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Henry David Thoreau -
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
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It is always singular, but encouraging, to meet with common sense in very old books, as the Heetopades of Veeshnoo Sarma; a playful wisdom which has eyes behind as well as before, and oversees itself. It asserts their health and independence of the experience of later times. This pledge of sanity cannot be spared in a book, that it sometimes pleasantly reflect upon itself.
Henry David Thoreau
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Surely one may as profitably be soaked in the juices of a swamp for one day as pick his way dry-shod over sand. Cold and damp ? are they not as rich experience as warmth and dryness?
Henry David Thoreau
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A true poem is distinguished not so much by a felicitous expression, or any thought it suggests, as by the atmosphere which surrounds it. Most have beauty of outline merely, and are striking as the form and bearing of a stranger; but true verses come toward us indistinctly, as the very breath of all friendliness, and envelop us in their spirit and fragrance.
Henry David Thoreau
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What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which would be in harmony with the scenery,--for if men read aright, methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor philosophy can supply their place.
Henry David Thoreau
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As long as there is satire, the poet is, as it were, particeps criminis.
Henry David Thoreau
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What is morality but immemorial custom? Conscience is the chief of conservatives.
Henry David Thoreau
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But they who are unconcerned about the consequences of their actions are not therefore unconcerned about their actions.
Henry David Thoreau
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All men are really most attracted by the beauty of plain speech, and they even write in a florid style in imitation of this. Theyprefer to be misunderstood rather than to come short of its exuberance.
Henry David Thoreau
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Some poems are for holidays only. They are polished and sweet, but it is the sweetness of sugar, and not such as toil gives to sour bread. The breath with which the poet utters his verse must be that by which he lives.
Henry David Thoreau
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The artist and his work are not to be separated. The most willfully foolish man cannot stand aloof from his folly, but the deed and the doer together make ever one sober fact.
Henry David Thoreau
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We have heard much about the poetry of mathematics, but very little of it has as yet been sung. The ancients had a juster notion of their poetic value than we. The most distinct and beautiful statements of any truth must take at last the mathematical form. We might so simplify the rules of moral philosophy, as well as of arithmetic, that one formula would express them both.
Henry David Thoreau
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The monument of death will outlast the memory of the dead. The Pyramids do not tell the tale which was confided to them; the living fact commemorates itself.
Henry David Thoreau
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I never read a novel, they have so little real life and thought in them.
Henry David Thoreau
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As polishing expresses the vein in marble, and grain in wood, so music brings out what of heroic lurks anywhere. The hero is the sole patron of music.
Henry David Thoreau
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The sun rarely shines in history, what with the dust and confusion; and when we meet with any cheering fact which implies the presence of this luminary, we excerpt and modernize it.
Henry David Thoreau
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We are independent of the change we detect. The longer the lever, the less perceptible its motion. It is the slowest pulsation which is the most vital. The hero then will know how to wait, as well as to make haste. All good abides with him who waiteth wisely; we shall sooner overtake the dawn by remaining here than by hurrying over the hills of the west.
Henry David Thoreau
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He is not a true man of science who does not bring some sympathy to his studies, and expect to learn something by behaviour as well as application.
Henry David Thoreau
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There are theoretical reformers at all times, and all the world over, living on anticipation.
Henry David Thoreau
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The nonchalance and dolce-far-niente air of nature and society hint at infinite periods in the progress of mankind.
Henry David Thoreau
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Yet the New Testament treats of man and man's so-called spiritual affairs too exclusively, and is too constantly moral and personal, to alone content me, who am not interested solely in man's religious or moral nature, or in man even.
Henry David Thoreau
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I should fear the infinite power and inflexible justice of the almighty mortal hardly as yet apotheosized, so wholly masculine, with no sister Juno, no Apollo, no Venus, nor Minerva, to intercede for me, thumoi phileousa te, kedomene te.
Henry David Thoreau
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There is a sort of homely truth and naturalness in some books which is very rare to find, and yet looks cheap enough. There may benothing lofty in the sentiment, or fine in the expression, but it is careless country talk. Homeliness is almost as great a merit in a book as in a house, if the reader would abide there. It is next to beauty, and a very high art. Some have this merit only.
Henry David Thoreau
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I know of no redeeming qualities in myself but a sincere love for some things, and when I am reproved I fall back on to this ground.
Henry David Thoreau
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He who eats the fruit should at least plant the seed; ay, if possible, a better seed than that whose fruit he has enjoyed.
Henry David Thoreau
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Some interests have got a footing on the earth which we have not made sufficient allowance for.
Henry David Thoreau
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Quote of the day
Autumn burned brightly, a running flame through the mountains, a torch flung to the trees.
Faith Baldwin
Henry David Thoreau
Creative Commons
Born:
July 12, 1817
Died:
May 6, 1862
(aged 44)
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