"The poet is a man who lives at last by watching his moods. An old poet comes at last to watch his moods as narrowly as a cat does a mouse."
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Henry David Thoreau quotes (page 84 of 139)
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"It is very rare that you meet with obstacles in this world, which the humblest man has not faculties to surmount."
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"What is commonly called friendship is only a little more honor among rogues."
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"No method nor discipline can supersede the necessity of being forever on the alert. What is a course of history, or philosophy, or poetry, or the most admirable routine of life, compared with the discipline of looking always at what is to be seen? Will you be a reader, a student merely, or a seer?"
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"Is it not possible that an individual may be right and a government wrong? Are laws to be enforced simply because they were made? Or declared by any number of men to be good, if they are NOT good?"
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"When I go out of the house for a walk, uncertain as yet whither I will bend my steps, [I] submit myself to my instinct to decide for me."
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"As a snow-drift is formed where there is a lull in the wind, so, one would say, where there is a lull of truth, an institution springs up."
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"In short, I am convinced, both by faith and experience, that to maintain one's self on this earth is not a hardship but a pastime, if we will live simply and wisely; as the pursuits of the simpler nations are still the sports of the more artificial."
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"Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government."
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"Most people dread finding out when they come to die that they have never really lived."
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"I quietly declare war with the State, after my fashion, though I will still make use and get advantage of her as I can, as is usual in such cases."
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"He is blessed over all mortals who loses no moment of the passing life in remembering the past"
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"I found that they knew but little of the history of their race, and could be entertained by stories about their ancestors as readily as any way ."
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"The most attractive sentences are not perhaps the wisest, but the surest and soundest."
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"On tops of mountains, as everywhere to hopeful souls, it is always morning."
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"For more than five years I maintained myself thus solely by the labour of my hands, and I found, that by working about six weeks in a year, I could meet all the expenses of living."
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"We do not enjoy poetry unless we know it to be poetry."
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"Love does not analyze its object."
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"All that man has to say or do that can possibly concern mankind is in some shape or other to tell the story of his love-to sing, and, if he is fortunate and keeps alive, he will be forever in love."
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"If the laborer gets no more than the wages which his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats himself."
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