Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau (July 12, 1817 – May 6, 1862) was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist. He is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay Civil Disobedience, an argument for individual resistance to civil government in moral opposition to an unjust state.
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“I came to love my rows, my beans, though so many more than I wanted. They attached me to the earth, and so I got strength like Antæus. But why should I raise them? Only Heaven knows.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The mass never comes up to the standard of its best member, but on the contrary degrades itself to a level with the lowest.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“This man was very clever and quick to learn anything in his line. Our tent was of a kind new to him; but when he had once seen it pitched, it was surprising how quickly he would find and prepare the pole and forked stakes to pitch it with, cutting and placing them right the first time, though I am sure that the majority of white men would have blundered several times.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It is not so important that many should be good as you, as that there be some absolute goodness somewhere; for that will leaven the whole lump.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Farmers are respectable and interesting to me in proportion as they are poor,—poor farmers.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)