What Emerson failed to see, and what

Henry David Thoreau Thoreau knew (or hoped) all along, was that by
leading a berry-picking party on a jaunt in the
(1817-1862)
woods he could "engineer for all America" in

On July 4, 1845 (the date was apparently

accidental), a young man ended a three-
the most profound way. This paradox
center of Thoreau's life and work.
is at the

year stay at the house of a friend and moved to

a cabin on the shores of Walden Pond in

Massachusetts. He was almost twenty-eight The Student Who Wouldn't Wear Black
years old and, to all appearances, a failure. He Thoreau was born in Concord, Massachusetts,
had lasted only two weeks as a schoolteacher in 1817. His father was a

(he refused to whip a child, z moderately successful manu-

then a mandatory form of v facturer of pencils. His
punishment); his public ; mother took in boarders,
lectures had been un- i
among them the sister of
inspiring; the woman to ij Emerson's wife, thus estab-
whom he had proposed f
lishing the relationship be-
marriage had turned him p tween the two families. As a
down; and he had little in- f boy, Thoreau tramped the
terest in the family busi- ! woods and fields around
ness. Despite his impres- f Concord, often with a fishing
sive Harvard education, ! rod and seldom with a gun.
he had not realized his lit- ^ Thoreau entered
erary ambitions. Harvard in 1833 and gradu-
If ever a person looked ! ated four years later. Inde-
like a self-unmade man, a I pendent and eccentric even
man who had squandered \ then, he attended chapel in a
the advantages of intelli- Henry David Thoreau ( 1856) by green coat, "because," he
gence, education, and the Benjamin D. Maxham. Photograph. wrote, "the rules required
friendship of brilliant and successful people, it black." He never ranked higher than the middle
was Henry David Thoreau. On top of all his of his class, but he was extremely well read. He
other problems, Thoreau was difficult to get became thoroughly familiar with English litera-
along with. Three days before Thoreau went to ture and with the German philosophers who
Walden, Nathaniel Hawthorne (page 296) wrote provided many of the underpinnings of Tran-
to a New York publisher that Thoreau was "te- scendentalism.
dious, tiresome, and intolerable. And yet," After returning to Concord and teaching
Hawthorne added, "he has great qualities of in- school, Thoreau went to New York in 843, 1

tellect and character." but he pined for his hometown. After six
Even his closest friends had doubts about months of struggling, he gave up and returned
Thoreau. "He seemed born for great enter- to Concord. A friend proposed that Henry and
prise and for command," Emerson said years he sail to Europe and work their way across
later at Thoreau's funeral, "and I so much regret the Continent, but Henry turned him down.
the loss of his rare powers of action, that I can- He appeared to be floundering, but in fact he
not help counting it a fault in him that he had knew what he was doing; Thoreau's voyage
no ambition. Wanting this, instead of engineer- would be inward, and it would depart from
ing for America, he was the captain of a
all Walden Pond, where Emerson had offered him
huckleberry party." the use of some land.

230 The American Renaissance

Walden: Life in Its Essence others saw as an attempt to extend American

The experiment at Walden Pond was an at-

slaveholding territory, Thoreau refused to pay
tempt to rediscover the grandeur of a simple life his poll tax, and spent a night in jail as a result.
While at Walden, and again in 85 (after the
led close to nature. Though only two miles from
1 1

town, Walden offered a focus for Thoreau's Fugitive Slave Act had been passed), Thoreau
contemplative urge. "I wish to meet the facts helped fugitives escaping slavery make their

he wrote journal, "the vital facts,

way to Canada. In 1 859, he was one of the first
of life," in his

which are the phenomena or actuality the gods defenders of John Brown, the radical abolition-

meant to show us . .came down here."

. and so I
ist who staged a famous raid on the Federal

confrontation was to Thoreau's arsenal at Harpers Ferry in Virginia.

