Explore Quotes by Henry David Thoreau

It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right.

It is not part of a true culture to tame tigers, any more than it is to make sheep ferocious.

Every generation laughs at the old fashions, but follows religiously the new.

Truths and roses have thorns about them.

Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.

A man's interest in a single bluebird is worth more than a complete but dry list of the fauna and flora of a town.

I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.

If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.

Generally speaking, a howling wilderness does not howl: it is the imagination of the traveler that does the howling.

Every people have gods to suit their circumstances.

If you can speak what you will never hear, if you can write what you will never read, you have done rare things.

It is never too late to give up our prejudices.

Thaw with her gentle persuasion is more powerful than Thor with his hammer. The one melts, the other breaks into pieces.

Money is not required to buy one necessity of the soul.

Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them at all.

After the first blush of sin comes its indifference.

What is human warfare but just this; an effort to make the laws of God and nature take sides with one party.

I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.

Nature will bear the closest inspection. She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain.

Ignorance and bungling with love are better than wisdom and skill without.

In the long run, men hit only what they aim at. Therefore, they had better aim at something high.