Talk of mysteries! — Think of our life in nature, — daily to be shown matter, to come in contact with it, — rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! The solid earth! The actual world! The common sense! Contact! Contact! Who are we? Where are we?

I frequently tramped eight or ten miles through the deepest snow to keep an appointment with a beechtree, or a yellow birch, or an old acquaintance among the pines.

Even the elephant carries but a small trunk on his journeys. The perfection of traveling is to travel without baggage.

I was born upon thy bank, river, My blood flows in thy stream, And thou meanderest forever, At the bottom of my dream.

Every man is the builder of a temple called his body.

Sobriety, severity, and self-respect are the foundations of all true sociality.

As for me, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are now only the subtlest imaginable essences, which would not stain the morning sky.