Tag: Henry David Thoreau

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

I have never found a companion that was so companionable as solitude. We are for the most part more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our chambers. A man thinking or working is always alone, let him be where he will.

All men are children, and of one family. The same tale sends them all to bed, and wakes them in the morning.

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.

Every creature is better alive than dead, men and moose and pine trees, and he who understands it aright will rather preserve its life than destroy it.

Men are born to succeed, not to fail.

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation.