We have tried so hard to adulterate our hearts, and have so greatly abused the microscope to study the hideous excrescences and sh...ameful warts which cover them and which we take pleasure in magnifying, that it is impossible for us to speak the language of other men.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
In the winter of '46-7 there came a hundred men of Hyperborean extraction swoop down on to our pond one morning, with many carload...s of ungainly-looking farming tools.... I did not know whether they had come to sow a crop of winter rye, or some other kind of grain recently introduced from Iceland. As I saw no manure, I judged that they meant to skim the land, as I had done, thinking the soil was deep and had lain fallow long enough. They said that a gentleman farmer, who was behind the scenes, wanted to double his money, which, as I understood, amounted to half a million already; but in order to cover each one of his dollars with another, he took off the only coat, ay, the skin itself, of Walden Pond in the midst of a hard winter.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
When I had youth I had no money; now I have the money I have no time; and when I get the time, if I ever do, I shall have no healt...h to enjoy life. I suppose it's the discipline I need; but it's rather hard to love the things I do, and see them go by because duty chains me to my galley. If I ever come into port with all sails set, that will be my reward perhaps.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Though Americans talk a good deal about the virtue of being serious, they generally prefer people who are solemn over people who a...re serious. In politics, the rare candidate who is serious, like Adlai Stevenson, is easily overwhelmed by one who is solemn, like General Eisenhower. This is probably because it is hard for most people to recognize seriousness, which is rare, especially in politics, but comfortable to endorse solemnity, which is as commonplace as jogging.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken, I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children,... And it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
America is hard to see. Less partial witnesses than he... In book on book have testified They could not see it from outside....LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The WORD was that Hard Rock wasn't a mean nigger Anymore, that the doctors had bored a hole in his head,... Cut out part of his brain, and shot electricity Through the rest.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »