Henry David Thoreau Firsts Quotations

In order to die, you must first have lived.

I would remind my countrymen that they are to be men first, and Americans only at a late and convenient hour.

If Columbus was the first to discover the islands, Americus Vespucius and Cabot, and the Puritans, and we their descendants, havediscovered only the shores of America.

After the first blush of sin comes its indifference.

Undoubtedly, in the most brilliant successes, the first rank is always sacrificed.

Of what use the friendliest disposition even, if there are no hours given to Friendship, if it is forever postponed to unimportant duties and relations? Friendship first, Friendship last.

The first pleasant days of spring come out like a squirrel and go in again.

No mortal is alert enough to be present at the first dawn of spring.

How imperceptibly the first springing takes place!

I am a citizen of the world first, and of this country at a later and more convenient hour.

What the first philosopher taught the last will have to repeat.

We cannot put a noose around another man's neck without first hanging ourselves.

We commonly do not remember that it is, after all, always the first person that is speaking.

. . . we should be men first, and subjects afterward.

First, there is the power of the Wind, constantly exerted over the globe... Here is an almost incalculable power at our disposal, yet how trifling the use we make of it.