None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.
Henry David ThoreauRead
Cast your whole vote, not a strip of paper merely, but your whole influence.
Interpretation
Engage fully in the political process, using all your influence and passion.
Henry David Thoreau emphasizes the importance of active participation in societal matters, urging individuals to not just cast a vote but to invest their entire influence and efforts into driving change. This quote serves as a reminder that true commitment to democracy involves deeper engagement beyond mere voting, advocating for a holistic approach to civic responsibility.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of civic engagement, I quoted Thoreau to inspire the audience to take action in their communities.
None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.
Through want of enterprise and faith men are where they are, buying and selling and spending their lives like servants.
An early-morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.
Have no mean hours, but be grateful for every hour, and accept what it brings. The reality will make any sincere record respectable.
As every season seems best to us in its turn, so the coming in of spring is like the creation of Cosmos out of Chaos and the realization of the Golden Age.
That grand old poem called Winter
I cannot choose but adhere to the word of God, which has possession of my conscience; nor can I possibly, nor will I even make any recantation, since it is neither safe nor honest to act contrary to conscience! Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God! Amen.
As a career Army bomb technician, I have seen real heroism in the Ranger warfighters I stalked Afghanistan with each night and in the injured combatants whom I healed alongside in Walter Reed Army Medical Center after losing the two legs God gave me.
Being a pathfinder is to be willing to risk failure and still go on.
I've seen many men die right in front of me - so many in fact that I've become almost hardened to it. Having seen the worst that human beings can do to each other, the results of torture, mutilation and seeing someone blown to pieces by a bomb, you develop a kind of shell. But you had to. You had to. Otherwise, we would never have won.
I still suffer terribly from stage fright. I get sick with fear. Not every night, but at the beginning and on occasion - not necessarily when I'm expecting it. You just have to cope with it - take it on the chin and work through it, trying to use the adrenalin to perform.
As for my own part I care not for death, for all men are mortal; and though I be a woman yet I have as good a courage answerable to my place as ever my father had. I am your anointed Queen. I will never be by violence constrained to do anything. I thank God I am indeed endowed with such qualities that if I were turned out of the realm in my petticoat I were able to live in any place in Christendom.
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