Henry David Thoreau：Walden, Excerpt 123

How can a man be satisfied to entertain an opinion merely, and enjoy _it?_ Is there any enjoyment in it, if his opinion is that he is aggrieved? If you are cheated out of a single dollar by your neighbor, you do not rest satisfied with knowing you are cheated, or with saying that you are cheated, or even with petitioning him to pay you your due; but you take effectual steps at once to obtain the full amount, and see that you are never cheated again. Action from principle,—the perception and the performance of right,—changes things and relations; it is essentially revolutionary, and does not consist wholly with anything which was. It not only divided states and churches, it divides families; aye, it divides the _individual_, separating the diabolical in him from the divine.

Source： https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/205
Locator：Excerpt 123 · Verified：2026-10-19 · Verification：Short excerpt

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