Henry David Thoreau Quotes About Imagination

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  It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Inspirational, Motivational, Positive

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Quotable Thoreau: An A to Z Glossary of Inspiring Quotations from Henry David Thoreau”, p.87, BookBaby

• Dwell as near as possible to the channel in which your life flows.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Life, Peace, Teaching

  Henry David Thoreau, Jeffrey S. Cramer (2007). “I to Myself: An Annotated Selection from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau”, p.182, Yale University Press

• This world is but a canvas to our imagination.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Inspirational, Life, Inspiring

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.208, Xist Publishing

• If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined...

  Henry David Thoreau

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

  "Walden". Book by Henry David Thoreau, 1854.

• It is the marriage of the soul with nature that makes the intellect fruitful, and gives birth to imagination

  Henry David Thoreau

  Marriage, Nature, Creativity

  Henry David Thoreau (1999). “Material Faith: Thoreau on Science”, p.27, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

• If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

  Walden ch. 18 (1854)

• Friendship is never established as an understood relation. It is a miracle which requires constant proofs. It is an exercise of the purest imagination and of the rarest faith!

  Henry David Thoreau

  Friendship, Exercise, Imagination

  Henry David Thoreau (2006). “Thoreau and the Art of Life: Precepts and Principles”, p.9, Heron Dance Press

• I have heard of a man lost in the woods and dying of famine and exhaustion at the foot of a tree, whose loneliness was relieved by the grotesque visions with which, owing to bodily weakness, his diseased imagination surrounded him, and which he believed to be real. So also, owing to bodily and mental health and strength, we may be continually cheered by a like but more normal and natural society, and come to know that we are never alone.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Real, Loneliness, Men

  Henry David Thoreau (2012). “Walden; Or, Life in the Woods”, p.89, Courier Corporation

• A thrumming of piano-strings beyond the gardens and through the elms. At length the melody steals into my being. I know not when it began to occupy me. By some fortunate coincidence of thought or circumstance I am attuned to the universe, I am fitted to hear, my being moves in a sphere of melody, my fancy and imagination are excited to an inconceivable degree. This is no longer the dull earth on which I stood.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Music, Moving, Garden

  Henry David Thoreau (1960). “H. D. Thoreau, a Writer's Journal”, p.91, Courier Corporation

• However intense my experience, I am conscious of the presence and criticism of a part of me, which, as it were, is not a part of me, but a spectator, sharing no experience, but taking note of it, and that is no more I than it is you. When the lay, it may be the tragedy, of life is over, the spectator goes his way. It was a kind of fiction, a work of the imagination only, so far as he was concerned.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Life, Imagination, Criticism

• The imagination, give it the least license, dives deeper and soars higher than Nature goes.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Art, Giving, Imagination

  Henry David Thoreau (2009). “Walden”, p.186, Cosimo, Inc.

• It is usually the imagination that is wounded first, rather than the heart; it being much more sensitive.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Anger, Heart, Imagination

  Henry David Thoreau (2006). “Thoreau and the Art of Life: Precepts and Principles”, p.9, Heron Dance Press

• Generally speaking, a howling wilderness does not howl: it is the imagination of the traveler that does the howling.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Nature, Imagination, Doe

  Henry David Thoreau (2014). “The Maine Woods”, p.93, Graphic Arts Books

• The universe constantly and obediently answers to our conceptions; whether we travel fast or slow, the track is laid for us. Let us spend our lives in conceiving then. The poet or the artist never yet had so fair and noble a design but some of his posterity at least could accomplish it.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Artist, Imagination, Track

  Henry David Thoreau (1882). “Walden”, p.153

• Some simple dishes recommend themselves to our imaginations as well as palates.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Simple, Imagination, Simplicity

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.179, Courier Corporation

• The intellect of most men is barren. They neither fertilize or are fertilized. It is the marriage of the soul with nature that makes the intellect fruitful, that gives birth to imagination...without nature-awakened imagination most persons do not really live in the world, they merely pass through it as they live dull lives of quiet desperation.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Gratitude, Men, Dull Life

• An island always pleases my imagination, even the smallest, as a small continent and integral portion of the globe. I have a fancyfor building my hut on one. Even a bare, grassy isle, which I can see entirely over at a glance, has some undefined and mysterious charm for me.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Islands, Imagination, Mysterious

  Henry David Thoreau (2014). “The Illustrated "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers"”, p.243, Princeton University Press

• The gross feeder is a man in the larva state; and there are whole nations in that condition, nations without fancy or imagination,whose vast abdomens betray them.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Men, Imagination, Fancy

  Henry David Thoreau (2015). “Walden”, p.182, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

• In love and friendship the imagination is as much exercised as the heart; and if either is outraged the other will be estranged. It is commonly the imagination which is wounded first, rather than the heart,--it is so much the more sensitive.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Friendship, Heart, Imagination

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1138, Delphi Classics

• The most stupendous scenery ceases to be sublime when it becomes distinct, or in other words limited, and the imagination is no longer encouraged to exaggerate it. The actual height and breadth of a mountain or a waterfall are always ridiculously small; they are the imagined only that content us.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Imagination, Sublime, Mountain

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.136, Xist Publishing

• When we come down into the distant village, visible from the mountain-top, the nobler inhabitants with whom we peopled it have departed, and left only vermin in its desolate streets. It is the imagination of poets which puts those brave speeches into the mouths of their heroes.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Truth, Hero, Imagination

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.282, Delphi Classics

• As we looked up in silence to those distant lights, we were reminded that it was a rare imagination which first taught that the stars are worlds, and had conferred a great benefit on mankind.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Stars, Light, Imagination

  Henry David Thoreau (1873). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.412

• We can conceive of nothing more fair than something which we have experienced.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Imagination, Experience, Fairs

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.269, Xist Publishing

• Comparatively, we can excuse any offense against the heart, but not against the imagination. The imagination knows--nothing escapes its glance from out its eyry--and it controls the breast.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Heart, Imagination, Excuse

  Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.159, Jazzybee Verlag

• Our bread need not ever be sour or hard to digest. What Nature is to the mind she is also to the body. As she feeds my imagination, she will feed my body; for what she says she means, and is ready to do. She is not simply beautiful to the poet's eye. Not only the rainbow and sunset are beautiful, but to be fed and clothed, sheltered and warmed aright, are equally beautiful and inspiring. There is not necessarily any gross and ugly fact which may not be eradicated from the life of man.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Beautiful, Nature, Mean

  Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Familiar Letters (Annotated Edition)”, p.132, Jazzybee Verlag

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