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There is something servile in the habit of seeking after a law which we may obey. We may study the laws of matter at and for our convenience, but a successful life knows no law.

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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birthplace of Henry David Thoreau
Thoreau
Henry D. Thoreau
Life
Study
Successful
Law
Servile
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Convenience
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Obey
May
Seeking
Matter
Laws
Something
Habit

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Many old people receive pensions for no other reason, it seems to me, but as a compensation for having lived a long time ago.
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This curious world we inhabit is more wonderful than convenient more beautiful than it is useful it is more to be admired and enjoyed than used.
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Let us consider under what disadvantages Science has hitherto labored before we pronounce thus confidently on her progress.
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The chickadee and nuthatch are more inspiring society than statesmen and philosophers, and we shall return to these last as to more vulgar companions.
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Men are probably nearer the essential truth in their superstitions than in their science.
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Faith, indeed, is all the reform that is needed it is itself a reform.
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You may rely on it that you have the best of me in my books, and that I am not worth seeing personally, the stuttering, blunderingclod-hopper that I am. Even poetry, you know, is in one sense an infinite brag and exaggeration. Not that I do not stand on all that I have written,--but what am I to the truth I feebly utter?
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We are a nation of politicians, concerned about the outmost defenses only of freedom. It is our children's children who may perchance be really free.
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I never yet knew the sun to be knocked down and rolled through a mud-puddle he comes out honor-bright from behind every storm. Let us then take sides with the sun, seeing we have so much leisure.
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I believe in the forest, and in the meadow, and in the night in which the corn grows.
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I never was so rapid in my virtue but my vice kept up with me.
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Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life of equal simplicity, and I may say innocence, with Nature herself.
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I only desire sincere relations with the worthiest of my acquaintance, that they may give me an opportunity once in a year to speak the truth.
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Music is perpetual, and only the hearing is intermittent.
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It is not so important that many should be good as you, as that there be some absolute goodness somewhere for that will leaven the whole lump.
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What a healthy out-of-door appetite it takes to relish the apple of life, the apple of the world, then!
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What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which would be in harmony with the scenery,--for if men read aright, methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor philosophy can supply their place.
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Do not read the newspapers.
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Simplify your life. Don't waste the years struggling for things that are unimportant. Don't burden yourself with possessions. Keep your needs and wants simple and enjoy what you have. Don't destroy your peace of mind by looking back, worrying about the past. Live in the present. Simplify!
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To watch this crystal globe just sent from heaven to associate with me. While these clouds and this somber drizzling weather shut all in, we two draw nearer and know one another.
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