"A person who chooses to die or..." - Quote by Henry David Thoreau
A person who chooses to die or to risk death demonstrates that there are values, principles, maxims, that are more valuable to him than is life itself. In short, he places his immortal self above his mortal self. Nothing goes by luck in composition. It allows of no tricks. The best you can write will be the best you are.
More by Henry David Thoreau
“I know of no redeeming qualities in myself but a sincere love for some things, and when I am reproved I fall back on to this ground.”
“For the most part, we are not where we are, but in a false position. Through an infirmity of our natures, we suppose a case, and put ourselves into it, and hence are in two cases at the same time, and it is doubly difficult to get out.”
“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.”
More on Values
“A man who hasn't found anything he'd die for doesn't deserve to live.”
“It is a tragic mix-up when the United States spends 500,000 for every enemy soldier killed, and only 53 annually on the victims of poverty.”
“The scholar does not consider gold and jade to be precious treasures, but loyalty and good faith.”