Quotes About Contemplation

Of all studies, the one he would rather have avoided was that of his own mind. He knew no tragedy so heartrending as introspection.

Sumner's mind had reached the calm of water which receives and reflects images without absorbing them; it contained nothing but itself.

She pondered: Was it worth the feelings of sadness and melancholy to make a friend and then lose him? Would she rather not have the heartache of losing a friend and not have the memory of friendship? No, she decided, no.

Basta por ahora de polémicas, la ciencia no es una mera cuestión de erudición; está integrada al destino absolutamente personal del investigador.

Prayer is the highest form, the supreme act of the Creative Imagination.

When I would recreate myself, I seek the darkest wood, the thickest and the most interminable, and to the citizen, most dismal swamp. I enter the swamp as a sacred place--a sanctum sanctorum; there is the strength, the marrow of Nature.

If we were required to know the position of the fruit dots or the character of the indusiumís, nothing could be easier to ascertain, but if it is required that you be affected by ferns, that they amount to anything, signify anything to you, that they be another sacred scripture and revelation to you, help to redeem your life, this end is not so easily accomplished.

He enjoys true leisure who has time to improve his souls estate.

Associate reverently, as much as you can, with your loftiest thoughts.

A man may stand there [Cape Cod] and put all America behind him.

Sometimes, in a summer morning, having taken my accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny doorway from sunrise till noon, rapt in reverie.

A lake is the landscape's most beautiful and expressive feature. It is earth's eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.

I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude. We are for the most part more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our chambers. A man thinking or working is always alone, let him be where he will.

In my afternoon walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations and my obligations to society.

It is so rare to meet with a man outdoors who cherishes a worthy thought in his mind, which is independent of the labor of his hands.

What are the earth and all its interests beside the deep surmise which pierces and scatters them?

Each thought that is welcomed and recorded is a nest egg by the side of which more will be laid.

Time is but the stream I go a-fishin in. I drink at it, but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. It's thin current slides away, but eternity remains.

Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it; but while I drink, I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains. I would drink deeper; fish fill the sky, whose bottom is pebbly with stars. I cannot count one. I know not the first letter of the alphabet. I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.

Whatever sentence will bear to be read twice, we may be sure was thought twice.

I find it wholesome to be alone the greater part of the time. To be in company, even with the best, is soon wearisome and dissipating. I love to be alone. I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.

Time is but a stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it, but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains.

Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it.

Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason so few engage in it.