The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.

Most people dread finding out when they come to die that they have never really lived.

I quietly declare war with the State, after my fashion, though I will still make use and get advantage of her as I can, as is usual in such cases.

That so many are ready to live by luck, and so get the means of commanding the labor of others less lucky, without contributing any value to society! And that is called enterprise! I know of no more startling development of the immorality of trade, and all the common modes of getting a living.

Give me a Wildness whose glance no civilization can endure.

It is in vain to dream of a wildness distant from ourselves. There is none such. It is the bog in our brains and bowels, the primitive vigor of Nature in us, that inspires that dream. I shall never find in the wilds of Labrador a greater wildness than in some recess of Concord.

Where shall we look for standard English, but to the words of a standard man?