The mass of men are very easily imposed on. They have their runways in which they always travel, and are sure to fall into any pit or box-trap set therein.
What great interval is there between him who is caught in Africa and made a plantation slave of in the South, and him who is caught in New England and made a Unitarian minister of?
The question is whether you can bear freedom. At present the vast majority of men, whether white or black, require the discipline of labor which enslaves them for their own good.
We have used up all our inherited freedom, like the young bird the albumen in the egg. It is not an era of repose. If we would save our lives, we must fight for them.
I would that I were worthy to be any man’s Friend.
I love my friends very much, but I find that it is of no use to go to see them. I hate them commonly when I am near them. They belie themselves and deny me continually.
The only danger in Friendship is that it will end.
There are times when we have had enough even of our Friends.
To say that a man is your Friend means commonly no more than this, that he is not your enemy.
I have never met with a friend who furnished me sea-room. I have only tacked a few times and come to anchor – not sailed – made no voyage, carried no venture.
Today you may write a chapter on the advantages of traveling, and tomorrow you may write another chapter on the advantages of not traveling.
A traveler who looks at things with an impartial eye may see what the oldest inhabitant has not observed.
The discoveries which we make abroad are special and particular; those which we make at home are general and significant. The further off, the nearer the surface. The nearer home, the deeper.
It takes a man of genius to travel in his own country, in his native village; to make any progress between his door and his gate.
There would be this advantage in traveling in your own country, even in your own neighborhood, that you would be so thoroughly prepared to understand what you saw you would make fewer traveler’s mistakes.
I want nothing new, if I can have but a tithe of the old secured to me. I will spurn all wealth beside. Think of the consummate folly of attempting to go away from here! When the constant endeavor should be to get nearer and nearer here!
You cannot hear music and noise at the same time.
If you are chosen town clerk, forsooth, you cannot go to Tierra del Fuego this summer; but you may go to the land of infernal fire nevertheless.
Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient.
The oldest, wisest politician grows not more human so, but is merely a gray wharf rat at last.