"What is morality but immemorial custom? Conscience..." - Quote by Henry David Thoreau

“We 've wholly forgotten how to die. But be sure you do die nevertheless. Do your work, and finish it. If you know how to begin, you will know when to end.”

“Have no mean hours, but be grateful for every hour, and accept what it brings. The reality will make any sincere record respectable.”

“There is not one kind of food for all men. You must and you will feed those faculties which you exercise. The laborer whose body is weary does not require the same food with the scholar whose brain is weary.”

“The true fountains of evidence [are] the head and heart of every rational and honest man. It is there nature has written her moral laws, and where every man may read them for himself.”

“Virtue is uniform, conformable to reason, and of unvarying consistency; nothing can be added to it that can make it more than virtue; nothing can be taken from it, and the name of virtue be left.”

“There is no outward sign of true courtesy that does not rest on a deep moral foundation.”

“We become aware, however, that all customs, even the hardest, grow pleasanter and milder with time, and that the severest way of life may become a habit and therefore a pleasure.”

“An ancient custom obtains force of nature.”

“Custom determines what is agreeable.”