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When you knock, ask to see God — none of the servants.

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
Asks
Servants
Knock
Servant
God
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More quotes by Henry David Thoreau

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If you would convince a man that he does wrong, do right. Men will believe what they see.
Henry David Thoreau
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We have not so good a right to hate any as our Friend.
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If you will not try, you will go to your grave with your song still inside you.
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Good for the body is the work of the body, good for the soul the work of the soul, and good for either the work of the other.
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The sport of digging the bait is nearly equal to that of catching the fish, when one's appetite is not too keen.
Henry David Thoreau
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It is not worth the while to let our imperfections disturb us always.
Henry David Thoreau
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With wisdom we shall learn liberality.
Henry David Thoreau
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Generally speaking, the political news, whether domestic or foreign, might be written today for the next ten years with sufficientaccuracy. Most revolutions in society have not power to interest, still less alarm us but tell me that our rivers are drying up, or the genus pine dying out in the country, and I might attend.
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Men reverence one another, not yet God.
Henry David Thoreau
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I have a great deal of company in my house especially in the morning, when nobody calls.
Henry David Thoreau
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As long as there is satire, the poet is, as it were, particeps criminis.
Henry David Thoreau
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For one that comes with a pencil to sketch or sing, a thousand come with an axe or rifle. What a coarse and imperfect use Indiansand hunters make of nature! No wonder that their race is so soon exterminated.
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What a fool he must be who thinks that his El Dorado is anywhere but where he lives.
Henry David Thoreau
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When we consider what, to use the words of the catechism, is the chief end of man, and what are the true necessaries and means of life, it appears as if men had deliberately chosen the common mode of living because they preferred it to any other. Yet they honestly think there is no choice left.
Henry David Thoreau
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The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.
Henry David Thoreau
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If all were as it seems, and men made the elements their servants for noble ends!
Henry David Thoreau
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The question is whether you can bear freedom. At present the vast majority of men, whether white or black, require the discipline of labor which enslaves them for their own good.
Henry David Thoreau
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A person who chooses to die or to risk death demonstrates that there are values, principles, maxims, that are more valuable to him than is life itself. In short, he places his immortal self above his mortal self. Nothing goes by luck in composition. It allows of no tricks. The best you can write will be the best you are.
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I saw a muskrat come out of a hole in the ice ... While I am looking at him, I am thinking what he is thinking of me. He is a different sort of man, that's all.
Henry David Thoreau
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Sometimes we are clarified and calmed healthily, as we never were before in our lives, not by an opiate, but by some unconscious obedience to the all-just laws, so that we become like a still lake of purest crystal and without an effort our depths are revealed to ourselves. . . .
Henry David Thoreau