Henry David Thoreau Quotations: Sun, Moon, & Stars
Morning brings back the heroic ages. I was as much affected by the faint hum of a mosquito making its invisible and unimaginable tour through my apartment at earliest dawn, when I was sitting with door and windows open, as I could be by any trumpet that ever sang of fame. It was Homer’s requiem; itself an Iliad and Odyssey in the air, singing its own wrath and wanderings. There was something cosmical about it; a standing advertisement, till forbidden, of the everlasting vigor and fertility of the world.—Walden
Most events recorded in history are more remarkable than important, like eclipses of the sun and moon, by which all are attracted, but whose effects no one takes the trouble to calculate.—A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
[N]o storms, no dust can dim its surface ever fresh;—a mirror in which all impurity presented to it sinks, swept and dusted by the sun's hazy brush,—this the light-dust cloth,—which retains no breath that is breathed on it, but sends its own to float as clouds high above its surface, and be reflected in its bosom still.—Walden
Of what significance the light of day, if it is not the reflection of an inward dawn?—to what purpose is the veil of night withdrawn, if the morning reveals nothing to the soul?—"Night and Moonlight"
Only the spring sun will soften the heart of this restless monster, when, commonly, it is too late.—Journal, 11 February 1859
The focus of their reflected color is in the atmosphere far on this side. Every such tree becomes a nucleus of red, as it were, where, with the declining sun, that color grows and glows. It is partly borrowed fire, gathering strength from the sun on its way to your eye.—"Autumnal Tints"
The ground under the snow has long since felt the influence of the spring sun, whose rays fall at a more favorable angle.—Journal, 28 March 1856
The light of the sun is but the shadow of love.—"Paradise (to be) Regained"
The most beautiful thing in Nature is the sun reflected from a tear-ful cloud.—Journal, 7 September 1851
The stars are the mountain peaks of celestial countries.—Journal, 2 February 1841
