I keep a mountain anchored off eastward a little way, which I ascend in my dreams both awake and asleep. Its broad base spreads over a village or two, which does not know it; neither does it know them, nor do I when I ascend it. I can see its general outline as plainly now in my mind as that of Wachusett. I do not invent in the least, but state exactly what I see. I find that I go up it when I am light-footed and earnest. It ever smokes like an altar with its sacrifice. I am not aware that a single villager frequents it or knows of it. I keep this mountain to ride instead of a horse.

Politics is the gizzard of society, full of grit and gravel, and the two political parties are its opposite halves - sometimes split into quarters - which grind on each other. Not only individuals but states have thus a confirmed dyspepsia.

The mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies.

I am awaked almost every night by the panting of the locomotive. It interrupts my dreams. There is no sabbath.

It is not worth the while to let our imperfections disturb us always. The conscience really does not, and ought not to monopolizethe whole of our lives, any more than the heart or the head. It is as liable to disease as any other part.

All perception of truth is the detection of an analogy.

Perfect sincerity and transparency make a great part of beauty, as in dewdrops, lakes, and diamonds.