|
I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only
the essential facts of life, and see if if could not learn what it had
to teach and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.
I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I
wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted
to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily
and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a
broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce
it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get
the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the
world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to
give a true account of it in my next excursion. For most men, it appears
to me, are in a strange uncertainty about it, whether it is of the devil
or of God, and have somewhat hastily concluded that it is the chief end
of man here to "glorify God and enjoy him forever."
--
Henry David Thoreau, WALDEN
|
|
