There are other letters for the child to learn than…

There are other letters for the child to learn than those which Cadmus invented.

Sourced, Walking
(1862)

Other Henry David Thoreau Quotes

As for my own business, even that kind of surveying which I could do with most satisfaction my employers do not want. They would prefer that I should do my work coarsely and not too well, ay, not well enough. When I observe that there are different ways of surveying, my employer commonly asks which will give him the most land, not which is most correct. - View Quote Details on As for my own business, even that kind of surveying…
In our science and philosophy, even, there is commonly no true and absolute account of things. The spirit of sect and bigotry has planted its hoof amid the stars. You have only to discuss the problem, whether the stars are inhabited or not, in order to discover it. - View Quote Details on In our science and philosophy, even, there is commonly no…
It is a great art to saunter. - View Quote Details on It is a great art to saunter.
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 action of masses of men. When the majority shall at length vote for the abolition of slavery, it will be because they are indifferent to slavery, or because there is but little slavery left to be abolished by their vote. They will then be the only slaves. Only his vote can hasten the abolition of slavery who asserts his own freedom by his vote. - View Quote Details on A wise man will not leave the right to the…
There are various, nay, incredible faiths; why should we be alarmed at any of them? What man believes, God believes. - View Quote Details on There are various, nay, incredible faiths; why should we be…
Man flows at once to God when the channel of purity is open. - View Quote Details on Man flows at once to God when the channel of…
A very few, as heroes, patriots, martyrs, reformers in the great sense, and men, serve the State with their consciences also, and so necessarily resist it for the most part; and they are commonly treated by it as enemies. - View Quote Details on A very few, as heroes, patriots, martyrs, reformers in the…
He is a singular character — a young man with much of wild original nature still remaining in him; and so far as he is sophisticated, it is in a way and method of his own. He is as ugly as sin, long-nosed, queer-mouthed, and with uncouth and rustic, though courteous manners, corresponding very well with such an exterior. But his ugliness is of an honest and agreeable fashion, and becomes him much better than beauty. He was educated, I believe, at Cambridge, and formerly kept school in this town; but for two or three years back, he has repudiated all regular modes of getting a living, and seems inclined to lead a sort of Indian life among civilized men — an Indian life, I mean, as respects the absence of any systematic effort for a livelihood…. Mr. Thoreau is a keen and delicate observer of nature — a genuine observer — which, I suspect, is almost as rare a character as even an original poet; and Nature, in return for his love, seems to adopt him as her especial child, and shows him secrets which few others are allowed to witness. - View Quote Details on He is a singular character — a young man with…
And now, at half-past ten o’clock, I hear the cockerels crow in Hubbard’s barns, and morning is already anticipated. It is the feathered, wakeful thought in us that anticipates the following day. - View Quote Details on And now, at half-past ten o’clock, I hear the cockerels…
My life is like a stroll upon the beach,
As near the ocean’s edge as I can go. - View Quote Details on My life is like a stroll upon the beach,
As…