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Can we not do without the society of our gossip a little while, - have our own thoughts to cheer us?

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
Without
Gossip
Cheer
Thoughts
Society
Littles
Little

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I am a happy camper so I guess I’m doing something right. Happiness is like a butterfly the more you chase it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.
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The lawyer's truth is not Truth, but consistency or a consistent expediency.
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I do not speak to those who are well employed, in whatever circumstances, and they know whether they are well employed or not but mainly to the mass of men who are discontented, and idly complaining of the hardness of their lot or of the times, when they might improve them.
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We are ashamed of our fear for we know that a righteous man would not suspect danger nor incur any. Wherever a man feels fear, there is an avenger.
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Color, which is the poet's wealth, is so expensive that most take to mere outline sketches and become men of science.
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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.
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Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. It is only expressing to men feebly your desire that it should prevail. A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men.
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I have seen some whose consciences, owing undoubtedly to former indulgence, had grown to be as irritable as spoilt children, and at length gave them no peace. They did not know when to swallow their cud, and their lives of course yielded no milk.
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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.
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If you would convince a man that he does wrong, do right. Men will believe what they see.
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They can do without architecture who have no olives nor wines in the cellar.
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Governments show thus how successfully men can be imposed on, even impose on themselves, for their own advantage.
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Nature is doing her best each moment to make us well. Why, nature is but another name for health.
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A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority it is not even a minority then but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight.
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Man is but the place where I stand.
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Why should we leave it to Harper & Brothers and Redding & Co. to select our reading?
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You may raise enough money to tunnel a mountain, but you cannot raise money enough to hire a man who is minding his own business.
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Do not entertain doubts if they are not agreeable to you.
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Time is like a handful of sand - the tighter you grasp it, the faster it runs through your fingers.
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