Quotes from book
Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle
Henry David Thoreau

Life Without Principle is an essay by Henry David Thoreau that offers his program for a righteous livelihood. It was published in 1863.

Henry David Thoreau photo

“I find it so difficult to dispose of the few facts which to me are significant, that I hesitate to burden my attention with those which are insignificant, which only a divine mind could illustrate. Such is, for the most part, the news in newspapers and conversation. It is important to preserve the mind's chastity in this respect.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)
Context: Not without a slight shudder at the danger, I often perceive how near I had come to admitting into my mind the details of some trivial affair, — the news of the street; and I am astonished to observe how willing men are to lumber their minds with such rubbish, — to permit idle rumors and incidents of the most insignificant kind to intrude on ground which should be sacred to thought. Shall the mind be a public arena, where the affairs of the street and the gossip of the tea-table chiefly are discussed? Or shall it be a quarter of heaven itself, — an hypæthral temple, consecrated to the service of the gods? I find it so difficult to dispose of the few facts which to me are significant, that I hesitate to burden my attention with those which are insignificant, which only a divine mind could illustrate. Such is, for the most part, the news in newspapers and conversation. It is important to preserve the mind's chastity in this respect.

Henry David Thoreau photo

“Of what significance the things you can forget? A little thought is sexton to all the world.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)

Henry David Thoreau photo

“It requires more than a day's devotion to know and to possess the wealth of a day.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)
Context: I do not know but it is too much to read one newspaper a week. I have tried it recently, and for so long it seems to me that I have not dwelt in my native region. The sun, the clouds, the snow, the trees say not so much to me. You cannot serve two masters. It requires more than a day's devotion to know and to possess the wealth of a day.

Henry David Thoreau photo

“An efficient and valuable man does what he can, whether the community pay him for it or not.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)
Context: The community has no bribe that will tempt a wise man. You may raise money enough to tunnel a mountain, but you cannot raise money enough to hire a man who is minding his own business. An efficient and valuable man does what he can, whether the community pay him for it or not. The inefficient offer their inefficiency to the highest bidder, and are forever expecting to be put into office. One would suppose that they were rarely disappointed.

Henry David Thoreau photo

“We do not live for idle amusement. I would not run round a corner to see the world blow up.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)

Henry David Thoreau photo

“They are infra-human, a kind of vegetation.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)
Context: Those things which now most engage the attention of men, as politics and the daily routine, are, it is true, vital functions of human society, but should be unconsciously performed, like the corresponding functions of the physical body. They are infra-human, a kind of vegetation. I sometimes awake to a half-consciousness of them going on about me, as a man may become conscious of some of the processes of digestion in a morbid state, and so have the dyspepsia, as it is called.

Henry David Thoreau photo

“The ways by which you may get money almost without exception lead downward. To have done anything by which you earned money merely is to have been truly idle or worse. If the laborer gets no more than the wages which his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats himself.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Life Without Principle (1863)