This [...] government [...] has not the vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man cam bend it to his will.

Some suggestions for you :

A bore is someone who takes away my solitude and doesn't give me companionship in return.

I am wont to think that men are not so much the keepers of herds as herds are the keepers of men. The former are so much the freer.

The most I can do for my friend is simply to be his friend. I have no wealth to bestow on him. If he knows that I am happy in loving him, he will want no other reward. Is not friendship divine in this?

The civilized man is a more experienced and wiser savage.

I was never molested by any person but those who represented the State.

Thus the great civilizer sends out its emissaries, sooner or later, to every sandy cape and light-house of the New World which the census-taker visits, and summons the savage there to surrender.

While civilization has been improving our houses, it has not equally improved the men who inhabit them. It has created palaces, but it was not so easy to create noblemen and kings.

There are many fine things we cannot say if we have to shout.

Our table was a large piece of freshly peeled birch bark, laid wrong side up, and our breakfast consisted of hard-bread, fried pork, and strong coffee well sweetened, in which we did not miss the milk.

I would remind my countrymen that they are to be men first, and Americans only at a late and convenient hour.

Gardening is civil and social, but it wants the vigor and freedom of the forest and the outlaw.

Our village life would stagnate if it were not for the unexplored forests and meadows that surround it. We need the tonic of wildness...

It is not enough to be busy; so are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?

As far as I have heard or observed, the principal object is, not that mankind may be well and honestly clad, but, unquestionably, that corporations may be enriched.