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"Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right."
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"The widespread assumption that ethical behavior takes the fun out of life is false. In actuality, living ethically ensures that relationships in our lives, including encounters with strangers, nurture our spiritual growth."
"I've never seen exquisite fallen beings, and I never shall see them, but such creatures as that painted Frenchwoman at the counter with the ringlets are vermin to my mind, and all fallen women are the same.' 'But the Magdalen?' 'Ah, drop that! Christ would never have said those words if He had known how they would be abused. Of all the Gospel those words are the only ones remembered."
"It isn't a natural thing to keep on worrying about the morality of one's material prosperity. These are proclivities superinduced by modern conditions of the conscience. There is a natural resistance in every healthy human being to such distressful heart-searchings."
"The task of the moral philosopher-thinker is to support and strengthen the voice of human conscience, to recognize what is good or what is bad for people, whether they are good or bad for society in a period of evolution. May be a "voice crying in the wilderness", but only if that voice remains lively and uncompromising, it is possible to transform the desert into fertile land."
"You cannot sensibly expect a starving 'God-fearing' man to honor the 8th commandment."
"Roman Catholicism is a broken and utterly desperate thing, capable only of malignant mischief in our awakening world."
"Never mistaken humility for foolishness, nor pride for power."
"I resent being lied to because a lie doesn't only undermine the value of the truth, but it further denies the liar a fair chance for honesty."
Explore more quotes by Henry David Thoreau
"I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes."
"I have seen how the foundations of the world are laid, and I have not the least doubt that it will stand a good while."
"I believe that the mind can be permanently profaned by the habit of attending to trivial things."
"Genius is not a retainer to any emperor, or is its material silver, or gold, or marble, except to a trifling extent."
"What is most of our boasted so-called knowledge but a conceit that we know something, which robs us of the advantage of our actual ignorance?"
"Next to us is not the workman whom we have hired, with whom we love so well to talk, but the workman whose work we are."
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