Walden Quotes

Let us spend one day as deliberately as Nature, and not be thrown off the track by every nutshell and mosquito's wing that falls on the rails. (Where I Lived.22)

Most men, even in this comparatively free country, through mere ignorance and mistake, are so occupied with the factitious cares and superfluously coarse labors of life that its finer fruits cannot...

Most of the luxuries, and many of the so-called comforts of life, are not only not indispensable, but positive hinderances to the elevation of mankind. (Economy.19)

It is never too late to give up our prejudices. No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof. (Economy.10)

I had this advantage, at least, in my mode of life, over those who were obliged to look abroad for amusement, to society and the theater, that my life itself was become my amusement and never cease...

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. (Economy.9)

I sometimes wonder that we can be so frivolous, I may almost say, as to attend to the gross but somewhat foreign form of servitude called Negro Slavery, there are so many keen and subtle masters th...

[Man] has no time to be anything but a machine. (Economy.6)