Quotes by Henry David Thoreau

About Henry David Thoreau:

Henry David Thoreau is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay Resistance to Civil Government (also known as Civil Disobedience), an argument for disobedience to an unjust state.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

None can be an impartial or wise observer of human life but from the vantage ground of what we should call voluntary poverty.

Henry David Thoreau

I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew as well.

Henry David Thoreau

There is a low mist in the woods— It is a good day to study lichens.

Henry David Thoreau

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wi...

Henry David Thoreau

The language of excitement is at best picturesque merely. You must be calm before you can utter oracles.

Henry David Thoreau

That government is best which governs least.

Henry David Thoreau

It is best to avoid the beginnings of evil.

Henry David Thoreau

Nothing goes by luck in composition. It allows of no tricks. The best you can write will be the best you are.

Henry David Thoreau

I did not wish to take a cabin passage, but rather to go before the mast and on the deck of the world, for there I could best see the moonlight amid the mountains. I do not wish to go below now.

Henry David Thoreau

Perhaps this was the first instance of that quiet way of "speaking for" a place not yet occupied, or at least not improved as much as it may be, which their descendants have practised, and are still practising so extensively. Not Any seems to have be...

Henry David Thoreau

It is not for a man to put himself in such an attitude to society, but to maintain himself in whatever attitude he find himself through obedience to the laws of his being, which will never be one of opposition to a just government, if he should chanc...

Henry David Thoreau

We go eastward to realize history, and study the works of art and literature, retracing the steps of the race; we go westward as into the future, with a spirit of enterprise and adventure. The Atlantic is a Lethan stream, in our passage over which we...

Henry David Thoreau

Wealth is the ability to fully experience life.

Henry David Thoreau

All men are children, and of one family. The same tale sends them all to bed, and wakes them in the morning.

Henry David Thoreau

The perception of beauty is a moral test.

Henry David Thoreau

Alas! how little does the memory of these human inhabitants enhance the beauty of the landscape!

Henry David Thoreau

I think that there is nothing, not even crime, more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself than this incessant business.

Henry David Thoreau

Only he is successful in his business who makes that pursuit which affords him the highest pleasure sustain him.

Henry David Thoreau

So thoroughly and sincerely are we compelled to live, reverencing our life, and denying the possibility of change. This is the only way, we say; but there are as many ways as there can be drawn radii from one centre. All change is a miracle to contem...

Henry David Thoreau

There is one consolation in being sick; and that is the possibility that you may recover to a better state than you were ever in before.

Henry David Thoreau

What is called genius is the abundance of life and health.

Henry David Thoreau

Author Bio

  • NameHenry David Thoreau
  • Description1817-1862 American author, abolitionist, naturalist
  • BornJuly 12, 1817
  • DiedMay 6, 1862
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionWriter; Poet; Philosopher; Essayist; Autobiographer