THE HESPERIAN STUDENT.
K
he ghtdmts' gcrap ooh,
YE EDITOR.
HyG. V. Onorrs,
Who tolls cnch day from ropy morn
Till sunset hues the hills adorn,
And seeks his couch weary and worn?
Yo editor.
Who fishes Items ono by one
From every babbling mother's eon,
And maketh now and then n pun?
Yo editor.
Who wakes tbo world up with a whnck
And puts a backbone In its back
And sends it rolling on ite track!
Ye editor.
Who is It that must ovor mix
In science, creeds, and politics,
And bring to light all ports ol tricks ?
Yo editor.
Who Is it that must ovor please?
When others snuff who thon must sneeze,
And trim his pail to every breeze?
Yo editor
Who is it somotlmcB is abused
And sees that naughty word "refused,"
And o'en of lying is accused?
Yo editor.
Who could wo never do without
Along this dreary earthly route
Where wo all need a guide and scout?
Yo editor.
Who ought wo thon to patronlzo
And whoso bravo work most highly prize
And firmly eland by till bodies?
Yo editor.
HENRY DAVID THOREAU.
A simple and independent mind does not toil at the
bidding of any prince. Genius is not tetnincr to any em
peror, and thoughts form a mind, than which in its inde
pendence and simplicity, the age has scarce produced a
greater. To ho rightly appreciated, Thoroau requires
more than a casual reading his character must bo studied
in his works. In such marked contrasts arc his ideas of
life to those of most men, Hint ho cannot fail to interest.
"I am wont to think," he says, "that men are not so much
the keepers of herds jib herds are ihe keepers of men, tho
former are so much freer. The sight of tho farmer toil
ing early and late, day afler day, prompls tho question,
does tho man own tho farm or the farm own tho man.
Tho advance of civilization, ho contends, has not severed
its true purpose. It has mado the formula of living more
complicated than tho restilt. Men have become tho tools
of their tools. The man who independently plucked tho
fruits when ho was hungry is become a farmer, and he
who Btood under a treo for shelter, a house-keeper. Tho
native independence nnd untrammelled simplicity, which
lie admires in tho savage is lost in tho man on whom civ
ilization hag placed its shackles, and "tho fall" as he
styles it, "from Ihe faimer to the operative is as great and
memorable as Ihe fall from the man to tho farmer." Our
appetite for news is but an unworthy taste for gossip If
you havo read of ono railroad disaster, one steamboat ex
plosion, one man robbed and murdered, you need novor
read of another. If you are acquainted with tho principle
what do you care for a thousand instances and applica
tion ? As for England, almost tlto last significant scrap of
news from that quarter was the revolution of 1040.
Of America's thinkers and writers Henry David Tlio
cau is perhaps (lie most intensely original. Born in
Concord, Massachusetts, July 1817, he was tho last male
descendant of a Froncli ancestor who came from the Isle
of Guernsey. Ilia character also bore the stamp of a
strong Saxon element. Graduating from Harvard at the
age of twenty he disappointed the expectations of iiis
friend in that while his classmates were turning their en.
orgies to law. medicine aud theology, ho alouo remained
unsettled. Look in what direction he would, the profess
ions seemed narrow. Their limitations were as fetters
to his restless ambition for knowledge. For a time ho
aided his father in the manufacture of poncils, determined
to make a better than was thon in uso in this couutry.
At length, having produced ono which was pronounced
equal to the London made, he was besot with tho congrat
ulations of friends, assuring him that an easy road to
fortune thus lay open. He merely unswored, "Why
should I do over again wmt I have done once?" His
rare skill in mathematics and his love for the fields next
led him into the occupation ol surveyor, though no labor
was ever pursued except as a means. To him tho highest
art of living, and the great problem towards whose solu
tion he bent every energy, was to settle all his practice
on an ideal foundation. To this end the study of nature
became his chief and especial delight; tor Nature is idoal
in all her operations. Never has alio of her own accord
formed an imperfect leaf. Has the rosoa blighted lioart?
There was a "worm in the bud." Wo talk of tho
"freaks" of nature only because tho deforming causes arc
hidden from our eyes. Art has copied but never equalled
her ideality. Inquisitive scienco, not content with min
ing for her secrets, has attempted to ttlflo with hor purity.
It has poured dyesupon theroolsofher peonies and chang
ed their colors. It has gone to tho wild luxuriance of hor
fields, plucked her modest daisies and placing tholr storas
in aniline ink, brought Ihe blush of shame to thoir
cheeks. Loving nature so well, Thoreau ontertaiiioii a
sincore jealousy of cities and tho sad havoc their artifices
made with her children. Tho nxe was always being laid
at tho root of tho forest,' "Thank God" ho cried, "They
cannot cut down the clouds."
That his communings wllh nature might have tho
charm ol solitude, he would fain dwell wllh her apart
Accordingly in tho spring of 1845, ho became a hermit
Ho erected a hut with his own bauds on tho shores of
Waldon pond near Concord, a placo henceforth over in-'
foresting to Amorican readers. In speaking of this stop
ho says, "I went to the woods because 1 wanted to live
deliberately to front only tho essential facts of life, and
seo if I could not learn what it hnd to teach, and not when
I came to nio discovor that I had not lived. I wautcd to
live so sturdily aud Spartan-llko us to put to rout all that
was not life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest
terms, and if it proved to be moan, why thon to get tho
whole nnd ponuino meanness of it, and to publish its
meanness to tho world or if it wore sublime, to know it
by oxperlenco." Hero wo may follow him in his soli-