This private
mind the truly heroic enterprise of his time. "I
Thoreau remained at Walden for a little

am glad to remember tonight as I sit by my more than two years. In 847, he left the cabin 1

door," hewrote on the evening of July 7, "that I

and moved back into the Emersons' house, in

too am at least a remote descendant of that exchange for a few hours a day of odd jobs and
heroic race of men of whom there is a tradi-
gardening. During the next few years, he

tion. I too sit here on the shore of my Ithaca, a worked on Walden (which was published in

fellow wanderer and survivor of Ulysses." 1854) and essays such as "Resistance to Civil

When he looked toward town, Thoreau saw Government." The latter, delivered as a lecture

his fellow citizens so caught up in making a liv-

in 1 848 and published as an essay in 1 849, had

ing that they had become one-dimensional. little immediate influence, but few essays have

"The mass of men," as one of the most famous had such an overwhelming, long-term effect on

sentences in Walden puts it, "lead lives of quiet human history. It was especially important in
helping to inspire the passive resistance used
desperation." He hoped to wake them up and
show them that the heroic enterprise of con- by Mohandas K. Gandhi in India and, later, by
Martin Luther King, Jr., in the United States.
fronting the "vital facts of life" lay literally in

their own back yards.

Thoreau moved back into his parents' house
Walden —one most well-known works
of the in 848 and lived there the rest of his life. He
1

ever produced in —
America owes much of its supported himself by making pencils, taking odd

artistic success to Thoreau's jobs —

he was an excellent carpenter, mason,
i

blending of style and content.

—
and gardener and doing survey work on the
Jjioreau's |_| e looked to nature, rather
land around Concord. He became a kind of
voyage would than to the stylists of the local recordkeeper, a fount of knowledge about
be inward, pas t, for a model. To the amount of rainfall and snowfall and the first

and it would 1 Thoreau, a style that imitated

days of frost. He could predict to the day when
depart from nature would speak funda- each wildflower in the area would bloom.

walden Pond, mental spiritual truths.

In I860, Thoreau caught a cold, and it soon
f

Thoreau wished to build sen- became clear that beneath the cold lay incur-
I

tences "which lie like boul- able tuberculosis. He faced his coming death

ders on the page, up and down or across; which with great calm. The town constable, Sam
contain the seed of other sentences, not mere Staples (who had jailedThoreau for refusing to
pay his poll tax), told Emerson that he "never
repetition, but creation; which a man might sell

his grounds and castles to build."

saw a man dying with so much pleasure and
peace."
Thoreau the Protester "Henry, have you made your peace with
Itwas while he was at Walden that Thoreau's God?" his aunt is said to have asked him toward
other famous act took place. As a protest the end. "Why, Aunt," he replied, "I didn't know
against the Mexican War, which he and many we had ever quarreled."

Henry David Thoreau 23 3

 —

Before You Read

from Walden, or Life in the Woods
their own experiences. Such a
Make the Connection Elements of Literature
generalization is a specific type
What's Necessary Point of View
Thoreau went to Walden Pond
of inference — a conclusion that
In the second paragraph of this
extends the ideas in a text to a
to find out what was necessary in excerpt, Thoreau justifies using
broader situation. Like all infer-
life and what could be done with- the first-person point of view
ences, generalizations are rea-
out. He discovered that the key to narrate his experiences at
sonable guesses. For example,
to making his life more fulfilling Walden Pond. "[I]t is, after all,
after reading Thoreau's call for
was to make it simpler. always the first person that is
"simplicity, simplicity!" you might
Few people go off to the speaking," he writes. Think about
reasonably guess that he
woods for a couple of years to what Thoreau might mean. As
believed people should lead lives
find out how they really want to you read, look for passages in
focused on what matters most
live. Every thinking person, how- which you think the use of the
to them, while eliminating
ever, stops at times to ask, "How first person makes a difference.
unnecessary complexity. You
do I really want to live? What do
need not agree with the gener-
I need in order to feel fulfilled
alization; you are simply extend-
and what am I doing now that's
ing the implications of an idea |n the first-person point
unnecessary?" Thoreau can be an
into new territory. (You would of view, the narrative is told
inspiration for anyone who asks
probably need to do additional by a particular person who
these questions.
research before stating that uses the personal pronoun
Thoreau in fact agreed with / or we to describe
your generalization.) experiences.
Reading Skills
As you read Walden, take
and Strategies notes in the form of a double- Formore on Point of View, see the
Handbook of Literary Terms.
Drawing Inferences: entry journal. In the left column,
Generalizations list Thoreau's ideas. In the right
Active readers make generaliza- column, examine some of the
tions based on information they interesting generalizations that
get from their reading and on logically follow from his views.

Thoreau's journals and a

writing box.

The Pierpont Morgan

Library / Art Resource, NY.

