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Homeliness is almost as great a merit in a book as in a house, if the reader would abide there. It is next to beauty, and a very high art.

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
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It is impossible to give a soldier a good education without making him a deserter. His natural foe is the government that drills him.
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We saw one school-house in our walk, and listened to the sounds which issued from it but it appeared like a place where the process, not of enlightening, but of obfuscating the mind was going on, and the pupils received only so much light as could penetrate the shadow of the Catholic church.
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How can we expect a harvest of thought who have not had a seedtime of character?
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You will pardon some obscurities, for there are more secrets in my trade than in most men's, and yet not voluntarily kept, but inseparable from its very nature. I would gladly tell all that I know about it, and never paint No Admittance on my gate.
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The child should have the advantage of ignorance as well as of knowledge, and is fortunate if he gets his share of neglect and exposure.
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A journal, is a book that shall contain a record of all your joy, your ecstasy, what you are grateful for.
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We fritter away our energy and creativity . . . we get bogged down in the thick of thin things.
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As I love nature, as I love singing birds, and gleaming stubble, and flowing rivers, and morning and evening, and summer and winter, I love thee, my Friend.
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A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority.
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My desire for knowledge is intermittent but my desire to commune with the spirit of the universe, to be intoxicated with the fumes, call it, of that divine nectar, to bear my head through atmospheres and over heights unknown to my feet, is perennial and constant.
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I learned from my two years' experience that it would cost incredibly little trouble to obtain one's necessary food that a man may use as simple a diet as the animals, and yet retain health and strength.
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For if we take the ages into our account, may there not be a civilization going on among brutes as well as men?
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There is not one kind of food for all men. You must and you will feed those faculties which you exercise. The laborer whose body is weary does not require the same food with the scholar whose brain is weary.
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If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go: perchance it will wear smooth
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The words of some men are thrown forcibly against you and adhere like burrs.
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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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How can any man be weak who dares to be at all?
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Do what nobody else can do for you. Omit to do anything else.
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It is dry, hazy June weather. We are more of the earth, farther from heaven these days.
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As if there were safety in stupidity alone
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