Henry David Thoreau

That man is rich whose pleasures are the cheapest.

Almost any man knows how to earn money, but not one in a million knows how to spend it.

The boy gathers materials for a temple, and then when he is thirty, concludes to build a woodshed.

Wealth is the ability to fully experience life.

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

We feel at first as if some opportunities of kindness and sympathy were lost, but learn afterward that any pure grief is ample recompense for all. That is, if we are faithful; for a spent grief is but sympathy with the soul that disposes events, and is as natural as the resin of Arabian trees. Only nature has a right to grieve perpetually, for she only is innocent. Soon the ice will melt, and the blackbirds sing along the river which he frequented, as pleasantly as ever. The same everlasting serenity will appear in this face of God, and we will not be sorrowful, if he is not.

We live in an era of tremendous facts. And the facts are facts. They are also unpleasant facts, which does not decrease their factual percentage one bit. Our job is to understand them, to recognize their presence, to learn if we can what they signify and not to fall into the error of minimizing facts because they have a bitter flavor.

To the man who only has a hammer, everything he encounters begins to look like a nail.

And you know, two heads are better than one.

The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.

Do you wish people to think well of you? Don’t speak of yourself.

I don’t think I’ve made mistakes. Every time somebody said I made a mistake, they do the polls and my numbers go up, so I guess I haven’t made any mistakes.

I was brought up to be a gentleman. That means you know how to walk, talk and dress the part.

Some people like my advice so much that they frame it upon the wall instead of using it.

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you stop to look fear in the face.

To do more for the world than the world does for you – that is success.

Blood banks are all closed; you can’t use others to keep you warm.

You cannot be who and what you are unless you have a lifestyle, both internally and externally, that is designed to support that definition of self.

Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after.

Sometimes you win and sometimes you learn.

Do you realize if it weren’t for Edison we’d be watching TV by candlelight?