Quote collection
173 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"In what bold relief stand out the lives of all walkers of the snow! The snow is a great tell-tale, and blabs as effectually as it obliterates. I go into the woods, and know all that has happened. I cross the fields, and if only a mouse has visited his neighbor, the fact is chronicled."
"The Kingdom of Heaven is not a place, but a state of mind."
"What a severe yet master artist old Winter is... No longer the canvas and the pigments, but the marble and the chisel."
"A man’s life may stagnate as literally as water may stagnate, and just as motion and direction are the remedy for one, so purpose and activity are the remedy for the other."
"Every walk to the woods is a religious rite, every bath in the stream is a saving ordinance. Communion service is at all hours, and the bread and wine are from the heart and marrow of Mother Earth. There are no heretics in Nature's church; all are believers, all are communicants. The beauty of natural religion is that you have it all the time; you do not have to seek it afar off in myths and legends, in catacombs, in garbled texts, in miracles of dead saints or wine-bibbing friars. It is of today; it is now and here; it is everywhere."
"The tendinous part of the mind, so to speak, is more developed in winter; the fleshy, in summer. I should say winter had given the bone and sinew to literature, summer the tissues and the blood."
"Happiness comes most to persons who seek it least and think least about it. It is not an object to be sought, it is a state to be induced. It must follow and not lead. It must overtake you, and not you overtake it."
"Few persons realize how much of their happiness is dependent upon their work, upon the fact that they are busy and not left to feed upon themselves. Blessed is the person who has some congenial work, some occupation in which to place one's heart, and which affords a complete outlet to all the forces that are in him or her."
"When you bait your hook with your heart, the fish always bite."
"If you think you can do it, you can."
"We can outrun the wind and the storm, but we cannot outrun the demon of hurry."
"The spirit of man can endure only so much and when it is broken only a miracle can mend it."
"How readily the bluebirds become our friends and neighbors when we offer them suitable nesting retreats!"
"Oh, Spring is surely coming, Her couriers fill the air; Each morn are new arrivals, Each night her ways prepare; I scent her fragrant garments, Her foot is on the stair."
"I have discovered the secret of happiness - it is work, either with the hands or the head. The moment I have something to do, the draughts are open and my chimney draws, and I am happy."
"To the scientist Nature is a storehouse of facts, laws, processes; to the artist she is a storehouse of pictures; to the poet she is a storehouse of images, fancies, a source of inspiration; to the moralist she is a storehouse of precepts and parables; to all she may be a source of knowledge and joy."
"Some scenes you juggle two balls, some scenes you juggle three balls, some scenes you can juggle five balls. The key is always to speak in your own voice. Speak the truth. That's Acting 101. Then you start putting layers on top of that."
"I think rain is as necessary to the mind as to vegetation. My very thoughts become thirsty, and crave the moisture."
"I seldom go into a natural history museum without feeling as if I were attending a funeral."
"Nature teaches more than she preaches. There are no sermons in stones. It is easier to get a spark out of a stone than a moral."