"Not without a slight shudder at the danger, I often perceive how near I had come to admitting into my mind the details of some trivial affair, - the news of the street; and I am astonished to observe how willing people are to lumber their minds with such rubbish, - to permit idle rumors and incidents of the most insignificant kind to intrude on ground which should be sacred to thought. Shall the mind be a public arena, where the affairs of the street and the gossip of the tea-table chiefly are discussed? Or shall it be a quarter of heaven itself, - a hypaethral temple [open to the sky], consecrated to the service of the gods? . . . It is important to preserve the mind's chastity in this respect . . . We should treat our minds as innocent children, whose guardians we are, and be careful what objects and what subjects we thrust on their attention. Read not The Times. Read the Eternities . . . Knowledge does not come to us by details, but in flashes of light from heaven."
Henry David Thoreau,
"Life Without Principle" (1863)
Photo: Pasqueflowers, with Greyrock on a stormy day; Roosevelt National Forest, CO; April 10, 2014
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