Monastic State

Famous quotes containing the words monastic and/or state:

    I like a church; I like a cowl;
    I love a prophet of the soul;
    And on my heart monastic aisles
    Fall like sweet strains, or pensive smiles;
    Yet not for all his faith can see
    Would I that cowled churchman be.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    Some are petitioning the State to dissolve the Union, to disregard the requisitions of the President. Why do they not dissolve it themselves,—the union between themselves and the State,—and refuse to pay their quota into its treasury? Do not they stand in the same relation to the State that the State does to the Union? And have not the same reasons prevented the State from resisting the Union which have prevented them from resisting the State?
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)