Henry David Thoreau

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.

We shall see but little way if we require to understand what we see. How few things can a man measure with the tape of his understanding! How many greater things might he be seeing in the meanwhile!

Men profess to be lovers of music, but for the most part they give no evidence in their opinions and lives that they have heard it.

Goodness is the only investment which never fails.

It takes two to speak truth – one to speak, and another to hear.

If I seem to boast more than is becoming, my excuse is that I brag for humanity rather than for myself.

Humility and knowledge in poor clothes excel pride and ignorance in costly attire.

This mournful truth is everywhere confessed, slow rises worth by poverty depressed.

The great advantages of simulation and dissimulation are three. First to lay asleep opposition and to surprise. For where a man’s intentions are published, it is an alarum to call up all that are against them. The second is to reserve a man’s self a fair retreat: for if a man engage himself, by a manifest declaration, he must go through, or take a fall. The third is, the better to discover the mind of another. For to him that opens himself, men will hardly show themselves adverse; but will fair let him go on, and turn their freedom of speech to freedom of thought.

A good end cannot sanctify evil means; nor must we ever do evil that good may come of it.

There’s not an American in this country free until every one of us is free.

No matter how hard the past is, we can always begin again.

To be mature you have to realize what you value most… Not to arrive at a clear understanding of one’s own values is a tragic waste. You have missed the whole point of what life is for.

Looking? Found someone you have, eh?

The public buys its opinions as it buys its meat, or takes in its milk, on the principle that it is cheaper to do this than to keep a cow. So it is, but the milk is more likely to be watered.

When any real progress is made, we unlearn and learn anew what we thought we knew before.

By law of periodical repetition, everything which has happened once must happen again and again – and not capriciously, but at regular periods, and each thing in its own period, not another’s and each obeying its own law.

For everything you have missed, you have gained something else; and for everything you gain, you lose something else.

Friendship is the marriage of the soul, and this marriage is liable to divorce.

Each time you learn something new you must readjust the whole framework of your knowledge

See one promontory, one mountain, one sea, one river and see all.