Henry David Thoreau

Sometimes we are inclined to class those who are once-and-a-half witted with the half-witted, because we appreciate only a third part of their wit.

I heartily accept the motto,That government is best which governs least; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which I also believe,That government is best which governs not at all; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient.

I respect not his labors, his farm where everything has its price, who would carry the landscape, who would carry his God, to market, if he could get anything for him; who goes to market for his god as it is; on whose farm nothing grows free, whose fields bear no crops, whose meadows no flowers, whose trees no fruits, but dollars.

A broad margin of leisure is as beautiful in a man’s life as in a book. Haste makes waste, no less in life than in housekeeping. Keep the time, observe the hours of the universe, not of the cars.

Goodness is the only investment which never fails.

The highest law gives a thing to him who can use it.

This gives force to the strong — that the multitude have no habit of self-reliance or original action.

When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our tenderness that we repent of, but our severity.

He who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare. While he who has one enemy will meet him everywhere.

There are many humorous things in the world; among them, the white man’s notion that he is less savage than the other savages.

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 private Life is to be preferred; the Honor and Gain of publick Posts, bearing no proportion with the Comfort of it

The wonder is always new that any sane man can be a sailor.

Ordinary people seem not to realize that those who really apply themselves in the right way to philosophy are directly and of their own accord preparing themselves for dying and death.

Wine makes a man more pleased with himself; I do not say it makes him more pleasing to others.

These are not dark days: these are great days – the greatest days our country has ever lived.

Sobriety, severity, and self-respect are the foundations of all true sociality.

The adventitious beauty of poetry may be felt in the greater delight with a verse given in a happy quotation than in the poem.

That man is rich whose pleasures are the cheapest.

The death of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover, which seemed nothing but privation, somewhat later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius; for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates an epoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be closed, breaks up a wonted occupation, or a household, or style of living, and allows the formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character.

To inherit property is not to be born – it is to be still-born, rather.