Do what you know you ought to do. Why should we ever go abroad, even across the way, to ask a neighbor's… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
You ask if there is no doctrine of sorrow in my philosophy. Of acute sorrow I suppose that I know comparatively little.… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
There is a certain class of unbelievers who sometimes ask me such questions as, if I think that I can live on… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
“What other words, we may almost ask, are memorable and worthy to be repeated than those which love has inspired? It is… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
As I stand over the insect crawling amid the pine needles on the forest floor, and endeavoring to conceal itself from my… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
The woodchopper reads the wisdom of the ages recorded on the paper that holds his dinner, then lights his pipe with it.… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
Great God, I ask thee for no meaner pelf Than that I may not disappoint myself, That in my action I may… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
On the whole, my respect for my fellow-men, except as one may outweigh a million, is not being increased these days.... Such… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
You ask particularly after my health. I suppose that I have not many months to live; but, of course, I know nothing… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
When I hear a grown man or woman say, "Once I had faith in men, now I have not," I am inclined… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
If the tax-gatherer, or any other public officer, asks me, as one has done, "But what shall I do?" my answer is,… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so. Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
The Friend asks no return but that his Friend will religiously accept and wear and not disgrace his apotheosis of him. They… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
As for my own business, even that kind of surveying which I could do with most satisfaction my employers do not want.… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
Insane!... Ask the tyrant who is his most dangerous foe, the sane man or the insane? — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
The mason asks but a narrow shelf to spring his brick from; man requires only an infinitely narrower one to spring his… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
To speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government,… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
When you travel to the Celestial City, carry no letter of introduction. When you knock, ask to see God,--none of the servants. — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
If ever I did a man any goodof course it was something exceptional and insignificant compared with the good or evil which I am… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end. — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
“Men say they know many things; But lo! they have taken wings, — The arts and sciences, And a thousand appliances; The wind that… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
“All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or back gammon, with a slight moral tinge to it, a playing with right and… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
“This spending of the best part of one's life earning money in order to enjoy a questionable liberty during the least valuable part of… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
As for doing good; that is one of the professions which is full. Moreover I have tried it fairly and, strange as it may… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
A traveler who looks at things with an impartial eye may see what the oldest inhabitant has not observed. — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
In proportion as our inward life fails, we go more constantly and desperately to the post office. You may depend on it, that the… — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society. — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
The still youthful energies of the globe have only to be directed in their proper channel. — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image
Concord's little arch does not span all our fate, nor is what transpires under it law for the universe. — Henry David Thoreau Copy Share Image