thoreau
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Let go of the past and live the future . . . Live the life you imagined.
Henry David Thoreau
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Do not despair of life. You have no doubt force enough to overcome your obstacles. Think of the fox prowling through wood and field in a winter night for something to satisfy his hunger. Notwithstanding cold and the hounds and traps, his race survives. I do not believe any of them ever committed suicide.
Henry David Thoreau
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Morning glory is the best name, it always refreshes me to see it.
Henry David Thoreau