Henry David Thoreau

In wildness is the preservation of the world.

We must walk consciously only part way toward our goal, and then leap in the dark to our success.

Nothing makes the earth seem so spacious as to have friends at a distance; they make the latitudes and longitudes.

Books, not which afford us a cowering enjoyment, but in which each thought is of unusual daring; such as an idle man cannot read, and a timid one would not be entertained by, which even make us dangerous to existing institution – such call I good books.

Money is not required to buy one necessity of the soul.

That man is rich whose pleasures are the cheapest.

At 70 years old, if I could give my younger self one piece of advice, It would be to use the phrase ‘f**k off’ much more frequently.

Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get your heart’s desire; the other is to get it.

Fate, then, is a name for facts not yet passed under the fire of thought; for causes which are unpenetrated.

To have striven, to have made the effort, to have been true to certain ideals – this alone is worth the struggle.

Big jobs usually go to the men who prove their ability to outgrow small ones.

The more you know the less you understand.

God Almighty first planted a garden. And indeed, it is the purest of human pleasures.

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

The traveler that resolutely follows a rough and winding path will sooner reach the end of his journey than he that is always changing his direction, and wastes the hour of daylight in looking for smoother ground and shorter passages.

I have a higher and grander standard of principle than George Washington. He could not lie; I can, but I won’t.

Natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning by study; and studies themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience.

Well, when it comes to social media – there are just times I turn off the world, you know. There are just some times you have to give yourself space to be quiet, which means you’ve got to set those phones down. You can’t be reading all that stuff. I mean, that’s like letting somebody just walk up and slap you, you know? You would never do that. You would never just sit there and go, slap me in the face and I’m good with it. No. So why would you open yourself up to that?

Haven’t you learned yet that I put something more than whisky into my speeches.

My life has been one great big joke, a dance that’s walked a song that’s spoke, I laugh so hard I almost choke when I think about myself.

The genius, wit, and the spirit of a nation are discovered by their proverbs.