There is always a present and extant life, be it better or worse, which all combine to uphold. – Henry David Thoreau
Nature and human life are as various as our several constitutions. Who shall say what prospect life offers to another? – Henry David Thoreau
Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence. – Henry David Thoreau
There are old heads in the world who cannot help me by their example or advice to live worthily and satisfactorily to myself; but I believe that it is in my power to elevate myself this very hour above the common level of my life. – Henry David Thoreau
If an injustice requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the government machine. – 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
There is no more fatal blunderer than he who consumes the greater part of his life getting his living. – Henry David Thoreau
Friends… they cherish one another’s hopes. They are kind to one another’s dreams. – Henry David Thoreau
A broad margin of leisure is as beautiful in a man’s life as in a book. Haste makes waste, no less in life than in housekeeping. Keep the time, observe the hours of the universe, not of the cars. – Henry David Thoreau
Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind. – Henry David Thoreau
I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. – Henry David Thoreau
True friendship can afford true knowledge. It does not depend on darkness and ignorance. – Henry David Thoreau
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. – Henry David Thoreau