A Thousand-Mile Walk 



On no subject are our ideas more warped and 

 pitiable than on death. Instead of the sym 

 pathy, the friendly union, of life and death so 

 apparent in Nature, we are taught that death 

 is an accident, a deplorable punishment for 

 the oldest sin, the arch-enemy of life, etc. 

 Town children, especially, are steeped in this 

 death orthodoxy, for the natural beauties of 

 death are seldom seen or taught in towns. 



Of death among our own species, to say 

 nothing of the thousand styles and modes of 

 murder, our best memories, even among happy 

 deaths, yield groans and tears, mingled with 

 morbid exultation; burial companies, black in 

 cloth and countenance; and, last of all, a black 

 box burial in an ill-omened place, haunted by 

 imaginary glooms and ghosts of every degree. 

 Thus death becomes fearful, and the most 

 notable and incredible thing heard around a 

 death-bed is, &quot;I fear not to die. 5 



But let children walk with Nature, let them 

 see the beautiful blendings and communions of 

 death and life, their joyous inseparable unity, 

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