Henry David Thoreau Quotations: THOUGHTS & OPINIONS
The penny-post is, commonly, an institution through which you seriously offer a man that penny for his thoughts which is so often safely offered in jest. And I am sure that I never read any memorable news in a newspaper.—Walden
The philanthropist too often surrounds mankind with the remembrance of his own castoff griefs as an atmosphere, and calls it sympathy.—Walden
The prospect of the young is forward and unbounded, mingling the future with the present. In the declining day the thoughts make haste to rest in darkness, and hardly look forward to the ensuing morning. The thoughts of the old prepare for night and slumber. The same hopes and prospects are not for him who stands upon the rosy mountain-tops of life, and him who expects the setting of his earthly day.—A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
The social condition of genius is the same in all ages. Aeschylus was undoubtedly alone and without sympathy in his simple reverence for the mystery of the universe.—Journal, 29 January 1840
The true student will cleave ever to the good, recognizing no Past, no Present; but wherever he emerges from the bosom of time, his course is not with the sun,—eastward or westward,—but ever towards the seashore.—Journal, 15 February 1838
The vast machine may indeed roll over our toes, and we not know it, but it would rebound and be staved to pieces like an empty barrel, if it should strike fair and square on the smallest and least angular of a man's thoughts.—Thoreau to H.G.O. Blake, 26 September 1859
There are enough who will flatter me with sweet words, and anon use bitter ones to balance them, but they are not my friends. Simple sincerity and truth are rare indeed.—Journal, 9 September 1852
There are few men who do not love better to give advise than to give assistance.—Journal, 4 June 1850
There are very few whose opinion I value.—Thoreau to George Augustus Thatcher, 26 December 1848
There is a stronger desire to be respectable to one's neighbors than to one's self.—Journal, 1845-1846
