Table of contents
Economy
Where I Lived, and What I Lived For
Reading
Sounds
Solitude
Visitors
The Bean-Field
The Village
The Ponds
Baker Farm
Higher Laws
Brute Neighbors
House-Warming
Former Inhabitants and Winter Visitors
Winter Animals
The Pond in Winter
Spring
Conclusion
Henry David Thoreau
Walden
ISBN: 9788892686465
Youcanprint Self-Publishing
Economy
When
I wrote the following pages, or rather the bulk of them, I lived
alone, in the woods, a mile from any neighbor, in a house which I
had
built myself, on the shore of Walden Pond, in Concord,
Massachusetts,
and earned my living by the labor of my hands only. I lived there
two
years and two months. At present I am a sojourner in civilized life
again.I
should not obtrude my affairs so much on the notice of my readers
if
very particular inquiries had not been made by my townsmen
concerning
my mode of life, which some would call impertinent, though they do
not appear to me at all impertinent, but, considering the
circumstances, very natural and pertinent. Some have asked what I
got
to eat; if I did not feel lonesome; if I was not afraid; and the
like. Others have been curious to learn what portion of my income I
devoted to charitable purposes; and some, who have large families,
how many poor children I maintained. I will therefore ask those of
my
readers who feel no particular interest in me to pardon me if I
undertake to answer some of these questions in this book. In most
books, the I,
or first person, is omitted; in this it will be retained; that, in
respect to egotism, is the main difference. We commonly do not
remember that it is, after all, always the first person that is
speaking. I should not talk so much about myself if there were
anybody else whom I knew as well. Unfortunately, I am confined to
this theme by the narrowness of my experience. Moreover, I, on my
side, require of every writer, first or last, a simple and sincere
account of his own life, and not merely what he has heard of other
men's lives; some such account as he would send to his kindred from
a
distant land; for if he has lived sincerely, it must have been in a
distant land to me. Perhaps these pages are more particularly
addressed to poor students. As for the rest of my readers, they
will
accept such portions as apply to them. I trust that none will
stretch
the seams in putting on the coat, for it may do good service to him
whom it fits.I
would fain say something, not so much concerning the Chinese and
Sandwich Islanders as you who read these pages, who are said to
live
in New England; something about your condition, especially your
outward condition or circumstances in this world, in this town,
what
it is, whether it is necessary that it be as bad as it is, whether
it
cannot be improved as well as not. I have travelled a good deal in
Concord; and everywhere, in shops, and offices, and fields, the
inhabitants have appeared to me to be doing penance in a thousand
remarkable ways. What I have heard of Bramins sitting exposed to
four
fires and looking in the face of the sun; or hanging suspended,
with
their heads downward, over flames; or looking at the heavens over
their shoulders "until it becomes impossible for them to resume
their natural position, while from the twist of the neck nothing
but
liquids can pass into the stomach"; or dwelling, chained for
life, at the foot of a tree; or measuring with their bodies, like
caterpillars, the breadth of vast empires; or standing on one leg
on
the tops of pillars—even these forms of conscious penance are
hardly more incredible and astonishing than the scenes which I
daily
witness. The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison
with those which my neighbors have undertaken; for they were only
twelve, and had an end; but I could never see that these men slew
or
captured any monster or finished any labor. They have no friend
Iolaus to burn with a hot iron the root of the hydra's head, but as
soon as one head is crushed, two spring up.I
see young men, my townsmen, whose misfortune it is to have
inherited
farms, houses, barns, cattle, and farming tools; for these are more
easily acquired than got rid of. Better if they had been born in
the
open pasture and suckled by a wolf, that they might have seen with
clearer eyes what field they were called to labor in. Who made them
serfs of the soil? Why should they eat their sixty acres, when man
is
condemned to eat only his peck of dirt? Why should they begin
digging
their graves as soon as they are born? They have got to live a
man's
life, pushing all these things before them, and get on as well as
they can. How many a poor immortal soul have I met well-nigh
crushed
and smothered under its load, creeping down the road of life,
pushing
before it a barn seventy-five feet by forty, its Augean stables
never
cleansed, and one hundred acres of land, tillage, mowing, pasture,
and woodlot! The portionless, who struggle with no such unnecessary
inherited encumbrances, find it labor enough to subdue and
cultivate
a few cubic feet of flesh.
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!
Lesen Sie weiter in der vollständigen Ausgabe!