"Things do not change; we change."
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Henry David Thoreau quotes (page 9 of 139)
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"The stars are the jewels of the night, and perchance surpass anything which day has to show."
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"Live in each season as it passes: breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit."
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"If a man walks in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer. But if he spends his days as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is deemed an industrious and enterprising citizen."
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"I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, and obsequious attendance, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board."
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"In wildness is the preservation of the world."
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"To have made even one person's life a little better, that is to succeed."
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"Kindness to children, love for children, goodness to children-- these are the only investments that never fail."
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"The silence sings. It is musical. I remember a night when it was audible. I heard the unspeakable."
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"Love must be as much a light as it is a flame."
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"We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh and blood and bone."
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"Though I do not believe that a plant will spring up where no seed has been, I have great faith in a seed. Convince me that you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect wonders."
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"As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness."
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"I think that every town should have a park, or rather a primitive forest, of five hundred or a thousand acres, either in one body or several, where a stick would never be cut for fuel, not for the navy, not to make wagons, but stand and decay for higher uses - a common possession for instruction and recreation."
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"There are moments when all anxiety and stated toil are becalmed in the infinite leisure and repose of nature."
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"The wilderness is near as well as dear to every man. Even the oldest villages are indebted to the border of wild wood which surrounds them, more than to the gardens of men. There is something indescribably inspiriting and beautiful in the aspect of the forest skirting and occasionally jutting into the midst of new towns, which, like the sand-heaps of fresh fox-burrows, have sprung up in their midst. The very uprightness of the pines and maples asserts the ancient rectitude and vigor of nature. Our lives need the relief of such a background, where the pine flourishes and the jay still screams."
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"The first pleasant days of spring come out like a squirrel and go in again."
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"Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it."
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"When was it that men agreed to respect the appearance and not the reality?"
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"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."
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