“Things do not change; we change.”
Documented source
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About this line
It comes near the end of Walden (1854), in the last chapter, “Conclusion.” Thoreau is talking about not chasing new things. Just before it: “Do not trouble yourself much to get new things, whether clothes or friends. Turn the old; return to them.”
Right after it: “Sell your clothes and keep your thoughts.”
Why we carry this line
I read somewhere that a supreme insult was to be told, “You’re just like you were in grade school or high school.” I took that to heart for some reason and embraced change.
Am I the same person I was in high school? Not by a long shot. Change is good. (Shhh, don’t tell my sis that!)
The design
The last word changes as you read it. It starts light, and each letter is a little heavier than the one before, until “change.” ends in bold.
Everything else on the line stays quiet, so that one word can move.
What happened next
Thoreau lived at Walden Pond for two years and two months. Then he went back to town.
In the same last chapter, he explains why: “I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and could not spare any more time for that one.”
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