Walden

Why is it that men give so poor an account of their day if they have
not been slumbering? They are not such poor calculators. If they had
not been overcome with drowsiness, they would have performed something.
The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a
million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one
in a hundred millions to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be
alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have
looked him in the face?

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical
aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not
forsake us in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact
than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a
conscious endeavor. It is something to be able to paint a particular
picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful;
but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and
medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the
quality of the day, that is the highest of arts. Every man is tasked to
make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his