Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) | by Linux fortune |
It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts. Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour. -- Henry David Thoreau, "Where I Live" | |
To be awake is to be alive. -- Henry David Thoreau, in "Walden" | |
That government is best which governs least. -- Henry David Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience" | |
The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
What does education often do? It makes a straight cut ditch of a free meandering brook. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
I do not know where to find in any literature, whether ancient or modern, any adequate account of that nature with which I am acquainted. Mythology comes nearest to it of any. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
Do not despair of life. You have no doubt force enough to overcome your obstacles. Think of the fox prowling through wood and field in a winter night for something to satisfy his hunger. Notwithstanding cold and hounds and traps, his race survives. I do not believe any of them ever committed suicide. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes. -- Henry David Thoreau | |
Lo! Men have become the tool of their tools. -- Henry David Thoreau |