Henry David Thoreau Quotations: Beauty
The beauty of the earth answers exactly to your demand and appreciation.—Journal, 2 November 1858
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 forest looked like a firm grass sward, and the effect of these lakes in its midst has been well compared, by one who has since visited this same spot, to that of a "mirror broken into a thousand fragments, and wildly scattered over the grass, reflecting the full blaze of the sun."—The Maine Woods
The land seemed to grow fairer as we withdrew from it.—A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
The mind that perceives clearly any natural beauty is in that instant withdrawn from human society. My desire for society is infinitely increased—my fitness for any actual society is diminished.—Journal, 26 July 1852
The most beautiful thing in Nature is the sun reflected from a tear-ful cloud.—Journal, 7 September 1851
The Scarlet Oak asks a clear sky and the brightness of late October days. These bring out its colors.—"Autumnal Tints"
The trees now in the rain look heavy and rich all day, as commonly at twilight, drooping with the weight of wet leaves.—Journal, 17 July 1852
There is a certain glory attends on water by night. By it the heavens are related to the earth—Undistinguishable from a sky beneath you.—Journal, 13 June 1851
There was a remarkable sunset, I think the 25th of October. The sunset sky reached quite from west to east, and it was the most varied in its forms and colors of any that I remember to have seen.—Journal, 12 November 1859