232 The American Renaissance

nay, partly even because of its transient character, ity, say, let your affairs be
simplicity, simplicity! I

I believe that that was doing better than any as two or and not a hundred or a thousand;
three,
farmer in Concord did that year. . . . instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep
your accounts on your thumbnail. In the midst of
this chopping sea of civilized life, such are the
from Where I Lived, and clouds and storms and quicksands and thousand-
What I Lived For and-one items to be allowed for, that a man has to
live, if he would not founder and go to the bottom

and not make his port at all, by dead reckoning,

... I went to the woods
and he must be a great calculator indeed who suc-
because I wished to live delib-
ceeds. Simplify, simplify. Instead of three meals a
erately, to front only the essen-
day, if it be necessary eat but one; instead of a
tial facts of and see if I
life,
hundred and reduce other things in
dishes, five;
could not learn what it had to
teach, and not, when I came to
proportion. Our life is like a German Confeder-
9
die, discover that I had not
acy, made up of petty states with its boundary
forever fluctuating, so that even a German cannot
lived. I did not wish to live
tell you how it is bounded at any moment. The
what was not life, living is so
nation itself, with all its so-called internal improve-
dear; nor did I wish to practice
resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I
ments, which, by the way are all external and
superficial, such an unwieldy and over-
is just
wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow
of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put
6 grown establishment, cluttered with furniture and
tripped up by its own traps, ruined by luxury and
to rout all was not life, to cut a broad swath
that
heedless expense, by want of calculation and a
and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and re-
worthy aim, as the million households in the land;
duce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be
and the only cure for it, as for them, is in a rigid
mean, why then to get the whole and genuine
economy, a stern and more than Spartan simplic-
meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the
ity of life and elevation of purpose. It lives too
world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experi-
fast. Men think that it is essential that the Nation
ence, and be able to give a true account of it in my
have commerce, and export ice, and talk through
next excursion. For most men, it appears to me,
a telegraph, and ride thirty miles an hour, without
are in a strange uncertainty about it, whether it is
a doubt, whether they do or not; but whether we
of the devil or of God, and have somewhat hastily
should live like baboons or like men, is a little un-
concluded that it is the chief end of man here to 10
7 certain. If we do not get out sleepers, and forge
"glorify God and enjoy him forever."
rails, and devote days and nights to the work, but
Still we live meanly, like ants; though the fable
go to tinkering upon our lives to improve them,
tells us that we were long ago changed into men;

like pygmies we fight with cranes;

8
it is error
who will build railroads? And if railroads are not

upon error, and clout upon clout, and our best built, how shall we get to heaven in season? But if

virtue has for its occasion a superfluous and

we stay at home and mind our business, who will

evitable wretchedness. Our life is frittered away

want railroads? We
do not ride on the railroad; it
rides upon us. Did you ever think what those
by detail. An honest man has hardly need to count
sleepers are that underlie the railroad? Each one is
more than his ten fingers, or in extreme cases he
may add his ten toes, and lump the rest. Simplic-
9- German Confederacy: At the time Thoreau was writ-
6. Spartan-like: like the Spartans, the hardy, frugal, and ing, Germany was not yet a unified nation.
highly disciplined citizens of the ancient Greek city-state 10. sleepers: British usage for "railroad ties"; so called
Sparta. because they lie flat.

7. glorify . forever: answer to catechism question,

. .

"What is the chief end of man?"

8. the fable cranes: In a Greek fable, Zeus changes
. . . Words to Own
ants into men. In the Iliad, Homer compares the Trojans superfluous (sa • pur'floo as) • adj.: unnecessary.
to cranes fighting with pygmies.

Henry David Thoreau 237

a man, an Irishman, or a Yankee man. The rails are and snowy days and nights especially." I am
laid on them, and they are covered with sand, and tempted to reply to such This whole earth —
the cars run smoothly over them. They are sound which we inhabit is but a point in space. How far
sleepers, I assure you. And every few years a new apart, think you, dwell the two most distant in-
lot is laid down and run over; so that, if some have habitants of yonder star, the breadth of whose
the pleasure of riding on a rail, others have the disk cannot be appreciated by our instruments?
misfortune to be ridden upon. And when they run Why should I feel lonely? Is not our planet in the
over a man that is walking in his sleep, a super- Milky Way? This which you put seems to me not
11
numerary sleeper in the wrong position, and to be the most important question. What sort of
wake him up, they suddenly stop the cars, and space is that which separates a man from his fel-

