If however the law is so promulgated that it of necessity makes you an agent of injustices against another, then I say to you ... break the law. Henry David Thoreau More Quotes by Henry David Thoreau More Quotes From Henry David Thoreau Every New Englander might easily raise all his own breadstuffs in this land of rye and Indian corn, and not depend on distant andfluctuating markets for them. Yet so far are we from simplicity and independence that, in Concord, fresh and sweet meal is rarely sold in the shops, and hominy and corn in a still coarser form are hardly used by any. Henry David Thoreau simplicity land sweet How many things are now at loose ends! Who knows which way the wind will blow tomorrow? Henry David Thoreau blow wind way In proportion as our inward life fails, we go more constantly and desperately to the post office. You may depend on it, that the poor fellow who walks away with the greatest number of letters, proud of his extensive correspondence, has not heard from himself this long while. Henry David Thoreau office numbers long For my part, I could easily do without the post-office. I think that there are very few important communications made through it. Henry David Thoreau communication office thinking I have always endeavored to acquire strict business habits; they are indispensable to every man. If your trade is with the Celestial Empire, then some small counting house on the coast, in some Salem harbor, will be fixture enough. Henry David Thoreau empires house men Commerce is unexpectedly confident and serene, alert, adventurous, and unwearied. It is very natural in its methods withal, far more so than many fantastic enterprises and sentimental experiments, and hence its singular success. Henry David Thoreau adventurous sentimental natural Unto a life which I call natural I would gladly follow even a will-o'-the-wisp through bogs and sloughs unimaginable, but no moonnor firefly has shown me the causeway to it. Henry David Thoreau bogs firefly natural In short, all good things are wild and free. There is something in a strain of music, whether produced by an instrument or by thehuman voice,--take the sound of a bugle in a summer night, for instance,--which by its wildness, to speak without satire, reminds me of the cries emitted by wild beasts in their native forests. It is so much of their wildness as I can understand. Give me for my friends and neighbors wild men, not tame ones. The wildness of the savage is but a faint symbol of the awful ferity with which good men and lovers meet. Henry David Thoreau summer men night It is worth the while to live respectably unto ourselves. We can possibly get along with a neighbor, even with a bedfellow, whom we respect but very little; but as soon as it comes to this, that we do not respect ourselves, then we do not get along at all, no matter how much money we are paid for halting. Henry David Thoreau respect matter littles We love to see any redness in the vegetation of the temperate zone. It is the color of colors. This plant speaks to our blood....What a perfect maturity it arrives at! It is the emblem of a successful life concluded by a death not premature, which is an ornament to Nature. What if we were to mature as perfectly, root and branch, glowing in the midst of our decay, like the poke! Henry David Thoreau maturity successful roots Love is no individual's experience; and though we are imperfect mediums, it does not partake of our imperfection; though we are finite, it is infinite and eternal. Henry David Thoreau imperfection doe love-is There were times when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of the head or hand. I love a broad margin to my life. Henry David Thoreau sacrifice moments hands We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us, like the grass which confesses the influence of the slightest dew that falls on it; and did not spend our time in atoning for the neglect of past opportunities, which we call doing our duty. Henry David Thoreau blessed past fall I have traveled a good deal in Concord; and everywhere, in shops, and offices, and fields, the inhabitants have appeared to me to be doing penance in a thousand remarkable ways. Henry David Thoreau penance office way Open all your pores and bathe in all the tides of nature, in all her streams and oceans, at all seasons. Henry David Thoreau tides streams ocean To anticipate, not the sunrise and the dawn merely, but, if possible, Nature herself! How many mornings, summer and winter, before yet any neighbor was stirring about his business, have I been about mine...So many autumn, ay, and winter days, spent outside the town, trying to hear what was in the wind, to hear and carry it express! I well-nigh sunk all my capital in it, and lost my own breath into the bargain, running in the face of it. Henry David Thoreau summer running morning Many a forenoon have I stolen away, preferring to spend thus the most valued part of the day; for I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days, and spent them lavishly; nor do I regret that I did not waste more of them in the workshop or the teacher's desk. Henry David Thoreau regret summer teacher I want the flower and fruit of a man; that some fragrance be wafted over from him to me, and some ripeness flavor our intercourse. Henry David Thoreau flavor flower men Any man will go considerably out of his way to pick up a silver dollar; but here are golden words, which the wisest men of antiquity have uttered, and whose worth the wise of every succeeding age have assured us of; and yet we learn to read only as far as Easy Reading, the primers and classbooks, and when we leave school, the Little Reading, and story books, which are for boys and beginners; and our reading, our conversation and thinking, are all on a very low level, worthy only of pygmies and manikins. Henry David Thoreau reading wise book Hence it will not do for the Landlord to possess too fine a nature.... He must have no idiosyncracies, no particular bents or tendencies to this or that, but a general, uniform, and healthy development, such as his portly person indicates, offering himself equally on all sides to men. Henry David Thoreau healthy offering men
