If the single man plant himself indomitably on his instincts, and there abide, the huge world will come round to him.

And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on governments which protect it, is the want of self-reliance.

Keep cool: it will be all one a hundred years hence.

Among the multitude of scholars and authors, we feel no hallowing presence; we are sensible of a knack and skill rather than of inspiration; they have a light, and know not whence it comes, and call it their own; their talent is some exaggerated faculty, some overgrown member, so that their strength is a disease.

He decided to give up his large ambition of knowledge and action for any narrow craft or profession, aiming at a much more comprehensive calling, the art of living.

The modernness of all good books seems to give men an existence as wide as man.

Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.