I was always embarrassed by the words sacred, glorious and sacrifice and the expression in vain. We had heard them, sometimes stan...ding in the rain almost out of earshot, so that only the shouted words came through, and had read them, on proclamations that were slapped up by billposters over other proclamations, now for a long time, and I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were like the stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat except to bury it.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Walden is melting apace. There is a canal two rods wide along the northerly and westerly sides, and wider still the east end. A gr...eat field of ice has cracked off from the main body. I hear a song sparrow singing from the bushes on the shore,--olit, olit, olit,--chip, chip, chip, che char,--che wiss, wiss, wiss. He too is helping to crack it. How handsome the great sweeping curves in the edge of the ice, answering somewhat to those of the shore, but more regular! It is unusually hard, owing to the recent severe but transient cold, and all watered or waved like a palace floor. But the wind slides eastward over its opaque surface in vain, till it reaches the living surface beyond. It is glorious to behold this ribbon of water sparkling in the sun, the bare face of the pond full of glee and youth, as if it spoke the joy of the fishes within it, and of the sands on its shore,--a silvery sheen as from the scales of a leuciscus, as it were all one active fish. Such is the contrast between winter and spring. Walden is dead and is alive again. But this spring it broke up more steadily, as I have said.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
He who is usually self-sufficient becomes exceptionally vain and keenly alive to fame and praise when he is physically ill. The mo...re he loses himself the more he has to endeavor to regain his position by means of the opinion of others.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
In the mountains of truth you will never climb in vain: either you will already get further up today or you will exercise your str...ength so that you can climb higher tomorrow.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Full many a glorious morning have I seen Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye,... Kissing with golden face the meadows green, Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy;LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Romeo. Peace, peace, Mercutio, peace! Thou talk'st of nothing.... Mercutio. True, I talk of dreams, Which are the children of an idle brain, Begot of nothing but vain fantasy, Which is as thin of substance as the air, And more inconstant than the wind.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Most glorious Lord of life! that, on this day, Didst make thy triumph over death and sin;... And, having harrowed hell, didst bring away Captivity thence captive, us to win:LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I am a parcel of vain strivings tied By a chance bond together,... Dangling this way and that, their links Were made so loose and wide, Methinks, For milder weather.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »