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
age bridge build decide gets materials maybe middle moon palace together youth
Youth gets together with their materials to build a bridge to the moon or maybe a palace on earth; then in middle age they decide to build a woodshed with them instead.
belly booming builds close hear smell solitary tonic whispering wilder
We need the tonic of wildness, to wade sometimes in marshes where the bittern and the meadow-hen lurk, and hear the booming of the snipe; to smell the whispering sedge where only some wilder and more solitary fowl builds her nest, and the mink crawls with its belly close to the ground.
home government building-up
No: until I want the protection of Massachusetts to be extended to me in some distant Southern port, where my liberty is endangered, or until I am bent solely on building up an estate at home by peaceful enterprise, I can afford to refuse allegiance to Massachusetts, and her right to my property and life. It costs me less in every sense to incur the penalty of disobedience to the State than it would to obey. I should feel as if I were worth less in that case.
egg nest recorded side thoughts-and-thinking welcomed
Each thought that is welcomed and recorded is a nest egg by the side of which more will be laid.
adventure canadians carried clear england exposure hardship led possessed spirit though
The Canadians of those days, at least, possessed a roving spirit of adventure which carried them further, in exposure to hardship and danger, than ever the New England colonist went, and led them, though not to clear and colonize the wilderness, yet
american-author companion found love
I love to be alone. I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.
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.
abroad among companion found lonely man men stay thinking
I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude. We are for the most part more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our chambers. A man thinking or working is always alone, let him be where he will.
bottom current detect divine drink eternity god himself indeed lapse moment occasions places present sandy shallow stream thin time true
In eternity there is indeed something true and sublime. But all these times and places and occasions are now and here. God himself culminates in the present moment and will never be more divine in the lapse of the ages. Time is but a stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it, but when I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away but eternity remains.
clean conscience greater lower man patch sound stood sure
No man has ever stood the lower in my estimation for having a patch in his cloths; yet I am sure that there is greater anxiety, commonly, to have fashionable, or at least clean and unpatched clothes, than to have a sound conscience
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Talk of mysteries! Think of our life in Nature- daily to be shown matter, To come in contact with it- rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks. The solid earth! . . .
brute deal deep fields hungry spirits stormy walks weather
Take long walks in stormy weather or through deep snows in the fields andwoods, if you would keep your spirits up. Deal with brute nature. Be coldand hungry and weary.