Henry David Thoreau

I have received no more than one or two letters in my life that were worth the postage.

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with success unexpected in common hours.

We must have infinite faith in each other. If we have not, we must never let it leak out that we have not.

Go fish and hunt far and wide day by day – farther and wider – and rest thee by many brooks and hearth-sides without misgiving. Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth. Rise free from care before the dawn, and seek adventures. Let the noon find thee by other lakes, and the night overtake thee everywhere at home. There are no larger fields than these, no worthier games than may here be played.

The lawyer’s truth is not Truth, but consistency or a consistent expediency.

We seem but to linger in manhood to tell the dreams of our childhood, and they vanish out of memory ere we learn the language.

The desire of gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit.

Success must include two things: the development of an individual to his utmost potentiality and a contribution of some kind to one’s world.

One of the first businesses of a sensible man is to know when he is beaten, and to leave off fighting at once.

My chief want in life is someone who shall make me do what I can.

A heart well prepared for adversity in bad times hopes, and in good times fears for a change in fortune.

We have reached a point today where labor-saving devices are good only when they do not throw the worker out of his job.

Nothing can be more contrary to religion and the clergy than reason and common sense.

Prosperity is the surest breeder of insolence I know.

In this country it is a good thing to kill an admiral from time to time to encourage the others.

Illusion is the first of all pleasures.

Character building begins in our infancy and continues until death.

Life is measured by the rapidity of change, the succession of influences that modify the being.

Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.

Children are all foreigners.

The early Christian rules of life were not made to last, because the early Christians did not believe that the world itself was going to last.