Henry David Thoreau Quotes

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Henry David Thoreau

Profession : Author

Birth : July 12, 1817

The most I can do for my friend is simply be his friend.

Henry David Thoreau

True friendship can afford true knowledge. It does not depend on darkness and ignorance.

Henry David Thoreau

A man cannot be said to succeed in this life who does not satisfy one friend.

Henry David Thoreau

Thank God men cannot fly, and lay waste the sky as well as the earth.

Henry David Thoreau

Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it.

Henry David Thoreau

Live your life, do your work, then take your hat.

Henry David Thoreau

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

Henry David Thoreau

To a philosopher all news, as it is called, is gossip, and they who edit and read it are old women over their tea.

Henry David Thoreau

It is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

Henry David Thoreau

All this worldly wisdom was once the unamiable heresy of some wise man.

Henry David Thoreau

Ignorance and bungling with love are better than wisdom and skill without.

Henry David Thoreau

I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.

Henry David Thoreau

In my afternoon walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations and my obligations to society.

Henry David Thoreau

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.

Henry David Thoreau

We must walk consciously only part way toward our goal, and then leap in the dark to our success.

Henry David Thoreau

Make the most of your regrets; never smother your sorrow, but tend and cherish it till it comes to have a separate and integral interest. To regret deeply is to live afresh.

Henry David Thoreau

Goodness is the only investment that never fails.

Henry David Thoreau

If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.

Henry David Thoreau

Aim above morality. Be not simply good, be good for something.

Henry David Thoreau

Men have become the tools of their tools.

Henry David Thoreau