Henry David Thoreau

Men are born to succeed, not to fail.

Be true to your work, your word, and your friend.

Thank God men cannot fly, and lay waste the sky as well as the earth.

The perception of beauty is a moral test.

The wilderness is near as well as dear to every man. Even the oldest villages are indebted to the border of wild wood which surrounds them, more than to the gardens of men. There is something indescribably inspiriting and beautiful in the aspect of the forest skirting and occasionally jutting into the midst of new towns, which, like the sand-heaps of fresh fox-burrows, have sprung up in their midst. The very uprightness of the pines and maples asserts the ancient rectitude and vigor of nature. Our lives need the relief of such a background, where the pine flourishes and the jay still screams.

You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.

For every minute you remain angry, you give up sixty seconds of peace of mind.

The foundations of a person are not in matter but in spirit.

Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed, and in such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.

Always do what you are afraid to do.

Nothing can bring you peace but yourself; nothing, but the triumph of principles.

Our strength grows out of our weakness.

I never could keep a promise. I do not blame myself for this weakness, because the fault must lie in my physical organization. It is likely that such a very liberal amount of space was given to the organ which enables me to make promises that the organ which should enable me to keep them was crowded out. But I grieve not. I like no half-way things. I had rather have one faculty nobly developed than two faculties of mere ordinary capacity.

It is very hard to be simple enough to be good.

PATIENCE YOU MUST HAVE my young padawan.

By common consent of all the nations and all the ages the most valuable thing in this world is the homage of men, whether deserved or undeserved.

Never mistake knowledge for wisdom. One helps you make a living; the other helps you make a life.

Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is because we are not the person involved.

The Pause; that impressive silence, that eloquent silence, that geometrically progressive silence which often achieves a desired effect where no combination of words, however so felicitous, could accomplish it.

The report of my death was an exaggeration.

Kindness is a language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see.