make a hue and cry about it, as if this were an ex- lows and makes him solitary? I have found that no
ception. I am glad to know that it takes a gang of exertion of the legs can bring two minds much
men for every five miles to keep the sleepers nearer to one another. What do we want most to
down and level in their beds as it is, for this is a dwell near to? Not to many men surely, the depot,
sign that they may sometime get up again. . . . the post office, the barroom, the meetinghouse,
the schoolhouse, the grocery, Beacon Hill, or the
Five Points,where men most congregate, but to
from Solitude the perennial source of our life, whence in all our
experience we have found that to issue, as the
. . . Some of my pleasantest willow stands near the water and sends out its
hours were during the long roots in that direction. This will vary with differ-
rainstorms in the spring or fall, ent natures, but this is the place where a wise
which confined me to the man will dig his cellar. . . .

house for the afternoon as well

as the forenoon, soothed by
their ceaseless roar and pelt- from The Bean Field
ing; when an early twilight
ushered in a long evening in Meanwhile my beans, the
which many thoughts had time length of whose rows, added
to take root and unfold themselves. In those dri- together, was seven miles al-
ving northeast rains which tried the village houses ready planted, were impatient
so, when the maids stood ready with mop and tobe hoed, for the earliest
pail in front entries to keep the deluge out, I sat had grown considerably
behind my door in my little house, which was all before the latest were in
entry, and thoroughly enjoyed its protection. In the ground; indeed they
one heavy thundershower the lightning struck a were not easily to be put
large pitch pine across the pond, making a very off. What was the meaning
conspicuous and perfectly regular spiral groove of this so steady and self-

from top to bottom, an inch or more deep, and respecting, this small Herculean labor, I knew not.
four or five inches wide, as you would groove a I came to love my rows, my beans, though so
walking stick. I passed it again the other day, and many more than I wanted. They attached me to
12
was struck withawe on looking up and beholding the earth, and so I got strength like Antaeus. But
that mark, now more distinct than ever, where a why should I raise them? Only Heaven knows.
terrific and resistless bolt came down out of the This was my curious labor all summer — to make
harmless sky eight years ago. Men frequently say this portion of the earth's surface, which had
to me, "I should think you would feel lonesome yielded only cinquefoil, blackberries, johnswort,
down there, and want to be nearer to folks, rainy and the like, before, sweet wild fruits and pleasant

11. supernumerary (soo'par-noo'ma-rer'e): additional; 12. Antaeus (an-te'as): in Greek mythology, the giant
unnecessary. who draws strength from the earth, his mother.

238 The American Renaissance

Quaker Ladies ( 1
956) by Andrew Wyeth. Watercolor and drypoint.

13 o'clock in the morning till noon, and commonly

flowers, produce instead this pulse. What shall I
spent the rest of the day about other affairs. Con-
learn of beans or beans of me? I cherish them, I
sider the intimate and curious acquaintance one
hoe them, early and late I have an eye to them;
and this is my day's work. It is a fine broad leaf to
makes with various kinds of weeds it will bear —
some iteration in the account, for there was no
look on. My auxiliaries are the dews and rains
which water this dry soil, and what fertility is in
little iteration in the labor — disturbing their deli-
cate organizations so ruthlessly, and making such
the soil itself, which for the most part is lean and
invidious distinctions with his hoe, leveling
effete. My enemies are worms, cool days, and
whole ranks of one species, and sedulously culti-
most of all woodchucks. The last have nibbled
vating another. That's Roman wormwood — that's
for me a quarter of an acre clean. But what right
had I to oust johnswort and the rest, and break up
— —
pigweed that's sorrel that's pipergrass have —
at him, chop him up, turn his roots upward to the
their ancient herb garden? Soon, however, the
sun, don't let him have a fiber in the shade, if you
remaining beans will be too tough for them, and
do he'll turn himself t'other side up and be as
go forward to meet new foes. . . .

green as a leek in two days. A long war, not with

cranes, but with weeds, those Trojans who had
It was a singular experience that long acquaint-
sun and rain and dews on their side. Daily the
ance which I cultivated with beans, what with
beans saw me come to their rescue armed with
planting, and hoeing, and harvesting, and thresh-
a hoe, and thin the ranks of their enemies, filling
ing, and picking over and selling them the last — up the trenches with weedy dead. Many a lusty
—
was the hardest of all I might add eating, for I
did taste. I was determined to know beans. When
they were growing, I used to hoe from five
Words to Own
13- pulse: beans, peas, and other edible seeds of plants effete (e-fet') adj.: sterile; unproductive.
having pods.

