HENRY D. THOREAU 9 



lived as tenderly and daintily as one would pluck 

 a flower," and actually and seriously aims to live 

 his life so, is not a man to engineer for all America. 

 If you want a columbiad you must have tons and 

 tons of gross metal ; and if you want an engineer for 

 all America, leader and wielder of vast masses of 

 men, you must have a certain breadth and coarse- 

 ness of fibre in your hero : but if you want a trench- 

 ant blade like Thoreau, you must leave the pot- 

 metal out and look for something bluer and finer. 



Thoreau makes a frank confession upon this very 

 point in his journal, written when he was but 

 twenty-five. "I must confess I have felt mean 

 enough when asked how I was to act on society, 

 what errand I had to mankind. Undoubtedly I 

 did not feel mean without a reason, and yet my 

 loitering is not without a defense. I would fain 

 communicate the wealth of my life to men, would 

 really give them what is most precious in my gift. 

 I would secrete pearls with the shellfish, and lay 

 up honey with the bees for them. I will sift the 

 sunbeams for the public good. I know no riches I 

 would keep back." And his subsequent life made 

 good these words. He gave the world the strong- 

 est and bravest there was in him, the pearls of his 

 life, — not a fat oyster, not a reputation unctuous 

 with benevolence and easy good-will, but a character 

 crisp and pearl-like, full of hard, severe words and 

 stimulating taunts and demands. Thoreau was an 

 extreme product, an extreme type of mind and char- 

 acter, and was naturally more or less isolated from 



