Our village life would stagnate if it were not for the unexplored forests and meadows that surround it. We need the tonic of wildness...
On Ponkawtasset, since, we took our way,Down this still stream we took our meadowy way,A poet wise has settled, whose fine rayDoth faintly shine on Concord's twilight day.Like those first stars, whose...
ONLY THE DAY DAWNS TO WHICH WE ARE AWAKE,IF WE ARE TO GRASP THE REALITY OF OUR LIFE WHILE WE HAVE IT,WE WILL NEED TO WAKE UP TO OUR MOMENTS,OTHERWISE,WHOLE DAYS,EVEN A WHOLE LIFE COULD SLIP BY UNNOTIC...
Not long since, a strolling Indian went to sell baskets at the house of a well-known lawyer in my neighborhood. Do you wish to buy any baskets? he asked. No, we do not want any, was the reply. What! e...
Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of the earth.
In the large towns and cities, where civilization especially prevails, the number of those who own a shelter is a very small fraction of the whole. The rest pay an annual tax for this outside garment...
In human intercourse the tragedy begins, not when there is misunderstanding about words, but when silence is not understood
If we were left solely to the wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance, uncorrected by the seasonable experience and the effectual complaints of the people, America would not long retain...
I turned my face more exclusively than ever to the woods, where I was better known.
I do not wish to flatter my townsmen, nor to be flattered by them, for that will not advance either of us.
I believe that, in this country, the press exerts a greater and a more pernicious influence than the church did in its worst period. We are not a religious people, but we are a nation of politicians.
He understood, as he would write in Walking, that the hero is commonly the simplest and obscurest of men.
Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined.
Girls and boys and young women generally seemed glad to be in the woods. They looked in the pond and at the flowers, and improved their time. Men of business, even farmers, thought only of solitude an...
Genius is not a retainer to any emperor, or is its material silver, or gold, or marble, except to a trifling extent.
De la literatura sólo nos atrae lo salvaje. El aburrimiento no es sino otro nombre para lo domesticado.
Be it life or death, we crave only reality. If we are really dying, let us hear the rattle in our throats and feel the cold in the extremities; if we are alive, let us go about our business.
As for Doing-good,that is one of the professions which are full. Moreover, I have tried itfairly, and, strange as it may seem, am satisfied that it does not agreewith my constitution. Probably I shoul...
Any man more right than his neighbors constitutes a majority of one already.
All change is a miracle to contemplate, but it is a miracle which is taking place every instant.