A traveler who looks at things with an impartial eye may see what the oldest inhabitant has not observed.

For the most part, we are not where we are, but in a false position. Through an infirmity of our natures, we suppose a case, and put ourselves into it, and hence are in two cases at the same time, and it is doubly difficult to get out.

I find it wholesome to be alone the greater part of the time. To be in company, even with the best, is soon wearisome and dissipating. I love to be alone. I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.

It is not in vain that man speaks to man. This is the value of literature.

The lichen on the rocks is a rude and simple shield which beginning and imperfect Nature suspended there. Still hangs her wrinkledtrophy.

Cold and hunger seem more friendly to my nature than those methods which men have adopted and advise to ward them off.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately.