Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.
Genuine
Yes. In Walden (1854), Reading.
Found word for word by program in the full text.
- Work
- Walden (Walden; or, Life in the Woods), 1854
- Where
- Reading
- Found at
- Paragraph 171 of the text
Researched by AI; checked by program against the full text on 31 October 2026. Editorial review: pending. How we check
On the page
[…] The orator yields to the inspiration of a transient occasion, and speaks to the mob before him, to those who can hear him; but the writer, whose more equable life is his occasion, and who would be distracted by the event and the crowd which inspire the orator, speaks to the intellect and health of mankind, to all in any age who can understand him.
[…] The symbol of an ancient man’s thought becomes a modern man’s speech. Two thousand summers have imparted to the monuments of Grecian literature, as to her marbles, only a maturer golden and autumnal tint, for they have carried their own serene and celestial atmosphere into all lands to protect them against the corrosion of time. Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations. Books, the oldest and the best, stand naturally and rightfully on the shelves of every cottage. They have no cause of their own to plead, but while they enlighten and sustain the reader his common sense will not refuse them. […]
Those who have not learned to read the ancient classics in the language in which they were written must have a very imperfect knowledge of the history of the human race; for it is remarkable that no transcript of them has ever been made into any modern tongue, unless our civilization itself may be regarded as such a transcript. […]
The works of the great poets have never yet been read by mankind, for only great poets can read them. They have only been read as the multitude read the stars, at most astrologically, not astronomically. […]
The scene
Thoreau describes written words as enduring works of art through which ancient thought becomes present speech. He says the oldest and best books belong in every cottage, then contrasts the influence of their authors with political power and a successful trader’s wealth.
What it means
Great books preserve intellectual riches that can pass across languages, generations and national boundaries.
Often misread
This is not an indiscriminate endorsement of everything printed: the surrounding argument privileges demanding reading and the oldest and best books.
Topics
Related quotes
- Man is a mystery. It needs to be unravelled, and if you spend your whole life unravelling it, don’t say that you’ve wasted time. I am studying that mystery because I want to be a human being. Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Human potential, though not always apparent, is there waiting to be discovered and invited forth. (paraphrase) William W. Purkey
- The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it. (paraphrase)
- That which is not good for the swarm, neither is it good for the bee. (paraphrase) Marcus Aurelius
- All addictions are a low-level search for God. (paraphrase) Carl Gustav Jung
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