Henry David Thoreau

Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each. Let them be your only diet, drink, and botanical medicines.

I have lived some thirty-odd years on this planet, and I have yet to hear the first syllable of valuable or even earnest advice from my seniors.

I would give all the wealth of the world, and all the deeds of all the heroes, for one true vision.

That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as another s. We see so much only as we possess.

I fear chiefly lest my expression may not be extravagant enough, may not wander far enough beyond the narrow limit of my daily experience, so as to be adequate to the truth of which I have been convinced. Extravagance! it depends on how you are yarded.

Talk about slavery! It is not the peculiar institution of the South. It exists wherever men are bought and sold, wherever a man allows himself to be made a mere thing or a tool, and surrenders his inalienable rights of reason and conscience. Indeed, this slavery is more complete than that which enslaves the body alone… I never yet met with, or heard of, a judge who was not a slave of this kind, and so the finest and most unfailing weapon of injustice. He fetches a slightly higher price than the black men only because he is a more valuable slave.

A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talks Greek.

The measure of who we are is what we do with what we have.

That was Youth with its reckless exuberance when all things were possible pursued by Age where we are now, looking back at what we destroyed, what we tore away from that self who could do more, and its work that’s become my enemy because that’s what I can tell you about, that Youth who could do anything.

If we want maturity, we have to be mature. If we want a nation that feels hopeful, then we have to speak in hopeful terms… We have to model what we want.

He never does a proper thing without giving an improper reason for it.

A sense of humor keen enough to show a man his own absurdities will keep him from the commission of all sins, or nearly all, save those worth committing.

The French are wiser than they seem, and the Spaniards seem wiser than they are.

Difficulties mastered are opportunities won.

Stay at home in your mind. Don’t recite other people’s opinions. I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.

The more I see of the moneyed classes, the more I understand the guillotine.

It is impossible for a man to be cheated by anyone but himself.

We should come home from adventures, and perils, and discoveries every day with new experience and character.

Will not a tiny speck very close to our vision blot out the glory of the world, and leave only a margin by which we see the blot? I know no speck so troublesome as self.

Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it.

If in doubt, don’t. If still in doubt, do what’s right.