Henry David Thoreau

Through want of enterprise and faith men are where they are, buying and selling, and spending their lives like serfs.

You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.

There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.

I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew as well.

A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the masses of men.

Men will lie on their backs, talking about the fall of man, and never make an effort to get up.

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him keep step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book!

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

I have found repeatedly, of late years, that I cannot fish without falling a little in self respect.

The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought, and attended to my answer.

I would rather sit on a pumpkin, and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion.

Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.

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

Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.