It was a pleasure and a privilege to walk with him [H.D. Thoreau]. He knew the country like a fox or a bird, and passed through it as freely by path….

A man of good sense but of little faith, whose compassion seemed to lead him to church as often as he went there, said to me; 'that he liked to have ….

It is always so pleasant to be generous, though very vexatious to pay debts..

What is man born for but to be a Reformer, a Remaker of what man has made? A renouncer of lies; a restorer of truth and good? Imitating that great Na….

If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the c….

In the highest civilization the book is still the highest delight..

Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss..

Is not, indeed, every man a student, and do not all things exist for the student's behoof?.

I confess myself utterly at a loss in suggesting particular reforms in our ways of teaching. No discretion that can be lodged with a school-committee….

No man can be criticised but by a greater than he. Do not, then, read the reviews..

And striving to be Man, the worm Mounts through all the spires of form..

We must set up a strong present tense against all rumors of wrath, past and to come..

Let there be worse cotton and better men..

Sleep takes off the costume of circumstance, arms us with terrible freedom, so that every will rushes to a deed..

And dazzling memory revive.Refresh the faded tints, Recut the aged prints, And write my old adventures, with the pen Which, on the first day, drew Up….

If you meet a sectary, or a hostile partisan, never recognize the dividing lines; but meet on what common ground remains,--if onlythat the sun shines….

When summer opens, I see how fast it matures, and fear it will be short; but after the heats of July and August, I am reconciled, like one who has ha….

Every ship is a romantic object, except that we sail in. Embark, and the romance quits our vessel, and hangs on every other sail in the horizon..

Speak as you think, be what you are, pay your debts of all kinds. I prefer to be owned as sound and solvent, and my word as good as my bond, and to b….

it in every fair face, every fair sky, every fair flower..

It seems as if the day was not wholly profane in which we have given heed to some natural object..