Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreauwas an American essayist, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, and historian. A leading transcendentalist, Thoreau is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay Resistance to Civil Government, an argument for disobedience to an unjust state...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionAuthor
Date of Birth12 July 1817
CountryUnited States of America
commitment direction life
Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.
flowers fragrance greet immortal life nature night
If the day and the night are such that you greet them with joy, and life emits a fragrance like flowers and sweet-scented herbs, is more elastic, more starry, more immortal -- that is your success. All nature is your congratulation . . .
heavenly humility reveals
Humility like the darkness, reveals the heavenly lights.
call close commonly good lie men pigs social together virtue warm
What men call social virtue, good fellowship, is commonly but the virtue of pigs in a litter, which lie close together to keep each other warm
agent break injustice machine nature requires
If... the machine of government... is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.
far latter near quarrel whom
I quarrel not with far-off foes, but with those who, near at home, co-operate with, and do the bidding of, those far away, and without whom the latter would be harmless.
earnest explore infinitely land learn mysterious mystery require sea time
At the same time that we are earnest to explore and learn all things, we require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be infinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us because unfathomable.
american-author friendship intelligence language
The language of friendship is not words, but meanings. It is an intelligence about language.
ability conscious endeavor evaluate fact life man
I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestioning ability of man to evaluate his life by a conscious endeavor
certain conscious criticism however human intense note presence remote self-knowledge sensible sharing stand taking thoughts
I know myself as a human entity; the scene, so to speak, or thoughts are affection; and am sensible of certain doubleness by which I can stand as remote from myself as from another. However intense my experience, I am conscious of the presence and criticism of a part of me, which, as it were, is no part of me, but spectator, sharing no experience, but taking note of it, and that is no more I than it is you.
dark paper piece sleep wrote
I put a piece of paper under my pillow, and when I could not sleep, I wrote in the dark
advances common directions dreams endeavors life meet success unexpected
If one advances confidently in the directions of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
advances common direction endeavors life meet success unexpected
If one advances confidently in the direction of one's dreams, and endeavors to live the life which one has imagined, one will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
came contact destiny doubt eating gradual human leave left savage surely tribes
I have no doubt that it is a part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each other when they came in contact with the more civilized.