Quotes by Henry David Thoreau

It is never too late to give up our prejudices.
'Economy,' Walden, 1854

He enjoys true leisure who has time to improve his soul's estate.
Journal, February 11, 1840

Man is the artificer of his own happiness.
Journal, January 21, 1838

There is no remedy for love but to love more.
Journal, July 25, 1839

Every man is the builder of a temple called his body.
O Magazine, May 2004

Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes.
Walden

Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end.
Walden

When we are unhurried and wise, we perceive that only great and worthy things have any permanent and absolute existence, that petty fears and petty pleasures are but the shadow of the reality.
Walden

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.
Walden (1854)

Things do not change; we change.
Walden (1970)

I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes.
Walden, 1854

It is an interesting question how far men would retain their relative rank if they were divested of their clothes.
Walden, 1854

The finest qualities of our nature, like the bloom on fruits, can be preserved only by the most delicate handling. Yet we do not treat ourselves nor one another thus tenderly.
Walden, Chapter 1: Economy

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.
Walden, Conclusion, 1854

Our houses are such unwieldy property that we are often imprisoned rather than housed in them.
Walden: Economy, 1854

Goodness is the only investment that never fails.
Walden: Higher Laws, 1854

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.
Walden: Reading, 1854