Quote

It is but too easy to establish another durable and harmonious routine. Immediately all parts of nature consent to it. Only make something to take the place of something, and men will behave as if it was the very thing they wanted.

Henry David Thoreau

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Wanted
Immediately
Take
Behave
Thing
Parts
Durable
Something
Habit
Harmonious
Make
Easy
Consent
Men
Another
Establish
Nature
Conformity
Place
Routine

More quotes by Henry David Thoreau

Image
The cart before the horse is neither beautiful nor useful. Before we can adorn our houses with beautiful objects the walls must bestripped, and our lives must be stripped, and beautiful housekeeping and beautiful living laid for a foundation.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
A kitten is so flexible that she is almost double the hind parts are equivalent to another kitten with which the fore part plays. She does not discover that her tail belongs to her till you tread upon it.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Law never made men a whit more just and, by means of their respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the agents of injustice.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Love your life, poor as it is.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Almost all wild apples are handsome. They cannot be too gnarly and crabbed and rusty to look at. The gnarliest will have some redeeming traits even to the eye.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
The only people who ever get anyplace interesting are the people who get lost.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Whatever beauty we behold, the more it is distant, serene, and cold, the purer and more durable it is. It is better to warm ourselves with ice than with fire.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
The theories and speculations of men concern us more than their puny accomplishment. It is with a certain coldness and languor that we loiter about the actual and so-called practical.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
I see less difference between a city and a swamp than formerly.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Every ambitious would-be empire, clarions it abroad that she is conquering the world to bring it peace, security and freedom, and it is sacrificing her sons only for the most noble and humanitarian purposes. That is a lie and it is an ancient lie, yet generations still rise and believe it.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
All good things are cheap: all bad are very dear.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
If within the sophisticated man there is not an unsophisticated one, then he is but one of the devil's angels.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
We rarely meet a man who can tell us any news which he has not read in a newspaper, or been told by his neighbor and, for the most part, the only difference between us and our fellow is that he has seen the newspaper, or been out to tea, and we have not.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Read not the Times, read the Eternities.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Where there is a brave man, in the thickest of the fight, there is the post of honor.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
If we were left solely to the wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance, uncorrected by the seasonal experience and the effectual complaints of the people, America would not long retain her rank among the nations.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
I do not value any view of the universe into which man and the institutions of man enter very largely and absorb much of the attention. Man is but the place where I stand, and the prospect hence is infinite.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
It is what a man thinks of himself that really determines his fate.
Henry David Thoreau
Image
Time is like a handful of sand - the tighter you grasp it, the faster it runs through your fingers.
Henry David Thoreau