Henry David Thoreau Quotes About Manners

• Nations are possessed with an insane ambition to perpetuate the memory of themselves by the amount of hammered stone they leave. What if equal pains were taken to smooth and polish their manners?

  Henry David Thoreau

  Pain, Memories, Taken

  Henry David Thoreau (1882). “Walden”, p.92

• Our manners have been corrupted by communication with the saints.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Communication, Atheism, Saint

  Henry David Thoreau (2004). “Walden: 150th Anniversary Illustrated Edition of the American Classic”, p.75, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

• I often accuse my finest acquaintances of an immense frivolity; for, while there are manners and compliments we do not meet, we donot teach one another the lessons of honesty and sincerity that the brutes do, or of steadiness and solidity that the rocks do. The fault is commonly mutual; however, for we do not habitually demand any more of each other.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Friendship, Honesty, Character

• The man who thrusts his manners upon me does as if he were to insist on introducing me to his cabinet of curiosities, when I wished to see himself.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Men, Curiosity, Cabinets

  Henry David Thoreau (2012). “Civil Disobedience and Other Essays”, p.88, Courier Corporation

• A true politeness does not result from any hasty and artificial polishing, it is true, but grows naturally in characters of the right grain and quality, through a long fronting of men and events, and rubbing on good and bad fortune.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Integrity, Character, Men

  Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.105, Penguin

• So is the English Parliament provincial. Mere country bumpkins, they betray themselves, when any more important question arises for them to settle, the Irish question, for instance,--the English question why did I not say? Their natures are subdued to what they work in. Their "good breeding" respects only secondary objects.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Country, Important, Settling

  Henry David Thoreau (2014). “Citizen Thoreau: Walden, Civil Disobedience, Life Without Principle, Slavery in Massachusetts, A Plea for Captain John Brown”, p.224, Graphic Arts Books

• There may be an excess of cultivation as well as of anything else, until civilization becomes pathetic. A highly cultivated man,--all whose bones can be bent! whose heaven-born virtues are but good manners!

  Henry David Thoreau

  Men, Civilization, Heaven

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.39, Xist Publishing

• One man lies in his words, and gets a bad reputation; another in his manners, and enjoys a good one.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Lying, Men, Reputation

  Henry David Thoreau, John C. Broderick, Robert Sattelmeyer (1981). “Journal”, p.145, Princeton University Press

• My neighbors tell me of their adventures with famous gentlemen and ladies, what notabilities they met at the dinner-table; but I am no more interested in such things than in the contents of the Daily Times. The interest and the conversation are about costume and manners chiefly; but a goose is a goose still, dress it as you will.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Adventure, Gossip, Gentleman

  Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.333, Penguin

• For a companion, I require one who will make an equal demand on me with my own genius. Such a one will always be rightly tolerant.It is suicide, and corrupts good manners, to welcome any less than this. I value and trust those who love and praise my aspiration rather than my performance. If you would not stop to look at me, but look whither I am looking, and farther, then my education could not dispense with your company.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Friendship, Suicide, Ambition

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.212, Delphi Classics

• We sometimes meet uncivil men, children of Amazons, who dwell by mountain paths, and are said to be inhospitable to strangers; whose salutation is as rude as the grasp of their brawny hands, and who deal with men as unceremoniously as they are wont to deal with the elements. They need only extend their clearings, and let in more sunlight, to seek out the southern slopes of the hills, from which they may look down on the civil plain or ocean, and temper their diet duly with the cereal fruits, consuming less wild meat and acorns, to become like the inhabitants of cities.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Children, Ocean, Men

  Henry David Thoreau (1862). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers. By Henry D. Thoreau”, p.211

• Much of our poetry has the very best manners, but no character.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Character, Poetry, Style

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.279, Delphi Classics

• The finest manners in the world are awkwardness and fatuity when contrasted with a finer intelligence. They appear but as the fashions of past days,--mere courtliness, knee-buckles and small- clothes, out of date.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Fashion, Past, Clothes

  Henry David Thoreau (1992). “The Essays of Henry David Thoreau”, p.87, Rowman & Littlefield

• We should never stand upon ceremony with sincerity. We should never cheat and insult and banish one another by our meanness, if there were present the kernel of worth and friendliness. We should not meet thus in haste.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Friendship, Haste, Insult

  Henry David Thoreau (2012). “The Portable Thoreau”, p.243, Penguin

• There is reason in the distinction of civil and uncivil. The manners are sometimes so rough a rind that we doubt whether they cover any core or sap-wood at all.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Doubt, Sap, Woods

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “The Essential Thoreau”, p.584, Simon and Schuster

• Our manners have been corrupted by communication with the saints. Our hymn-books resound with a melodious cursing of God and enduring Him forever. One would say that even the prophets and redeemers had rather consoled the fears than confirmed the hopes of man. There is nowhere recorded a simple and irrepressible satisfaction with the gift of life, any memorable praise of God.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Book, Communication, Memorable

  Henry David Thoreau (2004). “Walden: 150th Anniversary Illustrated Edition of the American Classic”, p.75, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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