None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.
Henry David ThoreauRead
I have now a library of nearly nine hundred volumes, over seven hundred of which I wrote myself.
Interpretation
Thoreau highlights the value of self-education and personal creation through writing.
In this quote, Thoreau expresses his pride in having created a vast library of his own writings, emphasizing the importance of self-education and intellectual contribution. He suggests that the act of writing not only enriches one's knowledge but also creates a legacy that reflects personal growth and exploration.
In practice
Use this quote to inspire students to engage more deeply with their own writing projects.
None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.
Through want of enterprise and faith men are where they are, buying and selling and spending their lives like servants.
An early-morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.
Have no mean hours, but be grateful for every hour, and accept what it brings. The reality will make any sincere record respectable.
As every season seems best to us in its turn, so the coming in of spring is like the creation of Cosmos out of Chaos and the realization of the Golden Age.
That grand old poem called Winter
Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.
Someday America will have its very own commercial-free TV and radio station devoted to only one thing: to teach people, in their homes, all the essentials of personal achievement.
I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy.
Even in high school, a rule that permits only one point of view to be expressed is less likely to produce correct answers than the open discussion of countervailing views.
If you really want to know about the future, don't ask a technologist, a scientist, a physicist. No! Don't ask somebody who's writing code. No, if you want to know what society's going to be like in 20 years, ask a kindergarten teacher.
We know that when people are civically engaged, when they understand what their rights are, when they understand that in a democracy you can challenge governments, you can challenge policymakers, and you can... actually shape and form future policy, I think it changes the perception that a lot of young people have about where power is.
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