Cast your whole vote, not a piece of paper merely, but your whole influence. A minority is powerless when it conforms to a majority; but is irresistable when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose.
Henry David ThoreauFor a man to act himself, he must be perfectly free; otherwise he is in danger of losing all sense of responsibility or of self- respect.
Henry David ThoreauWhat is most striking in the Maine wilderness is the continuousness of the forest, with fewer open intervals or glades than you had imagined. Except the few burnt lands, the narrow intervals on the rivers, the bare tops of the high mountains, and the lakes and streams, the forest is uninterrupted.
Henry David ThoreauLaw never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the agents of injustice.
Henry David ThoreauLate in the afternoon we passed a man on the shore fishing with a long birch pole.... The characteristics and pursuits of various ages and races of men are always existing in epitome in every neighborhood. The pleasures of my earliest youth have become the inheritance of other men. This man is still a fisher, and belongs to an era in which I myself have lived.
Henry David Thoreau