"This curious world which we inhabit is more wonderful than it is convenient, more beautiful than it is useful; it is more to be admired than to be used." (Henry D Thoreau, 1837)
"All perception of truth is the detection of an analogy [...]" (Henry D Thoreau, 1851)
"If we knew all the laws of Nature, we should need only one fact, or the description of one actual phenomenon, to infer all the particular results at that point. Now we know only a few laws, and our result is vitiated, not, of course, by any confusion or irregularity in Nature, but by our ignorance of essential elements in the calculation. Our notions of law and harmony are commonly confined to those instances which we detect; but the harmony which results from a far greater number of seemingly conflicting, but really concurring, laws, which we have not detected, is still more wonderful. The particular laws are as our points of view, as to the traveler, a mountain outline varies with every step, and it has an infinite number of profiles, though absolutely but one form. Even when cleft or bored through it is not comprehended in its entireness." (Henry D Thoreau, "Walden; or, Life in the Woods", 1854)
"He is not a true man of science who does not bring some sympathy to his studies, and expect to learn something by behavior as well as by application. It is childish to rest in the discovery of mere coincidences, or of partial and extraneous laws. The study of geometry is a petty and idle exercise of the mind if it is applied to no larger system than the starry one." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"Observation is so wide awake, and facts are being so rapidly added to the sum of human experience, that it appears as if the theorizer would always be in arrears, and were doomed forever to arrive at imperfect conclusion; but the power to perceive a law is equally rare in all ages of the world, and depends but little on the number of facts observed." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"The eye which can appreciate the naked and absolute beauty of a scientifi c truth is far more rare than that which is attracted by a moral one. Few detect the morality in the former, or the science in the latter." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"He is not a true man of science who does not bring some sympathy to his studies, and expect to learn something by behavior as well as by application. It is childish to rest in the discovery of mere coincidences, or of partial and extraneous laws. The study of geometry is a petty and idle exercise of the mind if it is applied to no larger system than the starry one." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"Observation is so wide awake, and facts are being so rapidly added to the sum of human experience, that it appears as if the theorizer would always be in arrears, and were doomed forever to arrive at imperfect conclusion; but the power to perceive a law is equally rare in all ages of the world, and depends but little on the number of facts observed." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"The eye which can appreciate the naked and absolute beauty of a scientifi c truth is far more rare than that which is attracted by a moral one. Few detect the morality in the former, or the science in the latter." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"Our books of science, as they improve in accuracy, are in danger of losing the freshness and vigor and readiness to appreciate the real laws of Nature, which is a marked merit in the ofttimes false theories of the ancients." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1873)
"The most distinct and beautiful statement of any truth [in science] must take at last the mathematical form. We might so simplify the rules of moral philosophy, as well as of arithmetic, that one formula would express them both." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1873)
"The poet uses the results of science and philosophy, and generalizes their widest deductions." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1873)
"The process of discovery is very simple. An unwearied and systematic application of known laws to nature, causes the unknown to reveal themselves. Almost any mode of observation will be successful at last, for what is most wanted is method." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"The study of geometry is a petty and idle exercise of the mind, if it is applied to no larger system than the starry one. Mathematics should be mixed not only with physics but with ethics; that is mixed mathematics." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"There is a chasm between knowledge and ignorance which the arches of science can never span." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"Every man has to learn the points of the compass again as often as he awakes, whether from sleep or any abstraction." (Henry D Thoreau)
"I do believe in simplicity. It is astonishing as well as sad, how many trivial affairs even the wisest thinks he must attend to in a day; how singular an affair he thinks he must omit. When the mathematician would solve a difficult problem, he first frees the equation of all incumbrances, and reduces it to its simplest terms. So simplify the problem of life, distinguish the necessary and the real. Probe the earth to see where your main roots run." (Henry D Thoreau)
"The most distinct and beautiful statement of any truth [in science] must take at last the mathematical form. We might so simplify the rules of moral philosophy, as well as of arithmetic, that one formula would express them both." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1873)
"The poet uses the results of science and philosophy, and generalizes their widest deductions." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1873)
"The process of discovery is very simple. An unwearied and systematic application of known laws to nature, causes the unknown to reveal themselves. Almost any mode of observation will be successful at last, for what is most wanted is method." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"The study of geometry is a petty and idle exercise of the mind, if it is applied to no larger system than the starry one. Mathematics should be mixed not only with physics but with ethics; that is mixed mathematics." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"There is a chasm between knowledge and ignorance which the arches of science can never span." (Henry D Thoreau, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers", 1862)
"Every man has to learn the points of the compass again as often as he awakes, whether from sleep or any abstraction." (Henry D Thoreau)
"I do believe in simplicity. It is astonishing as well as sad, how many trivial affairs even the wisest thinks he must attend to in a day; how singular an affair he thinks he must omit. When the mathematician would solve a difficult problem, he first frees the equation of all incumbrances, and reduces it to its simplest terms. So simplify the problem of life, distinguish the necessary and the real. Probe the earth to see where your main roots run." (Henry D Thoreau)
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