Henry David Thoreau 239

 14
crest-waving Hector, that towered a whole foot one dashed him from side to side, and, as I saw on
above his crowding comrades, fell before my looking nearer, had already divested him of sev-
weapon and rolled in the dust. . . . eral of his members. They fought with more perti-
nacity than bulldogs. Neither manifested the least
It was evident that their bat-
disposition to retreat.
from Brute Neighbors tle was "Conquer or die." In the meanwhile
cry
there came along a single red ant on the hillside of
mm . . . One day when I went out this valley, evidently full of excitement, who ei-

to my woo dpile, or rather my ther had dispatched had not yet taken
his foe, or

-^J^^^-r pile of stumps, I observed part in the battle; probably the latter, for he had
two large ants, the one red, lost none of his limbs; whose mother had charged
18
Msff^^' tne other much larger, nearly him to return with his shield or upon it. Or per-
' an mcn on 8' ana^ -
bl ac k, chance he was some Achilles, who had nourished
fiercely contending with one his wrath apart, and had now come to avenge or
19
J0§k^y^y^~' another. Having once got rescue his Patroclus. He saw this unequal com-
-v hold they never let go, but —
bat from afar for the blacks were nearly twice
struggled and wrestled and —
the size of the red he drew near with rapid pace
rolled on the chips inces- till he stood on his guard within half an inch of

santly. Looking farther, I was surprised to find that the combatants; then, watching his opportunity,
the chips were covered with such combatants, he sprang upon the black warrior, and com-
15
that it was not a duellum, but a bellum, a war be- menced his operations near the root of his right
tween two races of ants, the red always pitted foreleg, leaving the foe to select among his own
against the black, and frequently two red ones to members; and so there were three united for life,
16
one black. The legions of these Myrmidons cov- as if a new kind of attraction had been invented
ered all the hills and vales in my wood yard, and which put all other locks and cements to shame. I
the ground was already strewn with the dead and should not have wondered by this time to find
dying, both red and black. It was the only battle that they had their respective musical bands sta-
which I have ever witnessed, the only battlefield I tioned on some eminent chip, and playing then-
ever trod while the battle was raging; in- national airs the while, to excite the slow and
17
ternecine war; the red republicans on the one cheer the dying combatants. I was myself excited
hand, and the black imperialists on the other. On somewhat even as if they had been men. The
every side they were engaged in deadly combat, more you think of it, the less the difference. And
yet without any noise that I could hear, and human certainly there is not the fight recorded in Con-
soldiers never fought so resolutely. I watched a cord history, at least, if in the history of America,
couple that were fast locked in each other's em- that will bear amoment's comparison with this,
braces, in a little sunny valley amid the chips, now whether numbers engaged in it, or for the
for the
at noonday prepared to fight till the sun went patriotism and heroism displayed. For numbers
20
down, or life went out. The smaller red champion and for carnage it was an Austerlitz or Dresden.
had fastened himself like a vise to his adversary's
front, and through all the tumblings on that field
18. return . upon it: echoes the traditional charge of
. .
never for an instant ceased to gnaw at one of his
Spartan mothers to their warrior sons: return victorious or
feelers near the root, having already caused the dead.
other to go by the board; while the stronger black 19. Achilles . . . Patroclus (pa-tro'ktas): In the Iliad,
Achilles withdraws from the battle at Troy but rejoins the
fight after his friend Patroclus is killed.
14. Hector: In the Iliad, Hector is the Trojan prince Dresden: major the
20. Austerlitz or battles of
killed by the Greek hero Achilles.
Napoleonic Wars.
15. not a duellum, but a bellum: not a duel, but a war.
16. Myrmidons: Achilles' soldiers in the Iliad. Myrmex
isGreek for "ant." Words to Own
17. internecine (in'tar-ne'sin): harmful to both sides of without stopping.
incessantly (in -ses'snt- le) adv.:
the group.

240 The American Renaissance