Quote of the Day by Henry David Thoreau: “It is not enough to...” — being busy is not the same as living with purpose

Key points

• Henry David Thoreau, born in Concord, Massachusetts, in 1817, became one of America’s most influential writers, philosophers, naturalists and reformers.
• A central figure in New England Transcendentalism, he is best known for Walden, his 1854 reflection on simple living, labour, self-reliance and nature, based on his two-year stay near Walden Pond from 1845 to 1847. He also wrote the essay later known as Civil Disobedience, which influenced later movements of nonviolent resistance and moral protest.
• Britannica describes Walden as both a philosophical work on labour and individualism and an influential piece of nature writing.
• “It is not enough to be industrious;
• so are the ants.