"Let us consider the way in which we spend our lives. This world is a place of business. What an infinate bustle! It would be glorious to see mankind at leisure for once. It is nothing but work, work, work. I cannot easily buy an blank book to write thoughts in; they are commonly ruled for dollars and cents. I think there is nothing, not even crime, more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself, than this incessant business.....there is a coarse and boisterous money-making fellow in the outskirts of town, who is going to build a wall along the dge of his meadow.. He wishes me to spend 3 weeks digging there with him. If i do this, most will commend me as an industrious and hard working man; but if i choose to devote myself to certain labors which yield more real profit, though but little money, they may be inclined to look on me as an idler. Never the less, i do not need the police of meaningless labor to regulate me....i prefer to finish my education at a different school"
- Henry David Thoreau
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