A sentence should be read as if its author, had he held a plow instead of a pen, could have drawn a furrow deep and straight to the end.

— Henry David Thoreau

As for Doing-good... I have tried it fairly, and, strange as it may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my constitution.

— Henry David Thoreau

As for Doing-good, that is one of the professions which are full. Moreover, I have tried it fairly, and, strange as it may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my constitution. Probably I should not consciously and deliberately forsake my particular calling to do the good which society demands FFME, to save the universe from annihilation; and I believe that a like but infinitely greater steadfastness elsewhere is all that now preserve sit.

— Henry David Thoreau

As for style of writing if one has anything to say it drops from him simply and directly as a stone falls to the ground.

— Henry David Thoreau

As if you could kill time without injuring eternity.

— Henry David Thoreau

As in geology, so in social institutions, we may discover the causes of all past changes in the present invariable order of society.

— Henry David Thoreau

A single gentle rain makes the grass many shades greener. So our prospects brighten on the influx of better thoughts. We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us, like the grass which confesses the influence of the slightest dew that falls on it; and did not spend our time in atoning for the neglect of past opportunities, which we call doing our duty. We loiter in winter while it is already spring.

— Henry David Thoreau

A single gentle rain makes the grass many shades greener. So our prospects brighten on the influx of better thoughts. We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us, like the grass which confesses the influence of the slightest dew that falls on it; and did not spend our time in atoning for the neglect of past opportunities, which we call doing our duty. We loiter in winter while it is already spring. In a pleasant spring morning all men's sins are forgiven. Such a day is a truce to vice.

— Henry David Thoreau

As some heads cannot carry much wine, so it would seem that I cannot bear so much society as you can. I have an immense appetite for solitude, like an infant for sleep, and if I don’t get enough of it this year I shall cry all the next.

— Henry David Thoreau

As the sun went down, I saw a solitary boatman disporting on the smooth lake. The falling dews seemed to strain and purify the air, and I was soothed with an infinite stillness. I got the world, as it were, by the nape of the neck, and held it under in the tide of its own events, till it was drowned, and then I let it go down stream like a dead dog. Vast hollow chambers of silence stretched away on every side, and my being expanded in proportion, and filled them. Then first could I appreciate sound, and find it musical.

— Henry David Thoreau