A man is not his hope, nor his despair, nor yet his past deed. We know not yet what we have done, still less what we are doing. Wait till evening, and other parts of our day’s work will shine than we had thought at noon, and we shall discover the real purport of our toil. As when the farmer has reached the end of the furrow and looks back, he can tell best where the pressed earth shines most.
—Henry David Thoreau, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1845)
Dec 1, 2009, updated Apr 10, 2025