"If rightly made, a boat would be..." - Quote by Henry David Thoreau
If rightly made, a boat would be a sort of amphibious animal, a creature of two elements, related by one half its structure to some swift and shapely fish, and by the other to some strong-winged and graceful bird.
More by Henry David Thoreau
“The constant abrasion and decay of our lives makes the soil of our future growth.”
“My facts shall be falsehoods to the common sense. I would so state facts that they shall be significant, shall be myths or mythologic. Facts which the mind perceived, thoughts which the body thought - with these I deal.”
“For a man to act himself, he must be perfectly free; otherwise he is in danger of losing all sense of responsibility or of self- respect.”
More on Design
“Clay is moulded to make a vessel, but the utility of the vessel lies in the space where there is nothing. . . . Thus, taking advantage of what is, we recognize the utility of what is not.”
“I just want it to look like nothing else in the world. And it should be surrounded by a train.”
“Good designers copy; great designers steal.”
More on Nature
“Since an intelligence common to us all makes things known to us and formulates them in our minds, honorable actions are ascribed by us to virtue, and dishonorable actions to vice; and only a madman would conclude that these judgments are matters of opinion, and not fixed by nature.”
“Nothing could be more lonely and nothing more beautiful than the view at nightfall across the prairies to these huge hill masses, when the lengthening shadows had at last merged into one and the faint after-glow of the red sunset filled the west.”
“In the early morning on the lake sitting in the stern of the boat with his father rowing, he felt quite sure that he would never die.”